Still Alive

I am here. I am alive. I am ready to become visible again. It has been quite some time since I have posted to this blog. Much has happened since then. Some I will share. Other things I will just keep private. And that’s ok, because after all, it is my blog and I can share what I want.
Today I did something that I thought would be difficult, but instead turned out to be a phenomenal experience.
Several months ago, I was approached about the possibility of being a presenter at the Evergreen Conference in Salt Lake. Evergreen is an organization that is dedicated to helping those who struggle with same sex attraction, but wish to find healing through Jesus Christ.
Jeff and I actually have presented at the conference a couple of times before. The last time was in 2001. The conference was scheduled to begin on September 15th. We had tickets to fly from Florida to Salt Lake on September 12. But as we watched the horror of 911 unfold before our eyes and our Salt Lake flight was canceled, we had new choices to make. It would have been easy to just chuck the whole thing, but as we looked at each other we decided that we would not let evil designs stop us from doing something that we felt was important. So we loaded up the car and took off on an adventure. We took our oldest son with us to help with the driving and 35 hours later at 3:00 in the morning, we were driving through Emigration Canyon.
We gave our first presentation at 9:00 that morning. It was a wonderful experience and was worth all the trouble it took to get there.
Several months ago I was once again approached by the Evergreen Committee inviting me to be a presenter. I have to admit when I received the invitation, it was a very difficult decision to even think that it would be ok for me to go to this conference without him. I did not make an immediate decision, but allowed myself to grieve the idea of missing him. Eventually I did choose to take a day, fly down to Salt Lake and share a message of hope with a group of really awesome people.
It is 11:00 now and I just did get back from the airport. I am doing a 5 K in the morning with the Boise Women's Fitness Celebration so I need to go to bed.
I just wanted to share a little bit about what is going on in my life. I had such a great time sharing our story today that I think maybe it will be ok for me to come back to this and continue to share in my journey. I am moving forward in amazing ways. But today was a really good day to help me remember why I loved my husband so much. It was important for me to remember. I am not stuck in the past but everything that has happened in my life has helped me become who I am today. I am grateful.

Chris