Riding the storm out

Everyone faces storms in life. Some blow out as quickly as they blow in. Others linger, deluging you with heartache. And some never seem to leave.

For quite a while, life has been like being trapped in a Category 5 hurricane – destruction and heartbreak at every turn. Sure, every now and then the wind and rain would subside down to about Category 3 level, building up my hopes only for them to be dashed when the intensity returned.

I had reached the point where I simply wanted the storm to end – one way or the other. I was about to give up when something happened. A shaft of sunlight broke through the clouds for just a moment and restored a little hope to life.

With one email, I began to think the storm was ready to part. One email lead to another and then a phone call. Then another phone call and another and then a longer phone call. And at that end of that call the clouds broke and the sun shone brighter than it had in a long time.

As the storm pushes away from my life, a new adventure is ready to begin. What is that adventure, you ask? Well, thanks for asking because I am ready to scream it from the mountain tops. Here goes – I’M MOVING TO FLORIDA!!!

That’s right after spending most of the last 35 years in North Carolina and the last 13 at my current job, a door burst open with a privately owned newspaper in central Florida and the offer was just too good to pass up. And the offer was the first real ray of hope in a long time – one that came at the perfect moment.

While it was an “easy” decision, it is never easy to box up your life and move on. Yes, the storms of life had been battering me recently, but the rains don’t wash away the amazing memories I have made here. I graduated from college. I met my future wife and we got married here. We built and owned our first home. We have friends that we will cherish for a lifetime. But if the prolonged storm taught me anything it was to seek the rays of light life offers and follow them.

So the adventure begins. Boxes are starting to pile up. Donations are heading out of the house faster than pizza disappears around me. The stress level ebbs and flows from cataclysmic levels one minute to a mere minor annoyance the next. But life has reached a level of excitement that has not been present for quite a while.

Saying goodbye is never easy. Despite the many “bad” things that have happened of late, part of me will always be in North Carolina – much like part of me still resides in Pennsylvania. There are amazing people who have shaped my life in both places, people who have made me the person I am today. I pray that I will find those kind of people on the next stop of the journey.

One thing is for sure, it will be nice to see some sun and be out of life’s storm for a while. I certainly know that storms will come back – literally and figuratively – but there is joy in the journey again. And I have to say that makes riding out the storm worthwhile.