Pause. My life has been on pause. That includes this blog. Sometimes a pause is necessary to reevaluate our lives and it seems as if my friend and I are experiencing a life shift worthy of a pause simultaneously. We both are once again standing at the crossroads and wondering what direction we need to take. We are both sitting idle at the intersection of life carefully planning the next road to be followed.

Health issues have been to blame; my own, my mother, and my son have been experiencing increased difficulty with health. I have now been told I have two incurable diseases, my mother has had another serious operation, and my son’s epilepsy has been harder than normal to control. I needed a pause. I chose to step away to observe and listen at the crossroads. I needed to know what lie down each road and how to navigate the future. My decision: pull up a chair and wait. I didn’t feel like a change needed to happen, but I did feel a slow down, and pause, was needed. I needed to stop and let the world speed by because I was not able to zip along with the rest of the world (in part by my diagnoses). So here I am sitting in the middle of my road with my feet up and unapologetic about it. While everyone else is buzzing by I refuse to be moved until I know exactly what I want to do. There will be no rash decisions this time, there will be no spontaneous movements, I will wait…..

Pausing life does not come without its share of victims. This blog has flat-lined and I often feel more than guilty about it but I remind myself that this project was meant to be an enjoyable release. I do not want it to start to feeling like a job. I have plenty of work to do and I refuse to make the little things I enjoy feel, well, less enjoyable. Everyone and everything is in too much of a hurry. Everyone is rushing, but to where are they going? What is the destination? Run to our earthly end? Run out of expectation? Run out of habit?

I have been house-sitting while my mother has been in the hospital. Instead of going straight home after my last check, I took all four kids to the cemetery where my grandfather was buried over six months ago and to where my uncle was laid to rest over three years ago. On this day I was listening to a play list of some of my favorite songs instead of the usual kid’s movies. As I pulled up to my grandfather’s grave, Pink Floyd’s song “Wish You Were Here” came up. I parked in front of his tombstone and turned up the radio. It was hard not to be captive by the moment. I could hardly imagine the vast number of people who have visited that same cemetery and their hearts were singing those same lyrics, “How I wish you were here….” I didn’t have the words as I stood beside the bare earth above where he lay, so I just listened. Then, we slowly drove to the other side of the cemetery, my mind still fixated on the moment. I found my uncle’s grave and as I shifted into park, “Whiskey In the Jar” by Metallica began to play. Obviously my songs are in alphabetical order but the order and timing of what happened made me smile. I remember my uncle driving like a bat out of Hell down the interstate listening to our local rock station. He may be the reason Metallica is one of my favorite bands and why it was on that very play list. So I turned up Metallica for my uncle and stood where is body now lays. I was once again at a loss for words but I grinned thinking of my less than proper behavior at a cemetery and how my uncle was one to break the mold. The visit was humbling but not sad. My heart hurts to know that my time with these men is over but I am confident they are not confined to the grave. I know they are as free as the lyrics that filled the air.

A stroll, or drive through a cemetery can be quite humbling. If you haven’t done it, you need to. It is a good reminder that we all will eventually have the same space under the Earth to occupy. With all the running the world says we have to do and all we have to accomplish, we are just speeding closer to that hole in the Earth. STOP. Slow down, sit in your intersection and be unapologetic about it. And listen to a good song or two…… the music of life is hard to hear when you are moving too fast…..

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