Velveteen Mind suggested that I take a looksee at the carnival going on over at Blog Nosh. Perhaps I would find inspiration in the Tides Load Of Hope event that they have going on. Oh yeah, did I mention that I’m still kind of lacking in writing inspiration? Once again I tweeted looking for help. And the lovely Velveteen Mind kind of nudged me over in this direction. And wow. What a beautiful reason to blog. For HOPE. Especially when, during these trying times, there are so many who feel as if there is none. But there is! There always is!!

It was August 1999. I was a 30 year old mommy of two small children. I was the wife of one really screwed up little boy stuck in the body of a 33 year old man. Yet, I was no one. Just an empty shell.

Things looked pretty from the outside. Pretty house. Pretty cars. Pretty kids.

On the inside. It was ugly. I was dead and rotting. I felt lifeless and completely without any hope.

I was teetering on reaching maximum density. I was also precariously balancing my sanity. I was beyond misery and I didn’t want company. I wanted to stab my husband in his sleep. We couldn’t have that though. Because who would raise the kids if the dad was dead and the mom was in jail? The system? Hell to the no. I hated him though. With every fiber of my being.

It was bad. Not in a violent sense. There was just nothing worth saving there. But I wasn’t ready to jump off that high dive.

Until, one afternoon in early August. I snapped awake from a short nap. He was the first thing I saw. I looked at him, sweating on the exercise bike that was in our huge bedroom. And I knew it was finally over. Whatever guilt that had been holding me captive in that house, it had lifted. My fears and my conscience screamed that I was free to go.

And I did.

I grabbed clothes and toys. Enough to keep my 1 1/2 year old and 3 1/2 year old dressed and busy for the next couple of days until I could come back to the house when he wasn’t there. I grabbed some essentials for myself. Loaded the stuff into laundry baskets and placed them in the trunk of my car.

As I was strapping the kids into their car-seats, I explained to them that we were about to go on an adventure. Then I turned to my husband and told him that I was leaving. He stood there. Clueless. Not sure in what context I was using the word “leaving” in.

I climbed into my car and I backed out of that driveway.

I swallowed down my anxiety and directed my focus ahead.

I put my car into drive and moved forward. Taking with me, not only my children and my stuff. But a sense of hope. Something that I hadn’t felt in a long time but was so relieved to know it was still there.

With a head full of anticipation and a heart FULL of hope, I popped in a CD and played my favorite song of the moment, Beautiful by TLC, I told my babies that everything was going to be just fine. I knew it would be. I finally felt it from deep within me. It had been there. Waiting. All along.

And we drove off towards it.