All is Well

Have I told you all how much I appreciate your friendship and your kindness and all of the love that you share with me?  Sitting here with a cat on my lap(fighting for the attention of my hands as I try to type sentences that make sense!) and a dog at my feet, I am inundated with a feeling of gratitude not only for those who physically surround me, but also for those who surround me from faraway places.  I cannot tell you how many difficult days you have helped me to tackle.  I am a very, very lucky girl.

We spent the week up in the gorgeous mountains of Lake Arrowhead.  When our Angel Daughters were little, Mark and I decided to purchase a second home up there because we had grown up with snowy winters and wanted our girls to experience a bit of the white stuff.  This home has been a part of our family for fourteen years(so many wonderful memories) yet for the past two years, Mark and I had not been up there at all.  Dance competitions, work schedules and just life in general dominated our weekends and driving the almost two hours made it very difficult.  We used to go up for every Thanksgiving.  My best friend since junior high school who now lives in Las Vegas would meet us up there with her three children and we would share the holiday as one big family.  Well, as the children got older, other obligations disrupted our tradition.  Two of her children got married and went on to have babies.(whom I absolutely adore!)  They needed to remain closer to home so that they could split the holidays with in-laws, etc.  Last year I felt like I needed to be out of town for the holiday so we took the girls up to San Francisco for the week.  We had a lovely time, but some of the girls(you know who you are) complained that I was not making the traditional turkey dinner on Thanksgiving and that preparing it on another day was not the same thing!  So up the mountain we went with two new boyfriends, one very old boyfriend(Is seven years a long time for a twenty one year old to be in a relationship?) and a sweet girlfriend whose family was going to be tied up with her brother's hockey tournaments all weekend.  Mark took everyone skiing/snowboarding, we ate, we shopped, we laughed, but most of all, we had a really wonderful time.  The higher altitude did take its toll on my body but that was a small price to pay to spend Thanksgiving in the mountains with my husband and our girls.  I have stories to share but those will come later.

I hope that everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving filled with love, good food and lots of laughter.  I just wanted everyone to know that I am still here, fighting the good fight, living contently in spite of.    Battling the pain while soaking in every single joyful moment possible, trying my best not to give in to the focus that the aches can sometimes overshadow.  I am here.  Once again, thank you for visiting, for checking in on me, for your kind words and your sweet emails, for caring.  I only hope that you know that I feel the same way about you that you do about me.  It truly is my pleasure.  I plan on visiting, catching up and saying hello in the next couple of days.  Until then, just know that you are on my mind and in my heart, always.