I've been having a lot of flashbacks lately to last summer, and inevitably comparing where I am at now to where I was then. I just had a distinct memory flash into my mind, when I found out I had mono and couldn't do the triathlon I had trained 4 months and raised so much money for. I remember being at my doctor's office, and the realization that i was sick sick sick, hit all at once- it was my third visit to the doctor's office in a week, as they had repeatedly took blood samples and called me in to report the findings. I was tired, scared, and frustrated. Then my doctor told me I wouldn't be able to compete in the triathlon that was only 3 weeks away. I started to cry, and yet I remember being so impressed, in the midst of all my emotions, with her empathy. She handed me a tissue, and reminded me that while it was very sad that something I had trained so hard for wouldn't happen, that I could do other triathlons in the future, and that it was for a good cause anyway. She didn't hurry me out, or brush off something that was so very important to me. And she didn't trivialize that it was just mono.
A year later and I am so much leaner. I have weaned people, possessions, and goals out of my life that were superfluous. I'm more cautious about what drains my energy, and what replenishes it- about who drains my energy and who makes me feel revitalized. I am aware of when I am extending myself too far, and have remembered the wisdom of relaxing, and doing one thing at a time. It's as though mono, and being sick, really, for a month, pruned me like winter prunes the earth- the harshness of the illness killed off everything and everyone that wasn't necessary for survival, like winter kills branches and flowers that are superfluous to survival. This summer, I am distinctly aware of the lightness such a pruning gives. My heart, head, mind, and body are airy light and strong, like the bones of a bird.
I can't help but to fly everywhere I go...
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