almost

My 39th birthday is tomorrow.  The last year of a huge decade.  The last year of what feels like youth.  I'm entering my middle years.  And that's okay.

It's early morning and the children are still asleep.  In a few minutes I'll turn this off, wake them up and begin the full dance of the day.  The window is frosted over but the snow has melted.  The grass isn't green, nor is it white.  Sort of earth.  My eyes. 

I feel grounded like that end of winter grass.  Ready for light and vibrancy, content with quiet, slowly settling into what I am at this moment.

This birthday feels somehow private.  Extra personal.  I know I want to do something big when I turn forty.  A big trip to somewhere I've never been before.  Something out of my comfort zone, my safety net, my bank account.  I want to go big and break open that new vision that travel has always brought me.  I dream of it.

But for now, the new vision is here, this kitchen table, this grass, the ratty tatty old red, plastic swing that hangs from the Mountain Ash out back, probably too big now for my big boy.  I took a day away to celebrate myself with two of my partners in crime, one whose big day is the day after mine, my pisces sister.  We found ourselves back at the pass.  The sky opened and huge swathes of blue emerged from the white, the gray.  We pulled our bodies around the loop, flowed with grace and strength, big thoughts, racing mouths, mile after mile after mile.

To make the journey extra special, we extended, drove further away, found ourselves in the wild of hot springs, the enormous foot bridge one of my first memories of living in this then foreign land.  How could it be that this place even exists, I remember thinking.

 

 Barely a marker, barely a bend in the road and a mile in, these wild and perfect pools.  Our first shangri-la was not exactly as warm as we'd hoped and, naturally, there were sketchy old men in the best pool, eager for us to join them.  We found ourselves towards the back, more of a bath than a spa, but perfect in her humble glory.

I was extra dreamy that day.  My travel vision had exploded and I was ready to throw down some duckets, ready to create some weeklong adventure for myself somewhere tropical.  I had this vision of early morning coffee and long walks on the beach.  Reading and writing like mad, yoga in the afternoons, grounded and pure and doing the things that make me feel fully alive, my best self.

Missing my children did not come into this vision.  Needing them.  The vision was pure and real and will, indeed, happen.  But after a day with my girls, after nine uninterrupted hours of selfishness, of deep thoughts and goofy ramblings, of loud music and unexpected white outs, of muddy towels and spicy edamame dip, I felt my reset button unexpectedly hit on its own.  I was reset.  I was so ready to come home and kiss my husband, break into the room of the almost sleeping babies, see their massive smiles and sleepy, "Mommy!" mumbles, kiss their wild curls, touch their soft skin.  I remembered how tiny they still are.  I remembered how much of my grounded feeling, my best self, comes from them.  My solo tropical adventure will happen.  But it no longer felt dire.  It was a piece of my giant puzzle.  My puzzle, each piece feeling more precious and more clear, more precise and more perfect with each year.