The Future Scares the Hell Out of Me

So I am sitting here and looking over things for the Peace Corps and Graduate school, and all of these other crazy life decisions, and all I can think about is how much this all scares the hell out of me. I am looking at schools in different states and I am applying for a program that is going to take me away from my country for two years. Why the hell am I doing this? I am tighter with my family than anything else in my entire life. Am I just holding on to some sort of nomadic dream or traveling the world and having adventures? Is this what I really want? Can someone want something that scares them so bad?

This is the answer I have come up with. Yes, I can want something that scares the hell out of me. Yes, this is all life coming at me like mad, but...that is exciting as hell, and though i am scared out of my pants, I feel like I am on the brink of something truly amazing. I love my family and friends, and they are the most important parts of my life, but they wouldn't be the amazing set of friends nor the amazing relations that are family, if they weren't going to stay that way when I drop off the map for a little. Its going to be hard, and it is going to suck at times, because I am going to miss them so much, but if I don't go I am always going to wonder what my life would have been had I gone.

I refuse to be the the grandmother (heaven willing) that is on her death bed wondering what she could have done. Pondering who she could have met had she had nerve to go out and explore everything there was to explore. I will be the old woman (again, heaven willing) that went everywhere, and talked to everyone and has pictures on her mantle of both her dogs (I am not a cat person) and every corner of the globe. I want to speak a little of every language and worship in every religious building and wear out every pair of shoes I will ever own. I want the sun burn of the dessert, I want the waves of the ocean, I want concrete of every city, and the canopy of every forest. I want it all and though I may not get it, I will be damned if I am not going to try.

So I will put aside my fear, even if for a moment so I can catch my breath and refill my lungs. I will put one foot in front of another, and stop only when the pavement ends, and then go beyond that until the ground falls off, and sand is washed away.

"Yes we'll walk with a walk that is measured and slow,
And we'll go where the chalk-white arrows go,
For the children, they mark, and the children, they know
The place where the sidewalk ends."
~Shell Silverstein

~The Singing Ginger
I would like to dedicate this entire post to Amelia Lynn Callam, who on this day in 2006, became my guardian angel. Love you forever Mo.