Had a Bad Day?

by Tracey Flower


I recently had a terrible horrible no good very bad day.

(That right there is a shout-out to the children’s book “Alexander and the Terrible Horrible No Good Very Bad Day” by Judith Viorst, still LOVE IT).

It was a bad evening that sank into a bad night and catapulted me into a really bad day the next morning.

It went like this: Friday evening the boy I like rejected me (boo). I sulked on the couch all evening while it rained and stormed outside (for real, it was like a freaking Hemingway novel). I woke up Saturday morning and resolved to not focus on boys at all at the moment and instead focus on my fabulous new job as a receptionist and marketing assistant at a busy local salon. Then I got to work and by noon, following the most bizarre sequence of events I’ve ever witnessed in a workplace (another story for another time my friends), my fabulous new job came to a screeching slamming-on-the-breaks end. After only two weeks.

In the wake of the shocking end of my fabulous new job came the tidal wave of realization that my finances are a mess, that I am, in fact, broke and the thing I was counting on to revive my bank account was now nonexistent. Whew.

You know the "Friend’s" theme song (it’s by The Rembrandt’s)? The part that goes, Your job’s a joke/You’re broke/Your love life’s DOA? It was like that.

I felt blue.

But I don’t want to discuss the details of that lousy day as much as I want to talk about how I deal when things are crap.

First things first, I let myself feel really badly. I even go ahead and feel sorry for myself. I think there is something very healing in taking the time to notice and just sit with how I feel. The way I see it, even if I ignore my bad feelings, they’re still going to be there and it’s going to be uncomfortable either way, so I minus well acknowledge them and sit out the worst of it on my couch watching reruns of “Keeping up with the Kardashian’s” until that becomes more painful than whatever’s bugging me.

In the yoga classes I attend the instructors often encourage this method of sitting with it when we find ourselves holding a particularly challenging pose for longer than feels comfortable.

You’re probably feeling something in your legs right now, but that’s OK. That’s just discomfort, it’s just a little pain, just breathe and stay with it. 

The point is it’s only one moment. It’s temporary. And there is always something to be gained by staying; it could be it stronger muscles, looser hips or relieving back pain.

I think the same is true when it comes to emotional pain. There is always something to be gained by staying with it even though it hurts.

And what’s the alternative to feeling that pain? Numbness? Paralysis? Death? Feeling pain is part of being healthy and alive, and I for one am thrilled to be alive, and thrilled to experience everything that goes along with that, even if it hurts sometimes.

I also seek out friends and family members and talk about what happened and how it’s making me feel. Talking about what’s bothering me helps me. Period. And I am forever grateful to all the listening ears in my life. I would be lost without you.

And during it all I eat a bunch of junk (like a bag of the most offensive flavored Doritos you can imagine and lots of chocolate ice cream), listen to some sad songs and hide under a blanket (and watch “Teen Mom” reruns when I’ve exhausted all my Kardashian options) until I feel prepared to face the world again.

Eventually I shake off the blanket, go outside and move on.

That doesn’t always mean I feel totally better; whatever has made me feel sad, angry or disappointed will usually stick with me for a little bit, but after all that feeling sorry for myself I find a little perspective and realize the best way to banish those leftover emotions is to charge forward and check out new job listings, pick up extra shifts at the golf course, make a new budget plan, and, just maybe, meet Someone New.

As I move on I write. I go to yoga. I drink wine and spend time with my girlfriends.

I find my way back to Happy.


Life is crazy, wonderful, heartbreaking, challenging and beautiful. Throughout the journey we take chances and sometimes find the result isn’t what we hoped it would be. Hearts get broken. Pride gets wounded. Self esteem falls. My terrible horrible no good very bad day wasn’t the worst one I’ve ever had, and there will be better and worse days to come and that’s OK with me.

How do you cope when life leaves you feeling a bit blue?

And a Little Giving

by Tracey Flower
Dear Lovely Loyal Reader: I intended to write and share this post weeks ago but due to a hectic holiday schedule and lack of Internet access I wasn’t able to get around to it until now. My apologies.


