Feast of Epiphany!

James Joyce is essentially credited with coining the word epiphany, in a secular sense. For example, in the short story The Dead, the main character, Gabriel, has an epiphany when he realizes there is more to his wife than he previously thought. I know, the story is more complex than that, but that summary is basically the meat and potatoes of it. I can’t think of many moments in my life where meaning and substance had an iridescent glow that just spoke to me. Well, it probably happened, but I was too obtuse to notice. Is it an epiphany when I realized my then girlfriend would be the woman I would marry? It’s arguable that is not an epiphany but culmination of feelings that built over time. Epiphanies seem to have more of an instantaneous nature.

 I’m not writing to argue the semantics of the word but to share an epiphany I know I DID have recently. This moment has had a profound effect on how I view life and how I’m going to live mine from this point forward. I realized just because I’ve been doing something, I don’t always have to do that thing. Part of the beauty of being an adult is the ability to make life changes and independent decisions. So, from this point forward, I will no longer be constrained by the shackles of Right Guard deodorant. Right Guard has ruined the underarms of many of my shirts, made embarrassing stains on the fronts of t-shirts, and felt just icky and cold.

When I was at the grocery store the other day, I experienced a feeling of paralysis in my arm as I went to grab the Right Guard from the shelf to put it in my shopping cart. It’s like an unknown force was holding my arm doing, whispering in my ear, “No, Right Guard sucks. Get something else. Right Guard is gross.”

As I reached for the Degree, I knew my life was headed in the right direction.