New Beginnings. New Book!
It has been 1 year and 1 day since my husband passed away from a long battle with cancer. It has taken all of this year to address essentials, finances, learning to live without putting the ‘other’ first in my life and learning how to re-create time and space for me, identifying who I am without a partner and best friend. My other best friend, my Mom, has been a tremendous help, jollying me out of blue funks and reminding me to ‘remember when’ for all the good times the three of us shared.
Even when you are expecting it, when your life turns upside down, it still takes time to find your feet again. And forget creative energy for stories or art…the well is empty…or maybe just too full of ‘stuff and memories’. It takes time to empty oneself of all the internal dialogue of ‘we’, and start making space for the ‘me and I’, for inviting spirit, joy and peace back into your life.
With the long-awaited estate-garage sale over, the studio almost empty and awaiting a good scrubbing down and re-organizing, 2017 feels like new beginnings. Stones of Fire, The Spidy Chronicles, Book 3, which has been languishing on the back burner for this past year, suddenly up and finished itself, no worries. I’m happy with the characters, the story and the ending, and look forward to finishing another trilogy, The Entity Chronicles. I’ve taken up sketching again, readying to move on to oil painting and art in all aspects, with creative ideas and projects flowing through my heart, and found a new home of comfort and support in my faith community.
The migration of sand hill cranes and hummingbirds are a scant 3-5 weeks away and hints of new life are pushing through the ground all around me. Blessings on my partner and friend, all those in my physical, spiritual and art/writing family who have supported me, and blessings on the new days ahead, may they be filled with laughter, grace and the joy of living.
“You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting –
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.”
― Mary Oliver
https://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/23988.Mary_Oliver
Be well, Cooper Hill
