A day to always remember

I know, I know, here I go again with the tumbleweeds.
Honestly, if you know how much I have to say every day, you might actually be happy for a little quiet from me…lol.

But I have to tell you about my day yesterday.
Yesterday was the most amazing day for me. I drove X town for a very special session at my wellness centre.

I got to show nine amazing women how to make a wellness journal and help them make one for themselves from old books.

I have to say that, and I know I don’t talk about it, (or even like to think about it), very much, but 2014 and the diagnosis and radiation treatment left me unimaginably changed. But it is what it is, and there is no use burying our head in the sand. It was and continues to be a personal struggle to come to terms with it, to try to sort it out, to accept it, to stop thoughts of my life possibly not being as long as I had hoped…etc, etc.

And as much as I try to distance myself from it as a way of coping, I do believe that now, a year on, I’m at a good place where I find I can share my experience and the therapy I devised to get thru it.

The funny thing is that when Robert suggested that I make that wellness journal to take with me to treatment, at first I thought that that was the last thing I wanted to do. I know myself, and I knew that I would dispose of practically everything which would be a reminder of treatment as soon as I could, and I figured that if I made it I would never want to see that journal again. Robert said that was just fine. He said that if I locked it in a drawer and never looked at it again it would be just fine. If I chose to burn it it would be just fine. And so, having that mindset and having that permission, I made the wellness journal. And then showed it to my oncologist, therapist and wellness doctor.

Which brings me to this wonderful group of ladies that I had the absolute privilege to spend the afternoon with.
Each of us has a similar and yet vastly different story. Each of us are dealing/have dealt with a diagnosis and the fallout which inevitably comes from such a chaotic and devastating happening in our lives.

So we spent the afternoon together. Just the ten of us, tea, old books, and tons of art supplies.

Around that long table, we picked up books and pencils and felt pens and tracing paper. We laughed, we cried, we shared our stories, we drew and traced and stamped and tore up bits of paper.

We circled words and wove them together into lines and poems, and started our journals which we all hope will be a calming distraction in the wilds of our lives.

And, as I reflect on yesterday, I feel so lucky to have had that experience.

What a gift art is.

What a gift life is.