Extraordinary

September has always seemed the month for renewal, contrary to January where things just go on, September is always filled with promise. A new year full of new stuff. After the lull of summer, new school year, new patients, new grants, new research, new boots ;) Add to that the new, almost age of 49 and the need for renewal grows. You see, I am slowly approaching the NOW WHAT? age.

In case you don't know what the NOW WHAT? age is, it is that time in life when you ask yourself just that - NOW WHAT? I have teenage kids who are almost completely independent. I am fairly proficient at my job. I am doing research that I love. I am in fairly decent fit shape. I am happy, NOW WHAT?

So, I've been thinking maybe it is time to do something extraordinary. Maybe it is time to join Doctors without borders (I have been wanting to do this for years!) and go fight Ebola. Maybe it is time to renew the Harvard contacts and take the job. Maybe it is time to climb Mount Everest. Maybe it is time to go on some exhaustive self reflective walk on El Camino de Santiago in Spain. Maybe I need to do the Totem to Totem Haida Gwaii Marathon. Maybe, maybe, maybe.

And then this morning as if on cue to my do-something-extraordinary-quest, one of my three calming apps (yes, in my own weird overachiever way I have downloaded not one but THREE calming apps on my iPhone: Calm, Be Calm and Simply Being) wakes me up with my daily reminder to be mindful: "Today, take the time to notice the ordinary things in life that make you happy".

So, I started noticing, first the ordinary fact that made me happy was that I managed to unload the one-more-day-and-it-will-be-too-late-to-eat-bananas in the kid's lunches. But then it got better, it made me happy to see that there was still some of the two gallon OJ I bought two days ago in the fridge, ordinary. Then it made me happy to see that the rain has stopped and we had sun, ordinary (but not as much as the fruit related ordinary events, we agree?). On and on it went, happy after happy ordinary stuff.

Then it was the ordinary happy time to drop the teenagers off at school, their first day of school. Sebastian, a by now veteran in Grade 11 and Benjamin a new Grade 8. Both of them in their gray pants, white collared button down shirt, blue tie and blue blazer (a la Dead Poets Society as my friend would say).

I drive, happy in the sun, happy with the ordinary fact that there was no traffic. At the corner I stop and let them out and as I watch them walk away it hits me - THERE IT IS!! MY EXTRAORDINARY feat already done, two boys walking away side by side, talking and laughing, confident, kind, lovely - EXTRAORDINARY!