Sleeping to Daydream (as the year turns over)

When I close my eyes I dream of surf. A hammock bleached pastel in the sun, hung from a wooden beam by the rough hands of a romantic. An outdoor post spraying water over a slab of cement. Ducking under green brush on a dirt path guide to the sea. Shifting water and rising peaks that create and recreate a liquid landscape. North American holidays simplified. Fish for one friend, a board wax for another. A bittersweet taste, more sweet than bitter, of friends and family far away. With each flash of sunlight that makes the world go white, with each inch of skin submerged in water, with each morning you wake up before anyone else and tiptoe out the door, your life becomes your own. I’ve been to places like these before, felt the cool on my feet and the warmth in my hair. But lately I go there often. I daydream in the dark, with little care about drifting away from consciousness. Meditation or escape, I couldn’t say.

The year of 2010 was difficult. Struggling with down payments on a mortgage that always seemed just inches beyond our grasp while paying inflated ski town rent. A hard year that landed on the shoulders of my husband as I struggled with the realities of finishing six years of post secondary and coming out with nothing more practical than a firm grasp with photography and classic literature. A self-destructive streak of stubbornness and minimal tolerance for the casual rudeness of service industry customers or the misdirected anger of fellow employees. Crippling self-doubt crept in, not limiting itself to my short-term occupation, but effecting long-term goals. Finding its way into the part of me that should be brought to light from the inside but never plucked out. And yet, my day-to-day problems made me terrified to write. Terrified to find out that I can’t do the only pursuit I feel something real for.

And as is life, a hard, rough year is the background to days that shine. Moving into a beautiful new home still small enough to be quaint and cozy, with a view of the mountains in front and a network of year-round trails behind. Finding out that my brother’s one-in-a-million wife is expecting. Spending a weekend in Canmore for a simple family wedding and taking the route home North of Kamloops as the leaves turned color. Starting to find a writing voice again while witnessing an ocean of modern inspiration breathing life into others. Most recently, waking up in the morning and knowing that I will never take my husband for granted.

My life is a good one, and I’ve been fortunate throughout to have many who love and care for me.

I feel in my heart that I’m a writer of fiction, and I feel my family and myself in everything I write. And yet lately I feel some things so deeply that I don’t want to hide them in the conduit of a fictional character. I know that something is turning over as I suddenly refuse to hide my insecurities and shortcomings. I want to expose my heart to open air, and let strangers bear the burden of interpretation. And as I drop the layers of anger and frustration that hide me from the world, the wind makes them stir, and then takes them away.

I’m learning that being happy isn’t being perfect, but being flawed and still having nothing to hide.

So no resolutions this year. No small changes or the tearing off of corners. No sewing small holes only to re-thread the needle and sew another. By the time doubt arrives I’ll be long gone. To the next idea, the next creation. Moving out from under the clouds to find another place in the sun.

In the past few years I’ve been lucky enough to find friends that feel like family, and there’s talk of spending Christmas and New Years Eve in Nicaragua next year. And if they can’t make it happen, I’ll still go. I’ll wake in the morning and tiptoe outside. Slip on my suit and shower outdoors, walk the long path to the beach, and paddle out with a song in my heart for the girl that spent the previous New Year’s with water in her eyes, dreaming up a life of sweet creation and a New Year spent on sparkling surf.