So before going to bed, I thought I will play with improvisational writing.
Non-editing, jamming on the keyboard, free flow of thoughts writing down whatever comes to my mind and see where I go! This is going to be fun!
And I suppose tonight is a good night to create a blog as any other night. This is my new blog. Completely brand new. Turning over a new leaf for 2012.
A new blog for a NEW me.
I'm in a new town, evolved to new places in my heart, feeling very differently from living in the city.
I love cities. Pedestrian cities. Yet a city with its arteries plugged with cars; much time is wasted sitting in a parking lot of traffic. No quality of life on a road to nowhere. I arrived to a point of being maxed out after years of this. A-ha moment.
I will confess. I am not the most patient person in the car. When I have a plan, I want to get there now. My husband will tell you that outright. I hold so much in my brain. Mike goes with the flow.
"Mike, I would turn here honey ..."
I do not do this with anyone but Mike.
After many years in Seattle driving and managing a large territory, I have routes rehearsed in my mind, well-oiled reels that keep turning. Brain circuits that do not rest. I was first inducted into this matrix when I learned to drive in London, England. I was younger, a sponge for daring adventures.
Survival of the fittest. You can see the deadpan expressions of other clenched-teethed drivers with glaring white knuckles. Cortisol and Adrenalin levels through the roof.
Living in a small town now, I continue to thaw from traffic intoxication. Every so often I catch myself, " I'd turn turn here honey ... " and I realize I've lapsed back to old patterns. And in that moment, I am more aware than I've ever been.
I am learning to sit back, breathe, and not be a queen bee of the road --or at worst, a backseat driver.
And the irony is, there is some odd satisfaction solving the puzzle of how I will conquer those unpredictable roads; determined to not let it beat me up. And yet it did beat me. Well worn & a noodle at the end of the day. Exhaustion from the exhaust fumes and rat race driving was a monotonous leak in my life.
Slowing down is a gift.
It's taken me about a year to decompress. I've given permission to let go, let the circuits of my brain, waddled up in a tangle of wires, finally begin to unravel.
Nature-deprived was I, longing for open skies, I have finally come home to the country. A unhurried rhythm is my new normal; a tango versus a mosh pit.
Springtime has found me as a plush (soft, velvety) lily.
Wide, open, luscious, nourishing spaces have invited me to trust more, to go with the flow more, to stay off the roads more.
I don't have to have it figured out.
I'm listening.
