It's October, and things are great!

October is finally here!  It's my favorite month, you see.  As a kid growing up in Angleton, Texas, in the 70's and 80's, October always brought the Brazoria County Fair and Parade, the Renaissance Festival, and Halloween (which happens to be my birthday), and nowadays, there's a wedding anniversary thrown in.  The weather turns cooler, the sky turns bluer, and I generally feel thrilled to be alive.

Things are going pretty well for me right now.  A recent burst of enrollments at JMMA has finally allowed me to relax just a tiny bit and think that we're going to be able to pay our rent, and the energy of the student body is absolutely wonderful.  I've been doggedly training to improve my breathing and cardio capacity after spending most of the year struggling with a vicious asthma flare up.  Although I'm still far from where I'd like to be in regards to my athleticism, I'm improving all the time.  My Jiu Jitsu is getting better, I think.  And I've finally finished my second book, Gart's Road.  Family life at home has improved in many ways, so I'm feeling a general sense of delight.

At times like this, I finally feel like I can relax for a moment and just take it all in.  It's all a journey, and I'm sure there are many more ups as well as downs to come.  For this moment, at least, I feel deeply, truly happy.  There have been many times in my life where things were not going my way.  There have been some major challenges, to say the least.  In the face of those obstacles, I have always chosen to simply take a deep breath and then press forward with everything I could muster.  This has generally worked for me.  Of course, there have often been changes of plans, adjustments of routes, and I occasionally discovered that the process of meeting one goal ended up changing the goal altogether.  That said, I think it's important to just keep moving forward, one foot in front of the other, until you end up getting somewhere.  I've done that, and done it often.  It's hard work, yes it is.

However, at times like this, where I can feel a cool breeze on my face and the warm sun on my skin and everything in my world is more or less at peace, I'm grateful for all the challenges.  They led me to this moment, this particularly wonderful and happy moment.  Life is good.

I am trying to get into the habit of writing here more often.  I have another blog where I talk more about my books, and you can visit it here.  Feel free to leave a comment, drop me a line, or just say 'hey.'  And have a fabulous day.