Prior to the world meeting Caitlyn Jenner, I heard someone say to Bruce that he will get to live two lives in one lifetime. This has stayed with me, and I was thinking about it yesterday. I believe I now know why it struck a chord.
I had one life before my vision loss. It was full of independence and time in my car, often with my late mom, and travel for business and pleasure, lots and lots of books, and a career, where I was a whiz on the computer and managed people and corporate meetings and events with hundreds of thousands dollars budgets.
And now I have another life.
As I figure out what this new life of mine will look like, the only thing I do know, for sure, is that it will be very different from life before my optic nerves were damaged. If by some miracle my vision is completely restored, there is no going back. You don’t go through something like this and then slide back into the life you had before.
Bruce Jenner, of course, was very excited about his next life as Caitlyn. I have not been excited to forge a new life for myself, because I was clinging, for dear life, to my old one. In the last few months, my mindset has shifted and I no longer crave my previous career. (The driving, books and travel, yes.)
Two lives. It’s either a blessing or a curse. I’ve stopped thinking of it as a curse, most days anyway, but I’m not quite at a blessing yet. I’ll get there and my second life will be waiting for me. Hopefully I’ll be 5’6″ and 125 lbs. Now that will be a blessing.
