A few years ago, we had to decamp unexpectedly to Tucson for a family emergency. It threw everything into chaos, including my writing.
Then life settled down to a pleasing predictability, and I was happily enjoying boring old normal life when
BOOM!
Our lives were turned on their heads in an instant. One moment I was speeding down the street on my bike, following Mark to Starbucks to meet a friend. And the next…
BAM!
I slammed into the sidewalk, hard, on my right arm, ribs and knee. I screamed and managed to turn over on my back, but I couldn’t move my arm.
And then Mark was there. Mark is always there when I need hin. He’s my angel. My guardian. My soulmate. He waited with me for the half hour it took for an ambulance to arrive.
And now, we are facing surgery to repair a badly broken humerus. My work will stop for a few days, a week, maybe two. Me, the guy who never slows down, will have to just
STOP.
There’s a reason for this, right? There always is, whether it’s a message from God or the fates, or one we teach ourselves – a story we weave to explain why this thing happened to us, and what we can learn from it.
And while the reason is not yet clear to me, the message of the moment is.
SLOW DOWN.
The universe has wrested the wheel from my manic hands and has downshifted my life to neutral. So I can fight it, or I can lean into it and see what unexpected fruit it might bear. Mark and I will figure it out together.
Events like these strip away the artifice and remind us who we are, both alone and together. This one has reminded me how fortunate I am, even in the midst of cascading misfortunes. Because I have him. Because we have each other.
So yeah. Curve ball. Big time. But still, it’s ok, because in this tiny house where we never thought we’d end up, there is
LOVE.
And the rest will work itself out, writing included.
To my author friends, what curve balls has life thrown at you? What did you learn? And did you find a way to keep writing?