Never say never

My boy left on a plane yesterday. I didn't cry, but as I watched the plane pull away from the gate, I felt something like a pinprick within my chest. Pinpricks leave the kind of holes that don't gush all the pain out at once, but rather oozes it slowly, as if fighting to stay in. Driving home, the restless energy that had mustered inside my body began to gnaw at my legs and eventually rise into my stomach. I wanted to run. The urge was too strong to dismiss. I don't like to run, in fact, I hate it. But the trouble with stamping "never" on something, is that it's an invitation to test your resolve someday, somewhere, somehow. And so my day had come, and I tossed "never" aside and ran.

And then I thought I was going to die from hyperventilation and cardiac arrest, lol :). Yet, the pounding of my feet and heart, seemed to seal and mend that tiny hole that was left agape since the airport. This is why runners run, I surmised. Alone, in the shadows of the trees, without mental chatter and with only the sound of my breath and the occasional bird singing, I felt truly alive. The heartaches the seasons of our lives bring seem manageable when all we have to remember to do is breathe and keep going.

I realize now that I said more than one goodbye at the airport. I said goodbye to that scared, clueless young mother that I knew 10 years ago. I have been pounded, tumbled, refined and polished since then. I smiled fondly at the mother I once was, and then I thanked her for her perseverance and belief that she could change and rise up to become the mother her children needed her to be.  

A new phase of mother is beginning, I can feel it. A whole new set of challenges awaits---puberty, peer relationships, middle and high school, boyfriends and girlfriends, driving, ugggh, I think I am going to be sick...and I think it's time for me to buy a real pair of trail running shoes....


Wishing you a lovely August weekend...

xoxo