I was sitting on the back step tossing a tennis ball to the dogs when I heard it.

My husband had been working on a project outside for awhile before I came out so I deferred to him, “Do you hear music?” I asked cocking my head and straining my ear. To which he replied “This is the third rendition of “Wise Men Say” (not the real title I know….) I have heard since I came out.”

It was time to investigate.

We picked up the tools, shooed the dogs back inside and headed off, Pied Piper style, in the direction of the music. What we discovered was an Elvis Festival in full swing. I remember reading about it at some point but then the drama of the last week wiped it from my mind.

That is the fun part about living a few blocks from “downtown.” We are close enough to know when something is going on (and can join in if we feel like it) but not so close that we have to deal with it if we choose not to. We don’t have to pencil it in our calendars, hope we can find a place to park, and navigate our way to the action. We simply grab our keys, lock the door and follow the music.

The trade off is that life here is on a much smaller scale.

In Arizona, I went to book signings, author events and concerts with best selling authors and top billboard bands. I went to Cirque du Soleil and professional plays more times than I can count.

I was “cool” and “current” and while I enjoyed it all….I was unfulfilled and anxious. The traffic to get anywhere was nerve wracking and the crowds once I arrived were pretentious and overwhelming and I spent most of the event plotting a way out, waiting to go home.

I spent a good deal of time thinking there was something wrong with me, that I was broken or defective because as much as I wanted to be a part of the action, I just could not relax enough to enjoy it.

I was always overstimulated, overwhelmed, in over my head and drowning in my own panic, my need for air, for space, for escape.

I am realizing (slowly) that everyone operates at a different speed.

Some thrive in the fast lane. They want it all and they want it now. Big, bright and bold.

Some thrive in the slow lane, blinker on for miles, taking in the scenery, AM radio playing the oldies, oblivious to the world.

Some thrive in the middle.

That is where I find myself. In a gray area I always reserved for the undecided and the uncommitted. For those not bold enough for the fast lane, those not quite ready for the slow.

The middle was a vast wasteland where I thought nothing thrived.

Except I feel excitement, hold the panic, hearing “The King” crooning from a few blocks away.. I feel curiosity overtake apprehension.

I am not sure that I am “thriving” (yet) but I am definitely in the middle

I am in the gray and murky water between the buoy lines. I have not yet found my stoke but I am doing more than treading water, I am venturing farther and further from the shore. I am breathing more air than water, I and am floating more than sinking. I am finding the balance; the still place between ebb and flow.

My world may have become smaller, but I am becoming a bigger part of it….

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