i recently came across san diego momma who does this awesome thing called PROMPTuesday (patent pending, i’m sure), which essentially gives bloggers something to blog about on tuesdays just in case you’re having a writer’s block.  much like i am today.  so here’s today’s prompt:

For today’s PROMPTuesday, I ask that you write about a trip or an excursion that left you changed in some way. Did you conquer a fear on your trip? Learn something about yourself? Learn something about another person? Break up? Get together? Consider hospital time for the largest walking blister this side of Manhattan?

I look forward to what comes back and, I think it’s obvious by now that I’ve completely shitcanned the rules. Exxcceeepppttt:

  • Please have fun. Don’t put pressure on yourself. Together, let’s rediscover the simple joy in the writing process.
  • Post your submission in the comments OR post in your blog and leave a link to your blog in the comments.

in 2000, i was in the middle of a marriage (that might be news to some; sorry to spring it on you, i may or may not blog more about it later) that was heading quickly on a downward spiral. within a two-week period in april, my husband asked for a divorce after we’d only been married a year (because…??? i’m still not sure why), a high school friend of mine died in a car accident, and my 25-year old cousin died of a brain tumor, leaving behind a wife and a 5-year old son. i lost my love, a friend, and family. as event after event happened, i felt the burdens become heavier and heavier on my shoulders, and i felt like i was going to crack.  i was sad a lot, and confused a lot, and angry a helluva lot.

at the time, i worked for delta air lines, and i felt like the only way that i could cope with everything was to just. get. away. just for a short period of time, to regroup, to feel what it was to be Me again.  in retrospect, it really looks like i was running away from my problems, but at the time, i felt like it was simply survival instinct.

so i went to australia. the only thing i really did to plan for it (or the only energy i had for planning) went strictly towards reserving a standby spot on qantas, and saving up enough to be able to afford food, lodging (hostels of course), and perhaps a few souvenirs. as i stepped off the plane in sydney, i had no hostel reservation, only a stellar recommendation from someone on the forums of a hostel website. i made my way to the hostel suggestion, marvelling in the friendliness of everyone i had met so far, and crossing my fingers and toes that the hostel would still be open (it was around 10pm at night when i arrived). luckily for me, it was. i had a few backup suggestions, but i really wanted to stay at this one.

life lesson #1: i can do this by myself. i don’t need anyone to hold my hand and make sure i’m okay.

i wandered around sydney for a week, met up with the guy who made the hostel suggestion (who was from toronto and really, really cool), and met another canadian that i found out later had graduated with a (different) cousin near vancouver that was also staying at my hostel. the three of us wandered around sydney, went to taronga zoo, hung out at the aquarium (the best one in the world i’ve seen yet), and took in everything sydney had to offer, including the weirdly schoolmarm-ish prostitutes in the red light district of king’s cross. (umm, we didn’t take them up on THEIR offers….)

later on, i headed up to cairns, near the great barrier reef, and booked an overnight trip on a boat for some scuba diving, snorkeling, and to see what all the hype was about. when i first donned my scuba mask and dunked my head underwater, i was absolutely in shock and amazement and felt like i could not breathe. words cannot do justice to the beauty of seeing so much, looking down on what felt like another planet. the coral and the fish were so many different colors, and it was nothing like i’d ever experienced in my entire life before, and probably unlike anything i’ll ever experience again.

in one of my favorite movies, a daughter tells her mother that when she gets stressed out, to “remember the fish, mom.”  now i know exactly what she was talking about.  i am constantly going back to this moment when i need to clear my mind.  i guess you could call it my “happy place,” for lack of a better term.

then on top of all of that, i got up the next morning before anyone else on the boat, grabbed a hot tea and my headset, and listened to some music while i watched the sun rise up over the horizon of the ocean.

life lesson #2: even when it feels like life is throwing shit at you constantly, there IS beauty in the world that exists at the same time that you feel like your life shouldn’t.

i didn’t want to leave. in fact, later my mother told me that she really thought that i’d call and tell her that i wasn’t going to be coming home and to have my belongings shipped over. but, being the (mostly) responsible person that i am, i headed home to take care of the pending divorce and because i had student loan bills that i knew i wouldn’t be able to pay on what i would probably make in australia. so i headed home.

during my stopover in los angeles, i called home and told my mom that i’d likely be getting on the next flight and if i didn’t call back, that means i got on the flight, and to please pick me up at the airport at 6:30pm? she said that was fine. she then went on to tell me that in the short amount of time i had been gone, my husband (fine steward of finances that he was) had called my parents asking for a loan, as he’d just gotten a notice that the electricity was going to be turned off for non-payment. (this, after him telling me that he was going to take care of the bills. which were in my name. which subsequently led to me having really shitty credit that i’m still working on repairing.)

life lesson #3: sometimes divorce is not a bad thing. sometimes getting married is.

and so it goes.

today, i’d say that what i learned has quite likely made me a bit jaded, and maybe cynical as well.  but even when i am both of these things, i still recognize beauty in the world. and if all else fails (including love), i know i will always remember the fish.