Graduation and the Baboo

To all those who sent sweet words and smiles for my big graduation day-thank you so very much. It was so kind of you. Grandpa and Mary Esther I am overjoyed that you were able to visit the Lone Star State (as polluted and bland as it may be!). It meant so very much to look up from the stage and see the shining, supportive faces of my family in the audience. I desperately wanted to share the great sigh and celebration with you. I am feeling the weight of "falling out of the educational race".
Here is a picture of the Baylor College of Medicine Leadership Education Adolescent Health Fellows 07-08. Sigh, GRADUATION. Reflection before and now retrospection...No matter how often I repeat to myself that "life is journey, not a destination" I have often forgot the bliss of experience and the value of struggle in the midst of fantastic imaginations of "achievement" and "arrival". Most girls-in the tender years near 7 or 8-dream of princesses, pirates, puppies and happily ever after. Oddly and frighteningly enough, Graduation with my Masters has always been a pervasive longing of mine. After the lights go out, the gown is returned, books sold back and friends move away...work begins, transcripts are forgotten and student loans begin to pester. This is the moment in which I find myself this very evening.
Progress, how inevitably eternal and eternally inevitable! Moments turn to memories but something of their meaning expires as they pass. I find myself setting such lofty goals in all areas of my life. Of course, with my luck and the Lord's grace they rarely-if ever- go as planned. I was under the childish and naive impression that when a goal is mastered, dream is achieved or a mountain is conquered time itself and all the world pauses to sigh or shout with joy. Pomp and circumstance seems fitting. Yet, as the celebration fades and the grandeur becomes something more realistic, I find myself watching the dreams of yesterday drive off in the sunset and the hope of tomorrow roll into town.
Progress. It’s a curious thing, always waiting, always passing, always moving. It can feel like a rat race at times-as if you are left miles behind, drowning in leagues of ocean water. It can feel hopeful, promising, as a rose bud in bloom. Of all the ways it can feel or go...progress never stops, never sighs, never applauds or draws acclaim for its existence. It carries onward (though not necessarily forward), steady and constant. Always present, always changing. I sat, in the sigh of one door closing and others being opened ahead and experienced the curious feeling of self, progressing.

Work. Work. Work. Up before the sun, home after it sets. I'm on the run for lunch, no time to stop or take my leisure. Work in, work out, and work done, more work. So, this is it? How come no wise soul warned that this was the "reward" for a hard earned diploma? I like work, I find it soothing, predictable and rewarding, but here in the awareness of progress I long for a time out, silence, and suspension of movement. No regress no progress.

In hopes of recollecting my sanity from the onslaught of the working world and realism, I spent a week with a best friend living in Georgia that recently had her first child-a baby girl, Chloe, who turned 1 month old on the 11th of May. The frantic and anguish of labor and toil were left behind for my first REAL vacation. No homework to do "here and there", I didn't even bring a book. No professional work to accomplish-I left everything at the office and turned off my phone. I feared I'd be unable to go on vacation without school or work. What would I do? What if something happens and I need to be contacted? What if, what if, what if....
Shortly after arriving I found myself sitting on the couch with the most precious, beautiful baby in my arms. Her blue eyes examined mine. Baboo has such soft hair, such tiny hands and feet, such an innocent smile and a sincere coo. Even her cry was simple and loving. What piercing joy filled my soul! I think I’m beginning to understand why people become parents. I think I am beginning to understand why there is work balanced by recreation. There are so many facets to life. Achievement and milestones are never ending, onward time progresses-with or without you.
I think that picking strawberries in the summer sun is really what life is all about. The faint scream of a peacock, the persistent nuzzle of a goat. Strawberries as far as the eye can see. Silence as the wind blows gently against bare feet as they dangle from a wooden porch swing. Sharing a pint of homemade creamy bliss with a kindred spirit. Watching the clouds lazily dance across the sky. Tire swings and treasure hunts, imaginary friends and those who are as real as the moments you share with them. Smiles and genuine laughter....buckets full. Naked babies that smell like powder and mint. There were many moments of complete mindfulness, where joy overflows and life seems simple and purpose more clear. Georgia on my mind....