Saturday, March 23, 2013

I needed a vacation.

I could have gone on one if I had also wanted to lose my job, but I've decided against that option tonight.

Instead, I have driven my car to the nearest park, put on my tennis shoes and I am walking as far away from this parking lot as I possibly can.

Well, I'm walking.

And walking.

And walking.




Still walking.

The air is perfect, the earth alive with growth and fragrance. I'm taking long, quick strides - a girl on a serious mission to an unknown destination.

My life has felt blurry for months. If one were to ask, I would say that I had been working a lot, sleeping a little. Head buried in piano keys, song arrangements, ukulele strings. Counseling my way through a past of hard self-criticism, discontentment, failed relationships. A head full of grey, mostly. Makes it a bigger exhalation when I catch glimpses of color.

It all brings me here - fast paces along paved paths, suburban neighborhoods, patches of early spring growth.

I've spotted some large, flat rocks lining the creek to my right. I am releasing control - my feet carry me over. Drawing close, I can smell the rich mixture of water and earth. I am, once again, a small child standing in a creekbed, turning over submerged rocks in hopes of finding an orange newt or a brown "crawdad." A wave of peace surges through me in this moment of nostagia. I am young and free.

Muscles release tension, head slowly falls forward. Eyes shut and the scent of my memory is exemplified. The breeze blows through a patch of reeds to my left. I open my eyes and the sun births a dance of shadows through late winter branches.

All feels well here.

There is a therapy in stillness. In quiet. In just not thinking. In being. A discipline worth worth the practice for the preservation of sanity.

I return to my feet and begin the walk back.

I am ready to return.