Today I turn 49. I was born at 4:25 am, so naturally I woke at that exact time. As the moon still shone bright, I sat in the mermaid woods of the Outer Cape and breathed in the briney possibilities of a new year. What I hope to concretize and what I hope to create.
I thought about what I learned in my 40s, which was how to survive as a lone wolf–strong, strategic, resourceful, fierce, sometimes kind but never, ever nice.
And I thought about what I most want to learn in my 50s–which is how to thrive in beautiful collaborations. For even wolves roam in packs–a lesson that I overlooked until this wondrously challenging last year. It was a year I would not have survived without the clear heart of so many others. My bank broke and you were there. My back broke and you were there. My heart broke and you were there. And because of this unflagging, gorgeously textured support, I did not just end up surviving. I ended up thriving–completing the goal of the girl whose story I was writing. Which is to say: I wrote a whole book, one I pray goes on to foster others as you have fostered me.
Marge Piercy writes:
Attention is love, what we must give
children, mothers, fathers, pets,
our friends, the news, the woes of others.
What we want to change we curse and then
pick up a tool. Bless whatever you can
with eyes and hands and tongue. If you
can’t bless it, get ready to make it new.
Today I celebrate the new. And I also bless you who helped me accomplish what I alone could never.
Thank you for granting me what my past did not: faith in others, not just in myself.
Love and light to all today. it’s what we need if we’re going to put this world back to rights. That’s my birthday sermon and that’s my birthday wish. Take it if you please.