No more lives torn apart, that wars would never start, and time would heal our hearts. And everyone would have a friend, and right would always win, and love would never end. This is my grown-up Christmas list. 
~ from the Christmas song My Grown-up Christmas List

I recently read the book A Thousand Sisters by Lisa Shannon. The book is about the author’s fundraising efforts to support women in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and her subsequent travels there. Congo is a place she feels compelled to learn more about and lend aid to after she learns about the war and devastation happening there on an episode of Oprah. The book’s subtitle is My Journey into the Worst Place on Earth to be a Woman and her account is just that. The book chronicles tale after heartbreaking tale about the women living in this violence-ridden chunk of the world. In one village it was reported that at least 90 percent of the women living there had been raped. 90 percent. While most of the stories Shannon shares are heartbreaking (and difficult to read at times because they are so incredibly cruel and inhuman) this statistic has stuck with me, and it is because of this statistic that I feel compelled to do something.

(Photo Credit)

I have a lot of really great memories surrounding the holiday season, particularly Christmas (yep many of them of the warm giggly variety that contributed to my blissfully happy childhood). I loved the house all decorated, all warm and glowy. I loved making cookies with Mom and listening to Amy Grant’s Home for Christmas album. I loved a snowy white Christmas day and going to Grandma’s house. And, of course, I loved the presents—the anticipation, the unveiling, the thrill of getting exactly what I wanted. But even with a mother who loves gift giving (and often went overboard when it came to buying for her four wonderful children) it was stressed to me at a young age that there was something more to the season than the material stuff.

My siblings and I stopped giving gifts to each other (because what the heck do you get for your little brother?) and our parents years ago and instead donate to a charity of our choice for Christmas. My mom who, as I mentioned, loves gift giving has continued to spoil us over the years. She asked me what I wanted for Christmas this year (in addition to my stocking stuffers, you can’t not have stocking stuffers!) and, since I can’t help but want to balance out my happiness (and my thankfulness) with a little giving, and because that statistic (90 percent) keeps haunting me—anytime I walk home in the dark or forget to lock my door at night or am alone in a dodgy public restroom I’m reminded of the fact that in Congo women can’t even walk to get food or clean water for their children without being raped, and that I can do all those perhaps risky things without ever experiencing such a horror—I asked for money to help me adopt a Congolese sister.

Women for Women International is the organization that is going to make this possible, and the organization Lisa Shannon works with to aid women in Congo. Their mission (as stated on their website) is to provide women survivors of war, civil strife and other conflicts with the tools and resources to move from crisis and poverty to stability and self-sufficiency, thereby promoting viable civil societies. We're changing the world one woman at a time.

Women for Women offers the opportunity to enroll in a year-long program, through which my financial contributions will aid a woman in my country of choice (Congo). I have yet to enroll so I’m not totally clear on the details yet but it’s a little like adopting a starving bloated belly baby in Africa, a program through which I’ll receive photos of and exchange letters with this woman, my “sister.”

I don’t think this act will change the world. I don’t even know to what extent it will change this woman’s life, if at all. I’m not Mother Theresa and I have no intention of being like her (or desire to be like her for that matter). I’m no saint and I certainly like having nice things and pampering myself. I just think it’s important to balance all that stuff out with a little giving, that and stories about such violence and devastation break my heart and I can’t read about it and not do something.

This world is a big beautiful place and it is full of people, and whether we live here or there, we are all united by the fact that we are human. I’m pretty sure we’re never going to survive unless we can rely on each other to extend a helping hand and a little compassion from time to time. And, while Christmas (or Hanukkah or your birthday or any other gift-giving occasion) is a good time to do so because it’s likely you’re already putting away, or receiving, a little extra spare change, I want to encourage you to do what it is you can to lend some help next time a story breaks, or touches, your heart any time of the year. I encourage you to do what you can with what you have and, just maybe, all us humans can make this world an even more beautiful place together.


Stay tuned for updates on my Congolese sister and please let me know what stories, what charities, are near and dear to your heart.

On Soul Mates and Being Broken

by Tracey Flower

“Well, I like the word soul. I like the word mate. Other than that you got me.” ~Sex and the City’s Mr. Big on soul mates

I’ve been thinking a lot about the phrase “soul mates” lately. In fact this post has been in the drafting stages for several months now, revised over and over while I try to figure out what this term means to me. It’s been swirling and tumbling around in my head with other equally weighty and abstract concepts like fate and destiny. I’m not totally sure why it’s so important to me to define this phrase (blame it on trying to make sense of my heartache) but I think I’m slowly starting to figure it out (blame it on the six months of distance I now have from the day my heart was broken).

