A Fresh Start

I’m reading friends' posts on Facebook about being ready for 2013 to be over and that they are ready for a fresh start in 2014. Aren’t we all?! I like how at the end of each year we have hopes of getting a ‘reset’ option, a chance to push a button and with the dropping of the shiny ball in NYC we get to start again down a new path. 

As I strolled along the sunny California seashore over the Christmas holiday, I realized how much I need a fresh start. This year has been a year of disappointment, disillusionment and discouragement for me, with losing a job I loved, a church I loved, dear friends I loved, a boyfriend I loved, and financial security (I loved?! well, I didn’t hate it!). The first few months of 2013 felt like swimming to keep my head above water in churning, turbulent ocean which by mid-June dumped me in the sand like a broken shell. There I lay, all summer, on that lonely beach, thinking someone, something would scoop me up like a prized treasure as a beachcomber does when discovering a beautiful seashell. Instead, the last half of the year came and it felt as though the sea had disappeared and in its place was a hot, dry desert, barren of the refreshing waters of life I so enjoy. And I have been wandering. My mouth is dry and my feet burning and I am tired. Tired, of walking, walking, walking and getting nowhere, not finding that oasis I so long for. And I know you have been feeling the same way because though I may seem like a Facebook stalker, I really do read your posts.

What I noticed at the beach this week is that at the end each day, as the sun sinks low on the horizon, the hot, tired sand is littered with footsteps of all shapes and sizes, going all directions, people footprints and dog footprints and shoe footprints and bare feet footprints. Leftover sand castles half-washed away by a wave. Broken shells. Seaweed strewn across discarded pieces of driftwood. A forgotten sandal half-buried in the sand. It’s like a visual story that tells the tales of the day’s happenings at that beach, the highs and lows, the ups and downs, the wins and losses. We’ve been watching the tv series Lost and my biggest take-away from it is that each of us have a colorful back story and how we spend most of our life trying to hide it from others. But the beach tells all. You can’t take a step there without it leaving its trail.

We got up early on Christmas morning and walked along the gentle surf. The sun was new and the clean, clear light cast its first rays across the sparkling waters, and I was delighted by the transformation that had taken place in the night. The once-littered sand had been washed smooth by the waves of the high tide and yesterday was gone, eagerly awaiting today’s adventures to leave their mark. I felt alive and giddy and full of hope and wonder for what the new day would bring. I found a tiny perfect sand dollar in the sand. It’s beautiful how each morning the beach gets a reset button. A fresh start.

We arrived home two nights ago after a long, tiring car ride. The kids left to go to their dad’s, and as I sat here alone in my little apartment, I felt the familiar dark tug of this year’s disappointments, disillusionment and discouragement pulling at my sun-kissed, refreshed heart. But I don’t want to go back there. I don’t want to look at last year’s littered sand any longer. My resolution this year is to wake in the morning and appreciate how last night's waves washed yesterday away. And to revel in the beauty of the unknown that each new day holds. And I hope to see your footprints making a new path alongside mine. Happy New Year!