Fulfilling My Destiny

When do you most feel like you are fulfilling your destiny? When things feel just right, when you know you're using your innate skills, when you're using all the lessons life has been teaching you, when you know just what you're doing?

Today has been a good day so far. I've 'fulfilled my destiny' in many ways and it's only noon.

1. I fixed the faucet. Our faucet has been spraying water everywhere for a few days and we've just been sort of putting up with it, hoping it would 'fix itself'. Well... that wasn't happening, so I wrote to the landlord, who suggested seeing if there was sediment in the filter. After struggling to get the faucet apart, I remembered that I have these fantastic locking curved pliers. After an embarrassing struggle to figure out how to unlock them, I got them onto the faucet and with barely any force, the faucet parts moved and voila! I was able to clean the screen and put it all back together. No more faucet spray. I am always inordinately proud of myself when I fix things around the house. I feel like I'm living my life lessons, like my dad would be proud of me, like I really can do anything if I think it through. I love that. I wish I could download all my dad's fixit knowledge into my head, but I'm attempting to do that by always asking him how to fix things when I can't figure it out myself. Someday we will have our own fixer-upper and then I'll really kick into gear.

2. I painted a picture, on a very small scale. After a few years of struggling with huge canvasses, I have finally come to the conclusion that either I'm just not ready for large-scale paintings, or it's just not how my artist works. So I scaled waaaaay back down in size, and am very pleased with the result. I can't show you here since the recipient reads this blog... but I'll post it later. Whenever I allow myself time to just sit down and do art, I am so happy. Listening to bluesy rock on the headphones, figuring out color mixing, making adjustments along the way... I feel right at home.

3. I made ultra-delicious sweet potato soup last night. My brother and I both love to cook, so I feel that family connection whenever I put something yummy together. I have been working at learning how to really cook well for about 10 years, and it's nice that it's finally sort of starting to pay off, in that I can follow a recipe and then adjust the seasonings, etc., without ruining the taste. I'm starting to figure out what herbs/spices go with what flavors, etc. It's a nice feeling and again, I feel like I'm doing something I'm supposed to be doing.

4. And of course I wouldn't be me if I didn't bake sometimes. Actually last night I baked gingerbread (with fresh and candied ginger) but that's not very photogenic, so these are some cookies I baked for coworkers (chocolate, with white chocolate chips and crushed peppermint candies). My mom is the best cookie-maker. Even though almost all of our meals while growing up were overwhelmingly healthy, we did almost always have cookies around (sometimes made with whole wheat, but still). I don't always have cookies around, nor chocolate, nor ice cream (all staples at my childhood home) but I love baking and I like seeing piles of cookies on the counter (who wouldn't?).

5. And of course, reading. Yesterday I read my eagerly-awaited third installment in the Twilight series (it finally came in to the library!) and I read it in one day. Loved, loved, loved it. One of the best feelings in the world is when a story sweeps you up and you are somewhere else... it's one of my true addictions. It's one of my favorite things in the whole world. Alas, now I have to wait, like everyone else, for the fourth book. (back of hand pressed dramatically to forehead).

Wow. Now what? I think another painting... maybe maybe another piece of gingerbread.