Yesterday I experienced the worst pain of my whole life. It was worse than labor. From what I've heard and observed, it was most probably one step below kidney stones . . . and maybe a lance in the foot from a stingray . . .but it was definitely the worst pain that I have ever personally experienced.

I had just completed a thirty minute workout on my nifty, new deluxe edition Nordic Track elliptIcal, taking it slow and dutifully stretching every five to ten minutes, and was getting into the shower. I was leaning over to take off my sock when my head exploded with pain. Except that it wasn't my head that hurt; it was something in the right part of my lower back, that wouldn't allow me to stand back up without waves of fresh pain explosions. I though it prudent to just stay there like that for a minute staring at the Hanes logo on my sock and assessing the situation. I knew I needed help, but realistically there are some things you must do for yourself. Like standing up. I needed to get up. And I needed a shower. And since I was almost there, except for one sock, I decided to just sideshuffle in and see what might happen. But not without calling for backup . . . just in case. My phone was sitting on the bathroom counter within arm's reach. I texted my sister in law, who works with my husband. Then I texted my husband (I have no idea why the order except that maybe somewhere deep in my primordial psyche I know that women understand the urgency of some things better than men). Then I called my chiropractor's office (mercifully, his wife answered -- that primordial thing again) and let them know I was coming. And I made myself a promise that I would be showered and dressed if it killed me. I can tell you that at various points throughout the day, I really wished it had.

Somewhere between the shower and the bedroom where I finally made it to get dressed (my husband arrived just in time to help with socks and shoes), I discovered that standing was not my biggest problem. Standing, once I made it there, was actually the best place to be. I could even hobble along pretty well as it was mostly the right side of my body and down through my right leg that was making me scream every time I tried to sit down or stand back up again. Not being able to sit, getting to the doctor was a dilemma, beginning with actually getting into my husband's mini SUV which we chose on the basis that getting up might be easier than getting down into my own car. idk. We had never done this before. It would have pretty much been hell either way. I screamed getting in. I screamed getting out. But I think I managed to walk into the office behaving pretty normally. Maybe too normally.

Now before I tell you how things progressed in that office, let me tell you a little about chiropractors and chiropractic care first, and specifically about my current chiropractor. I discovered chiro years ago when I was running a lot and experiencing a lot of back pain. . I once limped into a chiropractor's office one day specifically for the pain in my lower back and walked back out without the slightest bit of pain in my back or my knee. He noted my limp and then looked at it as a personal challenge. "I fix knees, too," he said with a gleam in his eye. He had taken a little hammery thing and tapped on my knee just like on the Flintstones, and instantly fixed it. I was impressed. Different day. Different chiropractor. I walked in for a regular adjustment with a headcold. This one poked and prodded 'round my head and temples and when I got up off the table, I could breathe through my nose again. The chiropractic philosophy is that that the central nervous system can be manipulated naturally to fix almost anything. They can teach you to live holistically to attain overall better health. And that has been my experience with them. Due to some changes in insurance, I got shuffled around a few times and finally ended up in Jeremiah Shaft's office. I couldn't be happier. He and his wife are some of the smartest people I know. When my youngest daughter came back from Africa and we had a concern about parasites, and wanted to avoid chemicals, I called him on a whim. Diatomaceous Earth. He didn't skip a beat. When I couldn't sleep due to perimenopausal symptoms (yeah, it's out there), they had a natural remedy behind the counter. I sleep now. When my daughter called to tell me that my grandson had had so many ear infections that his pediatrician said he needed surgery for tubes, I thought that was too invasive. I called him. Pediatric Chiropractor, he said. No ear infections since the consultation. The PC was able to determine on Levi's first visit, through listening to a little history, that he was allergic to milk that was causing excessive mucus production and the ear infections. I am one hundred percent all in when it comes to chiropractic care, tried and true. I'm saying all of this to say first, that by no stretch of the imagination do I attribute the hell of the rest of my day to chiropractic care. I knew that the first step in healing my back was an adjustment. something had come out of whack and needed to be realigned. It's instinctive anymore. Secondly, I needed to explain this because I've internalized these philosophies so well, and I am so disgusted with conventional medicine that I refuse to take drugs. I never need them. Well, almost never . . .

When I walked into Dr. Shaft's office, there was a full waiting room. I never sat down, but I tried to act casual. So I was probably a little too casual about explaining the extent of my pain, as well. He came out of a consult with a patient and asked me what happened. Well. . . I did my elliptical . . . and I was just taking off my sock. He looked a little confused. I didn't press it. I had no problem just jumping on the table, as usual (I didn't really have to jump as there is nifty little table that takes you standing from the floor to parallel). He adjusted me, as usual, asked a few more questions about the injury, and then straightened the table for me to step off. This is when I perceived that my problems were only just beginning. Up to that point, I had managed moving forward, but when i took step back, my brain screamed again. I think it was just my brain. I thought it was just my brain. It was alternately screaming, while it was telling me to shut up. . . and don't embarrass yourself . . . and there are people here . . . He did a few more things after the initial adjustment, all the normal things he usually does. . . that all involved sitting. . . and standing. I wanted to be cooperative . . . and I swear I didn't scream, except that I did scream. . . because later when I told my husband that I almost said the F word, but I managed to bite my lip right before it came flying out, he said, "Well, that's good, because everybody could hear you." "Hear me what?" I asked. Screaming. And it makes sense because at some point I remember the doctor looking very confused and asking me "Now what did you do again?" I was just taking off my sock . . . Really. . . On my way out the door in a blurry haze, I heard him tell me to ice and stretch . . . because that's how chiropractors roll . . . All natural . . .

It took me fifteen minutes to get into the car, and fifteen minutes to get out once we got back home. The only thing that could finally make me get into the car were the patients that kept coming out of the office and asking me if I was okay. Did it look like I was okay? I was standing outside the SUV attempting to get in, and since that involved lifting my legs that were attached to my back, it involved excruciating pain and a lot more screaming. I heard it that time. I gritted my teeth and demanded my husband get me out of there. "I'm trying!" he said, "But you have to get in!" It was going to have to be like ripping off a band-aid. I braced myself, launched with both feet, and dived into the car headfirst, screaming like a hellion. One foot was left dangling outside the car. My husband tossed it in and slammed the door. He had reclined the seat for me and on the way home, I settled into a position that afforded relatively little pain. I lay there in shock and temporary relief for the ten minute ride and then it was time to get out again. Seriously? I tried. And I tried. And I moaned and screamed and shouted like I was on fire. And it really felt like my back was every time I tried to sit up. Stephen tried pulling my arms from the front. More yelling. He suggested trying the push the seat up from the back. I told him, no, forget it. I'll just stay in here for a while. I was beginning to feel sorry for myself. He said, well . . . let me get you some water . . . I'll get you your phone . . . are you warm enough? He was serious. I might have been when I said it. It had seemed like a good idea as opposed to ever moving again. He seemed to think it was a great idea. I think he was tired of the yelling. I did the band-aid thing again. I took a deep breath and launched myself up and out of the car. Using the top of the car door for leverage, I went flying through the air, hollering the whole way, and landed a perfect ten on the grass five feet away. I was out. I just needed to make it to the couch.

