I forget every year how quickly the holidays fly by. Only 3 weeks ago I was in North Vancouver, B.C. for my Waldorf teacher training, but it already feels ages ago. And in 3 weeks we will celebrate Christmas with Stephen’s parents. I had no problem crossing the border into Canada, but my flight into Chicago was cancelled due to snow, so my Monday travel day turned into a Tuesday travel day and I spent several hours at SFO waiting for my evening flight. I joke about how I would love to spend endless hours reading, but whenever I am stuck on an airplane or inside an airport and could read for nearly the whole day crossing the country in a matter of hours, I weary of reading. A body needs to move after a time.

Two days before yesterday (in Zoey and Zane parlance), we walked around Savannah, Georgia and stopped in at E. Shaver, Bookseller to browse the books and visit with the three resident bookstore cats; all were very fluffy and big. We found an Advent Calendar (not the chocolate kind!) for the kids with an activity behind each window. Zoey requested we hide the cards each day for her and Zane to find just like the Martin and Sylvia Sparkle story. It’s a nice way to count down to Christmas without sugar. They’ve had plenty of that in the past 3 weeks and will be having a lot more once we hit the Cowan household, in Texas, that is. Just telling it like it is.  Nearly everyday around the 3 o’clock hour, Zane announces that he is hungry. Neither Stephen or I had packed a snack, so we ended up at the Gryphon Tea Room.

The kids had a strawberry spritzer and I had a pot of cinnamon spice tea. The building was once an apothecary, a bookstore, and now a tea room/restaurant owned by the Savannah College of Art and Design. We ordered two sandwiches to share which felt like more than a snack, but two hours later, Zane was announcing yet again that he was hungry. We went to the Old Pink House Restaurant for dinner.

We left Georgia two days ago and arrived at St. Augustine, Florida. We went to the beach nearby, threw the nerf football around, and got our feet wet (or in Zane’s case most of his body) in the warm ocean water.

I’ve been reading the book Unsheltered by Barbara Kingsolver over the past several weeks. I’ve always enjoyed her writing, and this book has made me ponder the big questions about our current political situation (don’t worry, I’m not going to talk politics here!) and how we live our lives here on earth. We’ve spent 6 months on the road, and I start to wonder how this trip has changed us if at all. How will we live our lives differently once we have settled and have a house again? I realize I can only ask these questions because we’ve lived a privileged life.

I turned 42 in October and I told my friend Jen that I only now feel like I am taking up the reins in being an adult, or figuring out how to be an adult. And then I look at my daughter, and she gives me so much hope for our future. I’m sure you’ve noticed capable, young people in your own sphere of living. Our towel rack that hangs off the stovetop broke off on one side when we arrived at our RV park. Zoey noticed it and immediately went to the truck to get a screwdriver out of Stephen’s toolbox in the truck and went to work on fixing the towel rack. She fixed it in a matter of seconds. I beamed inwardly with pride that my daughter is so capable of fixing things, while simultaneously noting that I was going to leave it to Stephen to fix. I’ve lived most of my life waiting for someone else to fix things, but I’m awakening to a new consciousness that challenges me to do the things that don’t come naturally or easily for me. I wonder what it would be like if on a world scale we let go of inertia and fear and did the very things that were difficult and hard for us? Even if we just tried.