How It Is

"When something ends, let it," says Steve Ross.  "It is nature of this world."

Sometimes it's easy to forget that change is constant.  But when you're on the edge of major change like we are, you can't forget it.

In 55 days our movers will haul away all of our stuff to long-term storage.  That night, we will hop on a plane for L.A.  Two days later, we're off to Australia--the starting point of our world-wide adventure.

I love Santa Cruz.  And knowing we are leaving has brought out an extra sweetness to this place.  I focus more intently on the waves at our beach.  I notice how the egrets at the shoreline hop around in a way that's both awkward and elegant.  I find myself gazing at the redwood walls of our home as though to memorize their texture.

As I sit here writing, I revel in the smell of roasting vegetables and steak that Dave is cooking for dinner, and I feel in my bones the pleasure of our evening rituals.  I've always loved our Tempurpedic mattress, but as I snuggle in each night now, I feel like I'm being tucked into a royal bed.

Soon, our life will radically change.  This moment feels like good practice for letting things end.  For not resisting the nature of life.

But of course it's not practice.  It's living.  No one really knows the future--be that next year, tomorrow, or the next minute.  So this hyper-awareness of impermanence is actually an acceptance of reality.  An acceptance that time is finite.  And in that acceptance, I feel more appreciation of this moment than ever.