Be Careful What You Wish For

They always say "Be careful what you wish for".  It is true.

Many years ago, on this day 18 October, my parents took me to see the - don't laugh -IceCapades to celebrate my birthday.  I must have been five or six.  Among the many images from that night in the Denver Coliseum was an epic tale of speed skating Samurai Warriors battling spinning and twirling Warlords and for love and land.  There was an incredibly ornate bridge in the middle of the ice.  Two lovers were being pulled apart by the waring factions.  The climax happened when the bridge exploded and crumbled to the ground. 

My artistic side spent the next several weeks trying to build this bridge in our den out of chairs and bits of scrap wood and pillows.  I wanted to re-live that amazing extraordinary moment.  Over the years I saw more amazing spectacles, which no doubt have influenced my creative life.  But more importantly about that night it was the beginning of my prayer... I want to live an extraordinary life.

Life has brought me some absolutely amazing moments.  I have indeed been blessed with a life that I could have never dreamed of.  I have been able to travel a great deal. I have been paid to do what I love.  I act, I teach, I create, I build. I have met some brilliant shining people.  I have experienced love from all directions. 

It is in fact not the life that I had imagined.  To some extent it has been filled with much more pain and suffering than I had hoped for.  Extraordinary does not always mean pleasant.  Or easy.  Or even desirable.  An extraordinary life is certainly not always fun.  But what I have come to realise over the last 42 years, is that, as difficult has it has been at moments, I would not have been able to experience those moments of sheer joy and love and unparalleled spectacle in my life if I had not gone through the depths. 

While I may have wished some calmer seas at times, the mountain is made that much higher with the valley going before it. 

So....Happy Birthday to me... and blessings to you that wish to live extraordinary lives.