I Am a Writer…

I always have a bit of pressure on me now on January 31 it seems. It is the date last year and this year and likely every year from now on that for Valentine’s Day my husband makes a beautiful hardcover book for me as a gift. A printed book of my blog for the year.

We don’t just randomly print a blog book any day. He does it January 31 systematically and with tradition and purpose. This is the way he and I do things and my blog book is no exception to this rule.

He has been asking me this month..”Will you make the last blog entry special on Jan 31^st since it is the last one of that book?”

(No pressure sweetie really).

It is also the anniversary of my Dad’s death on this date. A confusing yet important milestone in my mind. One that brings up many things.

So as I reflected on what special and intriguing blog I could possibly write, I decided to reflect more on what has really, really been intricate and different about this year for me. What has stood out? There have been two things and surprisingly neither has to do with parenting or work. Very unusual indeed for me.

The first is the depth of the friendships I have right now in my life. I have been part of both significantly deepening existing ones and replenishing and nurturing other ones. I have also made  a couple of new wonderful and forever friends over the last two years . I feel so happy in this part of my life and circle right now and feel like it is something that I have always and desperately wanted. I have found my place in my friendships. I am deeply happy on this level. I have what I have always wanted and need and I cannot even begin to express how complete this makes me feel. I feel like I am uncovering a whole other side of myself through these deeper connections. I for the first time in my life in so many ways feel I am supporting others and feel fully supportable by others too. I am sharing in ways I have never before. I am sharing myself fully and asking for exactly what I need. The benefits of this process are far beyond my wildest imagination. Much of the same process is occurring with my husband and each child too. It is not new but it is deeper. Everything is deeper around me.
I have let deep in.

And my second occurrence is that I have realized I am truly a writer. It even makes me feel strange and shy and a bit odd to write that sentence as I do not identify with it (yet) hardly at all.

But I am most definitely a writer. As I read back on two years of blogs and the passion I felt in writing them I know that. As my Sister Savvy led me to this amazing blog writing experience and helped me to discover this for myself, I knew I was a writer As I spent  many afternoons over this decade on my boat in the summer, my hair blowing in the wind and sentences and phrases and paragraphs swirl though my mind it is clear to me that I am a writer.. 

As I reread for the first time the three completed chapters and bios and  book summary that I put together, (and of which two people in my life had to probe and push me to finally send them because they were dying of curiousity to see what I was working on)……I read the words last night with pride and joy. And I realized I am actually a writer. By the end of 2013 I will very likely have my name as co-author with a very well-known person on a published BOOK! My first book!

And it will be they first of many books for me of that I am clear. As hard as this process it and time consuming and eating up much of my spare hours on weekends and in the evenings, as much bureaucracy as writing a book is…I simply love it. I cannot imagine my life without a book in it actually anymore. And this is not even MY book. It is someone else’s that I am contributing to and partnering with to bring to life.

I have two more books and beyond just waiting to be written by me. They are so clear in my mind right now and have come to life for me very clearly over the last few months. I am excited to write them over the next 5-7 yrs.-very excited.

So yes I am a writer. And I will never ever be the type of writer who does this full time or even part time. As it will never replace my job or my career. It will be a few hours a week for many years of my life. It will be an in between activity and not an all-consuming activity.

 I will never be the type of writer that thanks everyone and everyone for pouring over their work and guiding them as my work is mine and is mostly for me for the moment. For me writing is not about getting it right, it is about getting it out of myself. For now anyways. It’s a bit of trial and error for now. Getting it to sound the way I want it to. Letting this incredible process unfold before me and with me in it. Letting my dream take shape and change directions many times over.

I can feel the future and it is friendly. I have a hobby! I have a passion I think! I have found something that relaxes me in many ways (and stresses me out of my mind in other ways!)

And my Dad was a writer. A GREAT writer. A known and expereinced and published many times over writer. And for years and years and years I denied myself this part of me because it was part of him and I wanted so desperately to be different than him.

But I have this part of him in me.

Is this the sign he sent me?
The gift he left me?

If it is I am ready to receive it. As Soulkeeper told me two years ago in my driveway with two babies in her hands “You are a writer” with her sweet and serious expression. With conviction. Sweetly. With truth. Even though she knew this would not be perceived as a compliment at the time.She did not care-she needed to tell me.

And I am one.

At every funeral there are always eulogies. My Dad had many people give one including his three children. And each eulogy has it’s moment …where everyone cries because what is said is touching and real. In my eulogy there were so many parts about my Dad, I was very honest and forthright about the complex and difficult relationship we had together and lack of one in mnay ways. It was a tough and freeing experience to say it aloud in front of so many people. To be heard and understood and to be able to have the words to both be true and real but also to have my father cherished and understood.

But the end of the eulogy was about me. Even if it was my Dad’s eulogy.My last line even if it was his funeral, was about me.

And since that day two years ago I have had almost everyone in attendance mention that line to me and the impact it had one them. I remember looking over at two of my beloved friends and seeing how it impacted them because they knew what it meant to me to say it aloud. A promise really.

“Dad..... is now time to put ink in my pen and allow music back into my heart”

I am now certain that that was my sign. That was the gift I was left. The gift of getting to speak about me even when I was supposed to be speaking about my Dad. My Dad giving me back to me.
My Dad being a Dad to me in death when he was not fully able to be in life perhaps? I seem to have some kind of comfort in making wishes and somehow hoping my Dad will make them come true. Today I made four and out them on little heart stickies right into his Urn on my fireplace as the first thing as I woke up this morning.
 

Yes..I am a writer. Among many, many other things.

Goodbye January 31^st

Hello:

“More Life, Please!”