The Awakened Traveler

I feel as if I have a chance to put some things to rest, things I regret doing and things I regret not doing. Living in the past does not allow one to be fully present in the now. And the now is the only time we truly have. Thinking about past loves, past jobs, past friends, past events only keeps our energy tied there. And thinking obsessively about one's future doesn't help to bring it about. The only way to live is in the now. The only way to make a dream come true is to live effectively in the present moment. My latest journey began when I left NYC in October of 2009. It's almost as if Spirit is leading me to process things I need to relook at and leave behind in order to move forward. One is my dysfunctional childhood that was filled with neglect and abuse by both parents. I realize looking back that many of my choices in life and what I have attracted into my life was an attempt to work out and process that pain. Bosses who didn't honor me and boyfriends who

Here I am living, albeit perhaps temporarily, again in Lafayette, Louisiana. The first time I arrived here was in 1996 with my husband, now my ex. After having followed him all over the country for his helicopter career, he finally got his dream job of flying for Petroleum Helicopters. In three years, we had moved from Northern California, Michigan, Ohio, and then back to California when he interviewed at the Louisiana company that flies oilfield workers out to the Gulf of Mexico. He went ahead of me and lived in Lafayette, and I began packing for the fourth time in three years, and it was getting old. My mother had just passed away, and I had just had my gallbladder out. I had graduated with honors from journalism school. My career was put on hold because we never stayed any place long enough for me to get a full-time writing job. I didn't want to go. I loved the East Bay of San Francisco, and I wanted to heal and rest, and I wanted to write again. A few years before we bega