Yesterday’s Women’s Meditation Network podcast was entitled “Connect With Your Breath.” It’s the first meditation I’ve done in weeks, possibly months. Maybe just a month. My eating, workout, and meditation schedule have been out-of-wack since my last-minute getaway to Antigua in February. I had to leave the country to finally see family for the first time in months during this damn pandemic. Once I got a taste, I took back-to-back trips to Boston for my godmother and another aunt’s birthdays.

Post workout, I scribbled my daily gratitude note. I chose “breath.” As I wrote it, it dawned on me that in a week’s time it’s the fifteenth anniversary of when my breathing almost ceased. I have a prominent, permanent scar at the base of my neck from the machine that breathed for me.

I’m days away from my birthday. Days away from when I almost lost my breath. I’m still breathing.