Rivers Know This

"Rivers know this: there is no hurry. We shall get there someday."

-A.A. Milne, Winnie-the-Pooh

Just a quote that made me cry today.

xoxoxo

Summer

My friend Dani just had her second child, a lovely angel of a boy, and invited us to visit her on her little farm and meet the latest member of the family. I held him and my heart beat faster. I made sure his sweet head was supported, marveling at his newness, handling him with gentle care. It's something so special to meet a brand new soul. 

After homemade peach cake and Dani's birth story, my friend Neli told me she would watch Rafael so I would have a chance to traipse around the grounds with my camera, as I love to do. I have missed being out and about with my camera very much. Losing myself in the plants, finding little pieces of nature that feel as if they were arranged just so that I could take their picture. Mother Nature creates the most beautiful still-lifes. 

So while Raffi splashed and squealed with delight along with the other children, I trudged through the high grass, discovering hedges of wild roses, a fallen feather, a rusty wagon wheel among frothy meadowsweet, and thin wisps of vine curling delicately around fencing. 

Summer is burning hot here, and Raffi runs around naked most of the time, with fingers full of cracker crumbs and a mouth red with strawberry juice. He has no time for sitting down to eat. I place little bowls of cut melon, peaches, ice cream, or banana on the patio table and he makes little stops for munching before running off to the water again. Sometimes I manage to slow him down long enough for a sandwich. Half of which lands on the floor for the dogs. He is having so much fun these days.

Happy summer everyone!

xoxoxo

Rebuild

Another rainy day, and I'm taking a little bit of time to post while Rafael naps. I know my last posts have been gloomy, and I understand that some of you are worried. Something happened in my life that has made me question everything, and has blown my idea of what my every day existence means into pieces. It doesn't mean I'm broken. Just my illusion of what I believed my life to be. 

So now it's time to rebuild.

What is important to me? What do I need to include in my life, and what do I need to let go of? These are the questions I am asking myself right now. You know, while folding laundry and wiping yogurt off the floor. I can't get too philosophical while my little guy is awake. 

I hear him yawning, waking up, in the next room. So this post is coming to a close. 

I mainly wanted to say.....don't worry. 

I am very strong, and I am bent on being happy. So I will be, eventually.

In the meantime: thank you.

xoxoxo

sometimes

How much of your life is really your life? How much of it is made of compromises, or doing what's right for others, or for the 'good of the family'? Is what makes others happy that which makes you happy? And if it's not, how long do you go on being patient, living someone else's dream, supporting them on their path, until it's ok to say, "I'm going to live for me now"? How many sacrifices for a loved one is too much? If your life was a pie chart, how big would the piece be labeled 'Things I Do For Me'?

Isn't it funny how we go about doing what we can to make the other happy, and then we sometimes find out that it's not enough, or that they wanted something else all along?

Isn't it funny how for a long time you think of it as 'our life,' and then one day you ask yourself, 'isn't this actually MY life?' 

We build homes, and families, and tightly intertwine our lives. But how close can you ever really be? Even with all of the things which connect us......we sometimes, for deeply sad moments, realize that we are actually alone.

xoxoxo