Knowing.

We are all experts at something.  Lately I am really good at being tired.  In general I am good at pretending that I am fine.  Fake it till you make it.  Sometimes this works. 

Our fish died yesterday and my children, Nicolas, who is eight and Lucas, who is seven, had a funeral for it with daddy.  I was not at home when she died and did what we do when someone dies; got some food.  I brought three different flavours of ice cream home to distract them.  Both kids had cried for Baby, yes our little goldfish was named Baby.  Chris, my husband, put a lot of effort into trying to save this tiny little life but she didn't make it.  My son hugged me today and said, "I love you so much I hope you never die."   My boys now know a little about death. One minute you're here and the next you're flushed down the toilet having taken your last breath.

My friend knows a little about MS, she was diagnosed a few weeks ago.

I know about cancer.  I was diagnosed with Ewing's Sarcoma fifteen years ago.  I sit here now, married with two children and can't believe how lucky I am. I am not immune however to worrying too much or caring more than I should about too many things.  I have always been like that, never quite fitting in because I said the wrong thing at the wrong time and always worrying about it, alone.

I know about love.  When Chris and I got together the pieces of a puzzle that were not quite right snapped together.  It has sometimes been hard, especially when the kids were very little, but we have been married for nine years and he is everything to me.  I am everything to him.  We know how to be together.

I don't know why I still keep waking up in the middle of the night though.  I have trained myself to stay in bed and do my very best to get some rest.  I have two children to look after and a job to go to.  I can't sleep all day.  But some days that is all I want to do.  Curl up in a ball and make the world go away for just a little while as I gather some more strength to do the things I know how to do.  Live.

We all hunger to know what makes us feel alive, some of us just 'know' like when they meet their soul mate and some of us stumble upon our purpose like blind mice with a whiff of cheddar under our nostrils, it's this way, no that way, and somehow eventually we get there and realize that we could see all along and are not quite sure why it took us so long.

I know how to have friends now and am not quite the misfit I once was.  I have learned how to fit in, most of the time.  Now all I want to do is know how it feels to be an author.  Finally.