We all try to do our best. Most days anyway. Most days the best Bob and I do is pretty respectable. Still, we wonder - is it enough? We don't know. And it's petrifying.
We didn't take off for a year just to travel with the kids. As big as that would have been - it seems easy compared to what we're trying to do here. We want to re-create our lives from the bottom up. We want to redefine the way we live. We want to figure out a way to earn a living working together, anywhere we happen to be. So many people want the same thing, and many people figure it out successfully. We're not exceptional, or singular. We've just thrown in semi-constant travel to foreign countries at the same time. You know - to keep it exciting. At times I can't believe our audacity.
We try to keep the faith: If we continue to do good work, and be open to opportunities, and be brave enough to keep reaching farther out of our comfort zone, and challenging ourselves, we will find our path.
This week had been a slow, simmering panic for both of us. The minute either one of us loses our nerve anywhere, even for a moment, it feels dangerous. That's a lot of pressure to put on two ordinary people.
This morning Eleanor was sensing that Bob and I were stumbling, and I was trying to let her know that everything is fine - no matter what. I explained that it's like if you lived at the bottom of a mountain, and there, you had everything you need. But, you really wanted to climb the mountain, and it was a very hard climb. So you start and you climb and you get cold and have to hang on really tight and be super-brave, and you might not make it. But if you don't make it, you have everything essential back home at the base of the mountain. You won't be homeless or hungry if you don't make it. You just won't be, well, on top of the mountain.
That cliched analogy sounds both harmless and devastating to me at this moment.
I quit writing this wincingly-honest and whiny blog and ate lunch, listening to the new Gabe Dixon album I just downloaded on itunes. Here are the lyrics from a song called Further The Sky:
The bigger the dream, The rougher the ride
The truer the love, The deeper the ache
The blinder the faith, The tougher the go
The higher you reach, The further the sky
The more miles you walk, The longer the road
The steeper you climb, The harder you stand to fall
The stronger you get, The heavier the load
See. It's universal. It only feels lonely.