DEFINING MOMENTS

A liar I am not.  As I pulled out of our neighorhood this one last time, a wave of nausea washed over me. 

This is it.

We’re really doing it.
No turning back now.

Joe had stayed behind to finish loading the moving truck.  It was me, the kids, the not so friendly voice of the GPS and a just-in-case road atlas tucked between the passenger seat and the console.  We wouldn’t be seeing him until we hit Charleston a week or more later.  What in the hell had I been thinking?  Me?  Little ole’ ME solely responsible for getting us from Iowa to South Carolina in one piece? 

And did I mention that I was embarking on this deathwish with no cell phone?  Another moment of sheer genius on my part, yes.

That was a snapshot of us, Charlie, Lola, Henry and me on July 1, 2011.  The first leg of the trip would take us to Cincinnati to my dad's house, his perfectly manicured lawn rolled out for us like a red carpet.  The drive was surprisingly uneventful, almost easy, if you don’t count the bicycle rack falling off of the back of the minivan at 70mph.

 “Hey, Mama.”

“Yeah, buddy?  What’s up?  Doin’ okay?”

“Yeah.”

“Whatcha’ need?”

“Uhm…nothin’.  But why are the bikes hangin’ down like that?”

But everybody needs a good roadtrip story, don’t they?  We stayed in Cininnati the better part of a week – just long enough to wipe out completely my dad and his wife – before we got back in the car and attempted the final leg of the trip to reunite with Joe and Luna.

We said adios to Des Moines nearly two weeks ago and though it’s been exciting, I gotta be honest when I say that there’s a part of me that’s scared shitless.  I feel something like a refugee right now; no home to call my own, just drifting along looking for a soft spot to land.  We’ve got a little more than a week left Stateside before we make this giant leap.  And this is by far the craziest thing I’ve ever done in my life, well if you don’t count that time I eloped or that time I shaved my head or that time stayed the night alone in a brothel…

So there’s been a few defining moments as we’ll call them.  The point is, without any of those moments I wouldn’t be who I am today.  Life is meant to be lived.  You’ll never know how great the water is until you throw yourself in, even if it is headfirst.  So go on now, get your butt off the internet and go do something you’ve never, ever done before. 

Go ahead, I dare you.

LIVE

YOUR

LIFE.