I'm not really sure why I bother with blogging. It definitely is like writing a letter and never mailing it. Which i have done many a time in my life. I used to belong to another blog community and i felt like i found like minded people there and it was nice to feel like someone out there was reading this. This site seems a little lonely. I know it's mostly because i don't have time to really add more people to my reading list - or comment. I miss my old blog world - but i'm just not sure going back would be the same.
So much has changed, and time has passed. People move on. I miss quiet nites where i could be alone with my thoughts and give the space and time for a really great blog entry to surface. Things feel crowded in the evenings now - like there is never enough time to get things accomplished. A race to see how many things can be checked off a list. It makes me tired. It's sad that i have to be downright sick to allow myself a day of laying around watching old movies and dozing off.
I'm torn between wanting to be the non-stop person, always on to the next thing. Planning out my days, checking my calendar to make sure nothing is already planned. Turning down offers to hang out last minute because i've been booked for awhile. It all feels very rehearsed. I went from no schedule whatsoever to being totally and completely scheduled. I think my work format has started to transfer over to my life outside of work - and honestly, as much as i LOVE my blackberry - it is probably due to my phone that i feel such a need to be scheduled.
Or maybe this is just life. And as we grow up - our ability to be spontaneous dims.
Friday, January 29, 2010
Thursday, January 7, 2010
This Decade
I started out this decade as a freshman in college. I remember over the holiday break for 99/00 I heard from one of my friends (still one of my friends) that he wouldn't be returning to college in the spring because he barely made grades enough for a GPA to be calculated. For whatever reason i remember sitting on my bed in my room in Danville, Kentucky thinking that him not being back at school in the spring would change the whole dynamic of college life. How would we all move on?
I remember contemplating whether i should try alcohol or not. Did that make me a bad person? I remember becoming involved in in Phi Mu and how no one had really figured out that i had a serious intellectual side yet because i was always a goof ball.
I remember one of my friends breaking up with his girlfriend back at home because they just couldn't stop the change that college brings. I remember him crying in my lap in my dorm room and me reading him this really sappy children's book trying to cheer him up.
I remember falling in love for the first time with a Canadian. And how happy and scary it was being in that situation. I remember being happy and not happy all in the same breath. I remember spending my holidays with him and his family in Canada and living in his little tiny room for several weeks during the summer and trying to figure out how to ride the bus since I didn't have a car.
I remember the friends that i made, kept, and lost during the last decade of my life. There are so few that started this decade with me and are still in that same spot at the end of it.
I recall moving from college to Canada to work full time on a temporary work visa. Having no friends and struggling with my decision to try and be "religious" again but not really understanding how to do that. Saving up to move to New Zealand - moving there with no job, no home, no transportation - just the idea that we would go to NZ and live for a year. I remember spending those 8 months struggling with my faith - reaching out to friends from back home that i hadn't talked to in way too long because they were my only connection to who i once was.
Those years were transformative years. The first 5 years of this past decade morphed me into a completely different person. The beginnings of an adult.
The last five years were me again struggling to figure out who i wanted to be. Being single again after not being single for so long and falling into love with the wrong person - again. Learning how to be mad and stay mad - how to know when it's time to move on. That's what i spent the next 3 years learning with both friendships and love.
And the last year has been about second chances, and being who i am regardless of how anyone else feels about it. Coming into my own. Being a prude when that's how i really feel - saying what i think like i used to when i was 16 and you said something i didn't like about God.
Again - wondering about my faith and talking to God, and remembering how to pray. Opening up to my sister and falling in love for the last time.
And now...2010, engaged. Living in a house where the discussion "could we have a family here" played a role in the selection. Starting a new job, well past my master's degree and starting new challenges like trying to be a fitness instructor.
I never would have guessed I'd be here. But it feels like the best version of my self in a long time, maybe ever. And we're not done yet.
I remember contemplating whether i should try alcohol or not. Did that make me a bad person? I remember becoming involved in in Phi Mu and how no one had really figured out that i had a serious intellectual side yet because i was always a goof ball.
