How are you, really?

It feels so strange to be sitting down and writing to you all. I haven’t done it for months.
 
With the weather change here, and “school” starting back up, I am feeling how we entering yet another phase of this time.
 
So how are you, really?
 
Is your first response, “Fine” or “Okay”?
 
Channeling Glennon Doyle, fine is a word I’m trying to stop using these days. Since March I’ve been anything but fine. I’ve been exhausted, despairing, angry, hopeful, determined, resourceful, happy, at peace, fearful. I’ve cried. I’ve raged. I’ve laughed. I’ve snapped at my son. I’ve fought with my husband. I’ve watched the light go our of my son’s eyes. And come back again.
 
We’ve drawn closer as a family. We’ve played board games until nearly midnight. Binged together on Supergirl. (Go ahead, judge us!) We’ve started to do activities together that my husband and I last did before our son was born. We’ve introduced him to a whole new world of outdoor adventure – and forged some amazing memories.
 
As my world has shrunk, it has also become clearer. What really matters to me: family, adventures together, time with trusted friends, sewing and sewing and sewing, gardening.
 
Am I happy? Occasionally.
 
Am I hopeful? I practice that.
 
Am I determined? Yes, very.
 
I’m determined to come out of this having learn and grown and become a better person. This in my control. It is perhaps the only thing in my control. I want to look back on this time and say: “This is what I learned. This is how I grew. This is the meaning I created from this time.”
 
So have I been fine? No. For I’ve come to feel how fine numbs. It obscures. It hides us from each other, and from ourselves. I don’t want to hide. I want to see myself. And I want to see others. Really see them. That is something I want to create out of this: more connection, more meaning, more courage, more purpose.
 
Easy? No.
 
Worthwhile? I believe so to the depths of my being.
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So how are you, really? 

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