After the clock stuck twelve last night I slipped out of the warm house that was filled with a group of humans I’ve grown to like a lot. I slipped out barefooted in my sparkly gold dress with a glass of champagne and I sat on the edge of the porch with my feet up listening to the ruckus around me on the university street I live on and I watched the snow fall silently to the ground.

And I wept.
That’s the only way I can describe what occurred. Weeping.

I wept for things lost and moments gone. I wept for joy that was taken. I wept for my aching heart.

I also wept for the beauty. Beauty of marriages and babies and friendships formed. I wept for the love I feel and the love I’ve been given.

And then two of the most important women in my life this year, Patty & Joanna, popped out to hug me. And we had a moment reminiscing on where we’ve been, what we’ve done and how we got here.

Then we went inside to finish celebrating and laughing and starting 2017 off with a bang.

And then, today, the wind came.

It met us after church. It was howling and sweeping around not yet melted snow. And it kept coming.

As I’ve sat in my front room attempting to rest and gear up for another week, the wind has knocked on my door on multiple occasions, it’s rustling the barren trees and moving around the bits of trash left over from a night of people reveling.

The wind met me, a little over 3 years ago, on a dirt road in Swaziland. Out of absolute stillness the wind came. In that moment it came to knock down walls in my life. The wind met me again in Spain. It was destructive, and calming and aggressive. It uprooted and plowed through me.

Today, the wind met me in 2017 to uncover.

I had a dream two nights ago, which is rare for me, and as I talked it through with a friend I realized it was full of significance for myself. In part of the dream we were restoring this beautiful estate. We were moving mounds of dirt that had piled up over these beautiful porches and patios and gathering areas. And then we gathered and celebrated in the beauty we had uncovered.

I’ve always known that the wind comes to uncover what was already there. What’s been there.

You just have to choose to clean up the mess that it moved.

Who knows what 2017 holds. I may or may not find that guy, I may have more unsuccessful days at work, the two year olds might do me in, I might feel lonely or sad.

But the wind came today.

The wind came and it moved all the crap and dirt and pain that 2016 left in its wake. It moved all of it to show the beauty that 2016 left. The beauty and the loveliness that has always been there.

I’m going to let the wind keep uncovering the beauty and truth in my life in 2017. I am going to create more, I’m going to hone my baking skills, I am going to write.
I am going to sing.

The wind brought me hope today, that I forgot I was capable of having.