Stephen had to go back to work, but he made sure I was as comfortable as I could be on the couch, lying flat on my back. He took off my shoes. He brought me a pillow and a bottle of water. I conceded to taking some ibuprofen. I hated it, but my back was begging me. I pictured it eating away at the lining of my stomach and bleeding out right there on the couch, but dead couldn't hurt as bad as this pain. He handed me the remote and my phone and covered me with a blanket. I could barely turn my head head to see the tv because it was attached to my neck which was attached to my back and that hurt. So I just listened. I couldn't move half an inch to the left or the right. I just lay there listening to the tv and checking my blog stats. Thirty minutes later, I had knocked over the water (I watched it roll across the floor and hoped I didn't get thirsty) and dropped the remote on the floor. I began to get texts from people to whom I mournfully conveyed my dilemma. They asked questions like what kind of painkillers did I have? And was there a muscle relaxer included? I ignored them and waited for the ibuprofen to kick in. I was lying on the ice pack that Stephen had stuffed under my left hip before fleeing, and I was beginning to get chilled. The dogs began to whine. And then . . . the worst thing that could possibly happen. . . I had to pee. I tried to ignore it. I played games on my phone. I listened to music. I complained to more people. I had to pee. Nobody had a solution for that. You can't dive or launch yourself from a flat on your back position. I tried the slow roll tactic. It took me five minutes to get to my feet and I didn't even try to hold back the noise. There may have been some swearing. The dogs stopped whining to stare wide-eyed. This happened twice more before 9:30pm when it occurred to me that the ibuprofen wasn't helping (I had taken 6 more by then), and I finally decided to heed the advice of my friends and my brother and my sister in law who were all urging me to find an ER. I googled the nearest Urgent Care and did the slow roll again. I wanted serious drugs.

More launching and diving and screaming finally downgraded to a low moaning found me driving through the dark down Ford Road looking for the Urgent Care, trying to get there before they closed. I had glimpsed the crossroads and the hours (they closed at 10:00pm) from my back before I left the house, but had forgotten to bring my cell phone. It may have been the pain. I traversed the entire length of the road once, and then in a haze of pain, pulled into a parking lot to gather myself. The thought of having to look for something else when I was so close was more than I could bear. I sat there willing myself to breathe through the terrible ache. Then I did something I rarely ever do unless I am very, very frustrated . . . or maybe in terrible pain. I began to cry. And then I prayed, which I do a lot. I took a deep breath, got my resolve, and pulled out of the parking lot. I immediately spotted the building right down the road and made the calculated decision to keep right on crying. I reasoned that crying women certainly get drugs faster than dry-eyed women. I was beyond shame.

I hobble hurried through the door at 9:50. The doctor took one look at me and busted out the pain shot. Then he wrote me a prescription for pain pills and muscle relaxers. I'll always love him. Ten minutes later I was in the home stretch at the CVS pharmacy counter where I leaned over and gave the pharmacist my best Clint Eastwood gaze and asked through gritted teeth "How quickly can you get that filled?" Thirty minutes later I had managed to climb up into my own bed and was drifting of to la-la land . . . giving just a little more grace to my astronomical insurance premium. . . and drugs.

By the way, I feel great today, as long as I don't sit down or, once there, try to get back up. I've written this entire blog standing at my kitchen counter. My elliptical sits in the corner taunting me. I'll hang up my shoes, though, at least until tomorrow.

"If we want to make a fire, we have to focus all the sun's rays on one spot . . . And there comes a moment when we need to focus that inner fire . . . and when intuition failed them, they resorted to discipline." Paulo Coelho

It's been eight weeks today since I stepped out of my red heels and into an earthy pair of Deerfoams, traded my Revlon Lipstay for Carmax, and christened my youngest daughter Queen of the Commute with my gold-starred Starbucks travel mug.  Quitting my job to write full time at home means that dressing up for me anymore is putting on a pair of jeans to go out, which actually feels like a pretty big event in and of itself.  Most days I just wear yoga pants and a CuddliDud shirt. Honestly, it's 4:43pm right now and I'm not even dressed yet. My favorite yoga pants and CuddliDud shirt are spinning in the dryer and I'd much prefer to wait for them as opposed to putting on something that isn't my favorite. In my defense, I showered today . . . after reading the April issue of Oprah cover to cover in the the hot tub. I'm counting it as research because the theme was change . . . and I needed to know more about that.  I could just go straight to pajamas, but I've GOT to go out for a bridal shower gift. At this point, I'm strongly leaning towards an on-line purchase -- you know, where you buy the gift and  give a card at the shower announcing the gift, and then it gets delivered directly to her house.  I don't suppose you can Skype into these events (?) . . .  I'm not really going to do either of those things, but it feels good to have some choices.  

Earlier this week, a friend asked me if I felt free.  I told her I would let her know in my next blog.  it's not as if I couldn't have committed to an answer right at that moment -- I was standing sockfoot and nap-fresh in my kitchen trolling Pinterest for new dinner recipes on my IPad, and carrying on three text conversations on my IPhone with the thrombots of Tom Petty's Freefalling beating a rhythm in the background of my brain -- but it's complicated. I work every bit as hard now as when I was dodging kids in hallways and collaborating instructional practices just quick enough to stay ahead of the next state mandate.  And I probably get even less sleep (even factoring in the naps). I'm a list maker, and most days my lists take over and sprouts buds.  And to be honest (again) not much of the feverish activity that they've dictated in the last eight weeks has had much to do with actually writing a book. 

So what am I doing here?  

