What 2008 was, and what 2009 will hopefully be

Many people that I have spoken to during the past few weeks express that 2008 was a hard year for them. It certainly was a hard year for me. The funny part about hard times during your life, is that no matter how hard that time was, somehow your mind will filter and forget to it's best ability, and often something much better emerges from that memory. Even though you know deep inside that the pain was real, and true, and not to be repeated, somehow your mind changes how you remember that event. With each year that memory becomes softer and harder, and softer again.

2008 was full of challenges, yet Martin and I moved ahead more during this past year than any other. We began this year with so much to fix, so much to figure out. It seemed impossible to fix what needed fixing. There was so much that we did not understand, that we didn't even know where to start in understanding. Before anything got better, it seemed to get worse. Our minds, our senses, even our bodies were stressed, and there seemed to be no end to the path that we were on. Now, today, in hindsight, I see the path as clear as daylight. I see that one obstacle had to be cleared in order for us to move onto the next. One problem had to be understood in order to find it's solution, which only lead to another seemingly more complicated problem. Today I see 2008 as the beginning of something so wonderful that I would not have it happen in any other way. But I remember some of those moments clearly. Those dark moments of sadness and guilt. Pity and anger. Resentment and confusion. Yet somehow, as my mind plays tricks on me, it is only now that I see all those little pieces coming together and forming the beginning of quite an uplifting story. So, as I look back now, I would not have it happen in any other way. Not the past 12 months. Not the past 29 years. But I do, once in a while, remember some of those moments and feel a stillness come over me. A stillness of something so real that it brings on the pain of that long gone, and long-ago lived second.

This is what I take away from this, as I remember some of the sadness of my past. The knowledge that every part of my life, every pain, is meant to be in order to fill in the blanks to create the whole story. The whole picture. The whole dream. The whole now. Sometimes, this leads me to conclude that fearing what is ahead is completely irrational. Everything is going to turn out as it should. It will cost us only that which it should. Only that which will be necessary to get exactly where we are going, where we are meant to end up.

I think this is something that I will want to tell my children. Since their story started before they were even born. In fact, we can take their story back many decades. As far as we want to tell it. I think about the struggles that my mom and dad went through in raising a chronically sick child. The challenges that they faced, and the grace that beat the odds. My mom and dad got me through more than just the physical part of CF, but also the emotional part, which is often at par with the physical. But as my mind plays tricks on me again, I remember the lessons that I was to learn during those times. I remember feeling strong when I was weak, I remember understanding that my life may have been limited, but I was so lucky to still and always have options in that life. That's when my child's story began, when I learned at a very young age that I had options. For every one limitation, I had several options on how to overcome it. Those were, and still are very good odds. Hence, that is why I never thought that I would not have kids, there was always hope embedded in those options. Options that I learned about before there was a baby to be born, before there was a husband, or a wedding, or those wonderful moments that begun it all.

So, as one year came to an end, and another one began, I think of the time I wasted on worry and sorrow in the year that passed. I vow, in 2009, to think about the moment in which I am in, and the options that I have, and the lessons that are to be learned. Lessons which allow me to move forward into the future that is only a factor of that which just took place. Nothing else matters, and nothing is less perfect than the beauty of now.