On Monday, for the first time in two years, I went to my first choral rehearsal.

The last month has been a whirlwind of my ambitions sweeping me off my feet again. Part of me is feeling alive again, while another part of me is terrified that I'll get overwhelmed. It's as if Kat is the upbeat running around anime girl with her arms waving back in a blur of excitement, and Kathryn is the meek girl with glasses who follows along, holding onto her sleeve, hoping to all heck that it doesn't end in disaster like she's been led to expect. "Please, be careful Kat. You remember what happened last time? You couldn't play or sing for 2 whole years."
"Oh, please, Kathryn, we'll be fine! Just look at this! We can go back to school full time online, study German, and Music, and become a teacher, and...!"
"But what about my job? What if you need too much time and we can't do it all?"
"We'll make it work! We're not in a bad situation anymore! Do you feel that music? That's what this is all for!"

I thought that after high school, the tingling I get from choir and music in general would never come back. I thought it all would get pushed down. Maybe, if I tried hard enough, I could push it so far down, that I wouldn't ever make myself look silly again. All I could think was that my little quivers and squeals when the song's chords moved my soul... that I would have to control it. To not let myself be vulnerable any more.
That was possible when I was at college. I had lost myself. I didn't know how to let music touch my heart like it always had. I smiled when I sang, but it was hollow. I tried so hard to fit in that I forgot what it felt like to get swept away by the unity and beauty of different voices joining together. So I became a stone inside.

So now, when I thought I'd forgotten how to love music... to go to choir rehearsal and feel again... When all the colors of the music hit me like the weight that I'd been carrying around, I quivered. My body moved of its own accord. My eyes widened and my head seemed clear again.
"See, Kathryn?" Kat smiled radiently, "It's safe. We're going to be okay. This is what it is all for."
And once again, Kathryn believed it, with a tiny smile at the edge of her lips and tears falling from her eyes. "We were so broken. You were so scared. You thought you had lost me, Kathryn. I'm still here. Don't try to push me down anymore, okay?"

So I let myself be loved by the music, and let my heart love it right back.  It's all one day at a time; the healing won't happen all together, but it will happen. I will learn to embrace it.