Wandering

I am going to write a little bit (maybe a lot, it has a tendency to end up that way) about why I am a wanderer, and why I'm not really anymore.

I have always been a wanderer.
One of my mom's favorite stories to tell of me was as a toddler, a one year old who didn't know how to swim.  She lost me briefly at the lake,  long enough for me to run and hide underwater.  Of course she was terrified, but her favorite part of the story wasn't finding me and easing her fears.  It was picking me up out of the water and seeing me laugh instantaneously, because apparently I thought it was quite a funny ruse.

As a kid I spent a lot of time wandering around.  Sometimes my parents encouraged it.  My dad sent me out searching for sticks one day for him to carve.  As an idealist I would say he wanted to encourage me to be artistic or to look at the world with a different perspective.  As a realist I know he just wanted me to stop bothering him for a little while.  It's difficult to use a dremel tool with a child hovering over you.  Either way, I was encouraged.

I was told not to climb trees, walk barefoot, or wander too far.  My parents knew I was going to do those things anyway.  They didn't say much when I kept tadpoles and frogs caught from the pond, and incidentally killed many.  All I knew was Mom was not keen on the smell and Dad provided Pringle cans for burial ceremonies.

Of course I didn't always wander to the best places or make good decisions.  Those stories are not as fun to tell.  Some people discouraged me or wanted me to change.  Some accepted me if I was different, even if they didn't want to. (Mrs. Nadeau who politely answered my question about why the roots of her hair were very white but the rest was black.)

My parents just let me be as I was, wherever I was.  I don't know if they realized the impact of this.  If my dad does, I hope he also realizes that it eventually brought me to a good place that makes me feel so fortunate at the age of only 24.

These thoughts came to me when I found myself in church a while back, truly wanting to be there for the first time.

My thoughts now are focused on the places and people who support me, who don't want to see me wander.  When I was younger I wandered not just because I could, but because I wanted to run away from a lot of things.

I have amazing friends and people in my life whom I never would have found if I wasn't allowed to run and sometimes hide.  I wouldn't have places where I feel I belong, if I hadn't first found the places where I didn't. I wouldn't want to teach or help children, do everything possible to make their lives better, if there weren't people who did that for me.

Thoughts of Late

Sometimes I don't write much, or think much for that matter.  Other times thoughts pile up.  There is so much I could say, but I'm going to stick to the relatively fun and interesting things.

Lunch with people from church today was good.  I have good friends and I know good people.  I am fortunate.  I also have a good but distracting cat.  Monster CatBeast keeps walking in the room and staring at me for a few seconds, walks out, then comes back.  I don't know why.

Back to lunch.  I realized that much of the reason I am sad about the postal service's slow decline is due to the movie The Postman.  According to books, movies and TV; civilized society and the government will come to an end.  We will need a way to reunite the people.

Support your local post office.  You can send people adorable Christmas cards like this one: