Well, I certainly have been burning the midnight oil lately.  In fact, I’ve been burning it enough to see the dawn.  This morning, as I watched another glorious sunrise, I pondered what I would write about today.  And I decided I would write about new beginnings.

So often, when we fall down on things we feel we should do or want to do (like, ahem, writing a blog) we get embarrassed.  We aren’t sure what to say.  We shuffle our feet.  And fight with the urge to apologize.

Sometimes this embarrassment is so acute, we’re tempted to throw in the towel and say the heck with it.  Just give it up.  Just walk away.

But I think that’s a shame.  Because life gives us so many opportunities for new beginnings.  If there are an infinite number of points on any line, it stands to reason that there are an infinite number of places where we can begin as well as end.  There are an unlimited number of places where we can stumble and fall.  But directly adjacent to those places are other places where we can get up again. Every sunrise is a new beginning.  Every breath, every heartbeat is a renewal of who and what we are.

I think about the many, many times I’ve tried to change things.  I’ve tried to introduce the world to the completely renovated, whole-new me.  And it’s true.  Every time I meet the world I am a new me.  I think where I get into trouble is when I believe the new me will stay exactly as I presented it on the day I designated as “whole new me” day.  But the truth is that there is no momentary me that I can crystallize in amber as the one acceptable me from which my future I may not deviate.  Yes, I’m a whole new me until I’m a whole new me again, and again and again.  Hopefully, I’m learning.  Hopefully I’m getting stronger.  But long ago, I learned to see my life and my progress as a curving, squiggly, messy line that sometimes is camera ready and sometimes is not so much so.

I’m waxing philosophical.  (Extreme sleep deprivation does that to me.)  But I’m also saying, here I am.  Whoops, sorry if you thought I had everything together.  Yeah, here I am making some of the same mistakes I made before, ‘cuz I’m, you know, human and stuff.  I’m so bummed if you sought a blog post from me and it wasn’t there.  But let’s pick up where we left off.  Let’s reconnect and laugh it off.  Let’s begin again.

Love,

Jeanette DePatie (AKA The Fat Chick)