Something to Say

Honestly, I feel like I have nothing more to say here sometimes.  I love this blog; I've loved using this as an outlet for all these years.  I love looking back to where I was one year, two years ago and seeing how far I've come.

One year ago today--I was at a conference here, and people were pulling me into corners to "chat" and I came out dazed with job offers.  This set off a 7 week period of angst, of unknowing--all of which led me here.  Back to DC, back to the very same building I walked into in 2003 as a fresh-faced intern.  I've been here almost ten months.

Just ten months. 

In ten months --I moved in with a friend, found a place, made new friends, began a new job, survived my first month with the car here in June (a feat that no one outside DC will quite understand).  I made new friends. I joined a softball team.  I had friends visit.  I shook hands with Governors, with Ambassadors, with Senators.  I had my car ticketed for parking in a spot reserved for the Greek embassy.  I was on C-span, twice.  I battled through health care reform and struggled every day to keep up with coworkers FAR more advanced than I, yet making the same salary and with the same job title.  I struggled to keep relevance.

I dated, and struck out numerous times.  I went to Utah, to Washington, to Tennessee, to Rhode Island, to Missouri, to New Mexico and to Pennsylvania in the name of work.  And I think I went alot more places than that, but those are what come to mind right away.  I kissed an old friend at the waterfront in Seattle and brought him home with me that night.  I got a new kitten.

I've lost two grandparents, sandwiching my summer into a Memorial Day funeral and a Labor Day funeral.   I think of them both every single day.  I went home that weekend, and sat with my grandmother and let her show me how to make biscuits.  I held a brand-new nephew and cuddled all the other nieces and nephews against me.

I watched a movie tonight, and at one point there was a funeral scene and a 21-gun salute.  The pain of watching that flag being folded brought my grandfather to mind so heavily that I knelt to my floor and cried.  When I was done, I looked up and found both my kittens curled up beside me.

I am working through every day.  I am okay. 

For long you live, and high you fly, and smiles you give and tears you cry --and all you touch and all you see is all your life will ever be.

This quote has been a favorite of mine for so long--Pink Floyd. 

This past year has held the tears, the smiles, the touches and the million reasons tied up in my own personal meaning of life.  My friends have taken my breath away this past year -from getting on planes to be with me, to getting up at 3am to call me, to sitting outside my therapists office every morning with tea for me --they have been extraordinary.  My sisters have been, too.  I am lucky indeed.

With so much emotion rushing just under the surface, writing and reflection proves difficult.  I am reading; I am thinking of you. 

I just wish I had more to say.