small magic

I was in Mexico with my sister earlier this year, and we sat through a two hour timeshare presentation in order to get free massages, because we are good midwestern girls and therefore did the math on what the spa treatments would cost vs. what we thought our time was worth. While we walked away wondering how anyone thinks that a lifetime of vacations is worth the significant investment required (and why we didn’t get offered free drinks in a whole pineapple like the people next to us did), we were happy to have the “free” morning of luxury – something we wouldn’t have otherwise allowed ourselves to indulge in – and took our gift certificates and went on our merry way. 

When we scheduled our appointments for later that week, we were offered the option of adding on a “hydrotherapy circuit” for some ridiculously low price, so obviously we thought, hey, why not try it? Having no point of reference for what a hydrotherapy circuit would entail, we showed up in our bathing suits and Old Navy flip flops to the most gorgeous spa either of us had ever seen: pools of orchids, artisanal loose leaf teas infused with some of the freshest fruit we’d ever eaten, and luxurious, fluffy cotton robes for us to wear while we experienced whatever it was we were supposed to experience. Not bad, in exchange for two hours of our time. 

The hydrotherapy circuit turned out to be much like what the name suggests: a guided, hour-long experience through water in its many forms: steam, sauna, cold shower, massage pool, and at the end, a cold plunge. Fatima, the graceful and kind woman who guided us through this experience, also appeared periodically to gift us with hot and warm water to drink, cold compresses for our eyes, and warm towels. It was a luxury unlike anything we had ever experienced — mostly because of how simple it was. The alternation of hot and cold, hot and cold set our nervous systems completely to rest. And our minds were taken somewhere else entirely. 

When we reached the end of the circuit – the cold plunge – my sister and I both stared down into the six foot deep, small rectangular pool set to a terrifyingly low temperature and hesitantly hoped the other one would go first. I don’t remember which one of us did (though it was probably her, as I am a famous scaredy cat), but when we finally took the plunge, the initial shock of the water’s temperature almost immediately gave way to something much more important — clarity; a feeling of being fully awake; a feeling of being fully alive. We reached for our warm towels, wrapped ourselves up, and went about the rest of our day, feeling refreshed and renewed. Hydrotherapy, indeed. 

I took a big leap of another kind recently, and it, too, has been much like that cold plunge: shocking, unfamiliar, but then totally clear. There are times in life for comfort and pleasure; there are other times for pain and growth. And then there are times of a different experience entirely:  the ones that break your heart but fix your vision. And these are the ones that transform us the most. 

I am reminded of one of my favorite quotes by the great Agnes de Mille:

“Living is a form of not being sure, not knowing what next or how. The moment you know how, you begin to die a little. The artist never entirely knows. We guess. We may be wrong, but we take leap after leap in the dark.” 

Many moons ago, I had a little blog which I named after this quote — leap after leap. And it’s in that spirit that I am writing today. Truth be told, I’ve had this WordPress site set up since December 2022, and have been creating many of the writings which I plan to share since long before then, but something about this moment in my life is compelling me to actually press publish on some of these thoughts that I’ve gathered as I’ve taken my own series of very big leaps – cold plunges, if you will – over the past few years. These are stories of my journey to remember myself, to find home, and to meet life in all of its exhilarating and terrifying glory. 

Small magic is a concept that came to mind in those dark, early pandemic days when we were all searching for some sort of meaning, some sort of joy, some sort of hope. My dog’s favorite thing in the whole world – his little blue sparkly Kong ball – went missing in April 2020 for several days, and when I finally found it and tossed it his way, I saw a joy unlike any other I had ever seen. This glittery, little blue piece of plastic had brought an all-consuming happiness to the scruffy 15-pounds of him, and I looked in his face and realized that it had been ages since I had stopped to consider what my proverbial sparkly blue Kong ball might be. And I resolved in that moment to find it. 

Along the way, I’ve found joy and hope in so many every day things — even when the larger things were more or less falling to pieces around me. I’ve learned to protect my mind and allow my heart to break — and to allow it to continue to keep breaking until it’s all the way open. I’ve found silence and peace in others that I had never found before, and I’ve learned lots of important lessons about home, safety, and self-love — about risk and reward, about the universe, about what matters most – and about the many little pieces of small magic that add up to a big and meaningful life. 

These are the things you see clearly after you’ve taken the plunge. I have so much I’m excited to share, and so much still yet to learn. These are my guesses and my leaps, my learnings and my thoughts, my chances and my mistakes — and the little pieces of magic that I am working hard to find in all of them.