The Year….. of ME

there are times, when I wish I could grab my favorite pair of jeans, my birkenstocks,
my Cleveland Browns t-shirt, my beat up denim jacket and Gizmo and just leave.
Vannish. Disappear.
Into thin air.

Whoosh.  She's gone. She left. She's outta here.

Not because I don't love my husband.  Not because I'm sick of my kids.
No - it's not that at all.  They represent the best part of who I am.






I'm just sick and tired of STUFF, and THINGS, and JUNK that doesn't have any purpose in the BIG picture.  Some of it tangible…. some of it not.

It seems I go through this more and more lately.  Purging myself of the insignificant.  And the older I get - the more insignificant everything that surrounds me seems to be.


THIS year (the year of CATHIE as I affectionately refer to it as I speak to my family,) I am
embracing the significant.

I am going to learn to knit socks.
Spend A LOT more time walking with my dogs on the beach and in the mountains.
Sit in the desert and ponder the meaning of life with my husband.
Work with both my kids on re-evaluating the content of their lives in an effort to focus on the value and meaning of who and what surrounds them. (I they want me to.)
Travel to Alaska and walk on a glacier.
Read a few "important" works.


See  Experience the Northern Lights.
Become involved with the Guardian Ad Litem or Adult Literacy Program and volunteer.
Paint.

Go back to Cleveland in the Spring and the Fall.
And, most importantly - intently focus on the "here," and the "now." Figuring out how I can tweak and purge my life in order to enhance it's value and enrich its meaning.
Just being.


You don't need "stuff" to just be.
All you need….is yourself.

But sometimes, it seems I've lost myself.
I don't know who I am. Or what I want.

This year, I'm going to focus on "being."
Figuring out at this stage of my life - what's valuable to me.

Finding out what truly makes me happy - fulfills my life's purpose. And maybe -  in the process finding the "self" I've lost along the way - over the years.

I will think of this next year of my life as a scavenger hunt.

A hunt for the little pieces of me that, over the years, have fallen by the wayside.
Putting some of them back together, maybe leaving some of them out.
Maybe re-arranging them a little - to make a brand new picture.

Yes.  Yes I like this idea.
The idea of my life as a brand new picture.