Months before Thanksgiving

Hello everyone.

I'm 29! I'm going to do an update post about my 8 Goals While 28, and share my new goals for this coming year, but first I want to talk about gratitude. Because I've got a lot of it, lately.

I used to think gratitude was a choice. Like, that you would be happier if you consciously chose to be grateful for things. I still think that's true, but I'm also starting to believe that gratitude is something that can happen TO you. It's something that can fill you up, suddenly and unexpectedly. I feel like that's been happening to me a lot lately.

There is so much uncertainty in Jacob and I's lives right now. We live paycheck to paycheck, and every audition and query letter and submission and substitute teaching job is another leap off another cliff. But while I'm leaping, the view is beautiful. Here are just some of the bright and peaceful moments that have been shimmering in my heart lately:

The early morning sunlight on the mountains as I drive to school in the mornings, the clouds slowly burning away as everything grows brighter.

The cast of "Damn Yankees" singing "Happy birthday" to me at rehearsal, accompaniment at all, while I sat feeling so shy but so full, grinning from ear to ear.

Jacob sitting in the living room, playing the songs he writes, singing words that are so beautiful and so true.

Driving through Provo in the rain, listening to romantic music.

Sitting in a Wendy's in Orem, while ideas for a story pour into me, and writing them messily down in a notebook.

Watching a woman at an audition write the word "YES" in capital letters on the top of my audition sheet.

Standing around the piano at Melany's house at 11:30 at night, Marshall's hands flying over the keys, and Daniel and Taylor and I all taking turns singing.

Good talks with new friends while driving to and from rehearsal.

Getting up early one morning and eating cereal on the front porch in the cool morning air, watching the world wake up around me.


Maybe it's because I'm sort of forced into "living in the moment" nowadays, but I just feel more present in my life than I have in a while. I suspect these moments have always been here, and I've just been too busy "planning ahead" to notice them. And life still isn't perfect. It isn't easy. The bathroom roof leaks and public school students always misbehave for the substitute teacher and I had to buy off-brand cheese last week. But I've got all these good and beautiful moments that give me the strength to deal with the not-so-good moments. I'm so so so blessed, and it would simply be unreasonable to go on without acknowledging that fact.

So I'm starting off my 29th year of life by feeling grateful.

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