At the finish line after my first 5K Walk, May 2009

I am a fellow traveler on the road who is on her way home.  From the time when I was a young child and saw a Christmas Day Mass on TV and thought I would like to be Catholic one day, to going to Minnesota for high school to college in Texas, short-term mission work in China, various civic opportunities,  diverse employment venues, graduate training, to writing, my path has not turned out as I expected it.

On each of these serendipitous turns, amazing things occurred. I met some of the most wonderful people I ever knew, initially in high school, where I grew into a skilled trombonist.  Then in college, I joined the Catholic Church (the childhood seed took root), and I am active in my faith still.  Travel to China for my senior capstone project introduced the world to me.  I held a summer job that led me to my ongoing involvement in prison ministry, and the various jobs I have held led me not only to several parishes where I grew in faith but also to lifelong friends, several of whom inspired the writing that I now do.

When my professional circumstances changed course for what seemed the umpteenth time in 2007, I returned to one of my passions, writing.  This initial spate of writing was inspired by the journey I made with a dear friend who had terminal brain cancer. I promised her I would write the story of our journey together, and I did.  That account is now published as Splinter of the Tree,and before I was ready to publish it, I released my first book of poetry in 2008, New Life and Joy:  Songs in the Shadow.  Less than a year later, I published  brief collection of some of my favorite poems entitled Wide Open Spaces.  Several of my articles appeared in local and national publications, and I was a ghostwriter on several pieces as well.   My third book, the namesake that inspired this blog, I Am Like Fire, debuted in September 2009, and a limited edition photo book inspired by my training, Looking for the Pearl, debuted in November 2009.

That brings me to today, deep in the midst of what I thought would be a mundane personal training experience, and I heard a familiar melody in my heart that can best be described as a love song.  Do I know the melody or the lyrics?  No, but that is not important; what matters is that I recognized this song has been in my heart from the time I was a child.  It is an eternal song, contained in the heart of every man, woman, child, and every created entity.  It is the pulse of the beating heart and the still point of every breath.  It is what I call the pulse behind the pulse, where I encounter God in a way that defies words.   In my new life, I accomplished unheard-of goals walking.  I drank deeply of the  experience of my first marathon in May 2010, and while I did not finish the goal I set out to do, I was kissed deeply by the experience and have competed in several races since, including half marathons in Columbus, OH and Cincinnati, OH. The 26.2 magnet on my car, bought before my first marathon, speaks of not where I have been but where I am going.    In 2008, this dream was not even on the radar; today it is at the forefront, larger than life.  The third leg of my stool (the first two being spiritual and emotional in nature), physical, grows stronger each day as it fills in the melody of my life created when all three spheres are in harmony.

The turns in the road have not been what I expected, but life and love have been given to me in the journey.  Now that is something to be fired up about!

after my best race finish in June 2010 & nearly 80 lbs. lighter than 2009