It turns out that quitting a job to stay home and work is actually hard work in and of itself. There's a transition period. Ask any woman who works 50+ hours per week outside the home, and she'll tell you that some things just don't get done.  I spent the entire first month of my defection undoing thirteen years of just don't get done.  I started from one end of the house and bulldozed my way through to the other end deep cleaning, organizing, redesigning, redecorating, replacing, repairing, and trying to remember where all these things had come from. And why we still had them. And why we ever had them in the first place. And why someone hadn't taken them with them when they left. One day -- about the third week in -- I walked past a pushbutton phone still hanging in the kitchen. Logistically speaking, it had to have been the 75,000th time I passed it in the ten years since we've had a landline. How was I just now seeing it? And then there were the shadow boxes and Victorian curtains in the dining room that were ever so popular in the 90s. And the games and the puzzles and the crafts and the office supplies all stuffed indiscriminately into cupboards and cabinets. I'm a big fan of candles and candle paraphernalia (toppers, votives, snuffers, matches), and apparently I decided subconsciously at some point to devote five separate drawers in strategic places to this endeavor and fill them all just a quarter of the way full. Maybe I thought if somebody found one stash . . . 

Some time in that first month I also spent a week shopping for a new healthcare policy (the old one went with the paycheck and I can't even talk about that experience yet), and I attended a one day social media seminar that was a catalyst for this past month's objective: building a website and blog to showcase my writing.  In addition to Facebook, which I mastered a long time ago, I've learned to navigate my way through Twitter (I still don't get it), Pinterest (how did I live without this?!), and Instagram (meh) in order to direct traffic back to my site.  Now I'm a slave to statistics.  I am exploring and testing what works and why it works and when it works (did you know that Thursday afternoons at 1:00pm is an optimum time to post a new blog? And that Mondays have the slowest traffic?).  

Shopping has also filled my days.  I'm the proud owner of a new IMac desktop (I was only two days into the website thing when my husband stopped me from hurling my old Toshiba laptop out the window and gently guided me towards the Apple Store), a deluxe edition Nordic Track elliptical (there's a setting to wash my gym clothes when I'm finished with my workout), and a nifty new pair of air light Nike Fitsole running shoes.  I can't afford any of these things. I don't have a paycheck (and I'm using my savings to pay for a ridiculously expensive health care plan that we may never need.  Whoops!  Tangent.  Another blog.  Another day.  Maybe check my Politics Aside page next week;),  but I can't afford not to have them if I'm going to make a living by spending  8-10 hours a day behind a desk.

Which brings me back to The Middle of July.  My whole reason for jumping  ship from that noble institution of public education in the first place.  I have managed to work in some editing and researching and writing and perfecting over the past eight weeks.  I have not managed, in the words of Paulo Coelho, to focus all my sun's rays.  I have not accomplished pouring my whole heart into my writing yet, as opposed to the three chapters worth that I've managed to piece together over the past several years.  I'm not worried, though.  I've accomplished so much in life already, and I know my discipline will kick in when it counts the most.  In the words of a dear friend (I am not in short supply), everything that I've ever done up to this point has prepared me for this, and the last eight weeks are no accident, and no exception.  I needed to get my house in order.  My poor husband is just now catching on that it was only okay to leave his dishes in the living room when I didn't have time to bitch about it.  I know that he is just as anxious for me to retreat to my office in long stretches as I am to get there.

So the answer to your question, my dear friend, if you've read this far, is that I do feel free. To quote Toni Morrison (from Beloved), I get "to wake up at dawn and decide what to do with the day." It's an intoxicating kind of freedom,  borne of passion and idealism.  But it's about to get more real.  There are things that I must do, but I get to decide how to make those things happen.   I have worked long enough and hard enough that I have afforded myself some choices.  And right now, in my feverish madness to create, to accomplish, to channel what God has given me in a noble direction, I am free.  Free from people pleasing, free from convention, free from cultural and institutional timelines. Free from keeping up, measuring up, and shutting up.  It's the most that anybody could ever ask from God in a lifetime -- that, and  to be given so many words.  Thanks for asking.  
 

#wcw  Re-posting this  blog from two years ago in honor of the littlest remarkable woman in our family . . . Happy birthday, Mackenzie Leigh Baker . . . your extraordinary gets a little bigger every day. 

Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the number of moments that take our breath away. 
~ George Carlin

It was a random and quiet Michigan Sunday in July.  Mackenzie had just turned four.  And we found out just that morning that she would be running a marathon in Colorado.  Just. Turned. Four.  Never stop surprising is a trait she inherited.  Her momma's faithful photos began to roll in . . . Mackenzie squinting in the sun, standing under a sign that read Start Do Finish: Kids' Cup Mile. . . Mackenzie, white-blond pony-tailed, in a line of children who all stand head and shoulders above her.  She is grinning into the camera, undeterred, standing straight and proud with the number 16 pinned to her little white t-shirt. You can see her tiny fists are balled at her sides, determined, ready.  Mackenzie crossing the finish line; she is flushed and red, but her ocean eyes focus forward, fists pumping, legs extending in a full out run, looking about as serious as any four year old ever looked. Her momma is running by her side, looking down in delight at her mini-me.  Mackenzie in a family picture, suspended between her mommy and daddy, lifted up in their arms, her legs dangling off the ground.  Her daddy holds her sleeping newborn little brother in a sling across his chest.  She is still wearing her number 16.  She holds her head slightly to the side, beaming, chin up, pulling off humble, proud, and adored all at once.  And then the story begins to come in in bits and pieces. . . easily assembled. . . She asked to do it. . . She wanted to run like her momma. . . She never stopped running the whole mile, but she asked for a drink of water. . . And the she said: "Momma, see that girl and her mom up there. . . Here's what we're gonna do. . . we're gonna pass them. . . we're gonna beat them. . ." And that's what happened. 

My granddaughter. . . my hope.  I spent a lot of time in 2013 thinking about heritage.  Reading about it.  Studying it.  Pondering it in my own life.  Mackenzie comes from a long line of extraordinary. . . We are runners and writers, educators and builders, pioneers and technological geniuses.  We are leaders and creative, innovative thinkers, and seekers of a higher power because we recognize our limitations.  We are liars and nurturers of the human soul, and murderers of the body and the spirit.  We are missionaries and world travelers.  We are indiscriminate takers and we give til it hurts.  We look for our place in the world no matter how far the search.  Sometimes we come home and sometimes we don't.  We are passionate and prone to depression.  We break each others' hearts and we build eachother up.  We run from each other and we run to the light. We are an abyss of untapped potential that occasionally bubbles to the surface and is worthy of the page. We are survivors,  and sometimes we die trying, screaming look at me from pages and pictures, from mountaintops, and from the deepest places in our soul that have been consumed by anger and hurt and injustice and life that just keeps coming.  We immerse ourselves in our God-given destiny to find our extraordinary and give it back to the world.  We are never failures.  But we fail and succeed by varying degrees. 

