i forgot it was an adventure!

They say people are like their pets. This may well be so. I ran into a buddy yesterday - he is bald, big and pretty friendly, and when I walked out the front door his new Sharpei dog was there. Zoe the dog was also pretty bald, big and friendly. They are both pretty happy and content beings, with a particular look of inward reflection.

It made me reflect how Tuppence and I - well, we have the same look about us. Namely, confusion.

Case in point. I have been walking Tuppence the puppy every day. We do the same walk, which is up the road, through the bush, through the park, then home. Every time we get to the steel steps which lead down to the waterfall, this happens:

You can't quite tell from the picture, but she got half way down and froze. Panic set in. Looking left and right frantically, she sat down on one step, put her paws on the next and that was it. No amount of coaxing, offering of treats, reassurance would move her. She was stuck.

This happens to me a lot too. I get someplace, it gets hard, and instead of figuring out what's happening, I just sit down. I get stuck in the Why Me mentality. I get caught up in feelings of helplessness, powerlessness and rage.

Driving home from my Mum's the other day, I became paralysed with grief. I realised I wasn't paying any attention to the road, I wasn't in my body, I was just subsumed with horror. I pulled over at a service station and ran the car up the gutter with a thud. I sat there, unable to see, or move, or even cry. I was absolutely gone into the feeling of loss. I had never felt anything like it. It was total, and it was almost like a madness. Time felt slippery and strange, and it was like I was there a millenium.

Eventually I came to - and cried a bucketload in the carpark of the service station. Grief broke me open and pulled me out of paralysis with pain. Ouch.

But nobody was coming to get me, and I was not a kitten stuck up a tree somewhere (or a puppy stuck on steel steps) so I just waited and tried to be with what was happening to me. I kept saying to myself that it would move through me if I could wait. And then I would take the next action.

When Tuppence was stuck on the step, I eventually picked her up and carried her down. Her heart was beating like a wild thing, and she didn't make a noise. But within ten seconds she was gleeful again. She ran, and investigated, and was curious about the world. Her puppy mind was saying "This is so great! This is awesome! Can you believe this place! Wow, yeah! I think that was a lizard!" She is always excited about the world. No steel steps are final.

That is where I came to think about the fact that life is an adventure. I don't want to be stuck in my sadness. I want to remember how yesterday Mum and I sat together laughing, drawing funny captions on knitting patterns. I want more awareness that through this time I am learning how to be RIGHT HERE in the moment, dealing with the NOW. Truly valuing simple, beautiful things, like the bright camellias in her front yard, the new door my Dad built, the smile Mum gives me when I hold my scarf that I just finished making. I want to celebrate. I want the happiness of this time. I want to feel it as fully as I do everything else.

In a couple of hours I am heading down to Mum's again. We are knitting today, and watching a movie. It is my aspiration that I am stay open to whatever is happening. Joy, grief, contentment, anger. Whatever.