I am running at full speed.  I am passing scenery and forgetting to look or breathe.  It has been this way for the past several months.  I look at my face in the mirror and wonder why. I am caught up in the epidemic.  It is an epidemic of not enough hours in the day to do everything I need to get done.  Alas, there lies the kicker, there are enough hours in the day.  We all are given the same 24 hours as the earth spins.  It is us who run at the speed of light daring to stop for a moment.  Needless to say, I am exhausted.  I am too exhausted to hold conversation, too exhausted to do what I need to do and well just too exhausted.   It is time for me to breathe.

When we forget to breathe we lose our way.  We lose connection to those that matter most.  In our crazy culture, we idolize being busy.  Perhaps we equate business with importance.  We have become slaves to the very thing that was supposed to free us, technology.  Looking across a busy restaurant it is not easy to miss eyes glued to Iphones when it should be our loved ones eyes in which  we are peering.  In our busyness, we miss out.  We miss the impromptu lunches or coffees with friends.  We miss that spur of the moment hike into nature.  We fill our heads with list of items we deem important.  As we sit idly we start to fidget and wonder what it is we are supposed to be doing.  “Am I missing something?”

I recall a journey to a remote part of South America.  I watched with amazement how we a group of well adjusted healthy women ran with warp speed to the nearest internet cafe upon reaching cilvilization.  I recall how we stood in the rain in a humid jungle trying to find just the right spot where we might get a phone signal.  Not to mention we had only been away for a week.

Today I sit in a Tuscan villa watching rain and fog cover the landscape. I have finally figured out how the light switches work but yet to grasp the heating system. Thanks to technology. As I sit I wonder what I did before an Iphone or my electronic tablet that sits by my side. Although I make my daily pilgrimage to the little house that has wi fi, I am making a promise to unplug for a little while.  I will allow myself that uninterrupted cappucino with loved ones and friends.  I will spend time resting and regrouping and trying hard not to fill my mind with all the things that I forgot to pack or bills that I forgot to pay. I will sleep late and not rise to the ring of an alarm clock and I will pick up a pen and write.