The ending of the page.

The glow of the evening sun caresses the rocky hills, that are my horizon.
Like a lover, carefully touching the curves and peaks of his beloved woman, letting the shadows darken in creases, their night time ritual, bidding farewell to each other before they are separated again by the dark shadow of the coming night.
The light is soft, warm and rose colored.

Funny that when your faced with the end of something it makes it so much sweeter.
The end of a relationship; or a separation. The last I love You remembered with tenderness.
The end of a college career.
The end of living anywhere. The last box packed up.
The end of a job. The last time card.

My job ended today. I was told in a staff meeting, the room full of patient and waiting faces that the restaurant I work(ed) for was going to lay off most of the staff for the winter; they just can't sustain such an army of employees especially when somedays we only get a handfull of patrons walk through the door. Thus how it goes in the winter in a small town.
     I watched as faces went white, blank, or grew clouded.
I've been watching the restaurant for a while and could see that something was going to have to change.  So it wasn't a complete surprise, although it was unexpected to be told pointblank in a room full of employees. I actually felt a little embarrassed for the people who's names got called, signifying they would be keeping their jobs. I could see gratitude and confusion at being singled out when the rest of us where asked to scatter like the autumn leaves I'd swept off their deck that very morning.

But, heres the really incredible part.
Instead of feeling betrayed or angry or sad, I felt freed.
As if someone had simply opened my caged door and told me I was free to go.
The temptation of the cages warmth and seed was little to the open and unexpected sky waiting for me.

So today I served my last burger, took my last order for ice tea and dripped my last bit of ketchup on my shoes.
It was actually bitter sweet clocking out for the last time, but I've been knowing that things need to change in my life for a while and this was the last little push to help it find a new course. It really brings it home how blessed I am that I live without rent (for now) and that I have been saving all year, so this doesn't send me into a panic of pain at the dependency on money coming in. I have faith in more work, I am not afraid to work.

So now, I'm free, but not sure what to do. I will wait and see. Yes, I will. and in the mean time, I will dance and write and cook. Yes, yes I will.

Below is an excerpt on work from Khalil Gibran's book the Prophet.

You work that you may keep pace with the earth and the soul of the earth.

For to be idle is to become a stranger unto the seasons, and to step out of life's procession, that marches in majesty and proud submission towards the infinite.

When you work you are a flute through whose heart the whispering of the hours turns to music.

Which of you would be a reed, dumb and silent, when all else sings together in unison?

Always you have been told that work is a curse and labour a misfortune.

But I say to you that when you work you fulfil a part of earth's furthest dream, assigned to you when that dream was born,

And in keeping yourself with labour you are in truth loving life,

And to love life through labour is to be intimate with life's inmost secret.

But if you in your pain call birth an affliction and the support of the flesh a curse written upon your brow, then I answer that naught but the sweat of your brow shall wash away that which is written.

You have been told also life is darkness, and in your weariness you echo what was said by the weary.

And I say that life is indeed darkness save when there is urge,

And all urge is blind save when there is knowledge,

And all knowledge is vain save when there is work,

And all work is empty save when there is love;

And when you work with love you bind yourself to yourself, and to one another, and to God.

And what is it to work with love?

It is to weave the cloth with threads drawn from your heart, even as if your beloved were to wear that cloth.

It is to build a house with affection, even as if your beloved were to dwell in that house.

It is to sow seeds with tenderness and reap the harvest with joy, even as if your beloved were to eat the fruit.

It is to charge all things you fashion with a breath of your own spirit,

And to know that all the blessed dead are standing about you and watching.

Often have I heard you say, as if speaking in sleep, "he who works in marble, and finds the shape of his own soul in the stone, is a nobler than he who ploughs the soil.

And he who seizes the rainbow to lay it on a cloth in the likeness of man, is more than he who makes the sandals for our feet."

But I say, not in sleep but in the over-wakefulness of noontide, that the wind speaks not more sweetly to the giant oaks than to the least of all the blades of grass;

And he alone is great who turns the voice of the wind into a song made sweeter by his own loving.

Work is love made visible.

And if you cannot work with love but only with distaste, it is better that you should leave your work and sit at the gate of the temple and take alms of those who work with joy.

For if you bake bread with indifference, you bake a bitter bread that feeds but half man's hunger.

And if you grudge the crushing of the grapes, your grudge distils a poison in the wine.

And if you sing though as angels, and love not the singing, you muffle man's ears to the voices of the day and the voices of the night.