When I look into the face of my Mackenzie, I see our extraordinary.  At four years old, she seems to have the jump on it. You can see it in the intensity of her eyes, hanging there in the center of her family, lifted up in love.  Her journey in life has just begun.  But already she exhibits qualities and characteristics of success that some adults never achieve.  She knows what she wants. She shows up.  She takes risks.  She is courageous.  She is not intimidated by bigger people.  She doesn't have to win everything . . . just something. She doesn't give up because it hurts.  She pays attention.  She understands delayed gratification, and that finishing counts.  She accepts the glory of a moment and lets herself be loved.  She is my hope and the very existence of her and the possibility of her, and all of us through her, takes my breath away.

March is reading month across America!  Join in the celebration of  literacy by sending a photograph of your beautiful baby reading (1- 10 years old)!  E-mail a picture to alda23@aol.com, and I'll post  it to the Book Bytes Baby Readers' Gallery on my Book Bytes for Kids page.  Be sure to include the child's full name, city, and state.  My goal is to represent baby readers across America!  Happy reading!  

Aerin Leigh

Heritage, legacy, genetics . . . whatever you call it, or however you choose to look at it . . . is an important thing, and has always been profoundly important to me. I left out the most obvious word - family - because sometimes in this life, for various reasons, we choose to separate ourselves from the very foundation of who we are. It may be in our own best interests;  it's most assuredly always in spite of ourselves. But I've come to understand that sometimes the healthiest thing, sometimes the only thing you can do, is to hold onto the best part of a person, acknowledging and honoring their part in your story, while keeping a distance. You can love them or hate them, or remain indifferent, but you can't deny them. Because whether it's in something as benign as the arch of an eyebrow, the gait of a stride, a passion for color, a predilection for Cilantro or whether it's reflected in the very essence of who you are - an ear for music, an inclination for mechanics, or a gift for healing, you can't escape your DNA. So you might as well make friends with it.

The photograph at the top is of my great-grandmother and most of her siblings.  It was taken around 1900 in the Great Smoky Mountains of North Carolina. To the far right is my great-grandmother, Nora Mae Jones, presumably the only blonde in the bunch, if it's not a trick of the light. In the faces of her siblings, I see the deep-set, steady gaze and the square jaws of my uncles, my cousins, my brothers. The boy at the top left is a dead ringer for my father around that age. And I can almost imagine my own features, and my daughters' mirrored in the face of Nora Mae. She lived for ninety more years after this photograph was taken, til just a few months before her one hundredth birthday, still picking the banjo and chewing tobacco. She had a holy side -- I can still remember her pointing a bony finger at the tv and declaring it the root of all evil -- but she could swear like a sailor in a fit of rage if you made her angry. She outlived my great-grandfather, Charles Hendrickson Ditmore, by about twenty years.  

Charley's family was from the other side of the mountain, in Tennessee's Cade's Cove, said to be an enclave for Southern Abolition during the Civil War. The whole story of his grandparents during that time (my great-great-great grandparents) is as hazy and as cryptic as the photographs (below). But based on conjecture, it's interesting to imagine how their struggles as "rebels among rebels" must have been, fighting and living and dying and raising babies and losing babies in one of the most beautiful and holy places on Earth. It must have crushed their spirits and built their fortitude over and over again. Charley was born there, too. He died in 1967, the year I was born. I didn't know him, but I have a picture of him playing a fiddle and this newspaper article.  

Charley Ditmore shoots Pitt Rose 1923
Maryville Times, (Blount Co. TN) Monday, April 2, 1923:

“Killing Ends Old Grudge"---Pitt Rose was shot and killed by Charley Ditmore Saturday afternoon, one shot being in the neck and two in the back, the trouble occurring at Calderwood. Ditmore is now in jail, his preliminary trial having been set for Tuesday morning. He claims self defense. Esquires Jett and Brakebill will hear the case.  It is said that an old grudge has existed between the men for some time, it being claimed that Rose accused Ditmore of having reported a still. It is asserted that Rose had threatened Ditmore, saying he would have to pay for the still or suffer the results. Parties from Calderwood asserted that Rose stepped in front of Ditmore Saturday and told him the matter would have to be settled then, and Ditmore fired three shots into Rose, one entering his neck and two his back as he fell. It was stated three bottles of whisky were taken from Rose’s pockets.

It's hard to imagine that that sweet looking old man whose legacy to future generations was the gift of music was also a murderer and a coward.  But maybe that's neither accurate, nor fair. In order to really understand a person, you have to understand their culture and where they come from.  Temperance, or Prohibition was a hot button issue, particularly in eastern Tennessee during that time. In 1920, Tennessee enacted state Prohibition even before national Prohibition was enacted into law by the 18th Amendment. It was a moral issue, but one that conflicted with the economy in a mountainous region that could sustain little industry. "Stilling" and selling alcohol was the only means of cash money that many could come by.  Now I am not convinced that my great-grandfather was a teetotaler. Alcohol has been the catalyst for too many bad decisions throughout the history of my family. And I won't speculate about the validity or the absurdity of Pitt Rose's accusation. I don't know what that was all about. But what I can imagine is that my great-grandfather was not immune to the violent nature of a culture where the very livelihood of the people is being threatened. That he adopted a kill or be killed survivalist mentality. Which must have been the accepted standard of the day, because I never did hear that he spent any time in prison.  Still, it must have been awkward for my grandfather, nine years old by my calculations, to have to sit next to Pitt Rose's children in school after that . . . "Sorry my dad killed your dad. . . " More speculation, but realistically, it had to have had some lasting impact on him.  And it also begs the question of nature vs. nurture? What was in my great-grandfather's very nature that would allow him to do something so egregious? And at the end of the day, why was it Pitt Rose lying dead and not Charley? Is survival instinct something he passed on in his DNA, or just simply violence? I would assert that even in these more civil times, brawlers abound in my family. But we are also survivors. Sometimes sin is simply unacceptable; other times it's two sides of a coin. 

