Hello readers. It’s hard to be objective when we write a difficult truth. If you have a moment to spare, I’d appreciate your comments and/or advice on this preface to my personal story. Thank you!

Preface:

My husband of forty-two years asked, “Why are you dredging all this up now. That time is behind us.” 

I tried to explain. 

There is a shape to being human, a wholeness when we find it. And we will. But thanks, and no thanks to the wolf in the universe who likes to stir up trouble, sometimes we must struggle first.

I picture that furry-pawed nemesis building an obstacle course of walls to climb over, hurdles to jump, cliffs negotiate and dark tunnels to crawl through – timed of course. All those barriers that make us feel that our problems are unsurmountable. But after we plunge through the chaos, make sense of our trials and tribulations, and find clarity and peace, we have come full circle into wholeness. 

The universe itself is made up of circular patterns and shapes. With every rotation, something new can be discovered. I’ve come to believe there is a God who speaks to us by using the universe as His-Her mouthpiece. Sometimes, the mouthpiece is a megaphone – loud and clear. Other times, it’s just a whisper on the wind. 

Signs from the universe come in various ways: through snippets of conversations, events too coincidental, chance encounters. Most of mine have come through in dreams.

I’m too curious to ignore the signs. I’m afraid if I don’t listen, my awareness will sit on the silence with nowhere to go.

For the better part of a year, I’d had a nagging feeling that something important needed my attention. Something more important than cleaning out a closet or scheduling a teeth cleaning. So I sat back and tuned in.

Over the course of a few months, each gifted clue built upon the next. The third and final was the key that snapped everything into place. 

Clue #1: A boxing buddy of mine authored a book I promised to read and review. Value Economics – the Study of Identity, asked the reader how much we were willing to sacrifice to defend our values. It was about choosing your hard and how our struggles are the fabric that, in the long run, strengthens us and helps us to grow.

My biggest hard came to me in a millisecond.

Clue #2: a dream turns into reality.

Over the years I’ve had a recurring and frustrating dream of leaving Hawaii and regretting I didn’t spend more time at the beach. The same dream had also showed me an enticing, wooded path off to the right of the shoreline, one I yearned to explore. But, airplane waiting, I had to leave that trail behind, unexplored. 

Recently, I actually went to Hawaii on a family trip. I spent plenty of time in the warm sand and blue water. Take that, dream!

The day before we were to leave the Big Island, we decided to try another beach. To get there, we had to follow, yes, a wooded path on the right. I didn’t put it together at first. But as I sat on Waialea beach under the abundance of shade trees that grew almost to the water, I knew. This is it, I told myself. The place I never got to see in my dream. 

As my husband and I relaxed on beach chairs watching our five grandchildren play in the sand. I knew, have always known, what I valued most. I turned to him and smiled. “Just look at what we’ve created.” 

Bam.

I knew what I had to do. 

Yes, thirty-two years ago, I had come out of my hard and found clarity and peace. But my full circle had a tiny, almost infinitesimal missing piece. 

This writer of fiction had to get real. 

Before I have to hang up my boxing gloves, before my eyebrows disappear and I have to draw them in with a magic marker, I need to write how my hardest struggle led me down a path to exactly where I was supposed to be. 

Never, ever, should we forget our struggles. Mr. Wolf might be a cruel one, but he’s a great teacher of life. I wonder if he sits back at times, files down his claws, and has known this all along.

Because once we are clear of the wolf’s mouth, Mr. Canine Lupus himself is likely to hand us a bow-wrapped diploma that reads, “congratulations.”So, I’m digging in now, reliving the “hard” of how I endured eight years of infertility and, despite Mr. Wolf, or perhaps because of him, I finally became a mother.