I can’t believe August has flown by so quickly?! It felt like a blink. Summer is slipping away, attaching itself to this smoke that is slowly moving up and out of the valley I live in. Dark and thick, looming around everything in a dry haze. For the past couple of weeks the smoke from the fire in Yosemite has been trapped over our city, incubating us like a bird plopped right on top of her eggs, keeping them still and warm for hatching. When the smoke clears it seems we will be breaking through into a new season.

I like that. It feels like a rebirth.

Life seems like that, depending on which way you look at it. Either a dozen little deaths everyday or a constant chance for new birth and life. I think thats the way God designed it. For us to see his forgiving and restoring nature in everything around us.
When I’m feeling hopeful it feels new, like anything could happen. I wait with anticipation and excitement. I see the fingerprints of miracles on everything. My days are wrapped with a warm blanket of appreciation. I take a deep breath and really feel it swarm into the depths of my lungs and fill me up. A deep and gratifying sense of being alive.

Right now. In this moment. I am here.

I feel my body. I make myself aware of it. There is some soreness. There is a tightness in my back. My headache from this dang smoke has dulled but is still lingering. There is the familiar heaviness, but I don’t care because I’m not defeated.
I’m not dead. I’m living and alert.
The damage has not been done to this day yet and I feel sober minded.
Ready to tackle what lies ahead, today and in the season to come.

Some days when I wake up and sit to write I feel uninspired. I feel empty and am not sure what to write. Then I remind myself that it doesn’t matter. I’m not performing. I’m writing for myself. For the clearing of my mind and heart. To organize and arrange my thoughts and prayers, in the hopes of growing and moving forward. If you’re reading this, I am so honored to have you along for the ride. It’s nice to know I’m not alone and that in some small way I have been used to inspire someone else.

Sometimes I guess we just have to see beyond the smoke and know that even if they aren’t showing through, blue skies are on the way.