Four Weddings, a funeral, and a summer....

May seems so long ago. I suppose that is the mark of a good summer, that it was long and full. It started with graduation, happy parents, good food, and delirious seniors. Yes, I got pranked.

Then summer took a bit of a turn as we said goodbye to my aunt Martha. When our loved ones pass on, we can't figure out how to be. How does the day start again without her? I think I needed the whole summer to figure that out and I'm still kinda struggling, but the days have continued, and the sun has risen many times since. This summer was a good time to be around my family and remember her.

I traveled to the Oregon coast and the high desert of New Mexico. I went boating with my family and took care of my friends' dogs.




And there were books, boats, babes, beads and birdies (okay, not a birdie, but definitely par).





And there were the weddings. I called myself "the wedding bitch". If you have a wedding detail needs doin', I will get her done. Yes, it was very "27 Dresses" of me. I fetched things, I set up chairs and centerpieces. I carted sushi and wax stamped about a billion placecards. Shoot, at one wedding, all I had to do was show up, that was really fun. I loved being able to participate in all the details and processes of each special day, and the actual weddings were really really beautiful. Joy, peace, beauty and love were the winners in every single wedding I attended, but FYI, payback is coming, ya'll.




But the best part of summer was the big sky. Everywhere I went, the sky seemed to change and transform itself. I felt it's vastness and it's warmth, and it challenged me to stop and be. Yeah, I always have a summer "to-do" list, and for the most part, it got done, but that's beside the point. It was my summer to recharge, to meditate, and to remember. This is a moment, it will pass as soon as it will come, and sometimes that is a relief, and sometimes that is a heartbreak, but the important thing is to be IN it.

Leaps of Faith

One of my former students started a blog, and her first post was about skydiving. I thought she was being metaphorical, because you know, going to college is kinda scary, a big leap of faith and what have you. No, she meant actually jumping out of an airplane with a cute tandem guide named Bobby and a parachute strapped to her back. I'm always in awe of people who do crazy stuff. I'm not really like that; I'm a "ground" kind of person. But as I watched Lyndsay and her sister Lauren skydiving, I was thinking a lot about leaps of faith.


Lauren and Lyndsay, pre-jump

As we drove out to the landing strip in the back of a generously shaking trailer truck, the tandem skydiving guides and the skydiving "hobbyists" argued that it was no more a leap of faith than going into an elevator. These people are seasoned, jumping up to 10 times a day, and they know that everything works; the parachute is well-packed, there's always a backup chute opener, the guides know what they are doing, yadda yadda yadda. But I argue that stepping out of an airplane at 35,000 feet is not really routine. We HOPE that the parachute is well-packed, we HOPE that we don't have to use the backup opener, we HOPE that the guide is well-trained. We don't know.


Safe landing

I'm going to a wedding today, and I think again about leaps of faith. Getting married is scary to me. I am always in awe of two people who put rings on the other's finger and say, "I will be there for you, and I HOPE you'll be there for me". Fingers crossed, ya'll! I would be just as nervous jumping out of a plane as I would be about getting married. This may account for why I have not done either. But I wonder if I could go through a day without any leap of faith, big or small. The first day of school is ALWAYS a leap of faith. Eating expired yogurt is a leap of faith. Shoot, wearing a sleeveless dress to this wedding tonight will be a big frickin' leap of faith.

I guess my point is that ife isn't always about "ground", sometimes (especially if you want it to be really great) it is about soaring.