So Summer has finally arrived. Not just in the warm sun, blue skies and long dry days but in the way I feel too. I feel happier and healthier than I have for years (I can pinpoint the last time, it was early 2004, I was on an incredibly exotic holiday, I was drinking fabulous fruit cocktails and swimming daily, and unbeknown to me I had just become pregnant). This time I'm certainly not pregnant - the certainty is just one of the benefits of my firmly single status - and nowhere exotic, simply at home in the Midlands with my gorgeous 6 year old son, and plenty of time for life.
End of term came as a relief, I had run on empty for so many months that I was surviving, not living. This Summer is about me. I don't mean brash neon coloured fun, I mean healthy natural all the time in the world taking pleasure from the world around me kind-of-fun. And I've found it. Its good. And I've found me again, although I've changed a little bit. I'm less sure, more aware of my lack of perfection, but more compassionate in every way.
My son is growing up every day, amazing me with his knowledge, his need to learn, his spirit. I want to bottle up the feelings and the happiness we are having together, to keep us going through the dark months ahead. I don't want to get into the same exhausted state as last year. I will find time for my son and our life. I will find time to be me. Its going to be difficult but I will do it.
