Lake McDonald, MT Thanksgiving
“WHAT IS WRONG?”
I asked myself as I looked in the mirror. I was all set to go to outdoor Yoga, but I was feeling wonky and looked even worse. I took a short hike. It didn’t help. I cancelled Yoga. Am I having a mini-stroke, vital organ failure? (Hypochondriacs don’t mess around with the small stuff.) What is up?
I finally remembered when I’d seen that look on my face before. I was having an anxiety attack. It’s amazing how a human can plow along until Life says, “Halt, we need to stop and debrief.”
So I did.
I stopped everything and put on some music of the heart. I took a soothing lavender bath with humidified air of the same scent and reviewed this year of my life, reflecting on it all.
I REALIZED THAT THIS YEAR HAS BEEN off the charts crazy, unlike any year I have ever experienced and in spades. My heart was breaking for the kiddos, their schools and teacher’s challenges; the jobs and business’s struggling or lost, sickness and even death.
These things had lodged in my heart; I felt them without even recognizing it.
I came to grips with the fact that all these things, the pain, grief, disappointments and heartaches, must be given time to be deeply considered and processed; it’s not in their nature to be simply brushed aside.
The realization of this being the first ever Holiday Season the Leichtfuss Clan will not gather together hit me square between the eyes. I cried which I don’t do often enough. This is the stuff of the “new reality” I am, we all, are trying to adjust to.
I took inventory. OK, I can’t see all my family and friends, but I have them. They may not be in the room with me, but I can connect with them.
I had a huge “Ah Ha” moment. It was time to create a different kind of Holiday Season for 2020 and let go of what likely would not be. I needed to go with it and see where it would take me.
I began by calling an old friend that just lost his wife, another whose adult child is struggling, then a sibling that had also just lost his wife. Mostly I listened. I could tell it was important, it met a deep need of connection.
Today I began living this very new and exceptionally different Holiday Season.
Amidst this chaos of crazy, the anxiety I had not realized was in me left. It won’t be the usual Holiday Season, but it will be another new adventure. And though different, I’m glad to have one more.
HAPPY THANKSGIVING
