If You Fall...

I have been somewhat remiss, possibly even lazy, about many things lately. But since it is coming down to the wire for me to share anything more in 2012, I offer a single metaphor.  I credit Meredith Vieira's  recent TV Guide interview wherein she recounted her experience in a Broadway production of "The Lion King."  She recounted some advice given in the event she had a problem as one of the bird women in the "Circle of Life" number: "If you fall, don't get up. Just lie there and wait until the ambulance comes." 

What an inspirational metaphor!  

I do find it hilariously applicable in a literal way when I ponder my prospects for successful cross-country skiing.  I have only minimal experience in this sport, and since I am much older than my old skiis, and eons older than the boots I bought a few years ago, getting upright after falling does present quite a challenge. It's not only because the barely-broken-in-boots don't release from the skiis very easily, but my bones and body are less than lithe (if they ever were). Add the MN winter temperatures and you grasp that I might indeed  perish from the cold before an ambulance crew could find me!  

But metaphorically, there are many applications that occur to me. Some, but not all applications, are admirable.  Obviously, one has to recognize when passivity is virtue.  One has to discern between futile efforts at change, and change that is actually possible.  This can be even harder than skilled cross-country skiing! Nevertheless, whether one figures it out or not, it seems to me one has to forge ahead and, somewhere in the process, it will become clear when to just lie there and wait.  

Probably no one outside my own skin will ever know what fears cut into me most deeply, and sometimes I, too, am slow to see them.  And then there's the fact that terrors can survive even while lying there waiting, feeling  alone  even as I hear the sirens and see the flashing lights.  It can be a rather surreal sensation, and deeply spiritual.  

Going into a New Year, like any adventure, is exciting. The possibilities ahead are imagined and unimaginable.  I certainly hope for health, security, safety and sanity, resilience, steadfast faith, hope and belief in the triumph of goodness, love and peace. And I try to stay mindful of the many real blessings I've received, praying they will ever shrink the obstacles obstructing my path, allowing me to lean forward and happily move on.  

And this is the prayer I make for everyone else, near and far, in 2013 and beyond. (I might make one exception, albeit a political one, but only because I cannot stomach the subversive, self-serving "elements" in congress!  Forgiving their evils does come hard... )

MN State Veteran's Cemetery, Camp Ripley