(Photo Credit)

I have to start by telling you I don’t believe there is one and only one person out there for everyone; I don’t believe in the idea of The One. I always sort of suspected I felt this way but it’s such a happy little idea and I’ve certainly found myself swept up in the romance of it from time to time but after having friend after well-meaning friend tell me The Guy (who broke my heart) just wasn’t The One I got fed up.

I believe in love. I believe in great love. I believe in marriage and that it can and does last forever (thank you to my grandparents and parents for providing me with excellent examples of this). I also believe in timing and other crazy twisted upside down circumstances that sometimes lead to the end of great love, love that in a different time or place, under different circumstances, would have most certainly lasted forever. I believe that you just don’t get to spend forever with everyone you love and that you can truly madly deeply love someone forever and not spend forever with that person (and still have oodles of love left for the someone you are spending forever with).

And as far as soul mates go, I do think they exist, just not in the traditional sense (as The One).

I think The Guy was my soul mate. Yes I did think I was going to marry him (in fact I was sure of it until the moment he told me, once and for all, that I wasn’t), but that’s not why he was my soul mate. I believe I was meant (ok, destined) to meet him, I believe he was always supposed to come into my life and that, all along, I was going to fall in love with him. And I believe it was always going to, one way or another, end tragically.

There’s a passage in the book Eat, Pray, Love (by Elizabeth Gilbert) that helped me come to this conclusion. It goes like this:

People think a soul mate is your perfect fit, and that’s what everyone wants. But a true soul mate is a mirror, the person who shows you everything that’s holding you back, the person who brings you to your own attention so you can change your life. A true soul mate is probably the most important person you’ll ever meet, because they tear down your walls and smack you awake. But to live with a soul mate forever? Nah. Too painful. Soul mates, they come into your life just to reveal another layer of yourself to you, and then they leave.

BINGO.

When The Guy ended our relationship forever (just hours before I was supposed to get on a plane bound for Sydney to live with him) it crushed me and turned my world upside down. It brought me to my knees, hell it sucked the wind out of me and had me curled up breathless on the floor. I’ve never been so broken in my life.

Once I caught my breath I realized that the thing I thought had certainly killed me, in fact, hadn’t. I slowly lifted myself off the floor and started moving forward again. Since then I have tripped, stumbled and fallen down again. But six months have gone by and I’m still alive. I hate the pain this has brought to my life, I hate how exhausting it is and that it’s not quite gone yet. But I can’t deny that I’ve grown. I can’t deny that I’ve changed or that I’m quite sure I’m becoming someone, that I have become someone, I never would be had I not met, fallen in love with and been so very broken by The Guy.

And that’s the point. Just as muscle has to be broken down by strength training in order to grow stronger, sometimes we must be torn and cracked open emotionally and mentally so we can strengthen those parts of ourselves.  We better ourselves during life's rough patches, we need these tough times to survive and thrive just as our muscles need exercise to do the same.

Some people come into our lives, shake us up, break us down and then, as my friend Neil would say, disappear into the night like a winter wind. I believe these people are our soul mates.

I also believe there are more dimensions and definitions to this weighty phrase and I’ll most certainly continue to muddle through and explore them here. In the meantime what do you think about soul mates?

On Goals, Forgiveness, and Turning 28

by Tracey Flower

“Maybe our mistakes are what make our fate. Without them what would shape our lives? Perhaps if we never veered off course we wouldn’t fall in love or have babies or be who we are. After all seasons change. So do cities. People come into you life and people go. But it’s comforting to know the ones you love are always in your heart and, if you’re very lucky, a plane ride away.” ~The ever-wise, albeit fictional, Carrie Bradshaw (“Sex and the City”)


Many folks take the start of a new calendar year as an opportunity for fresh starts and change. Personally I think it’s more appropriate to make resolutions on my birthday. It feels more natural to take stock of my life that time of year, to review lessons learned in the past year, and to make a few goals for the year ahead.

A year ago last week (my birthday was Tuesday) I turned 27 and decided I was going to make the year all about me (The Year of Flower I called it in my journal and aloud to a select group of friends). I don’t have any dependents, not even a dog or a goldfish, to rely on me; my life in general is already pretty much all about Tracey, but for most of my adult life (aka my life since college) I have been in some form of a relationship. I moved to Colorado for a boyfriend and shortly after we broke up I started another serious relationship and, as my 27th birthday approached, I started to get the feeling I wasn’t totally making decisions for my life based on what I wanted and needed.

