My Golden Anniversary

Three years on the Third

When I first looked out the window this morning, the lake had disappeared.

Fog rested gently on the water while, to the east, the rising sun painted the sky with soft hints of rose. Rays of light slipped through the trees, but across the lake, the shoreline was impossible to see.

Split realities.

Light and fog.

Certainty and uncertainty.

Standing there with my coffee, I couldn’t help thinking how much that morning looked like life itself.

Then I remembered.

Today is my golden anniversary.

Three years on the third.

Three years alcohol-free.

When people hear “three years,” they often imagine a dramatic turning point. Mine wasn’t dramatic at all. I began with a simple promise to myself.

I had spent years wishing I could be the person who enjoyed one glass of wine before bed.

I wasn’t her.

One glass became another.

Then another.

Eventually, I stopped wishing I were someone else and accepted who I was and stopped drinking altogether.

That acceptance changed everything.

Not overnight.

One day at a time.

One sunrise at a time.

Today, looking back, I don’t spend much time thinking about what I gave up.

I think about what I gained.

I gained mornings.

I gained peace.

I discovered that words were waiting for me before the rest of the world woke up.

Over these past three years, those quiet mornings filled journals.

Those journals became poems.

Some poems became songs.

Those songs found their way into books.

Now, together with a friend, we have built Tranquil Resources — a place where photography, music, and words come together in hopes of helping someone else slow down, breathe, and notice beauty.

One of the biggest surprises?

I didn’t need alcohol to be creative.

I had believed that for years.

Instead, I found that creativity had been patiently waiting beneath the noise.

When I stopped numbing my life, I started noticing it.

I noticed baby ducks taking impossible steps.

Morning fog drifting across the lake.

The sound of sandhill cranes.

The way sunlight filters through oak trees.

The beauty had always been there.

Now I was finally present enough to see it.

As I stood looking out the window this morning, something else happened.

The fog began to lift.

Slowly, the shoreline appeared exactly where it had always been.

It hadn’t disappeared.

I simply couldn’t see it for a while.

Maybe hope works that way.

Maybe purpose does too.

Maybe the life we’re searching for isn’t gone at all.

Maybe it’s simply waiting beyond the fog until we’re ready to walk toward it.

Three years ago, I promised myself I would choose life.

Not perfection.

Not certainty.

Just the next right thing.

Today, I’m healthier.

Stronger.

Far more hopeful.

And perhaps for the first time in my life, I’m no longer afraid to let people see what I’ve created.

that may be the greatest gift of these past three years.

Not sobriety.

Freedom.

Freedom to write.

Freedom to create.

Freedom to become the person I was quietly meant to be all along.

So today I’m celebrating out loud.

Not because my journey is finished.

But because this ordinary Monday morning reminded me how extraordinary an ordinary life can become.

If you’re standing in your own fog today, wondering if the shoreline will ever come back into view, let me leave you with this:

Keep walking.

The light is already rising.

You just may not be able to see the shore yet.

Three years ago I made myself a promise.

Today, I celebrate the life that promise made possible.

For years, I believed I was not good enough. I don’t believe that anymore. Now I believe I’m just one brave step away from who I was always meant to become.