the business of living.

this past week was a bad one. so much happened it became a joke. i keep feeling like i'm being tested and i keep demanding to know when it will stop. it's not a feeling i like nor is it one i intend to keep around. but right now it's here. i'm facing it and i'm not looking in the other direction. 

it's not just me. people i love are going through scary things too. family members and friends, women i adore and look up to, have a lot on their plates. it's not a good feeling, but this happens. we are tested. it's hard. it's really unbelievably hard sometimes and sometimes you turn to chocolate when you swore you'd give up sweets for a month. you eat way too much and you become really upset when you get a really crummy phone call. 

but then you remember to pause. you watch homeland, downton abbey, that lifetime movie you've seen seven times already. you read essays by truman capote that are thoughtful and sharp, 85-page essays that you can't put down. you email your mom, your therapist, your friend in colorado, your friend in oklahoma who calls you peach. you talk to someone you love. you feel better for an evening, a day, a handful of days. 

God willing these handfuls of days add up.

i'm blessed beyond words to have wonderful people in my life, people i can't wait to tell good news and people who help me organize the bad. and it's when the bad is piling up that you see the value in friendships more than ever before, the people who know how to help.

this weekend was full of amazing food spent with ben's friends and family, blanket tents at eva's request, playing in the snow-finally, and the 84th viewing of the polar express. i'm grateful for the days that allow me to come down from such wretched weeks. i'm grateful for things that put my mind at ease. and i'm grateful for the good that keeps coming, the good that makes the bad less heavy. 

the business of living-there is always something to be learned. it won't always be easy. but we must pay attention to the light. we must always pay attention.

You just do it. You force yourself to get up. You force yourself to put one foot before the other, and God damn it, you refuse to let it get to you. You fight. You cry. You curse. Then you go about the business of living. That’s how I’ve done it. There’s no other way.

Elizabeth Taylor