My birthday last year came just days after the guy I was in love with left Vail to move home to Australia. Our relationship over the past few months had been complicated and tumultuous and because I was so invested in, so wrapped up in, him emotionally I found my day-to-day actions and decisions were heavily influenced by him. It seemed like the perfect time, then, when he left and my birthday arrived for me to take charge. 

I made myself a list of goals. First and foremost I was going to get my head straight about that relationship. The first goal I wrote in my journal then was to be “happily single.” We had left things very casual and, although he was on my mind when I wrote that, I was fed up with myself for letting another person inadvertently control my thoughts and decisions to the extent that he had. I also wrote that I wanted to learn to cook, to get fit, to get paid to write, and to travel somewhere new. The Year of Flower was going to be a good one.

The first half of the year, the first third really, went exactly how I had hoped it would (OK except for the cooking part, I’m still working on that one). I will even say it was the happiest, the most content, and the most confident I have been in a long time. The last four months of the year, however, were a complete disaster. Quite honestly they were the worst four months of my life (if you read Flower Blog on a regular basis you know this. If you don’t now’s probably a good time to catch up. Start here). As I approached my 28th birthday last week and mentally reviewed the last year, and checked back in with last year’s goals, I realized I was right smack dab back where I had been a year ago. And that pissed me off.

I got my heart broken. No shattered. No ripped out, stomped on, and shoved back into my chest all achy and torn apart. And for that I was pissed. My anger wasn’t directed at The Guy though; or rather my anger was no longer directed at him (don’t you worry three months ago I was oozing anger toward him). I was pissed off with myself. I was pissed that I let myself, in the year where I was supposed to be taking control, find myself in a position (with a guy who had broken my heart once before) where I could get as hurt as I did. I was pissed that even while I thought I was finding this great balance in my life, while I thought I was being unapologetically selfish and, dare I say it, finding myself, I let my love for this one stupid guy ruin everything. 

My dad told me a few months ago, when I was at my very worst, that even as I struggled to figure out how to forgive The Guy (not because he deserves or even needs my forgiveness but simply because it’s very tiresome to carry around that much anger toward someone for any length of time) that I was also going to have to forgive myself. At the time I had no idea what he meant (the situation wasn’t my fault, I had done nothing wrong). I think I get it now, though.

There’s a line in the book Eat, Pray, Love that goes like this; “To lose balance sometimes for love is part of living a balanced life.” The author tells herself this when she realizes she has fallen in love with a man after a year spent traveling solo, doing some serious soul-searching, and finding her balance. I agree with that, but I would take it a step further and say sometimes you have to become unbalanced for love even if it means risking your heart. Because apparently, OK admittedly, you'll learn some serious lessons about life and yourself. I don’t know if acknowledging that counts as forgiving myself, because to be honest I’m still a little pissed, but I think maybe it’s a start. And with that shaky start I begin a new year.

And Home Again (From Flower Blog Two: Stories From Down Under)

My time in Melbourne has come to an end. I was there just over two weeks but it felt like months. I was going to live and work in Australia initially because someone I loved asked me to go there and because I wanted to be with him. Now that I no longer have that person in my life I know that living and working in Australia is not something I want to do. I also know that I had to go to Australia despite my loss, if only for a short time, so that my loss could become real to me. It was like going to the funeral of the relationship that has just died. I had to go to say good-bye.

Farewell Melbourne. The city from St. Kilda Pier.

When I left Michigan for Melbourne I was in shock. I had been dumped and rejected quite coldly and it was devastating. Everything I had believed to be true was false and everything I had been looking forward to for the past few months was gone. This was, and still is, a lot to take and it makes me feel light and dizzy and wonder if I’m dreaming. And so, I believe my mind went into shock to keep me moving forward, to protect me from pain that might have been too intense to handle right away.

The shock wore off quickly when I got to Melbourne. What I have lost became real to me there and grief set in. I sat in the bedroom I was renting while Melbourne’s winter gloom loomed outside and let my grief make itself known. And I cried. I sobbed and sobbed and I let the grief become part of me. I wandered and explored the city by myself and let all the aspects of my grief appear, the heartache, the loneliness, and the anger. I made the decision to return home almost immediately but I let it twist and turn in my mind for a while to give it time to separate from the grief (because let’s be honest, grief itself doesn’t always make the best decisions). I went to Australia with a sick feeling in my gut and while I have returned with my grief in tow, that sick feeling is gone and I at least feel calm and content that my purpose for being there was fulfilled and home is where I should be right now.

