I want to live like I am on vacation.

My daughter, who is living as a college student, sent me a text message the other day; "I feel like I am on one long vacation and I have had enough!" Funny, I understand that feeling and remember vacationing myself at a wonderful place several years in a row for the typical one week vacation. Finally, one year I planned for my family to go for two weeks. What I found out was 10 days was "just right." (I purposely avoided use of the word "perfect" here, questioning whether such a concept actually exists. I am sure that the author of Goldilocks and The Three Bears had some reason too for using "just right" instead of "perfect.")

I called my daughter and applauded her for knowing herself well enough to know when "enough is enough." Like the game "Say Uncle", many of us don't know when to "Say Uncle," indicating that we surrender or have had enough. We seem to endure so much in our life before we are ready to make a change. Why is it that wanting change and creating change are so far apart? And wanting it, is not enough to create it. My daughter, although not throwing in the towel on her social life by any means, is able to identify that boundary line for herself. I am often amazed at her insight and wonder how many young adults know their limits. I for one didn't at that age.

Today though I have titled this reading "I want to live like I am on vacation," not because I want to see if I have the courage to cry out "Say Uncle" but rather because I want the lines of my life to not be so distinct and separate. I want my worlds to blend more joyfully. How many people live to work and spend their nights fretting over their next day? Too many. Working with my own Life Coach, my life blends more easily from morning to night. I have learned how to make the moments count, not count the moments.

Somehow we lose too many days waiting for the good ones to come- those days like we are on vacation. People tell themselves that when they are on vacation they will do something fun or meaningful, and in the meantime will continue to endure each day, knowing that they are losing precious time. Time had always been something I raced against. For years I believed that if I didn't sleep, I could fool time.

Yes, there are some who bound out of bed in the morning calling out "Carpe diem quam minimum credula postero!" (Translated, "Seize the day, trusting as little as possible in the future."). Perhaps I am looking too closely for "perfect," yet I am not concerned that I will not reach it. I use it only as a guidepost to achieve that knowing feeling of, I have loved enough, played enough, and yes, worked enough, just for today.

At the end of a day on a vacation, I reflect on the day asking myself if I have savoured the day living, exploring, learning, loving, giving, eating, and resting. Although, I excitedly anticipate tomorrow, I have had enough for this day. I want this everyday. At night, when I close my eyes, should it be my last waking moment, I want that knowing feeling that I have had enough, that my life is just right.

Life is a series of firsts...

For me, right now, each day has become a series of firsts; things that I must do for the first time within my new identity. I am a single mom now, a divorcee who does not yet know how to place the accent mark above the first e in "divorcee," as I create my first blog. I do not want to take the time today to learn and become bogged down with the mechanics. I will learn and make my way each day, just as I will have to learn to make my way in so many other areas of this new life. (I must be honest though. Technically I will not be divorced for a few more weeks; another technicality that I do not want to become bogged down with.)

Creating this blog seems like an accomplishment to me. Waiting to see what will appear on the final screen is simultaneously frightening and exciting. Once it is "posted", will I be able to erase my words from space, if I should later see them as juvenile or too bare for others to see? I am reminded that vulnerability is considered a weakness, not attractive nor viewed as intelligent. I want to be strong, intelligent and attractive. Since one of my identities is that of a lawyer, I have no choice but to be all of this too. Why isn't being vulnerable considered strong? It takes courage to share your heart, or to trust. I am grateful to Adrian for giving me the courage to write this blog. Her blog holds her words that together are smooth and engaging; she writes in a style that connects to my mind and heart. She writes about real places and real things. I tell myself if she can do this, I can too.

I did take the time to check with the online thesaurus to make sure that divorcee was really a word; as if, if the word didn't exist, I might not either. My eye caught the first word that I saw, what I thought for a moment was the peculiar definition for divorcee, "divine being." My heart paused at the thought that somehow I had transitioned into a divine being just by becoming divorced. Then I noticed, in fact, what the site was telling me was that the word "divorcee" did not exist and the words listed below were only alphabetical options that I might choose instead.

Luckily, my handy Second College Edition of the American Heritage Dictionary confirmed that I do exist. In fact, following the chain of definitions I am led to the fact that divorce can be defined as, "A complete or radical separation of things closely connected." That is clearly what I think has happened to me. I have been ripped apart from the identity I had become closely connected with. In this moment of time I feel as if I am hurling through space without a plane ticket to a destination, and I am holding in my hands precious cargo. I will not be able to use my hands to brace my fall. Landing on my feet is my only option.

So today, I choose to identify myself as a "divine being," some sort of superwoman who has survived the loss of one life and is brave enough to blindly walk forward into the next. In this new life, I will not let my thoughts win. I will not lose site of my heart and all that I have believed in: love, family, friends, connection, kindness and most importantly, living life fully, happy, joyous and unafraid.