writing for self-discovery

There’s a lot going on in my head. There often is, but my thoughts are taking a detour from the usual these days. It’s little wonder. Italy isn’t Bali. Praiano isn’t Ubud. A change of scene opens up mental space to imagine.

The timing is perfect. December ends the twelve-month cycle on the Gregorian calendar but Pisces, February 20 – March 20, marks the wrap-up of the solar year. Tomorrow, 2/20/2020, the sun enters the sign of the fish to complete the last thirty days of its journey through the zodiac.

For months my friends have been muttering about feeling unfocused and edgy, as though they’re waiting for something without a clue to what that something might be.

I’ve felt the same.

Of course, turning seventy has a certain shock value. Even though I knew for 365 days that I was sixty-nine, and I’ve known for much longer than that how to count, actually becoming seventy years old surprised me. It compelled me to look back at my life and ask, “What have I accomplished?” And to look ahead and say, “What’s next?”

I’m happy with the past. That’s a good thing because it’s too late to change it and I wouldn’t if I could. It made me who I am.

But this moment in time feels pivotal, like stepping out of one reality and entering another that’s cleaner, clearer, and shorter than what’s gone before.

On my terrace, gazing at the vast horizon where water and sky collide sometimes with no line of demarcation to indicate where one begins and the other ends – breathing air salty and moist – hearing the lilt and staccato of a language I don’t understand but am growing to love – lifting my face to be kissed by the sun, it suddenly doesn’t matter that I don’t know what lies ahead.

I’m filled with a sense of release, letting go of everything I don’t want to carry with me into this new cycle that’s about to begin. It feels like a time of rest and patience. Of slowing down the outer world and focusing within. Of making new choices.

As I wrote that last line, butterflies came to life in my stomach and my arms sprouted goosebumps.

Making new choices…

Tomorrow, to give special attention to 2/20/2020, I’m choosing to accept Sig. Gaetano Bove’s invitation to visit Tunata San Francesco, the winery he co-owns with three associates.

Whether I write about the experience immediately or at some future date will depend upon how enthusiastically I taste the samples on offer.

Welcome back, Pisces, it’s been a long eleven months!