I keep thinking about the insect exhibit in the Melbourne Museum. There is an area dedicated to all the large, ugly, and slightly terrifying spiders that call Australia home. Next to the live tarantulas is a display of one of the largest of these beasts’ old skins. It seems tarantulas have the same habit of shedding their exoskeleton as they grow as snakes. It made me wonder if these creatures are aware of this shedding as it is taking place, if they know how hideous they look when it’s happening and if it hurts at all. I wonder if they know that they are growing and that when they finally lose that old skin they will be changed, they will be larger and stronger.

I feel like a tarantula right now. I have returned home in poor shape. I’ve lost weight and sleep and I have a bad cold. Every time I look in the mirror at the moment I’m shocked to see the person looking back at me. I don’t recognize her, she looks drained, this person, she looks pale and weary and it’s hard to believe this person is me. I look back at photos of myself taken in Moab just weeks ago when I started this blog and I also have a hard time believing the person in those photos is me. I don't feel like her anymore and the truth is I will never be her again. I’m in transition right now and I’m growing, which isn’t always a particularly pretty process and is usually quite painful, but when it’s finished the shell of who I used to be will remain and I will crawl out of it still me but changed and, hopefully, stronger.



This will be my last post on this blog. My time in Australia is done and it’s time to move on to new adventures. I have plenty more stories to tell and thoughts to share, though, so stay tuned.

NOTE: To read about what I learned last time I visited Australia read Breathe.

Why Melbourne? Why Now? (From Flower Blog Two: Stories From Down Under)

Total time it took to get from South Haven, Michigan to Melbourne, Australia (including time spent in airports): approximately 33 hours.

Total extra money spent to get me and my very heavy bags from South Haven, Michigan to Melbourne, Australia (including fees for changing my original flight, booking a flight from Sydney to Melbourne, and excess baggage fees): approximately 600 dollars. (Apparently you can bring your baggage with you to Australia but it will cost you).

Seeing the Sydney Opera House and Harbor Bridge at dawn from the plane: well, not quite priceless, given the hours, dollars, and heartache it took to get me here, but pretty spectacular nonetheless.

Sydney Opera House and Harbor Bridge

It was that moment, in fact, when it first hit me where I was and what I was doing. It was that moment, when the plane turned a little to the left and I strained to see the view out of the tiny airplane window, that this adventure I’m living became real and was no longer just a foggy dream. It was after hours and hours of sitting on a plane in the very back row; after hours of fitful sleep spent still wrestling with the decision I’d made to come to Australia despite my change in plans, I realized I had arrived and, even if it was a decision I was still unsure about, I had no choice but to go through with it. As I followed the masses through customs and the baggage claim, though, the only thought my sleep-deprived brain could manage was, what the hell am I doing here?

I have been here a little over three days now. I’m settled into a cute townhouse in a really cool neighborhood called Richmond. And, yes, I realize describing it as “really cool” sounds a little lame but when I was walking around the other day trying to get a feel for the place, all I could think is how cool it is. There are shops and trains and cafes all within a short walking distance from my house, and for a gal who grew up in a small resort town, went to college in a corn field, and then moved to another small resort town, this kind of neighborhood is, well, just plain cool. I’m excited to be here, I’m excited to be somewhere so new, so cool. Still, though, that thought keeps surfacing, keeps plaguing me; what the hell am I doing here?

I can never decide if I believe in the concepts of fate or destiny. Sometimes I think they’re just ideas dreamed up by the romantics out there and they’re happy little thoughts but not totally realistic. But there are some times, like right now, when I find myself clinging to the hope that they must exist. I still feel like my life isn’t my own at the moment, like the real me is floating over this strange life and the only place I can find footing is in the idea that there must be some reason why I have found myself in this place at this time.

So I’m wondering what do you, my lovely readers, think about the concepts of fate or destiny? Do things really happen for a reason? When your life is turned upside down and sideways and spits you out in a direction you had no intention of going in, is there a reason for it? Or is that just something we tell ourselves to cope with change?

When Plans Change (From Flower Blog Two: Stories From Down Under)

I’m a planner. I’m obsessive about organization and insist on writing everything down. I panic a little when I don’t have a plan. One of the hardest things about being this way is realizing, over and over again, that sometimes the powers that be have no regard for my plans. Really lousy things can happen; you lose your job, someone close to you dies, you love someone and he confesses he no longer loves you. It’s life and it’s not fair and there’s really no way to plan for these things. To do so would be very strange.

