people

Happy Thanksgiving?

Well it’s thanksgiving kind of. Actually it’s technically the day after because it’s midnight here in Arizona. It’s the first time I haven’t celebrated Thanksgiving ever… same with Jay. We’re both pretty bummed. I had SpagettiOs for dinner. Which I threw up not long after. Apparently the little one isn’t a fan. I’ve been having a hard time keeping down a lot of foods. All I really seem to enjoy these days is fruit and steak. Things here are.. okay I guess. It’s hard being home alone without Jay most of the day but we’re both trying to make the best of it. It’s hard having student loans and expecting a child and not seeing each other as often as we’d like. I miss him but that’s part of the process of growing up I suppose. For the most part life is good. We enjoy the time we have together and like to take little trips singing in the car.

Let’s talk about something else happy.

For my birthday we went up to flagstaff and played in the snow and had starbucks and ate steak. It was a nearly perfect birthday 🙂 It makes having SpagettiO’s not so bad. I just wish we had more moments like these 🙂

 

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P.S. Since it’s officially Friday I guess that makes me 28 weeks.

Home

Oh Portland, City that I love,

I missed you more than you could possibly imagine. The memories that we have are paramount. Though I was able to visit briefly I remember why I loved you so. I remember your overcast skies that so beautifully tinted the world around me like a safety goggle secured over sensitive eyes. I remember smiles from strangers, walks downtown, chats with new friends, drives with old friends. But there is one thing that I forgot while I was away, a sense of home. I landed in your radiant city on a tiny little jet plane from somewhere south. I keep trying to convince myself that this new place could be my new home. But as my tiny feet hit the tarmac that Saturday afternoon I felt the one thing that I haven’t felt in quite sometime… I felt home. The adjustment was somewhat strange at first perhaps even a foreign memory of a repressed old feeling. I was skeptical of the caress of familiarity and it took me an hour or so before I recognized what it was. I simply felt home. In the arms of an old friend who greeted me even when I was at the worst. The memories embraced me like a warm childhood blanket on a cold winter day. Secure. Safe. Home. I was home. I had no idea how much I missed my grey skies or my fluffy green trees. Or that cold mountain. Memories… ten by ten they flooded in like the rouge river herself. Glitter on the sidewalks, brilliant bridges high and low, and family (biological and adopted). Leaving my beautiful city wasn’t easy. So I plugged my headphones in and listened to “Painting Pictures of Egypt” just one more time and then another. The theme song of my very soul. I keep waiting. I keep wishing. I keep praying. For something. Something to remind me that I am alive like I once was. Age has brought me a new feeling, a new set of neuro chemicals to make me wonder what on earth is next. This can’t possibly be what life is about. There has to be more. I keep telling myself that it’s the wrong timing, that I must wait… but I have no idea what I’m waiting for. Perhaps if it came now I wouldn’t recognize it just like the song says. Perhaps I’m just not ready. It’s not my timing after all. It’s His timing. My job is to trust Him. To lean on non linear thinking. I’m working on it. I know that I must be learning something right now. But I miss the intellectual times in my life and the physical times in my life… the times where and when I felt like I was on top of the world. I miss my times in Portland. I miss my times educating myself, learning new languages, experiencing new cultures, and breathing in the exciting and challenging moments in life. I know they are still there. But I feel blind lately. Mostly bored. A little disappointed in myself.  What am I supposed to be doing with my life and how am I supposed to be doing it? I miss the people who I used to talk this stuff over with. People like June and Pat and so many others. I miss the people who loved me even when I was vicious and ugly. They made me a better person. I don’t really know what I need at this point. Perhaps joining in on a new class at Real Life or calling an old friend. I’m not sure what I need. I do know for certain though that I need people. The extrovert inside me needs people. But I believe until I can find a “home” again I will have a difficult time meeting people. I need a home. A place where I have beautiful memories and can force myself to relax. But the timing is wrong. For now I will try not to Paint Pictures of Egypt but rather wait on my non linear timing.

-Me

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Matter

Late at night my nostalgia seems to replace my grey matter. It seems to keep me awake with worry and hope and all kinds of mixed feelings. I think until I can’t anymore. As a new year begins much has happened. We’ve watched countless tragedies and prayed for complete strangers. We’ve seen Christmas lights, and sang Christmas music. We’ve toasted our glasses full of bubbly Champagne.  Life is a complex system involving positive and negative electrical charges. Sometimes we’re inspired and other times we feel completely helpless. We either set our expectations too high or too low. We dream or we lose hope. We smile or we frown. Life is one impulse or another. Many try to simplify life by saying it is black and white. I think those people are naive and under-thinking. Do they not realize how many shade of black and white there are? It’s not quite as simple as they would assume. Justice for one person may not lead to justice for another. What’s right for one person may be wrong for another. If people were all the same and life really was simple everything would lose its purpose. But purpose continues to exist. Our purpose to love , protect and care for one another. Our purpose to try and survive when things get rough. Every one of us important. We all matter.

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