small travels

"Rider, 36 says she made it through her ordeal by focusing on her family and her future. "I wanted to get back to my husband. We're a team. What is it you want out of life? You have to aim for it," she said. "We have a tremendous amount of power within ourselves.""

Her story was; "for eight days she lay trapped in her SUV going in and out of consciousness with no food or water. Her collarbone was broken and she was suffering from kidney damage." She had crashed her car in a 25 ft ravine in Washington State.
This has been an ongoing theme of this blog, it may be a (the) central theme of my life: there is no dress rehearsal.

This is it. It's why we're (some of us) thrilled to watch life and death struggles on the discovery channel, why we like extreme sports, from skiing to bungy jumping, why we fight with our lovers, climb mountains, in our hearts and worlds..  to feel alive.
I left Ontario on July 1 2010. I left having a home, a job, any sort of stability. I had no place to turn to, and no net. Today, May 18, 2011, I finally got confirmation that I have work, contract work, but work nonetheless. I just got a place to live and stopped wandering / staying with friends a few weeks ago. A friend said to me tonight, in honest admiration, of the leap I took and the fact that I have, ultimately, landed on my feet - "you did it."
I'm not meaning to trivialize the compliment, because it really meant a lot to me, but... I did it every day [ok - most days.. ok; one or two???]. Because what it is: is being completely alive and present, to...  now.
If someone offers you love - you open your heart, if you have the chance to make money or move your career forward - you put 100% of your attention on it, if you have the chance to help someone - you drop what you're doing, if you have the chance to travel - "I'm ready, when do we leave?" More importantly, you do have to know where you're going, in some sense.
To quote Tiger the Lion again:

"simply to wake to your life."

Today, for me, that's beginning to have a more acceptable outward appearance of "success". I threw everything away and started over, a couple times. Why?: "You can't have what you want until you give up what you've got."
I'm writing this, saying it - for anyone out there who might be reading it, who's shaking in their boots, "standing on a hill in a mountain of dreams", thinking - "is it real?" or "is my dream just bullshit?" or "can I make it all happen, can I really grab this window, this moment, and make the life I want?"

Yes, you can.

They are small travels. We are all born, and all die, and all have a few glorious moments to sieze. Or many; maybe one every moment...

The story about Rider came from an article in the paper on human's amazing ability to survive.
She's right. "We have a tremendous amount of power within ourselves."

           Wisely watch for the sight
      Of the supernova burgeoning over the barn
Lampshine blurred in the steam of beasts, the spirit's right
           Oasis, light incarnate.