My Australia plans have changed before the trip even began. I was supposed to be in Sydney right now, I was supposed to leave early this week and I didn’t. I’m now leaving early next week for Melbourne. If you’re close to me or know someone close to me you know how and why this change happened. Perhaps I’ll share the very personal details of this moment with a wider audience one day. If I did that now the result would be a ranting hurtful tell-all of the very painful events that led me to this point and I don’t want to do that. So if you’re not someone close to me or someone close to someone close to me then, at the moment, these events are none of your business. I will, however, share with you the thoughts I’ve been left with in the wake of everything.

There are certain truths we accept as fact in our lives. Things we plan, things that just are. Then seemingly overnight, sometimes in an instant, they’re gone. We wake up one morning and find the truths we accepted yesterday have vanished and have been replaced with a whole new set. Suddenly life feels strange, not like your own and you don’t really know how to handle it.

I think that’s one of the most difficult aspects of grief. Of course the loss itself hurts. The spot in you that was filled by someone or something is now empty and that is a hollow aching feeling. And even if you find things to temporarily fill that hole, even if you find little ways to cope with that pain through the day, the fact remains that your life is now changed and will never be the same as it was before. Realizing this feels like the wind being knocked out of you and it makes you feel dizzy and wonder if you will ever recognize this strange new life as your own.

I don’t know yet if or when this life I’m suddenly living will feel like my own. All that is pushing me forward at the moment, all that I know to be true about my life right now is that I am, in fact, still alive. I have no choice but to keep moving forward so I don’t miss out on a single moment of this precious, often fleeting, life. I know I must wake up every morning and continue to invest myself into getting to know these new truths so I can eventually make my peace with them.


NOTE: For more of my thoughts on dealing with heartache, read One Sunset at a Time.

Birthday Weather

The weather forecast printed in the “Vail Daily” for tomorrow, September 21, 2009, is bleak. The predicted temperature high is 53 and the low is 29. “Showers by day, mixing with snow at night” is written under a cartoon of a cloudy, rainy sky. Tomorrow is my 27th birthday and it is an appropriate forecast for the day.

My dad has told me that September 21, 1982 was a cold and rainy day. Fall in Michigan, like fall in Colorado, can be spectacular, with vibrant colors, clear blue skies, and temperatures in the 70s. Fall in Michigan, like fall in Colorado, can also be rather miserable, with cold, cloudy days that lead to that freezing rain and snow combination fondly referred to as sleet. The day I was born was a miserable Michigan fall day. It was the kind of weather my family refers to as Tracey’s Birthday Weather, which makes tomorrow’s forecast so appropriate.

It also feels appropriate because it reflects the way I feel at the moment. My birthday this year comes just days after saying good-bye to someone very special to me and I’m a little heartbroken. I’m also flat broke with no employment lined up for the near future. My first thought this morning was that tomorrow is the first birthday in 27 years that I’m not looking forward to.

But then I saw the forecast in the paper. A miserable Colorado fall day. Perfect. See because even though it reflects the way I feel at the moment I love Tracey’s Birthday Weather. I love an excuse to stay home all day wrapped in a blanket and to put on a sweater for the first time in months. I love that coffee just tastes better with the first hint of snow in the air. I find something familiar and comforting in a miserable fall day. It makes me feel safe. Secure. And I can’t think of a better way to feel tomorrow. Because even if I feel a little down at the moment I can’t deny that I’m looking forward to seeing what the next year holds, that I’m excited to live it and to grow and learn. So tomorrow I will enjoy Tracey’s Birthday Weather and I will feel safe, secure, and hopeful. And that is all worth looking forward to.

Breathe

I was in Australia floating in the Pacific Ocean over the Great Barrier Reef with an oxygen tank strapped to my back, preparing to scuba dive for the first time and I was panicking. While the rest of the group practiced emptying water from their masks and other tasks I was hyperventilating. My mask was filling with water from tears and I was ready to jump back on the boat.

I should have expected the panic. A couple years earlier I had attempted snorkeling for the first time in Key West and it didn’t go well. I can swim and I’m comfortable in and around water; I grew up a few blocks away from Lake Michigan. But I have issues with swimming in the ocean, the vastness of it overwhelms me and the uncertainty of what is swimming around in it terrifies me. I couldn’t seem to master breathing through the snorkel on that trip, particularly while having a panic attack over being in the big scary sea. Every time I put my face in the water I lost control of my breathing and swallowed about a gallon of salt water. I had to refuse a rescue mission from the boat crew and was out of the water after only about five minutes.