There are people whose DNA I share with whom I choose not to actively participate with in a family unit anymore, and who would have to have a real, authentic come to Jesus for me to ever consider reversing my decision. But I don't judge them, and I don't hate them. It doesn't even mean that I don't love them. It just means that I choose to protect and preserve the family that I created. It means that I choose to honor myself, and in doing that, I embrace all the parts of me that come from them, and leave it up to God to heal the unacceptable.  My husband and I err on the side of gun ownership, and in our circle of supporters, there is often debate about whether or not, in a situation where there was a very real threat to our lives, could we shoot to kill? I answer unequivocally, yes. DNA. Sometimes, in a fit of rage, I swear like a sailor and sometimes I drink too much. DNA. Sometimes I need a come to Jesus. DNA. I have been known to intimidate people unintentionally with an unflinching, steady gaze. DNA. I'm a quirky left hander. DNA. I have never stumbled upon any musical inclination, but somehow it showed up in my daughters, along with their father's chiseled Scandinavian bone structure, as well as his offbeat sense of humor (Kelsey) and his blonde gene (Brittany). DNA. I have a passion for language and for telling a story. I labor over the flow of the paragraph and the exact words. It keeps me awake at night. I don't know where this came from, but I know that some relative, near or distant, must share, or have shared, a hidden or dormant gene for written communication. And I delight in the fact that both of my daughters inherited it. DNA. I love unconditionally, and I forgive. . . . DNA . . . and a little bit of Jesus.  

From the Archives of Top Ten 2013 . . . 


Chicago Christmas Reunion

It probably started with a facebook post, followed by an instant message.  I don't remember exactly.  Just that I hadn't seen my brother in years, and the things that had driven us apart receded far into the background of the things - and the people - I wanted him to know.  My daughters, his nieces, whom he had once adored, had grown up. One had a little daughter that looked just like her.  The other would receive a surprise marriage proposal at Christmastime in his city, Chicago.  We were all going there, and would he like to meet us for dinner?  He did, and any awkwardness that I don't remember must have been lost in the banter and the glow of lights from the windows overlooking Michigan Avenue that illuminated our table and the adoring of the little girl in the Christmas red peacoat that starkly contrasted the blue in her eyes.  We ordered dinner from separate sides of the table amidst the various conversations of 10 plus people, and my brother and I were the only two that ordered alcoholic drinks.  He asked for Hendricks Gin, straight up, slightly dirty, with 3 - exactly 3 - bleu cheese stuffed olives.  I wanted a Long Beach on the rocks, top shelf, and NO orange juice, only cranberry juice. We were intent on our task and oblivious to the amusement of everyone who had paused in conversation long enough to witness our OCD tendencies (my husband filled me in later). When dinner came, the waitress put identical dinner plates in front of us, down to the garlic mashed potatoes and asparagus that accompanied our New York Strips.  That was hard to miss.  I don't know what all this said about us - it's a pretty safe bet that there followed a slightly tipsy conversation of psychoanalysis that bordered on collective Narcissism and bored everybody else - but it was certainly a testament to the DNA I had been missing.  Later, a photo marked the occasion - one that still takes my breath away.  My brother, my girls, and my granddaughter pose close together, happy and looking like they belong, in the holiday bedecked lobby of the hotel where we are staying.  I'm not in the photo, but there I am, somewhere in the matching cheekbones of my brother and my youngest daughter.  These are all my babies, my brother eight years younger than me.  It's not quite 2013, but it's a moment of hope come home that will carry me into the New Year. Complete.

Update -- Our family has grown since then . . . We are so blessed . . . 

Last spring, Stephen and I made the decision to get another puppy for pretty much the same reason that we decided to have a second child (27 years ago:). I remember we were halfway through the winter of 1987. I  was sitting cross legged on a pile of lego blocks that were digging into my thighs and looking over the top of a Fisher Price doll house at a two year old pixie blonde who was alternately entreating me in stanzas of I love you, you love me and saying things like "I'll be the mommy and you be the baby" and "Let's pretend . . ." and I thought I am not doing this one more winter . . .this girl needs a sister. Similarly, last year, long about the third month of virtual isolation in the longest and most brutal Michigan winter on record, I looked at my four year old Boxer, Merlot, rope toy hanging from his drooping jowls, imploring me with his big brown eyes to play some more tug of war and I thought this guy needs a sister. I am not entertaining him one more winter! And, indeed, I did not.

We found Riesling at an Amish farm on the edge of Ohio, and brought her home early last September, just in time for the Autumn chill. Just around that same time, my daughter in Colorado was deciding that she had taken on too much in the the dog she'd enthusiastically inherited from a friend several months earlier. She conveyed this to me on numerous occasions while she breathlessly chased the dog through the neighborhood or hurriedly swept the fur from the kitchen floor before the baby crawled through it again. So just about the time Riesling was in, Miya was out, and five year old Mackenzie was sad. Thus, Riesling became her dog (and her baby brother's) -- the one that stayed at Grandmommy and Poppa's -- and she is registered as Mackenzie's Amish Riesling.  

On the subject of grandchildren, they are the second reason that we decided to bring another Boxer home.  If you're not familiar with the breed, allow me to take an aside here and illustrate how truly remarkable these dogs are.  On the occasion of his first meeting with my grandson, I fell madly in love with Merlot all over again. Levi was about 8 months old when my daughter brought him to Michigan for a visit. She sat him down on the living room floor to play with some rubber cars and I was wary. The last time the babies had come to Michigan, Merlot had been a gamboling, oversized puppy under the misconception that Mackenzie was a fellow puppy creature, and in his attempts to play with her, he kept knocking into her and knocking her over. I had been impatient and cross with him. Levi had been a newborn and we never put him down around the dog. On this second occasion, Merlot had matured, although he still very much wanted to play (Boxers never outgrow puppy play). Levi sat with his cars all around him, and Merlot approached tentatively. I was ready to jump in, but held back to see what he would do. It was magical, almost ethereal, that boy and his dog moment that I witnessed. Merlot first sat down near him, an unmistakable curiosity for the boy, and yearning to share the cars, but with the calmest reserve I had witnessed from this typically quivering bundle of energy. He moved closer, wanting those cars, looking into the boy's eyes. He lay down, snout in paws, stars in his doggy eyes, but never touched a car, although his eyes continued to scan the array of them surrounding the baby on the floor. He moved closer, to Levi's obvious delight, who patted his snout with both hands and laughed. And then, Levi very deliberately and thoughtfully picked up a red car and and held it out. Merlot opened his mouth, and Levi's little hand disappeared out of sight for just the few seconds it took to place that car on Merlot's big, lolling tongue.  And they both laughed. I swear. It gets better. After they went home, we discovered that Levi had left one of his cars behind . . . the red one. We placed it on the book shelf in our living room to remember to send it back, and when Merlot discovered it, he wanted that car.  He wiggled his butt.  He pleaded with his eyes. He whined. Incessantly. Allow me to digress again and tell you that there are only two toys that Merlot has ever not destroyed, given the opportunity and a sufficient amount of time (Boxers are aggressive chewers). One was a little stuffed purple Barney dinosaur given to him by our friends Frank and Windy when he was a puppy, and the other is that little red car that my grandson shared with him, and that we finally relented to give him. If you've ever doubted it, dogs love. Boxers remember and they love deep and true. I'm not exactly sure if it was Frank or Windy that Merlot fell in love with, but Levi definitely has Merlot's heart, and they both have mine.  