I remember one of my friends breaking up with his girlfriend back at home because they just couldn't stop the change that college brings. I remember him crying in my lap in my dorm room and me reading him this really sappy children's book trying to cheer him up.
I remember falling in love for the first time with a Canadian. And how happy and scary it was being in that situation. I remember being happy and not happy all in the same breath. I remember spending my holidays with him and his family in Canada and living in his little tiny room for several weeks during the summer and trying to figure out how to ride the bus since I didn't have a car.
I remember the friends that i made, kept, and lost during the last decade of my life. There are so few that started this decade with me and are still in that same spot at the end of it.
I recall moving from college to Canada to work full time on a temporary work visa. Having no friends and struggling with my decision to try and be "religious" again but not really understanding how to do that. Saving up to move to New Zealand - moving there with no job, no home, no transportation - just the idea that we would go to NZ and live for a year. I remember spending those 8 months struggling with my faith - reaching out to friends from back home that i hadn't talked to in way too long because they were my only connection to who i once was.
Those years were transformative years. The first 5 years of this past decade morphed me into a completely different person. The beginnings of an adult.
The last five years were me again struggling to figure out who i wanted to be. Being single again after not being single for so long and falling into love with the wrong person - again. Learning how to be mad and stay mad - how to know when it's time to move on. That's what i spent the next 3 years learning with both friendships and love.
And the last year has been about second chances, and being who i am regardless of how anyone else feels about it. Coming into my own. Being a prude when that's how i really feel - saying what i think like i used to when i was 16 and you said something i didn't like about God.
Again - wondering about my faith and talking to God, and remembering how to pray. Opening up to my sister and falling in love for the last time.
And now...2010, engaged. Living in a house where the discussion "could we have a family here" played a role in the selection. Starting a new job, well past my master's degree and starting new challenges like trying to be a fitness instructor.
I never would have guessed I'd be here. But it feels like the best version of my self in a long time, maybe ever. And we're not done yet.
Tuesday, January 5, 2010
All That I Said
One of my projects over the holiday break was to unpack the guest room. The guest room is really like my "dressing room" because half my clothes are in the closet there and our dresser with clothes is also placed in that room. In addition, there are about 3 big rubbermaid bins just full of stuff.
Well, it looks like stuff to the common eye. I know better.
It's like everything in my life that was important enough to carry with me since I left home in kentucky. I packed those bins back in 2003 when my mom told me that when i came back from New Zealand, they would have already sold the house and moved. So i packed up all that "stuff" that usually your parents keep for you up in their attic. Like report cards from middle school and a copy of the hand drawn birthday invitations courtesy of yours truly for my 5th grade birthday party.
So when my dear fiance told me it was a project to unpack - I hesitated. Sorting through all that stuff again would take me a year. How to decide what to keep - what is trash, what is worth remembering and what am i not ready to forget yet?
I ended up starting this project at the very end of the break and i'm not anywhere near done. It will take me forever to truly finish. I think it's mostly because these boxes of "stuff" are literally boxes that i need to keep. Now - i agree that some it can go. Everytime i sort thru these boxes, i'm ready to let go of something.
But there are those stories and daydreams i wrote daily all through highschool, those painful entries about my struggle to be who God wanted me to be. The entries after my sister was born kept in a school journal when i was in elementary school. The account of my father telling us we were moving from my birthplace into a new city and i would have to make new friends when i was 10. How much it hurt when he moved a year before we did and i only got to see him on weekends.
In highschool, all the notes that I got from Genie and Jennifer and Sarah Biggs. Folded in crazy ways that i know i'll never figure out again. The art is lost on me. The funny pictures and sayins we had that i would forget about if i didn't have them stored away so i could read them again - later in life.
The terrible pictures of me from middle school. Braces, hairspray bangs and no clue how to apply makeup. Why did my mom let me wear that outfit? And i look at them now and am thankful that i turned out pretty okay, even though i still want to lose those 20 pounds.
