This is not a "New Chapter"

Long long ago, in a land not too far away, there was a little girl named Dory. She lived with her parents in a big old stone house with white washed walls and a white picket fence around the garden. She spent the first six years of her life living in this house, swinging on the swing and lounging in the garden while her mom worked, not realizing the affect this place would have on the rest of her life.

My dad is a photographer. Capturing every photogenic moment of your own children's lives is quite a task to undertake and he has risen to the occasion every day of our lives thus far. This has given me a fairly picturesque view of my childhood. It seems to me that I spent A LOT of time in the gardens with my mom and A LOT of time watching and helping my dad capture photos of nearly everything. These documented moments show a little family (my sister is six and a half years younger than I and wasn't born until we moved out of the state park) spending a majority of time taking pictures of growing our medicines and our food, teaching others about the magic of plants, and spending time traveling together all while learning new things about places and plants and people. (My dad has always been a connections guy, meeting and befriending people hither and yon, taking their photos and then maintaining those relationships for the future.)

My father was always behind his camera. In fact he still is always behind his camera. And it is not a stretch to see why I now spend my adult years growing, harvesting, cooking, feeding others, and photographing every single step along the way.

It has been a surprising journey for me. And I still have a hard time figuring out why it is so surprising to me that I have finally found my stride. Nutrition and herbalism will make fine bedfellows and will no doubt lend themselves to beautifully documented adventures and explorations through health and the creation of my career.

A leap has been taken! I honestly have a hard time verbalizing how thrilled I am to be at the Institute of Integrative Nutrition moving towards my Health Coach Certification. I have always felt like I was happy and having fun doing whatever it was I was doing, but THIS, this path is taking me to a new place, a place where all of my different lives, my two minds can be at work together instead of creating a divisiveness in my life, having to be hidden from one another. I feel empowered and driven and validated and excited. So so so excited.

After twenty something years in the making, I can take my plants, my foods, and my photographs and weave them all together to make myself a beautiful and fulfilling career.

It is not a "New Chapter" it is not even the next chapter. I think it is more that everything is shifting. What was important the last three years is now in the background, taking a supportive and restorative role and what had been pushed to the side as my dirty little secrets are now able to shine and I can explore and play and create and really let through who i am and what I want to do and where I want to go and how i can make a difference in this world. (hey mom, remember when I lamented and cried and was so torn because politics and horses and whatever else i was trying to do was not satisfying my desire to make a change in the world?)

And here is where I say something silly like.... I am going to keep my blog again, I swear. I know its been a year since my last entry, but blah blah blah. However i am not going to say that at all. I am just going to see what happens.

xoxo