Some things remain the same...

While catching up with an old friend I hadn't spoken with much over the past 2-3 years a prominent question was raised...

Is there anything about you that is the same?

On the surface there is very little, but the core remains the same.

Opposed to previous plans & desires I am not living alone in a canvas tent isolated somewhere deep in the wilderness writing about the joys and struggles of primitive life all the while compiling a vast work of photographic art to go along with the novel.

Instead I am living with my husband in a 3rd story apartment in suburbia writing about the joys and struggles of training for a 1/2 iron & marathon all the while compiling a vast work of photographic art that captures Other's life moments & whatever I find beautiful in my daily life.

I never did spent over a month on a three part tour of New Zealand, Fiji & Australia relishing in the beauty and culture of those wonderful places.

Instead the engine on the car I had just bought seized eating up all of my trip funds that were then needed to replace a vehicle. The month I would've spent on the tour I spent getting to know the amazing man who I would later marry & his family.

I no longer define the closeness of a friend by how much we agree on topics of life & religion. We are all imperfect people. I delight in how those imperfections reveal character and have the capacity to spur another person on. If we all agreed how would we grow in knowledge & understanding?

My appearance is no more anchored on trademark hair. Function has come before vanity. Function equaled to 2ft. less hair, no perms & no color, but I can fit it into a swim cap, under a helmet and run without being slapped by it.

My life, as it has always been, is one driven by passion & what my God has blessed.

The life I live now, while drastically different than what it used to be or what I thought it would be, is not a compromise to previous passions. Passion itself has not been relinquished, but rather morphed into other loves, adventures and activities.

Of course the quip of stubbornness has not relinquished either. (Only goes to prove the comment I made earlier about the imperfect.)