Altitude & Life (somewhere over the ocean...)

Right now, I’m sitting on a plane to Italy (via Germany), drinking white wine and reading about Patti Hansen (wife of Rolling Stones’ Keith Richards). And it suddenly overwhelms me (possibly courtesy of the significant effect of alcohol at altitude) how delicious life is. And how lucky I am.

I am cruising thousands of metres above the ocean, off to see a part of the world I have never seen. Every day I have an opportunity to learn something new, to discover someone different, to taste and sense and experience and feel and know and question. I have the freedom to do what I want, when I want, how I want.

I earn enough money that I am never hungry, or homeless, or restricted in my choices. I have the support of beautiful people who love and look after me – even when I don’t deserve it. I have the advantages of education, health, safety, security and love. And I know I am one of the supremely lucky people who can do or be anything I want. And this is courtesy of all the people in my life - both those who gifted me the kind of genetics that make anything easy, and those who told me time and time again that there was nothing in the world I couldn’t accomplish with a little bit of sweat.

Sometimes it’s easy to complain about life. No one’s journey is ever easy or simple, and sometimes I will lie awake at night and wish desperately that I didn’t think so much, or feel so much, or want so much of the unobtainable. My brain is an overactive hub of activity that I can never switch off – and left unchecked it can drive me to the cliff-edge of madness. But would I give it up? Never. And looking around me I cannot but scold myself for being ungrateful.

So as a brief note to those people who love, support, and believe in me – no matter what I say or do – please know this: no matter how forgetful, preoccupied, melodramatic, distanced or compartmentalized I can be – I can never thank you all enough for giving me this opportunity to live a most beautiful life. And if I forget to say thank you? Never doubt that you deserve a thanks that I could never say loudly enough.

Ps. Yes, okay, I can hear your laughter. I should probably NOT get drunk and write my blog on an airplane. But I mean it nevertheless. You know my greatest emotional honesty is provoked by alcohol!