"We live at the edge of the miraculous." - Henry Miller

There's something delicious about being on the edge of things. In a few days we leave for almost a month on our journeys, and I'm relishing my home life in my mode of adieu. 

I inhale the sea air with a little extra fervor. I appreciate the way the light comes into the house through the floor-to-ceiling windows.  I cherish the purple tulips on my desk--which is finally cleared of to-do stacks of items. 

Dave always fills our house with flowers.

That's another thing:  when you're on the edge of leaving, you must finish things off.  I like to clear space for what's to come.  Grades in.  Books ordered for fall.  Laundry completed.  Blog entry finished.  Eye exam done, new contacts in  hand.

Next comes packing. 

I am challenging myself to keep it simple.  No more over-packing.  I will pick my very favorite things to wear--and just wear them over and over.  No opening my suitcase at the end of the month to things I never wore popping out like Jack-in-the-boxes.  I'll take advantage of limited space and pack the things I love the most.  It will help make living out of a suitcase all ease and flow. 

The non-example.

Also, I want to actually have some extra space in my suitcase for things I buy.  We're not  big shoppers, but we do have buying goals in Mexico:  Wedding outfits.  I figured Mexico City might be a good place to find a sundress for me, and a guayabera for Dave that's in similar colors.  Perfect wedding attire for a barefoot-in-the-Hawaiian-sand wedding.

So here we are.  Home, poised for adventure. Wings unfurling. I'm savoring the feeling. 

"Come to the edge, he said.  They said:  We are afraid.  Come to the edge, he said.  They came.  He pushed them and they flew."  - Apollinaire

My friend Tiffany just announced she has accepted a job in Korea.  I'm sure she's in a heightened state, feeling the edge pulse between the familiar and the new. 

This morning she posted a poem on her Facebook page that moved me.  The poem is not only about that delicious in-between space; it's about all that preceded it.  Life is always in flux.  The edge is actually an illusion because we are always moving and changing.  We think an earthquake happens suddenly but the ground is always shifting at subterranean levels.

"I want to stand as close to the edge as I can without going over.  Out on the edge  

 you see all the kinds of things you can't see from the center."  - Kurt Vonnegut

It's often poignant, scary and exhilarating when we are aware that we are on the edge. 

Over there, we think, is the unknown. 

But that is true every moment.  The future is always the unknown.  So it's the awareness of the edge that highlights these truths about life:

Change is constant.

New beginnings are always available to us.

For a New Beginning

In out-of-the-way places of the heart,
Where your thoughts never think to wander,
This beginning has been quietly forming,
Waiting until you were ready to emerge.

For a long time it has watched your desire,
Feeling the emptiness growing inside you,
Noticing how you willed yourself on,
Still unable to leave what you had outgrown.

It watched you play with the seduction of safety
And the gray promises that sameness whispered,
Heard the waves of turmoil rise and relent,
Wondered would you always live like this.

Then the delight, when your courage kindled,
And out you stepped onto new ground,
Your eyes young again with energy and dream,
A path of plenitude opening before you.

Though your destination is not yet clear
You can trust the promise of this opening;
Unfurl yourself into the grace of beginning
That is at one with your life's desire.

Awaken your spirit to adventure;
Hold nothing back, learn to find ease in risk;
Soon you will be home in a new rhythm,
For your soul senses the world that awaits you.

~ John O'Donohue

"It is at the edge of a petal that love waits." William Carlos Williams