June 20, 2010 – It’s always sad when the honeymoon is over – it’s always wonderful to suspend life, step out of it and do what we love. But I think a perpetual honeymoon would wear quickly. We need the ups and downs, challenges and disappointments of life ( at least I do) so that it’s beautiful and wondrous parts stand out and have meaning.

I am still very much on the hero’s journey. Still seeing my expectations and plans go awry, still facing one challenge after another, still coming to terms with fear and it’s pervasive impact on my life. When I think of my life two or three years ago, I know I am on the path. I have worked hard in therapy, and it has helped me tremendously. I feel that I am soon coming ot the end of that work, and beginning another. This one has more to do with a spiritual self, a spiritual center. I see it as a bubble at the center of me. A therapist once asked me where I felt the fear was, and I said it was like a heavy blue sludge sitting on my heart. It is smaller, and another part of me – the “bubble” – a calmer, more peaceful part of me, is growing. I’m working on that.

I’m still trying to get things straight – money, bureacracy, technology, writing, perspective. But look at how far I’ve come. I am married to a wonderful and dear human being, and she and I share life together, fully and deeply. I love my photography more all of the time, and I am thrilled to be returning to fiction,to novels, short stories and children’s books. I think this is really my medium. I am happy to have animals back on the farm – a small number I can care for and get to know. I am happy to be staying on the farm.

All milestones on the hero’s journey, which continues. I like being a married man, it is a natural state for me. I like the commitment and solidity of it. I like fusing our lives together. I especially like sharing this place with someone who loves it as much as I do, perhaps more. Honeymoons and perfect lives to together in a way. They are defined not by what is perfect,but what isn’t. That’s what gives them meaning.