So, in the past 6 months, life has been a veritable roller coaster involving an unexpected trip to Kurdistan, Iraq, followed by uprooting from my beloved PEI, then exploring possibilities in Nashville, TN, and most recently, 23 days serving with The Extreme Tour throughout the northeast USA.
Phew! I honestly never saw any of that coming my way.
So what’s next, you/I ask? Well, I’ve been “home” for 4 days. And according to my driver’s license and license plates, I am officially a resident of Ontario as of yesterday.
And that’s all I know for now.
And already I’m feeling uneasy about just standing still for a while.
I mean, I’ve got this blog now, so my life needs to stay extra-exciting, right? Thrill the people with tales of a jet-setting, “rolling stone gathers no moss”, modern-gypsy life! But, there’s something to be said for settling. Not “settling” in a sense of tired compromise or complacency, rather as the ole Dictionary.com defines it, “to become calm or quiet”.
Standing still.
Trouble is this old potent notion of potential. Potential spurs someone on to greatness with the right amount of effort and drive. Potential is that glimmer of “a diamond in the rough” that can be mined to shine one day, gloriously. Potential can be that quiet promise of future value in something, someone. Potential, I’ve been learning, can also be a disquieting whisper, taunting with its elusive sister, possibility, just loud enough to disturb contentment with the present.
I find myself without a set course at the moment, no defined path. I am not callously or ignorantly lamenting what I see is truly an incredible freedom and a blessing, the bright side of potential. possibility. But I have been wading through seas of opportunity lately and find myself searching for some solid ground. A Solid Rock.
How do I start putting one foot in front of the other? Maybe by unearthing the beautiful busyness of being content. Finding routine. Living wholeheartedly where God has lead me to be, right now, whatever that looks like from day-to-day for an optimistic-dreamer-artist-nurse like me. Will you still journey with me if I find myself back in the daily grind, maybe even back in the land of nightshifts and bedpan-wielding? For as my old colleagues and compadres know, that is the true stuff of legends anyway.
Or of blogs, too, I guess.