River Rafting

I am just too consistently tired and overwhelmed to blog these days, let alone to properly describe the mental/emotional subtleties of what the last few weeks have been like. All I can do is use metaphor (I know, you're shocked), and I'm too stretched out to think of something clever or original, so please just bear with me. (My wordsmithing fu is weak, dear Internet, and your humble servant begs for forgiveness. Please have mercy and do not slay me. I will recover my strength soon.)

This is what it feels like: I am sitting on a smooth, water-shaped and sun-warmed rock here in the middle of a wide green river. I was lying down on the rock not long ago, taking a nice nap all cozy in the sun, but a few minutes ago I was jarred out of my sleep by a big splash of cold water. After the initial shock passes, I realize that I was getting mighty hot just lying there in the sun and the cool water feels pretty good. In fact, I feel a lot more awake and clear now. Sleeping was certainly a pleasure, and it's pretty here in this spot, but I know that this river goes a long way and there's a lot more to see and do. So now I'm sitting on the rock and dangling my legs in the water as the river rushes by, feeling the pull and the power of its movement and trying to decide if I should just jump in and start floating downstream or whether it would be more fun if I went and grabbed an inner tube or blow up boat. I remember how much fun river rafting was years ago, even though it was something that I didn't control or direct.

Then Josh, who's been sitting next to me on the rock all along, takes my hand with a twinkly look and says "hey, this looks fun, doesn't it? Let's wade over to the shore and grab that inner tube--no wait, maybe the boat--no, that would take too long, how about the inner tube--and go float downriver?" And we look at each other and realize that we're not totally sure where that river goes or whether there are serious rapids nearby but the sun is warm and the water is cool and everything seems like a thrilling combination of scary and fun and we do what we always do: say "yes." And we jump off the rock and start splashing towards that tube, laughing.

All right, all right, I know that gives a kind of emotional flavor to what's been going on, but you want to know, hey, what's actually been happening over there, Ms. Floating-Down-The-River? Well, I will tell you, at least in brief (because that's all I can stand right now). There are actually two major things going on right now:

1) My new job, as I think I've mentioned before, is for a company that provides financial education and coaching with the goal of supporting people to take concrete, step-by-step action towards achieving financial freedom (whatever that might mean to each individual in terms of actual $$). Josh and I have been really inspired by the entrepreneurial and DIY philosophy and approach of this company, and the community that has built up around it. We just last night got back from one of the educational seminars that my company puts on around the country (this one was in Chicago), and we have a whole new set of goals we are going to be working towards (I have to be a little vague here but hope to be clearer soon). We are going to be starting a business (actually, several), and we are newly committed to educating ourselves about and taking action on the ways our money flows and works for us. We are committed to more self-direction and less letting other people do things for us. It's a huge, huge learning curve to be doing all these things, and it's simultaneously exciting to be stretching and learning new things, and hard on the ego in the way that being a newbie always is (just like I've been experiencing with my new job, for example). We are going to be working our butts off for the next few years.

2) In the middle of all this left-brain excitement comes a totally different kind of opportunity for movement and growth: last weekend, after returning home from another long weekend camping (which I will just have to write about separately at some point), I found an email in my inbox congratulating me on being accepted to Viable Paradise. VP is a week-long writer's workshop in Martha's Vineyard for fantasy and science-fiction writers, taught by some people whom I greatly respect and admire. I've been wanting to go to this for years (ever since I started the novel, pretty much) but with Isaac so little it was just never the right time. But with the encouragement of my writer's group I applied last January, and holy Moses, through some sort of amazing alignment of all the stars and planets, I got accepted. (There are only 20-something students accepted each year out of who knows how many applications, so it's pretty amazing.) I was already talking myself out of the disappointment, rationalizing that this would be a difficult time in my life to focus on the writing anyway with so much else going on, and then I got the email. So even though I'm overwhelmed with all the other changes going on, I know there's a message of "balance" here for me. And you bet I'm going! I can hardly focus on anything else, I'm so excited about VP. So I guess another lesson I'm learning right now is "compartmentalization". Whee!

These are watershed times right now, I am certain. It will probably all seem much clearer and b'shert ("meant to be") in the future when we are looking back on these days, but for now--woah! Everything seems to be moving very fast. I'll write more when I can.