Dear Me,

Girl, I look at you as we move into 2008 and simply put, I am amazed. Amazed at how you’ve learned to let go…even when holding on felt good, when letting go felt scary. How you learned to laugh when you really wanted to cry. How you reaffirmed that tears can be just what the doctor ordered…that they can be cleansing, healing, nurturing. How you learned to discern between what was worth your tears…and what wasn’t. How you learned that it really wasn’t about what you were looking at but what you saw. And you didn’t let what other people saw – or didn’t see – phase you not nay one bit. You set boundaries and enforced them – not in an effort to keep people out but rather to remind them that while in your space, they needed to respect whatever choices you made.

You bent without breaking, yielded without cracking, opened up without getting caught up…letting LIFE show up however it was meant to and dealing with the truth of it without getting lost in all the noise or letting any of it pull you too far left or right of your true self. For one solid year, you stood looking into the mirror of your own soul, gently examining your heart. And you never once flinched. No matter what you saw because you knew it was truthful, you knew it was necessary….you knew it was healing.

You stood your ground, doing it your way, praying your way through. Didn’t let your circusmstances DEFINE or CONFINE you. Shoooot, Frank Sinatra ain’t the only one singing, “I did it my way!” You kept moving forward, stopping when you needed to catch your breathe, stepping around the immovable. You slowed down when you needed to, slowed down enough to realize that sometimes to speed up, you have to slow down.

You learned not only to trust your self but to trust more in God. Always. In all things. No matter what it looked like to the naked eye. You did all right Ma - danced more, laughed more, listened more, got still more, smiled more, rid your life of clutter in ALL its various forms, found more peace, cultivated more joy. Loved more, loved deeper, loved better. Weathered the storm. Even found that you loved them…when viewed from the proper perspective.

Girl, you held it d-o-w-n in a mighty way. You and all those folks who were TRULY in your corner. Heaven guided. Heaven provided. Gon’ on wit cha bad self. Shoot, Frank Sinatra ain’t the only one singing, “I did it my way!”…and YOU did it in 3-inch heels. Ha!

So gon’ on Girl - get ya strut on. Strut Ma, strut right into 2008 with all the boldness, gratitude, excitement, anticipation, determination, and purpose that you can muster. Enjoying every step of this beautiful journey.

Make it happen Girl!

Set the world on fiya!

To me…from me -
Loving you with all that I got, all that I am,
“J”