When It’s Safe

The lists of our to-dos, like where to travel and adventures we want to take when this is all over and life returns to normal, are growing as we live through this pandemic!

At midnight December 31^st, I wished for everyone to leap into the New Year with hearts and eyes wide open. Everyone is starting to realize that we can’t go back to the old normal, but we can go forward with everything we have learned and make it a good new-normal. Make lemonade, especially while we are trudging through January, aka 2020’s really bad hangover.

We might have had a similar list prior to 2020, but the lists were titled: Bucket List, or maybe Wish List. How one year—a year we’ve all hated and/or blamed—seemed to change our mindset. If asked before a pandemic what I would I do if I were locked in a house for almost a year, I would have replied, “Why would I be under house arrest?” Having lived it, apparently I would write a couple books and publish my tween/teen journals. Dreams of mine that I’d never thought would happen. Now it’s 2021, and what is in store for all of us next? Don’t worry, I am not going “there” on politics. Nope, this is pure and simple…

When it’s safe, I wish to…

…travel around and talk with groups about writing. Not as an expert, but how journaling and my little notepads have changed my life in so many ways. Even with disabilities that can be mentally crippling for a writer, I plowed through obstacles. I would have never, ever have shown someone my original journals from Girl Sailing Aboard the Western Star or The Last Crabtree Girl. Being self-conscious, I simply couldn’t. My dyslexia and ADHD are too blatantly obvious in my writing, and I was raised in a time when these hadn’t even been named yet. Simply put, teachers told my parents I needed extra help, like there was something wrong with me. Now, I hit “my issues” head on! However, I am not an expert on learning disabilities—only getting better at how to deal with my own.

When it’s safe, I can see myself traveling around talking with groups of horse lovers and riders who want to reminisce, Horse Talk, but with a little extra. I’d love to show young riders how to capture memories with more than just pictures from a cell phone and more mature riders how to preserve those precious memories of yesteryear. Sitting around on horses or not, wouldn’t it be grand to talk about them and the experiences we’ve had with our horses and ponies?

What do you want to do or achieve when it’s safe? Reorganize that “Bucket List” or personal “Wish List” and make a new, revised “When It’s Safe List.” Don’t give up on dreaming. Learn from and embrace 2020, so you can use it as a tool to empower your future!

Here is to you finding your “When It’s Safe!”