I know a lot of people don’t like New Year’s resolutions and the like but as a planner and an organizer, I enjoy the whole process of a new beginning. Each new page on my daily planner is a wide open space and I look forward to that opportunity. Each new day, week, month, year presents to me a brand new canvas and I think that is exciting!

Last year meshed right into this year as we said our final goodbyes to my sweet mother-in-law. There was nothing warm, comforting, nor Hallmark card about it. The jagged edge of this parting makes it all the more difficult to wrap the whole thing up neatly and move on.

It seems like the last big chunk of years has been tethered to this or that, all the different and difficult phases of my PhD, particularly the dissertation; my mother-in-law’s life altering stroke and now her passing. Everything in my life has been wound and wrapped around these things. Now I should feel free but instead I feel rather precariously out on a ledge and very much without direction.

Remember that scene in The Shawshank Redemption where Andy crawls through the poop pipe? Freedom is on the other side but oh, the journey!!! I think I’m feeling a little like Red when he was released – Red was here too. A combination of Andy and Red. Okay, it’s certainly not that bad. But I do feel like I’ve crawled through the pipe and I’m still standing in all that mess. I’m at my heaviest weight ever, I’m completely out of shape, the stress and worry has taken its toll, and in many ways I feel like I’ve hit some place that very much has a rock bottom to it.

And still I rise – in the words that sound in my mind in the fabulous voice of Dr. Maya Angelou. I know it’s the end of the January but I’m ready for my New Year to begin. I may be a little behind but I’m here, I’m out of the pipe, and I’m ready to find myself again. And I’m ready to do that with music and movement. I think I’m finally ready for a ballet class.

All will be well. Who wants to dance with me?

Image from the Internet. Owner unknown.