We're All Sinking.

It’s pouring rain. I love it. It makes my insides giddy. It makes me feel like a kid again.
I’ve been trying to write something serious, but I need to write this.
I just got back to Texas after a beautiful two weeks away.
I ate lobster in Maine, took a boat around a quaint harbor, cooked over a campfire.
Spent time with my family. Sat on a rocky ledge and watched the ocean.
Stayed up with my sister playing games.

Flew to Florida. Sat next to a psychologist  who was reading Thomas Merton. We talked about Jesus and other religions and why people do what they do.

She recited this poem in my ear at 10,000 feet:

“This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.

A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.

Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.

The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.

Be grateful for whoever comes,
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.”
(Rumi)

Florida was great, relaxing. So wonderful to catch up with my friend, see where her life is at. Floated out on the lake in her back yard every day. Got to go surfing for the first time. It was perfect, the waves, the weather, the sun setting.
I kept expecting something to interrupt it, some panicky thought or fear or stress or bad thing.
I guess sometimes I feel like I don’t deserve the life that I have,
That it’s too wonderful for me.
I’ve learned to see beauty, but expect tragedy.
Sometimes, I wish I could just take this gift, open it, accept it, not feel like I need to repay it.
At time, I feel like I have re-gained the ability to do that: childlike faith, a needed greediness to gobble up life and all it has to offer.
That’s when I realize, All this is grace: the ocean, the wind, the waves, the airplane, the people that make up the poetry in my life.
(“If Grace is an ocean, we’re all sinking.)
Breath.
Rainfall.
Accepting who I am and what I have and where I am at in life.
And being ok.
Not just ok, but overjoyed.

In Florida, we walked on a beach only to realize it was covered in dead jellyfish. Squishy globs of clear jello glinting in the sunlight. It was weird and extra-terrestrial-ish.
But it was beautiful.