1000's of cards i've gone through. Happy graduation - 3 times over. Highschool, College, Grad School. Finding my constants. The people that have been there through it all, or most of it. The birthday cards from my now deceased grandparents. My finger moving over the pen marks on their card - wondering if it will help me reconnect with them. Do i keep it? Does throwing it away make it trash? Or just something i have to let go of?
The pictures from past relationships - wondering what i was thinking. Who was i at that moment to be with them and them with me? I inspect my smile and wonder: Was i happy?
Keeping a few of the pics because I need to remember. I need to document my life. On paper. I need to keep a few momentos from even those darkest times to remind me of how far i've come. Looking around in this guest room - I see my engagement ring in my jewelry box, the envelope with a few copies of our engagement pictures, the new necklace RJ got me for christmas. This is my present. Things that aren't going in the box to be reviewed later. It's mine to keep out in the open and hang on the wall for others to see. The tears this time are because I'm happy, finally, with how things turned out.
And the tears as i continue to place items from these boxes into "keep" "trash" and "i'm not ready yet" are bittersweet. I see the flicker of an old photo - me and my friends. Friends who are still in my life. A chill runs through my body. I realize it's not the end of a road at all, it's just the wind at my back as I continue this journey.
Well, it looks like stuff to the common eye. I know better.
It's like everything in my life that was important enough to carry with me since I left home in kentucky. I packed those bins back in 2003 when my mom told me that when i came back from New Zealand, they would have already sold the house and moved. So i packed up all that "stuff" that usually your parents keep for you up in their attic. Like report cards from middle school and a copy of the hand drawn birthday invitations courtesy of yours truly for my 5th grade birthday party.
So when my dear fiance told me it was a project to unpack - I hesitated. Sorting through all that stuff again would take me a year. How to decide what to keep - what is trash, what is worth remembering and what am i not ready to forget yet?
I ended up starting this project at the very end of the break and i'm not anywhere near done. It will take me forever to truly finish. I think it's mostly because these boxes of "stuff" are literally boxes that i need to keep. Now - i agree that some it can go. Everytime i sort thru these boxes, i'm ready to let go of something.
But there are those stories and daydreams i wrote daily all through highschool, those painful entries about my struggle to be who God wanted me to be. The entries after my sister was born kept in a school journal when i was in elementary school. The account of my father telling us we were moving from my birthplace into a new city and i would have to make new friends when i was 10. How much it hurt when he moved a year before we did and i only got to see him on weekends.
In highschool, all the notes that I got from Genie and Jennifer and Sarah Biggs. Folded in crazy ways that i know i'll never figure out again. The art is lost on me. The funny pictures and sayins we had that i would forget about if i didn't have them stored away so i could read them again - later in life.
The terrible pictures of me from middle school. Braces, hairspray bangs and no clue how to apply makeup. Why did my mom let me wear that outfit? And i look at them now and am thankful that i turned out pretty okay, even though i still want to lose those 20 pounds.
1000's of cards i've gone through. Happy graduation - 3 times over. Highschool, College, Grad School. Finding my constants. The people that have been there through it all, or most of it. The birthday cards from my now deceased grandparents. My finger moving over the pen marks on their card - wondering if it will help me reconnect with them. Do i keep it? Does throwing it away make it trash? Or just something i have to let go of?
The pictures from past relationships - wondering what i was thinking. Who was i at that moment to be with them and them with me? I inspect my smile and wonder: Was i happy?
Keeping a few of the pics because I need to remember. I need to document my life. On paper. I need to keep a few momentos from even those darkest times to remind me of how far i've come. Looking around in this guest room - I see my engagement ring in my jewelry box, the envelope with a few copies of our engagement pictures, the new necklace RJ got me for christmas. This is my present. Things that aren't going in the box to be reviewed later. It's mine to keep out in the open and hang on the wall for others to see. The tears this time are because I'm happy, finally, with how things turned out.
And the tears as i continue to place items from these boxes into "keep" "trash" and "i'm not ready yet" are bittersweet. I see the flicker of an old photo - me and my friends. Friends who are still in my life. A chill runs through my body. I realize it's not the end of a road at all, it's just the wind at my back as I continue this journey.
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