31 Days of Five-Minute Free Writes: Day 3

31 Days of Five-Minute Free Writes: Day 3 - Capture

I went to Europe with my sister in 2013 as a celebration for my 50th birthday. The photo above is the moment it fully hit me that I was in London. We had been there two days and for some reason, as we crossed the Millennium Bridge it hit me - I am in Europe. I captured the moment and grasped that I was realizing a lifelong dream. I. was. in. London.

How often do we ignore these moments in our life and neglect to capture the preciousness of them? It doesn't have to be a major trip to a far-off land. It can be time spent with a parent who is telling you about his days in college some 65 years ago. It could be sitting in a book club gathering when you realize that you have found a group of people that you can completely be yourself with. It could be when you wake up one day and don't feel the longing for the life you thought you would have.

When I graduated from high school, my family took a trip to Hawaii as my graduation present. It was a magnificent trip full of beautiful sights and wonderful experiences. But because my boyfriend was in Europe at the same time, I didn't capture the moment that was this trip that I know my parents scrimped and saved for. Because I wasn't seeing the sights that had been existence for hundreds of years, I didn't capture the beauty of the trip I was experiencing.I didn't capture the wonderful gift that my parents had given me.

Capture is about appreciating the everyday in its mundaneness. It is about accepting your experiences without comparing them to those around you. Capturing what life has to offer is the key to capturing life in its fullest. It is about capturing what life gives instead of what we want. We must be willing to capture what we are given instead of standing with open hands waiting for what we think will fulfill us. So raise those hands and capture the offerings of life!

Comments

Five Minute Friday: Roots

Lisa-Jo Baker (lisajobaker.com) hosts a weekly event on her blog called "Five Minute Friday". The rules are 1. Write for 5 minutes flat – no editing, no over thinking, no backtracking. 2. Link back here and invite others to join in. 3. And then absolutely, no ifs, ands or buts about it, you need to visit the person who linked up before you & encourage them in their comments. Seriously. That is, like, the rule. And the fun. And the heart of this community.. So here's my first try at this. Today's topic was Roots. Roots – I think about my grandparents who lived on a farm until my grandfather’s diabetes worsened and they moved to a town with a hospital nearby. My father still says he wished he could have kept that farm. I think of my grandmother who was a widow for 20 years. Every year she would stand over my PaPa’s grave, wishing she was with him. I think of my parents, a product of those grandparents, how hard my father worked to put 2 girls through

Five Minute Friday: Time

Five Minute Friday is a writing event that has writers spending five minutes writing on the same topic and then sharing them at http://katemotaung.com/five-minute-friday/ . This week's word is Time. Sometimes time feels like this, like we are in it. Standing inside it, watching life pass by. It is so easy to get stuck in a time - in our pain, in our hurt. We hear the ache tick away in our head like a giant clock. Time, instead, is a gift. More time with family, more time to accomplish goals, more time to see the world. When you are hurting, it seems like time takes forever. One day turns into another day, turns into another day. When we hate a job, the five days of time that make up a work week seem to go on forever. But those five days are also a gift. Because these days, a job is not a guarantee. I want to see time as gift, not as a chore. I want to be on the other side of it, wishing there was more of it. Making the most of every hour, minute, and second instead of

Five Minute Friday: Dwell

Five Minute Friday is a writing event that has writers spending five minutes writing on the same topic and then sharing them at http://katemotaung.com/five-minute-friday/ . This week's word is Dwell. I have thought about this word a lot - where should I dwell. After my divorce, I had a big decision to make - did I buy X's half of the house and continue to dwell where I had for the past 15 years or did I sell and move to a new dwelling. After crunching numbers and weighing my options, I decide to stay in the house we had bought together. Because, when it came right down to it, I loved my house. I felt safe there. I try not to dwell on the sadness that happened in this place but instead try to dwell on making it my own. I have painted rooms in colors X would have never agreed upon, I have bought artwork that he would never have hung. I want to dwell in a place that reflects who I am. When the yard is full of weeds and the basement full of water, I long to dwell in

One Is Just A Number

Search This Blog