Miles to Go

It’s 6:14am on a Saturday morning and the view out this airplane window is blue.

Deep, deep blue.

The sun hasn’t yet extended her warm arms around this part of the globe, though soon I will see her face shining to the East.

But for now, it’s still dark.

And cold.

People around me are sleeping, or pretending to, but I can’t rest. I am not where I can rest yet. There is too much to do. Too much to be awake about, and too much to feel and be aware of at this moment.

I have a fullness of desire to do and accomplish so many things. And, though I tap this out on this keys-too-close keyboard knowing this note will go to the universe and the ether for likely none to read but me, in some distant day I hope to look back here and note how I felt this day, and I pray the reminiscing will be joyful and from a place where I only long to reach from here.

My baby turned thirteen. She’s growing up and exploring her talents in so many ways. She was the first, the Trusting Gift, the one who lead the way for us in so many aspects. The one who couldn’t wait to come. The one who first grabbed my finger with her whole hand on that original birthday of hers so long ago in Boston — and something inside my heart broke at that moment, leaving room for what could only be new growth in a place in my heart I didn’t understand existed until then.

Yet here I am on a plane — thirty thousand feet above the earth — from here the perspective is broad, expansive, limitless — but for all this world and all its glory and all the trinkets, treasures the only thing I want to be is on the ground, in my own home — at home.

I don’t want vast expanses, I want warm, snuggly blankies and Saturday morning laughter with toes poking out, begging to be tickled.

I need to be home.

I need to be safe.

In the quiet around me and slight snoring of other passengers trying to catch up on their shut-eye, I think of another traveler far from home who paused to note his surroundings, then pressed onward once again:

Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening #

by Robert Frost

Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.
My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.
He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound's the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.
The woods are lovely, dark, and deep.
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

The last several years of my life have been anything but easy, simple or plain. They have been filled with things to be done. Promises to keep… and other promises to mend.

I have lost sleep, lost weight, lost friends, lost opportunities, and thought I lost my mind, my life and everything really valuable to me.

And yet, I have gained a real appreciation for people, for living, for breath and air and health, strength, real love (bought with a price), real religion, real hope and healing, and real grace.

I have promises to keep. Some remade and some new. There’s a lot of work I have left to do …and miles to go before I sleep.