Funny how sometimes things that you don't expect can lead you to a place you didn't know you were missing. I was feeling a little lost again, wondering what it was I should be doing. Last week I made my way to place where the answers seemed tofind me. Minnesota. Of all places. I guess I should have known that there was a reason Prairie Home Companion and Target (two of my principle addictions) are headquartered in that state. Why I had never been, I will never really know. But I went. Quality time was spent with people who are like me. Who care about others and their careers-- who want to learn- to grow- and get better.
Like the girl in the bee costume from the blind melon video I found my home. Not so much because of the details of my public safety career, or even the careers of those I had met. The home was found in people who you are friends with in the first moment you meet more so than you will be with an acquaintance in a thousand years (to paraphrase Richard Bach). Home was found in opening up my heart and mind to new experiences and realizing that I have a long way to go. In a way, for me at least, its reassuring to realize that the path is long. That it will involve so many. Growing and sharing and learning from each other.
I suppose the best indication that it was a good time-- a needed time-- was that I returned to the place called PSAC with a smile on my face, a brisk step, and was not phased by the inevitable dramas. Even the critiques of my writing, the insolence of those that do not care-- even those normally effective attempts to pry up the track did not work. I blazed over the gaps in the system and the reality and in the place I must be for a bit longer, certain that I know I am going strong, even if I may not know exactly where.
My minister, and C.S. Lewis, and Richard Bach, and John Steinbeck, and my mother, and many other great philosopher souls I have encountered long proclaimed that out most important task is to be confident in ourselves- in our place at God's table- and our role we have to play in this long sweet mystery opera. For some reason, in a few short days and some classes and in a few beers, a few more glasses of wine, I found that pace in a way I have rarely known. What a joy and a gift and an honor.
And what a mission I have to live.
Observations, essays, ramblings, thoughts and more from a slightly reformed New Yorker who has returned home to Ohio. A spiritual person having a human experience, writer, photographer, and public safety professional.
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