i’m back again. and it feels oh-so-very-good to sit down here and pound out the thoughts that have been stirring around in my head for weeks now. to click-click-boom see them come alive. so good. so good. there are a bajillion things i could hit you with right now in my better-late-than-never style…obvious things like Christmas and new years and resolutions and new beginnings, and other much less obvious things. but for now, all i want you to know is i’m back. i’ve got things planned for us. thoughts and ideas that will be unloaded once i cure the ache in my chest that lingers after every return trip from *home*…metaphorically speaking.

unintentionally, but inevitably, i always fall into a funk after leaving these gorgeous mountains,

to return to this arid, scarred desert,

…and that’s just landscape…we won’t even delve into the town itself, the weather, or the people. oh, the people.

to combat the funk, my gratitude and optimism have to compensate and kick it into high gear. i’m in high gear right now and the wheels are spinning, grasping at good health, roofs over our heads, food to eat, and the promise of more trips in the future, hoping to gain traction and go rip roarin’, burnin’ rubber down the road shouting, *yeeeeeee-haw! we made it!* i’m still waiting for that moment. it takes a couple days.

my dear friend texted me earlier today, encouraging me not to let geography steal my joy. MY joy. i needed that. you know who you are, thank you. so for now, i’m clinging to my joy for dear life, wheels a spinnin’, gratitude a flyin’, with promises of a more optimistic post the next go around.

until then,

* joy is what happens when we allow ourselves to recognize

how good things really are * {marianne williamson}

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