My Long Lost Love

One of the highlights of our recent trip to the Ozarks was water skiing again after a 13 year break.  Reminded me how I adore water skiing, gliding across the water makes me feel as if I am strong. Exhilarating.  As much as my life has changed over the past 13 years, so has my approach to water skiing.  When I used to water ski, I felt as if I were being pulled by the boat, completely out of control, pretty much waiting to crash in order to end my water skiing turn.  This time, I still was being pulled by the boat, but I recognized that I had choices.  I would look up and see one side of the boat was particularly choppy, so I would move to the other side.  I would notice some large waves straight ahead and would bend my knees to absorb the shock.   I would notice when I was fatiguing and decide to give the signal to stop rather than wait until I fell.  Basically, I was making choices to try to make my stay up as long as possible.  This frame of mind, this strategizing made the sport for me that much more rewarding.  It reminded me of how my dad and I used to play Othello when I was growing up.  When Thom and I purchased the game and began to play, I stopped, stunned.  I did not know what was happening, this was not the fun easy going game I recalled as a child.  Thom was strategizing the whole game, a technique my father had not employed upon me, I'm sure allowing me to win much of the time, making me think I was actually GOOD at the game, when in fact, I was not at all.  I enjoyed living under that delusion.

This whole episode seemed like a metaphor for life.  I mean we're all being pulled by a big boat through life.  You get to choose how you respond when you meet up with those big waves.  You can anticipate some of them, others will be a surprise.  You always have the choice of how you respond to them.  Just like I used to tell Ellie at the hospital, there are certain things we HAVE to do, but we can choose what we think about them.   By recognizing my control over the situation, my enjoyment increased tremendously.