One June day at Salmon Creek, I was walking off my frustration as a mom, wife, sister, daughter, community educator, writer. I was trying to ignore how I felt pulled apart, thin as taffy. There wasn’t enough of me to go around.
Something on the trail caught my attention. It was a turquoise dome in the dark gravel. I bent to find a robin eggshell, left after a hatching. It was a reminder to attend within.
I carried it home— *
—which took special care.**
The next summer I was stuck in an admin job, wanting to broaden my writing world, unsure of myself. I spotted a shell upside down near Vancouver Lake. Picking it up, I found its broken top wedged in its bottom half. As if, after splitting the shell, the baby bird stepped on the lid and pressed it compactly, the way you might stomp down the trash after taking it out.
A sign to boldly pursue my future.
The following spring, I was walking at Twanoh State Park, discouraged. I rounded a pine-needled slope, contemplating the twenty novel rejections I’d received. Probably I should quit. The very moment—God’s honest truth—that I had this thought
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