I’ve never seen a shooting star, not until this morning. I got up at 4 a.m. to let the dogs out and made breakfast, before getting picked up to go to the airport and to Cincinnati, Dayton, Chicago, Portland, Or. and Seattle. I opened the rear gate and saw this bright ball shoot across the sky right over my head and vanish into the darkness. What a beautiful thing, a divine spark, God answering a prayer for me, sending me a signal that he was listening to me, that he loved me just the way I am. The way I am learning to know love.

Someone asked me at a reading the other night if I would write more about my notions that the pressures we put upon ourselves – gotta do this, should do that, need to do this – are impediments to a spiritual life. I will do that, more when I get back from the book tour. But she did get me to thinking. What is sacred to me are the stories of our lives. We are the story we tell about ourselves in so many ways. None of us can prevent life from breaking out, or alter the reality of death – one of the things we share with all living things. At that same book event, another person came up to me and told me about the death of her dog five years ago, her mother’s death from cancer, her brother’s stroke and her own high blood pressure. Why is she telling me this? I wondered.

Because it is the story of her life and I think it used to be the story of my life in some ways – look what has happened to me.

It is the way she chooses to see her life, I thought. So it is her story. I asked her if anything good had happened to her. Oh yes, she said. She has a boyfriend, she loves her garden, she is close to her daughter, she loves her new dog. That’s it, I thought later. We are our stories.  She has chosen hers. We can see ourselves as awash in struggle, bad fortune and sadness, obligation and fear. Or we can write a different story for ourselves.

My life is about stories, and they are holy to me. I tell them every way I can with all the tools I can master – and some I can’t.

I used to go on a book tour dreading and grumbling about it. They weren’t doing enough, spending enough.  I was tired, my feet hurt. Airlines are awful, and flight is uncomfortable. Security is intrusive and airline staff unfriendly.  Book tours gave me stuff to bitch about for days. Then I began approaching a spiritual life in some earnest and I saw – with much help – that I was mired in sad stories about myself and the world.

I am altering these stories, as is my power, my right, my obligation. The shooting star reminded me of the sacred obligations of life, of the power of our stories. I am grateful to be going on a book tour, it is an affirmation of my work, and I appreciate them spending the money in tight times to make this possible for me. And helping Maria to join me.

I often wonder when I see a beautiful thing if God is whispering to me. Sometimes, like this morning,  he is shouting out loud.