all the art of living

I'm beginning to believe there might be nothing better than an empty kitchen sink and newly-shined floorboards. With every window open to the winter-spring air, my little apartment positively breathes new life. It has every feeling of starting over, a rather nice reflection of how I'm feeling myself this weekend. Everything seems new, full, moving forward. That could be due entirely, of course, to the promise of March and the coming Spring, but every year it is the same: come the last of February, I feel new hope. New independence. Something in me a little stronger, a little more confident.

The news of Wales, however, completely threw that feeling. With Italy a definite, I didn't imagine they'd still want me in Cardiff, too. So I'd planned on a summer at home with the family, last moments with friends, and an August departure. Thursday's email scrapped that plan, fast. Suddenly I'm looking at staying for Spring semester, choosing the two classes I'll need to carry to keep my scholarship, rearranging housing plans, trying to wrap my head around not one, but two semesters abroad. For two full days now I've been in a bit of a panic, trying to put all these pieces back together. For two full days now, I've been living in fear.

{Brief pause while my dad quotes Strictly Ballroom (8:15 mark'll do it)}

Okay, so maybe that's a bit dramatic, but it seems most accurate to me. Not fear as in terrified; fear as in unsettled, unsure. Most ridiculously, it has nothing to do with these new adventures, the foreign languages and challenges ahead. That I'm looking forward to with bright eyes and happy heart. No, I'm worrying over what I'm leaving behind. It's one of my most major flaws: the inability to Let Go.

I can hardly stand it. I mean, I know how stupid my worrying is. I know everything will work out, that I'm being overly dramatic and sentimental. The Writing Fellows I love will let me know what Grad school they decide on, and Room 118 is always open. A. will keep me updated and she wouldn't dare fall completely in love without me to see it. Jacq will write me from her mission and I'll see that joy in her wide-eyed writing. And I don't even want to be a Lab Assistant when I get home, nor do I want to live in #215 again. So why all this worrying? Why do I do this to myself? Why do I ruin a perfectly lovely prospect with such unfounded anxieties?

I don't know.

But while I'm not exactly sure how to fix it entirely, I do know how to move past it. It's been said a million times over, but it's true: live in the present. Live the now. I am today. Which isn't to say forget the future---or even the past---but to live this moment as a testament to your best past and as preparation for your best future. The days I manage to live this truth are the days I feel that wide-open-spaces possibility, that hope and independence I so associate with the Spring season. When you live like this, every day is a new one, ready to fill right up to the top. And the most absolute best part of this Way? It's not about you anymore. It's about Giving Back, because you realise that's what the Present means. It's whatever you choose all wrapped up and beautiful, ready for the giving.

So now it's merely a matter of listening to myself. Remembering those fleeting times I managed to Let Go and strive to live them. Easier said than done, of course, but there's always something to be had for trying.