A B-52 Year

Greetings!

We are well into the New Year of 2014 and I have also begun my personal New Year, having celebrated my birthday on January 10th.

If last year was my P-51 year (Powerful 51), this year is my B-52 (Bountiful 52). A few years ago, the B-52 completed 50 years of continuous service (just like me) and is expected to continue to serve into the 2040s (absolutely! I intend to be running strong then too!). The B-52 has "superior performance at high subsonic speeds and relatively low operating costs" (ah, the similarities continue!) And its nickname is "BUFF" which also applies :-) (I won't tell you what the acronym stands for, because it definitely doesn't work in the search for commonalities!).

As you can see from the picture, the B-52 has gone through a number of evolutions and iterations, as have I.

And that, perhaps, is the key to surviving so long - the ability to adapt and  improve, and the willingness to accept change. Change is one of the most difficult things for us to embrace. We often fight against the inevitable evolution of life. We hold tightly to people and places that no longer serve us simply because we fear the uncertainty that letting go would cause; We resist losing those we love, whether it be through diverging paths or as a result of death, because we dread the pain that loss would bring; We insist on continuing behavior or patterns that are destructive because they are comfortable. We are indeed creatures of habit.

It was not until I learned to accept change, embrace it even, as part of the beautiful evolution of being, that I really began to relax into my life. The tumultuousness of change is a bit like the churning of a washing machine. At the end of the cycle, everything comes out fresh and clean. All that tossing about can be a bit jarring, but it is a necessary process to keep us from getting stale and stagnant.

And so, I enter my B-52 year excited about all the changes the new year will bring. For starters, I am planning to create a new look for this blog. I have let it lapse a bit lately and would like to morph into a slightly new direction - some aviation, some adventure, some ad-libbing on various subjects. I hope you will all make that transition with me and invite others along for the ride. More details to follow on that....

In the meantime, go out there and shake it up a bit!

xo, Cate