On a final note, timing is everything with pets. And as Stephen and I experienced in our own attempt to raise dogs with babies, it can be extremely challenging (more on that later), so we fully supported Brittany's decision to return Miya . . . Imagine our surprise then, when she started showing up in the family photos again!  As it turns out, the family who originally owned her aren't able to spend enough time with her, so now they just "lend her out now and then". . . it works for everybody.  Levi is a boy with a part-time dog . . . And he loves to Skype with his buddies in Michigan. Life is good.  

I used to, like most people, love to sleep in late on a Saturday morning. After initially waking to my longstanding internal alarm, I would luxuriate for a minute, revel in the reprieve of the week's 5:00am wake up call, and go back to sleep. Saturday mornings were the one day a week that I could fulfill that fervent wish. Now Saturday mornings are the one day a week that I make myself go back to sleep. I made this a rule for myself. This morning. I was lying in bed at 5:00am lamenting the fact that I hadn't been able to successfully optimize my newly minted Pinterest page last night before finally giving up at 12:30 am. . . and then knocking out a few chapters of Wicked (Book Bytes for Grown-Ups pick for March) . . . and I suddenly got the brilliant idea that I should sleep sometimes. And that this type of behavior might just account for my 11:00 am office naps, where I surreptitiously lean to the right from my computer chair and fall into a heap on my couch (it's a small office, and really, who am I hiding from?), and bouts of narcolepsy throughout the day. I don't really think there's anything wrong with me that a little scheduling and self-discipline won't fix. I'm operating on true passion. And it's a good thing.

I used to have this same passion for education, and for teaching. I taught in an elementary classroom in inner city Detroit for six years before moving into a reading specialist position that stretched into the next seven. I loved teaching sixth graders. I loved that the range of budding adolescent brains afforded me the opportunity to delight them with a Shel Silverstein poem one minute and then shock them with a history lesson on the Holocaust in the next. I loved facilitating the buzz of literacy circles in the morning and being able to achieve the semi-somnolence required for independent reading and journaling on a snowy afternoon. I loved orchestrating the field trips that would add another little piece to their small world puzzles to evoke wonder and questions and a reach for something bigger. I loved lesson planning and coordinating bulletin boards with the changing of the seasons and the camaraderie of debriefing with my teaching partners when the work day was done.

What I did not love was the exhaustion. I recognized it early on from the first year, the first week, really, that I entered the classroom, and I knew, even then, that it could not be sustained. Because beyond the delight and wonder, the shock and awe, the moments of quiet achievement and the predictable rhythm of a school day, there is a world of dynamics and circumstances that will suck the very life out of the very best teachers -- especially the best teachers -- and especially in (but not limited to) the inner city. Weekends and holiday breaks and long summer vacations don't help. Please. Those are recovery periods.

What good teachers understand, and what just might be their undoing, is that children of poverty are loquacious. That they need opportunities to express themselves and to be heard, and that they need someone who can quiet them without breaking their spirit. That they recognize their own poverty and their own need (don't be fooled) early and they enter the school and the classroom with the expectation that they will be afforded a measure of fairness and stability that the street, and often home, does not offer. That they need constant praise and recognition in order to offset the injustices of their world and to thrive and grow. And good teachers give them all of these things, but not without the cost of the inherent exhaustion that comes with the giving, and eventually, their passion.

A day in the life of an inner city teacher (or otherwise) might go something like this (with variations according to grade levels):

• Teacher arrives early to get the jump on the day only to be intercepted by a parent demanding to know why their child arrived home with his coat unzipped (at best) or why their child is being bullied (which may or may not be valid, but requires more time than the teacher has for discussion).
• Teacher gets to his classroom with just a few minutes to spare only to find that the thirty pencils he purchased and carefully sharpened the previous evening have all been stolen from the pencil box (this is going to impede progress all day), and that glitter and pencil shavings, as well as Johnny's homework assignment that he ripped into a hundred little pieces are still covering the floor because the janitor went home early yesterday.
• Teacher can count on 1/3 of the class being up to an hour late (punctuality and attendance are often optional), so they plan accordingly with bellwork, busy work, and RtI (Response to Intervention) which often equates to catching up students who fall behind due to absences and tardies, and who might be absent, yet, again..
• Ten minutes of the math lesson is lost trying to coordinate an IEP for a student whose parents never showed up for the last one, and the entirety of the rest of the lesson is spent trying to compete with the noise and steady flow of "bathroom traffic" coming from the classroom next door who have a sub for the day . . . Meanwhile twelve of the thirty students learning New Math long division have colds and are going through the Kleenex like Piranha, and two adorably braided girls who were best friends yesterday suddenly can't sit together anymore to the point of violence because of an unfortunate Facebook altercation the evening before.
• After lunch, the hands-on science lesson/ experiment is interrupted by a fire drill that upsets an autistically challenged student so badly that he throws up on a classmate's head . . . at roughly the same moment, six students commence to shrieking because a bedbug with really bad timing is making his merry way across their table.
• Just before gym, which is teacher's prep time (and coveted 55 minutes of sanity), a student confides in her that he is not wearing any socks with his tennis shoes, and that his feet hurt and he is embarrassed to go to gym. She allows him to stay in the room with her and organize bookshelves while she enters grades into the computer. He talks the whole time, and she listens. Really listens. And never asks why he doesn't have on socks.
• At dismissal, Johnny suddenly remembers to hand teacher a note from his mother that demands to know why he never gets any homework, and while teacher is mulling over this, it comes to his attention that the two little braids are brawling on the playground. Teacher is second guessing her decision to just separate them during math over sacrificing more instructional time by alerting the school counselor when, after breaking up the fight, the mother of one little braid, who has been watching from her car in the parking lot, gets out to scream a juicy stream of obscenities at teacher for allowing the fight, at which point a parent in the car behind gets out to yell at teacher for allowing another parent to scream obscenities in the presence of children (this really happened - you can't make these things up).
• Teacher leaves late after an hour of tutoring and another of grading papers, but doesn't go home. . . she makes phone calls for the duration of her forty-five minute commute to plan the Christmas program and she stops at Wal-Mart to purchase pencils for the second time in a week, as well as a box of Kleenex, a pack of size 4-6 boys' athletic socks, Santa hats, and a bottle of wine.

