Thursday, 2/13, the day before Valentine’s Day, I had plans to meet my significant other in Manhattan. However another snow storm of epic proportions fell yet again, so Thursday was not a day anyone drove anywhere. Instead we all shoveled, or in my case had son number 3 shovel, 10 inches of fresh, heavy, wet snow from the driveway and car tops.

Friday the sun shined for a mid day break and we quickly got ourselves into the city before any additional snow had the chance to communicate with the clouds. We had tickets to see the show Beautiful. For those who have not yet heard of this show, it’s about Carole King’s life and music. How she got started, who she knew, where she went to school, how she met her first husband, how she took to mothering. If you haven’t seen it, do. I expected it to be good. I didn’t expect it to shake me.

Saturday afternoon my significant other left for Pennsylvania to take his grandchildren to the circus and I headed uptown for my monthly writer’s group meeting. Five of us braved the snow, and the space took on an intimate, cohesive character with more personal sharing than usual. We spoke about energy, motherhood, writing, expectations. I mentioned the play I’d seen the night before on Valentine’s Day. There were two prompts we wrote about and I uncharacteristically cried reading both. Virtual strangers but writing friends embraced and supported me as I felt embarrassed and vulnerable. “Write about it,” they said.

The afternoon snow fell in ever thickening flakes and was more the snowstorm than the snow-shower predicted. The view from the apartment window showed swarming flakes of varying size and shape, massive enough in quantity to cover the existing sidewalk in additional layers of white. I left early because of the snow and my discomfort, and because I was meeting a friend that I hadn’t seen in years on the other side of Central Park. My dinner with my college friend was nourishing. We spoke as though we’d seen one another yesterday, time apart did not impede the conversation. On the contrary. We dove, arms outstretched, into the swirls of our beings, of what mattered, of truth. It felt freeing and energizing and emotional.

An obstruction dislodged. It was the best Valentine’s Day weekend of my life. With significant other who does not want to be named, with writers, an outstanding and touching play, and a close friend. My heart flipped off a block of accumulated mud caked on through living life. It felt momentarily foreign, vulnerable and valuable. I have reset an energy path (which I am confronting on  physical and emotional levels) and I see a different life ahead of me.