I’m back home after an incredible week on Whidbey Island. I joined a remarkable group of women there and spent the week talking about our stories and writing some of them. After we wrote, we read to one another. Through the readings, we offered the circle of women a piece of ourselves, and those pieces were received and celebrated in the most loving way.

I told the group this morning, as we were saying goodbye, that I had entered the island determined to spend a week alone. The reality though is that I was never truly alone. I did have my own room. I also had quiet mornings to myself before the house woke up. I took time to run by myself to the beach. And we agreed, as a community, to have an extended period of silence so that we could write without interruption. But I was never truly alone. These women entered my heart within the first couple of days, and I carried them with me the entire week – when I slept, when I read, when I ran, and when I wrote. I carried them with me off the island, and I will carry them with me going forward.

I will also carry with me the freedom of this moment on the ferry back to the mainland.

Thank you, ladies. I will carry you with me wherever I go.