Any good teacher who teaches just long enough (you'll notice I incorporated some gender equity here:) will experience all these things in one form or another. They do these things, and persevere in these things because they are passionate about what they do. They love their jobs and they love the children. And do you know what happens to them as a result of their heart and dedication and competence? They are rewarded with more students and more responsibility. Because they can handle it. Because they can be trusted with the students. Because when Ms. X down the hall fresh from college "didn't know it would be like this", or when Mr. Merriweather from the suburbs didn't understand what he was getting into, a good teacher is always on hand to take one more, or half a dozen, or a dozen when a class needs to be split up due to lack of teacher retention, or budgeting, or poor planning. A good teacher, in spite of all they have to offer, is sadly often reduced to a beast of burden when they would better serve as a paradigm.

Some of the above seems funny, and that's how I meant to present it -- partly for effect and partly because that's how teachers often remember it in the telling when they're debriefing at the end of the day, or days later, or months or years -- part of the camaraderie is in recognizing the heroes, and sometimes we laugh so we don't cry, when in the face of all this, we're told "we're not a good school", that what we did, what we endured, how hard we loved was not enough to make a difference in state scores that determine the bigger picture. Good teachers sometimes come from "bad schools" . . . sometimes the circumstances that render them such are beyond the control of a handful of faithful . . . Sometimes good teachers are only ever able to control their own little corner of the world and the beauty of that corner gets overlooked in the larger scheme of things . . . politics and egos and scapegoating and numbers . . . and if you are one in that handful, you know who you are, and if you haven't conceded yet to having done all that you can, take heart and don't give up. You're operating on your own timeline, and YOU will never be a failure, because you can always take your brilliance with you and shine somewhere else. You will only leave behind the dozens, maybe hundreds or thousands of children, who will carry your love and light forever no matter where you plant yourself to re-bloom.

When I entered the classroom thirteen years ago, I experienced these things, day after day, and year after year, and I set a five year goal for myself to move on before I burned out. At six and a half years, I came out of the classroom and stepped into a reading/ coaching position. I promised myself that I would never lose my connection to the classroom and my compassion for what a teacher's day is really like . . . that I would never forget or overlook the good ones . . . and that someday I would tell their story.

Sometimes I catch myself thinking that this passion that drives me was buried for far too long, that I sacrificed a part of myself and spent too many years spinning my wheels among the politics and the chaos and the numbers. But the truth is -- and I understand this to my very core even in my brief bouts of doubt and self-recrimination -- in stepping into another role, I got to experience another aspect of the educational system that would equip me to do just what I was always supposed to do . . . tell the story . . . the whole story. But that's another story for another day. . . I'm not quite there yet. For now, please, please hug a good teacher today . . . or the next time you run into one in the Wal-Mart. It won't be me.

Early this morning, I watched the sun come up and the moon go down.  I got up to let the dogs out, and stepped outside. As I stood in the quiet, assimilating the gentle flow of water and the low hum the hot tub filter, I noted the brilliance of the moon high in the western sky and the faint glow of the coming day outlining the trees in the east.  My brain was still dull from sleep as a lone duck, silhouetted in flight against the inky sky above, honked at me (I like to think) to help  make my decision.  I  always thought it would be nice to have the time to linger in the hot tub, watching the sun come up before beginning the workday.  Over the years, I've caught a few Saturday mornings, but sleeping off the long work week has always taken precedence over the sun's first rays.  And here was an opportunity to watch down the moon.  I made myself a cup of tea and sank down into the warmth to reflect as I watched the celestial transition. 

I wouldn't have been inclined to get out of bed just yet if it hadn't been for the 6:30 texts, one after another.  It's been a while since someone looked for me that early, and I didn't recognize the alert tone of my boss (former) until after the second one when my husband grumbled at me to turn off my sound. As a joke, I had given her a low, ominous text tone. It's not as funny at 6:30am.  It turns out she was only returning the favor, answering my text from late last night to wish her a happy birthday for today. And to be honest, I have been burdened for her and for Allen Academy (my former work place).  Since I left, I still receive a steady flow of phone calls and texts from former colleagues about the progress and the changes taking place in the school. And I know there was a board meeting last night that would determine the extent of these changes. In theory, these things shouldn't concern me anymore. My brain is constantly buzzing with the newness of a different world.  I am consumed by plans and possibilities daily and into the night.  I fall asleep and wake with words that need to fall somewhere, and with the burden of the task of connecting with people in those words.  The same intense energy that drives me now was the energy that drove me there, and it's difficult to let go of the hope.  I know this is where I belong.  But the heart has a difficult time moving on when it has invested so  much in a place and in the people there.  

The water bubbled around me as I reviewed the mental checklist of  tasks ahead in my day and I thought about Allen as I alternately focused on the magic of the fading moon and the pale light of the sun. And as brilliant as I knew the sun was, just below the horizon, I was mesmerized by the moon. It was in its waning phase, and with each passing minute, it was losing its luster, fading into the light of the morning, but I could hardly look away, thinking about one of the simplest lessons I'd ever taught my students - that the moon borrows its light from the sun. It might fade into the shadows, but  it's anchored by gravity into something true and right and steady.  It will always come back around to shine light into darkness, and the light it has shone already can never be taken back.  This is the way of the world.  But it's the light in the people, and not in the places that make it true.      

