Hello! 

Well, its been a year.  Physically,  I'm much improved, and also much different.  I'm able to participate fully in my life.  I may be slower than I was before,  but productivity is not the value measure of a life, and if you met me for ten minutes, not knowing about the surgery,  you likely wouldn't notice anything amiss.  Warren and I have registered for a 5K this fall - one of us to win his age group, and one of us to finish. I'm grateful - I can drive, work, hike, and bike, and enjoy the world fully.  

I'm also much more ready to rest, to sit and visit for a spell, to engage in good conversation,  to enjoy a meal with friends.  I'm a better friend in many ways, though I'm no good at moving furniture.

Mostly though, I am grateful for one more year to watch my boys grow up, to hold Clark's hand and kiss his stubbled cheek, to do family vacations and hold baby lambs and pick out birthday presents and assign chores and practice for spelling tests on Friday mornings and play Uno and eat smores and live in this wonderful life.  I am thankful for the friends who came out of the woodwork and lent literally dozens of hours of their time and talents to help me relearn how to use this new, different body.

As Anne of Green Gables would say, "there's always the bend in the road!"  Thank you all for walking with me on the bend in this road - I plan to stay on it for a long, long time.