Can you hear me whisper?

For weeks, I've woken up irritated, frustrated...almost angry. Believe me, it's awful and only kind of irrational. I open my eyes and already know what's going to happen when I take out my earplugs. 

NOISE!

I know, I live in the city and cities make noise. It's just part of the gig. Well, I hate it. I love living in the city, I love everything the city has to offer, but WHY DID I GET AN APARTMENT ON A MAIN ROAD?! And please tell me WHY DID I GET AN APARTMENT ON A MAIN ROAD THAT RUNS THE T (the Boston subway)? Sweet God, what was I thinking?!! 

It's not like I've spent my last 22 years in a cornfield where all you found hear was the buzzing of the bees and your own breath. I lives in St. Louis--directly adjacent to a main highway (as in, you could toss a beer can from my apartment window onto a car--no, this never happened) and a mile from one trauma hospital and two miles from another. I've lived in the middle of noise before, but there was always some calm...and I never had to live with my windows open (because I don't have AC). 

So, it's loud. And I've been complaining--only to those closest to me who won't pass harsh judgement about my cynicism and pessimism. Clearly, that filtering just ended.

This past week, I've been dog(Riley)/house sitting for a family in Needham, Mass. Needham is about 9 miles from my apartment but it seems like a different world. There are driveways and small yards and a distinct difference between the areas where people live and where they do everything else (eat, work, shop, play). 

I lived at this family's house for my first week and a half in Boston last August so this isn't a foreign place to me. Still, it was a bit different this time. Or maybe I was different.

After my first night, despite the fact that I was waking up at 4:45am to get to a swim meet, I was not cranky...it was quiet. I heard the bed creak and Riley's paws on the hardwood floor. I didn't hear cars zooming or the T screeching. I certainly didn't hear people talking loudly. 

For a moment, peace.

I continued having these moments throughout the week. Every time I went outside when Riley had to pee, I just stood there, in silence. This morning, I sat on the front porch to drink my coffee and call my best friend. perfection. 

For the first time in a long time, I could hear myself think. 

This week, I am grateful for silence. I am grateful for the peace brought by the sound of raindrops crashing to the ground and bunnies hopping through the back yard and for sleeping with the windows open without needing earplugs.

What are you grateful for this week?

Dance through your life

Pain. You just have to ride it out. Let it go away on its own. Let the wound that caused it heal. There are no real solutions. No easy answers. You just breathe deep and wait for it to subside. Even if it takes longer than anticipated, longer than you think you can handle. 

Most of the time, pain can be managed. But sometimes, the pain gets you when you least expect it. Hits way below the belt and doesn’t let up. Pain is a bitch.

Pain. You just have to fight through. 

Because the truth is, you can’t outrun it. And life always makes more.

Pain hurts. That's the nature of it and it's bad. There's always a lot of bad to focus on. there's hope too. And that matters. Hope matters. 

According to Glennon Menton Doyle. life is 'brutiful' (a hefty dose of both brutal and beautiful simultaneously) 

You can choose what you want to believe in--the bad or the hope or some combination.

You choose.

Now.

Every moment.

Life isn't about waiting for the storms to pass

it's about learning to dance in the rain.

-Vivian Greene

What is you decided to embrace Pain and Uncertainty and Confusion and all that? What if you decided that there is something to be gained from your current situation? What if you understood the awesome responsibility you have of choosing how you view your life? You get to choose if you wait and get angry about the cold, wet droplets pounding your skin or if you dance to the sound of the water sparkling around you.

What if you could appreciate where you are right now? who you are right now? Have you ever wondered what you would be like if the only person you compared yourself to was you? 

Don't get me wrong. I'm super cynical and sarcastic and find it disgustingly difficult to live in a state of home and positivity. Buttttttttt I LOOVVVEEEEE gratitude. Before I visited my best friend for just a few short days back in February, someone asked if I get the post-visit blues. My response? Surprisingly no, I wrap myself in post-visit gratitude. 

Now is the time to dance, because the longer you just wait, the easier it is to keep waiting...and waiting. The perfect time to dance will never come. Dance while things are imperfect and things just may get better pretty darn fast.

And here's a trick, don't dance alone. You can if there's no one around, but we belong to each other. We all live in this brutiful world. We are all trying to make it through.