Saying Yes

I'm home from my grand, gala week in New York. The finale to the trip was a mini-reunion with five friends from my freshman year dorm, McAfee Hall, at Wellesley. We reconnected over Facebook and decided to rendez-vous in either Boston (three of them live in New England) or New York (two of them live in or near the city); I'm the only one who lives far away, the only one who had to fly to get there. But I'm so glad I did. It was a lifetime-memorable day, one that I'll still be savoring in thirty years.

Kathy, Marcey, and I shared a hotel room on Friday night; on Saturday morning, Tricia, Lisa, and Donna met us there and we headed out for brunch, followed by a tour at the Lower East Side Tenement Museum, a stroll through the new High Line park (on an abandoned stretch of elevated railway, first reclaimed by nature, and now reclaimed for recreation), had drinks at Donna's gorgeous apartment on Central Park West, talking and laughing for hours, and then dinner at the Union Square Cafe. Now we want to meet again - Boston? Colorado? Meet every year!

The one little teensy drawback to saying yes to absolutely everything in life that is gloriously fun and worth doing is that, well, outings and jaunts and treats cost money. This one cost a lot of money. It was worth every single penny. But I don't have all that many pennies. I am so committed to living a life crammed full of joy and opportunity in whatever form it presents itself. But then the credit card bills arrive.

So I'm glad that I also said yes to teaching not one, but two classes on children's book writing for Lifelong Learning, through Boulder Valley Public Schools, starting in the beginning of October. And yes to teaching summer school again next year. And yes to guest-editing a publication for the University of Maryland.

Yes, to all of it.