Destination 13 - Pleasure Island

It has always been within me to make my own happiness. This life is so amazing, if only you allow yourself to seek out the beauty and appreciate it. Those things change from day to day, and certainly year to year...and are very personal. What one person sees as beautiful may be unwanted and ugly to someone else. I call this part of myself, Pleasure Island.

I can spend days at a time on the island, or if time is limited, a few minutes. Sometimes I am alone on the island, while other times I have company. With the mainland far from my mind, I can get lost in happy thoughts. With my life being busy and stressful, these are the only kind of getaways possible. But instead of seeing the wine glass as half empty, I choose to see it as half full. There will come a day in my life again where I am free to explore places I've never been. Until then, I visit Pleasure Island to maintain my sanity.

Sometimes a song will take me to the tropics, while other times a smell or a taste of something heavenly is all I need. Escapes can be innocent shopping trips or dinner with friends, with the mainland still within view. Once in a while though, I may need to drift further out to sea, far away from the wake of others' opinions.

Time spent daydreaming is never time wasted...as these little trips can renew the soul. As the tides change, so do my needs. As the weather changes, so do my moods. But as life changes, never does my sense of self or who I am. ~Sue

Destination 12 - Halfway

It is halfway...in so many ways. Truly, for a 10 month employee, January 31st is 50% day...5 months down and 5 to go...but February break, for a long time, has felt like a halfway point for me. I spent my February break in the most lovely of ways, first visiting family, and celebrating my niece Norah's first birthday. I also had time to go out galavanting and wine touring with my hubby. Then we came home, and "burrowed" as a family. There were outings, to skate and bowl, but overall, there was a lot of reading, and TV (Olympics rule!), and movies, and games, and time together just doing nothing in our jammies. It is what we do. But still, in all of it, I missed my friend, my collaborator in this venture. It seemed that she, for whatever reason, was avoiding me, and I guess you could say that in some ways I distanced myself from her as well. Still today, I had some clarity...through Paul Davis and the song "Sweet Life" from the 70's. I AM living the sweet life (and thank you dear sweet Jesus that she DID get Tim's nose) and as our friends seem to be in a hurry, we ARE taking our time. I, sometimes, get so caught up in other people's issues that I forget that I am JUST FINE. I suppose what I need to recall is that my life is not my friend's life, but that doesn't diminish either of us in any way. I do have a sweet life, and she has the life she has and that is just the way it IS. Still, I don't want us to hide, from eachother, in any way, and I feel like we have been. Who knows, I may be way off base, still, it is only halfway.

-Cheryl