Barefootin’ At Last!
It’s Independence Day! Pancake breakfasts, parades, and fireworks. It’s fun, full of family, friends, and old-fashioned camaraderie. It feels patriotic. Red, white, and blue abound. There are classic cars and trucks, fire engines, wagons, marching bands, and horses. F-16’s proudly soar above. Americana prevails.
This year’s Fourth wasn’t much different than the picture. The grandkids and I took off bright and early in anticipation of the day. We headed out to the country to pick up my brother and sister in-law for the leisurely drive to all the day had to offer. These are the kinds of things that make for a full life.
But it WAS different. My husband wasn’t along for the festivities. He just wasn’t feeling up to it.
This month’s challenge got me thinking about my own personal independence going forward and what it means to me as an aspiring Barefoot Writer. There are going to be changes in my life, and I am up for the challenge. I will keep the favorite old traditions and I will happily make new ones along the way.
Yep, the Barefoot Writer’s life is going to give me the freedom to make my life all that I’ve wanted it to be and more. To be able to reinvent myself? Oh yes, I’m so excited! Don’t get me wrong, I’ve had a wonderful time along my life’s highway and I have many cherished memories I hold in my heart. But I’ve been longing for a change and I believe I’ve found the way.
My new life will be an escape from hospital waiting rooms, ICU’s, and cancer centers. It will be an escape from month-end closings, variances in sales figures, and looming board meetings.
I won’t worry about being late to work, or late to a doctor’s appointment. The deadlines I keep will be of my own making, and I will keep them willingly and gratefully.
My new waiting room will be an outdoor patio bathed in warm sunshine, filled with rejuvenating and brilliant foliage, drenched in the pallet of Mexican rainbows. The world will be a comforting blanket of inspiration. I will enrich and be enriched with the words that my pen will scrawl.
I am free to create my own destiny. My new life will be ultimately more uncomplicated, even selfish to a point. I’ll have time to enjoy the simpler pleasures like watching the hummingbirds drink the nectar of the Hot Lips Salvia, and hearing the grandkids in their laughter delighting in the coolness of the sprinkler raining down on them.
I will experience new places and new cultures. I will immerse myself in new colors and textures. I will look at life from an altogether different perspective, the Barefoot Writer’s perspective.
I will embrace my newly invented self.
