As a child I thought about Narnia a lot.

I remember wondering what the first winter after the witch was like for the Narnians who’d been introduced to spring sunshine only months before.

Did they think Aslan or the kings and queens had lost their power?

Did they search old records to learn how long winter was supposed to last and start counting down the days till Spring?

~ ~ ~

I am better than I’ve been in 2 years.

I feel different, I’ve learned not to look to closely at my joy or analyze it away but just to bask in the glow.

And I wonder how winter (and Jay’s eventual travel) will affect this rediscovered freedom.

Anxiety does tap on my door, just a bit.

But thankfully it’s more a curiosity than an urgency. I do wonder what winter will bring. I already know it’ll be different than anything we’ve done before. But I’m hopeful, because the further I get from my deepest pit, the more I’m thinking this wasn’t a (classical?) chemical-imbalance-depression as much as it was fatigue, exhaustion and rebuilding.

And just like any physical sort of trauma (busted knee, wrenched ankle), I believe that having been depressed means that I could have a lower threshold of resistance to circumstances that might pull me back down. But what that means, too is that I’m highly motivated to guard myself in order to prevent that from happening. I don’t feel like I’m at the mercy of something completely out of my reach.

So I am thankful the anxiety had not found a place to roost. And I am thankful for my hope.

The Lord has provided so significantly for such specific, tiny needs, that I am thankful.

And at peace to wait.