Today I found out

What my novel is going to be about. So far it's working out really well, being a good mix of things I know something about and things I will need to learn a bit more about. It's all very preliminary as I've only been working on it a few hours. But I have An Idea. It is my first novel, if you don't count the one I started at five, singing songs into a tape recorder about cats, because you have to sing into a tape recorder, right? And what's more interesting than cats? It may quickly devolve into a short story or sketch, but it is something I have been thinking about for a very long time. My parents are writers. My husband is a writer. All my favorite writers are writers. I'm going with what I call the Lori Colwin model where I take a person who sounds suspiciously like me and make her do things I don't think I would do. Hopefully, it won't be awful.Well, back to work.

No Fear

I have always been afraid. But I'm starting to rethink it. I'm naturally anxious and would rather mull over worst case scenarios than just about anything, but I've had some good days where I could see what life without all that would be like. For instance, I'm a picky eater. As a child, it helped me exert a level of control over events, and I suppose it serves much the same purpose now. But once, some people I dearly love took me out for a very fancy New Year's Eve dinner, and I decided that I was not going to be picky that night. It was a prix fixe event, and I was going to eat what was on the menu and enjoy it, because, well, that's how I was raised. Luckily, it was an evening filled with delicious and largely nonthreatening food, but I was able to glimpse what life might be like without all that anxiety for control. Nothing bad happened to me, and I had some new experiences. It was really pretty wonderful. Have I had many days like that since? A couple, when the meds are right and it all falls into place. Another thing that lifted the veil slightly was childbirth. Why are you afraid? Because you think it might hurt. Well, childbirth did hurt, but I got over it and my life changed for the better. I've been thinking about these two experiences a lot lately. Looking at my life and wondering if it has to look like it does. How much change is really possible at my time of life? Can I do it? What's the worst that could happen? I've been planning these changes, some for years, and I'm coming to think that it really is now or never. I'm going back to school, Henry is walking, and I can make the life I want to have. I can be a good student. I can be physically active and raise my kids to be physically active. I can find time in the day to do some writing and some reading. I'm not saying it will be easy, but I'm also not saying it will be drastic. These are activities I want to include in my life, to improve the quality of my life. And I have to believe that I am up to the challenge, or what am I here for? It's still early to just give it up completely. I have plans and dreams for the future. I want to visit Japan. I want to go to graduate school. I want to become a person who runs. I have a lot of life left to live, and I'm finally deciding what I want it to look like. Part of the being afraid was not making plans. But the future is happening all around us, and I want to get started on it myself.