I know I’ve been pretty quiet lately.

After a couple of months of typing words as fast as they came to my mind I needed a little silence.   I needed to stop recording life and spend some time just living it, and not thinking about how today’s events or feelings link back into a bigger picture or how my mom is in every moment.

I needed to watch my babies play and not think about what the joy in those moments meant.  I needed to walk at the pace and speed and distance that I could and not record the bumps in the road because those bumps are not the important milestones but continuing the journey forward is. 

And I did.  I’ve spent the last two months loving on my kids, snuggling, reading, celebrating birthdays, splashing in the pool, working, walking and taking in life. 

I’ve also been doing a lot of thinking lately.  As the days till the 3-day tick away, my excitement is rising, but so is my anxiety.  I am already asking myself what next?  Where do I go now?  I certainly could walk again, and I think I might.   But I have this nagging feeling that I should do more.  That I need to do more.  There is something inside of me that is pushing me to find what my next step in this journey is.  Telling me that this next step could be an important one. 

My mom always wanted to write a book.  She use to tell me that one day we would sit down together and we’d write our book.  The book that laid out the challenges that broke us down and the spirit that allowed us to move forward.  The book that chronicled the highs and the lows and the moments that made her the person she was.  She wanted to write about it all and any time something extraordinary would happen she would say, “ah, this is one for the book.”  She use to tell me that, while her life may not be important, she had life experience that could fill the pages.  

When she was sick I would whisper in her ear that her life was important and that her moments did matter.  And that was the truest thing I knew to say to her.  Because to me, her life was the most important life in the World.  And I believe – I HAVE to believe that losing my mom means something.  That losing her is suppose to point me towards some purpose. 

You know, Nancy Brinker, whatever you may think of her today, did something amazing because of the profound loss she felt for one person.  Nancy Brinker built Susan G. Komen.  And I don’t care if you hate her politics or you think she’s done a crappy job leading the organization or detest her as a person, but she built a breast cancer fighting pink monster in her Sister’s memory.  And my God, the things we owe to Susan G. Komen today are countless.

I’m not going to build the next cancer fighting monster, but I have the same ball of grief and determination churning in my gut that I imagine moved Nancy Brinker to action.  And that churning ball keeps asking me what next?