This time, though, I was in Australia off the coast of Cairns, Queensland. The water was warm, still, and shockingly clear. After days of rainstorms the weather had cleared and finally presented us with a chance to see the Great Barrier Reef. I was panicking but I also didn’t want to chicken out this time.

I felt claustrophobic in the water and couldn’t train myself to breathe through the mouthpiece when I went under. The group was ready to move away from the boat and I had decided to give up when the guide grabbed my hand, told me to plug my nose with my fingers, and follow him. He didn’t give me a chance to protest and suddenly we were swimming deeper and farther away from the boat. I went through the entire dive holding my nose with one hand and maintaining a death grip on the guide’s hand with the other. Plugging my nose, though (despite the fact that I had a mask on and couldn’t breathe through my nose anyway), forced me to focus on breathing through my mouth, and taking slow deep breaths through my mouth forced me to calm down and focus on the moment. The experience was spectacular in a once-in-a-lifetime kind of way. I wrote in my journal that day, “I feel like I’ve faced and overcome a fear, the ocean still freaks me out but it was so well worth it. I truly hope we can preserve this place for future visitors…it has exceeded my expectations.”

People travel for many reasons—to sight-see, to relax, to teach, to learn—I went to Australia for all of the above, but mostly I went there to make a decision about the direction of my life at that moment. I had been living in Vail, Colorado for about two and a half years and been in my relationship for nearly three. I wasn’t particularly happy and I felt my life coming to a crossroads or, possibly, a dead end. I found myself in Australia with the intention of finding clarity and making a decision about a relationship I had been unsure about for awhile. I wrote in my journal while there, “I truly hope to be changed by this experience and that it has an impact on my life, I don’t think it’s possible for it not to.”

I gained strength and confidence in Australia. I returned from the trip and made the decision to end my relationship and move forward. It was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done and the aftermath of it was chaotic and challenging. More than once I considered un-doing that decision. I didn’t though. I waded through the chaos and focused on calming myself by breathing like I was under water and the peace I felt when the chaos subsided was spectacular.

Romanian Mami

I met Mami four years ago during my first winter season in Vail. She visits for several weeks at a time, usually over Christmas, and stays at the Marriott. She spends a couple hours every day in Bailey’s Coffee House where I work. Her name is Elena but she insists we call her Mami.

Mami is from Romania but lives in New York City. Her face is jolly and she wears tiny glasses with round frames that rest near the tip of her Cabbage Patch-doll nose. I imagine that with a bit of rouge on her round cheeks she would look like a cartoon. She is short, sturdy, and plump. She is grandmotherly in a wise and endearing way and has a teenage son, Roberto. Mami doesn’t ski she just reads, talks on her cell phone, and drinks her favorite white chocolate mocha, decaf and skinny with lots of syrup, while Roberto skis.

She told me once that I should visit Romania with her. It is a beautiful country, she said, where people drink bottles of wine on the ski slopes and the men are very handsome. She said she will translate for me when I find a good Romanian boy. I should not, however, get married too young; 24, she said, once I told her my age, is too young. She told me she married very well, and by well she means her husband is wealthy (her frequent use of his American Express card proves it), but much too young. She said she is sure I will find a nice boy one day because I’m skinny like she once was.

Mami has lived in Manhattan for about 15 years in an apartment near the World Trade Center site. When she talks about her neighborhood I think of her there on September 11, 2001. I imagine her close to the site of so much tragedy, praying in Romanian, crying, and hugging her son.

Mami never showed up around Christmas this year and I assumed it was due to the economy then she turned up one day in February. When I told her I had been wondering when I would see her this year or if she was coming at all, she started crying. She said she hadn't come over Christmas because her mother passed away and she had to go back to Romania. Then she pulled some photos out of her pocket; one was of her mother as a young woman, another of her mother about a year ago, and the last one was a picture of her mother's body in a casket. The casket was in a house, in what looked like a dining room, and Mami’s father stood next to it, his eyes puffy and red, she said he had wept for days. I was both moved and disturbed and I admired her for being so open with her grief. I didn’t know what to say so as she continued to cry and describe her pain I made her a white chocolate mocha, decaf, skinny, with lots of syrup.