Life is Beautiful: My epiphany: Life is Beautiful

I hear the excited yet exaggerated screams of my fellow classmates as the road rises and falls. The vast desert stretched before me, and us, framed towering mountains in the distance. I look up through the van window and admire the bright blue sky. I can’t help but think of how it complements the brown and green world we are making our journey through. Energy courses through the white Prescott College van as the anticipation of our upcoming climbing trip heightens. Joshua Tree; we are on our way!

Our group consists of two adjunct instructors and a teaching assistant who was very quickly becoming a close friend to me, and eight students, including myself. Introduction to Rock Climbing was the official title of the course and yet to me this had become an introduction to truly living. Up until this point, most of my life had belonged to others. Since childhood my life had been driven by the wishes and desires of others. I was raised with the eastern European guilt of putting others before yourself, and never ever being selfish. I have learned it is healthy at times to be a little selfish. If you do not love and take care of yourself, it becomes impossible to love and care for others.

Introduction to life came to me at a great time of need. It was a period in my life where I had just went through an emotionally painful hardship. I saw this time as a great tragedy, and like life likes to do, it turned into a miracle. It was the end of my old life and the beginning of my freedom. Out of desperation I dropped a course in environmental policy and eagerly signed up for a rock climbing course so I could forget the sorrow that I was filled with. So many times we fall upon hardships like rough jagged stones, and although we may have some bruises and cuts to show for our fall, they will heal with time. We stand up after our fall, make an assessment that is far more grim than the reality. Once the pain begins to fade, once the initial shock passes, only then is it clear that our wounds are superficial. We fall down and we get back up again. We heal.

After the fall I had taken I believed I would not heal. I believed that life as I knew it had ended; thankfully it had. If it hadn't I would not be embarking on this new adventure, traveling to a new place, with ten brilliant souls.

I had come to Arizona to grow, to live, to love. The open road before me stretches far beyond my view. The yellow lines that divide the highway blur and form one solid line ahead. My yellow brick road.
I lean back on the open van window to feel the dry desert wind rushing through my hair. The unruly curls dance and play as I close my eyes and reflect upon the past. The past disappears and the wind caresses my cheeks; I feel my wings spreading so I can fly upwards, and onwards. I cannot imagine the beauty I am about to encounter, I feel the excitement start to build inside of me. I return to the present and relish the moment. This very moment in time. Life is beautiful.