Curve of the Road

This past year has been the most volatile I’ve had so far, full of very high highs and very low lows. I’ve been struggling to reconcile all the breathtaking beauty in my life with all the pain and all the loss. Right now I feel like I could be standing on the edge of this photo, looking out at the threatening clouds, at the hills that vibrate with their sheer aliveness, anticipating the blind curve in the road.

I’m a planner by nature. I have lists of goals tucked away in notebooks and on slips of paper. When I decide I want to change something, get somewhere, do something, I work for it obsessively until it is realized. I usually know what is around every bend because I have made it happen, because it’s purposeful.

But in this moment, a lot of my life is simply out of my control. Death overcoming the most stubborn will, overcoming overwhelming love. Plans we’ve put on hold. Goals being amended and shifted and stricken.

Every turn has become that top-of-the-rollercoaster mix of sheer terror and anticipation.

It has its own kind of beauty.