There is Good Here Too.

My words feel like they are stuttering along with my heart. I want to hurry time, to get to the good part that I can see just over this next hill.  I'm convinced that the sunset will have colours just a little more brilliant, that the dew will sparkle on the flowers and that the road will smooth out ahead of me. My heart could easily settle back into straining and fighting to get ahead. My mind wants to deem this place as not good enough yet.

Except I'm realizing that this IS the good part. It's the beginning of so much good and I want to savour every last piece of it. It has been years in the making, more like my whole life in the making. I don't want to miss any of it, not even the ache in my feet or the burning in my muscles as I climb one more hill.

This beginning is my blood and tears woven together with a brave I never knew I possessed.

I know how to write about the hard things. The things that wreck me, that leave me feeling raw and brave when I push publish, or place the ribbon and close my journal. There are too many stories of being wrecked that I could write. That I need to write.

Yet as this year progresses, there are new stories that I'm living. Stories with hope, with light, with creativity. Stories where dreams no longer turn into nightmares or futile fantasy. I don't know yet how to write about the good things.

I want to cradle the good to my chest, to cuddle it and own it as mine. It's taken thirty years, but I'm finally glad that I wake up every morning. In many ways, I'm holding my breath still, waiting for the other shoe to drop, waiting for this glorious wonder at enjoying living and investing in myself to disappear. This feels like a rainbow on a grey sky. There's more rain coming, the storm isn't done and there will be yet more mud by the time the rain stops for good. But right now, there's a rainbow - colours blazing out faint in places, but blazing with all their glory that there is good here too.

Because I'm still learning about this, I want to pose some questions:

How do you handle the mix of good and bad? Do you tend to lean more to one side or the other? How do you relish the good moments, knowing that there will still be hard times ahead?