Blog Post #500

500.  What a number!  500 blog posts and about two years ago, I was mired in the muck of confusion and doubt, truly alone for the first time in my life and experiencing an existential pain that I did not know what to do with.  A new friend told me my cup was empty.  When she showed me her beautiful blog and artwork (Contemporary Photography), I didn't see words and beauty, I saw a lifeline and grabbed it.  Two days later, Peaceful Legacies was born with post #1.

Step-by-step, post-by-post, my life changed, expanded and made room for miracles.  Gradually my cup filled and overflowed with beauty and gratitude.  Little by little, I began to hear my own voice and find my own path (this reminds me so much of the last part of Mary Oliver's powerful poem "The Journey" that I've reprinted it below).  Doors that I thought were shut forever opened and new possibilities danced before me.

What I have to wonder as I contemplate and give thanks for the journey that played out in the first 500 posts is "What will the next 500 posts reveal?"  There is such fun and awe in knowing that the journey continues one blog post at a time and that, most likely, I can't even imagine what surprises, delights and challenges await me.

Thanks for being my companions on this journey.

The Journey by Mary Oliver

One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice --
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.
"Mend my life!"
each voice cried.
But you didn't stop.
You knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very foundations,
though their melancholy
was terrible.
It was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen

branches and stones.

But little by little,

as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice
which you slowly
recognized as your own,
that kept you company
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do --
determined to save

the only life you could save.