How to begin again, and is it fair that there are final chapters? Thinking of Amelia . . .

In the novel, I have a coda. In it Amelia is in the cockpit, flying towards Howland. I use her own words, spoken into the void. Not that the Itasca, the ship waiting to spot her, couldn't hear. It was that Amelia couldn't hear their response. There was one moment of contact, but that was it. I presume to channel what she was feeling and thinking. Anxiety. Exhaustion. Exhilaration. And ultimately, regret. When my own mother pulled me close to whisper that I was the one who got her, a few weeks back, I think she was counting up her own regrets. They are the things that stay with us, I suppose. And that haunt us.

But life is full of other things. I happen to believe that the more one risks, the more one gets from life. Granted, the risks I've taken are writ small. I've spoken my mind, often in an impolitic manner. As a writer, I've been rejected over and over and over. And I've fallen in love, and loved my friends wholeheartedly. It doesn't always work out in the end, or work out in the way I imagined. Yet I believe it's worth it. Without putting myself out there, without risking my heart and my live-lie-hood where would I be? And who would I be? No one I could recognize.

Anyhow, there it is. My Amelia moment for the day. All this time spent with her has made me think a great deal about taking chances. And how important they are. How they really make life worth living. So here's the question I pose. How does one live life to the fullest? What chances do we take? And what risks do we force ourselves to take?