I waited until the moon had faded almost indiscernible into the blue and dipped into the bare branches of the trees before I looked back into the sun, now flaming over the house.  It had been a clear sky from the beginning, and there were no clouds for the light to play into color. No dazzling effects - just all business and intense brilliance.  And just before I made my way back into the house on the final notes of Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah, a single line of mallards flew noisily overhead, so low I thought I could touch them, into the rising sun.
This really happened. I would not cheapen a metaphor by fabricating or even embellishing;)

"I've seen your flag on the marble arch and love is not a victory march . . . It's a cold and it's a broken hallelujah." ~ Leonard Cohen

No two journeys are the same. But whether we come by them with a burning, desirous leap of faith, or they are thrust upon us so suddenly that we have to learn to breathe again, they belong to us, and they become part of our story. How do you want your story to end? When you can't control everything, what will you do with the something you can? Do you trust the source of light that has been in you since before you were born . . . and trust that you were chosen for it, and it for you? Will you own it? And what kind of decisions will you make at the in between places when the light seems to fade and you can't see your way forward? Because all of those things matter profoundly for each page and for every chapter, at the beginning and the end of each day . . . for every single morning that we get to decide all over again. How do you want your story to end? And where will you begin?

"Do not go gentle into that good night . . . rage, rage against the dying of the light."
                                                                                                               ~ Dylan Thomas

Today marks four weeks and four days since I purposely took a giant nosedive into the oblivion of unemployment to pursue a full time writing career, and this is the first official blog (other than those that I've appropriately re-posted to kick off my new web-site) that I've posted.  I had been reflecting carefully on a theme for my first blog that would mark this journey. As of Monday, it hadn't come to me yet when I sat down to begin my work day (yes, I really am working over here) and clicked on my AOL news feed to see the headline American Writer Hacked to Death on Busy Street. Now I realize that this is not funny in and of itself, but I couldn't pass up the opportunity to click a photo of this and attach it to a text message to my friend Jean that said My inspiration today to which she immediately quipped back without missing a beat Brave new world . . . and with that, my theme was realized. Jean's good like that. I can always count on her to get right to the heart of a matter, because the truth is, (and this probably won't come as a great surprise to any responsibly grounded adult, which is most of my peer group. . . well, maybe not anymore) this is the scariest thing I've ever done. 

And to be really honest, I never thought I'd do it.  From the very moment the idea took shape with certain clarity in my mind, and I knew what I was going to do, I didn't think I'd do it.  It was like there were two of me running around . . . one that knew what was good for me, and one that . . . well . . . knew what was good for me. For months, they argued. One of me would say, "Nobody just gives up a cute corner office with decent pay, excellent benefits, and an admirably growing 401K to pursue a dream," and the other one of me would say with calm resolve, "People do these kinds of things all the time . . . and nothing extraordinary that has ever been worth doing has been done without some courage."  And then I would look at the sign I'd hung on my office wall that said, "Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him." KJV. . . And I knew I was thinking too small, knew I needed a bigger imagination. I know that it was God and I'm fairly certain it was the correct me that won that argument. . . 

And the people. . . I can't -- I won't -- ever forget the people that, without exception, from the first moment I threw out this crazy idea, have supported me with stars in their eyes, even when my decision could have potential negative impact on them.  And the people whose inspiration, and even very presence in my life - often in serendipitous ways - led to my decision.  There was Jean (again) who gave me a Paulo Coelho journal for my birthday three years ago, and then when her work took her to Traverse City for the day, asked me to drive along.  So I spent the morning writing school improvement plan reports in a quaint little coffee shop in downtown Traverse, and then in the afternoon wandered down to a local bookstore.  There, on a shelf, just inside the door,  Manuscripts Found in Accra by Paulo Coelho was displayed. I had never heard of Paulo Coelho before the journal, never would have picked it up . . . In addition to the front jacket flap referencing a historical event that happened on July 15th, 1099 (this is why I bought it), on page 67, there is passage that exhorts, "If we want to make a fire, we have to focus all the sun's rays in one spot. . . "  That passage sparked the flame of now.  . . And then there's my friend Rebekah. . . I literally listened to her teach (and teach beautifully) second grade  for years. Her classroom was just down the half flight of stairs outside my office, and for years she would pop in on her preps and we would talk about teaching and reading and parenthood and life and everything in between.  Then in the fall of the 2014-2015 school year, she never showed up. No warning. Just gone. And I heard through the grapevine that she didn't have another job yet. I was devastated and worried and I texted her from my hot tub (this is what we do) . . . something to the effect of have you lost your mind?  But she hadn't.  She knew it was time, and she was taking a leap of faith that what she really wanted, what was next in her journey, would find her if she worked hard enough to find it. Not long after, she was on her way to work for the first day of a new job when she received a phone call to interview for an even better one. She got it. She's my inspiration, and on days when my faith begins to falter, I just whisper, Rebekah . . . Rebekah;) . . . Within my last few weeks of work, I received innumerable phone calls and texts and facebook messages that encouraged and congratulated me on my own leap of faith (I got the loveliest text from Rebekah that said graciously said nothing about me losing my mind), and on my very last day, the whole first grade (and some of the second) threw me a going away party in the cafeteria in the morning . . . In the afternoon, my very dear friend, Melissa, gave me a paperweight that had DREAM embossed in gold across it and invited me to receive "memories" from her sixth grade students in the very classroom that used to be mine. And to complete that circle, she walked with me to my car for what would be my very last day in a thirteen year career. When I got home, there were flowers from my husband and a package on the counter from my Colorado daughter. Inside was a hand painted sign that says Let Your Faith Be Bigger Than Your Fear  with a note attached and words that I'll hold in my heart forever. The note is tucked into page 67 of Manuscripts. It sits on my desk in my home office that my husband spent months carefully and lovingly remodeling and furnishing for me . . . the office where I sit now, that waited for me. Finally, on that evening, my faithful and dear friend, Jill, arrived with gifts to celebrate my launch, and treated me to dinner and the movie Wild, based on the book that celebrates the brave journey of a woman who soly traversed the Pacific Coast Trail  in order to find her way. There were other affirmations along the way . . . too many to enumerate here. . . the focus of this first entry needed to be a thank you letter .  . . 

And more truth . . . with each milestone, this fall gets less scary.  Even a month in, on the fringes of my very last paycheck and with a ridiculously astronomical health care bill looming monthly, I'm at peace with my decision. I go to bed every night and wake up each morning with a passion that sustains me - the fire and focus of something very important I need to accomplish, something I've needed to do for a long time is finally happening. I have the freedom to pursue so many possibilities.  And I have the faith of so many people carrying me, and the echoing voices of those who leaped before me, leading me, into this brave new world.  

Thank you.  Thank you. Thank you.