Tumoulin Girl

Different Feeling

About a month ago I pulled my many finished and some only half-full journals off my shelf and read through them. Some things I wrote made me cringe; others gave me sweet memories accompanied by giggles; and I'm sure I cried at times. But one thing that I remember the strongest is this first paragraph I wrote in a journal I began on the 2nd of October, '02:

"It's a different feeling writing in a new journal. When I wrote in my last journal it was like I was adding to every burden and memory I'd written of beforehand. Whether it was good or bad, those incidents strengthened their hold on me. Now that I've closed that journal and placed it on the shelf it's as if I've closed a file. If and when I want to I can go open that file and pull out the parts to look at that I want. But otherwise I can leave the draw put away, leave it there and move beyond the grasp of those reminders."
I feel exactly like that now--with the New Year just begun. I feel as if I've cut off the hold that all the pain and despair of last year had on me and closed it away in a file. I feel lighter. Free-er. As if I'm standing on a mountain top and there's the sweet breath of wild wind dancing through my hair, whispering to me the many wishes and wonders and untainted hopes of a new year. I can't run laughing with the wind--that wish of wellness hasn't yet been granted--but one thing I do know and that is that I can laugh nonetheless--letting loose in sacrifice the joy that God sends to me when I have no happiness of my own.

posted by Lydia @ 4:40 pm