Breathing new life

Lately the blog has been a place for me to process some tough stuff. I've also had a lot of good, fun stuff going on, so it's a shame the lighter side isn't represented. I guess the hard stuff needs processing, and the blog is one way I do that. Who needs to process fun?

The one-year anniversary of my dad's death is this coming Tuesday--November 21. For a while I really dreaded the anniversary. But you know, it may not be as hard as I imagined. I've been mucking along so heavily lately that I am really ready to come out of it and (as my counselor says) to "let a year of grieving be a year of grieving." To take down the black curtains and put up some yellow ones. To breathe some life and newness into a year of so much death and loss.

Certainly I don't think things are going to look magically different once Nov 21 comes and goes. But I do think a kind of release is taking place inside me. I am focusing more and more these days on how to celebrate my dad and the gifts he gave and continues to give me.

And dammit, I love Advent and Christmas. I'd really like to enjoy them this year.

The theme for my Wednesday meditations this month is Gratitude. What came to me this week is this: "Even in death, there is new life. It is this for which I adopt a posture of Gratitude."