On temporary pain....

Tattoos are kind of hilarious to me. I'm often perplexed at how emotionally violent people can get about either their love of or hatred of them. I've seen people get oddly judgemental toward people who have them; but I've seen the flip-side, too. I've seen people with tattoos get oddly preachy about the reasons they have theirs...as if one group could convince the other to change their minds. As if it matters.

I have a few tattoos of my own. Four, to be exact. And I love them all. Well, I love three of them. The ugly stepsister tattoo (which was my first) is embarrassing, at best. I need to get it fixed. It was the product of a slightly intoxicated rebellious streak and, because I knew nothing of how to research artists or questions I should ask, I essentially wound up with a paint-by-numbers drawing on my back. Lesson learned, Universe. Lesson learned. [It should also be noted that I credit Miami Ink with teaching me the questions to ask and skills to expect with something so permanent].

So that was my first tattoo. A naked fairy sitting on a rose on my lower back. It's hideous. Borderline white trash. Sigh. It's going to take a lot to fix it.

Despite that catastrophe of a tattoo, I've become addicted, as so many people do. I now have four tattoos with room for nine more and ideas for at least four of them. Each of them mean (or will mean) something special to me. One is my life's mission. Another is my family. The most recent is my strength. The next is how I feel about myself (or should feel, because I don't always feel this way). Another is my past and there will be a matching future. I have a plan for one to display my pride in myself (and my body). I'd like one to display my zen, my peace...but that one will take some time to design.

It's about the most permanent way I can think of to display the things that make me, me. I see some of my tattoos daily and am reminded of so much of the good and magical in my life. It forces me to remember that for all the good and beautiful in my life, it's come with some signficant pain. But more than that, it reminds me that pain is temporary and beauty really can feel like forever.

On learning to love again....

Confession: I have struggled with feelings of hatred and fear for a really long time.
Mostly, these feelings are directed at myself or at situations I find myself in. I hate the high arches in my feet. I hate that my gums are receding. I hate that I have a five-head (and I especially hate the scar on said five-head that is in no way a curling iron burn, but everyone stupidly asks that question). I hate the cottage cheese that's starting to appear on my ass and thighs. I hate that my top half is disproportionately small compared to my bottom half.

Very recently, I took up yoga in a pretty serious way. I went one time with a girl friend about a week ago and have gone every single day since then. Honestly...$75 for unlimited yoga? It was an easy sell for me, even with my very limited budget. I don't know how it happened, but during one of my classes, I just started thinking while I was breathing: "Peace and love in; Hatred and fear out." I think it's become my mantra.

And it's started helping my understand and appreciate (dare I say, even begin to love) my body more than I ever have. My high arches allow for quick and light footfalls when I run. There's very little I can do about my teeth and gums, but my new dentist is dreamy in a (married) Michael Buble kind of way so I hate going to the dentist a lot less. My five-head looks pretty awesome when my hair is pulled back in a delightfully messy ponytail when I run. My dimpled ass is just a product of me getting a little older, but my legs are carrying me farther than I ever thought I'd go. And while I still don't like that I can't fill out a sundress, I can honestly say there's nothing better than not having to worry about my chest or back aching from that weight while I run.

Yoga is teaching me things I didn't think I could learn. Things like restoration and inner peace. I still have a long way to go on both of those fronts. I'm still a really frenetic, Type A monster most of the time. But for an hour a day, I can relax into myself and my breath and just...be. I think I could easily spend five or six hours flowing through gentle poses and it would probably be the most beneficial thing I'd ever do for myself.

And what makes this whole yoga thing even more relaxing to me is the knowledge that I can take it with me anywhere I go. Granted, I have a lot of learning to do before I can do this on my own. I'm a creature that thrives in structured environments where I'm told what to do...so the idea of going it alone in yoga is a bit overwhelming, but I'm hopeful I can get there. I have dreams of practicing on a front porch somewhere, overlooking the ocean. Or taking my mat camping with me and being a warrior and star gazer in the hills.

No matter where my life takes me, I'm convinced that yoga will go with me.

On the fear of change....

I'm getting ready to move in the next several months. To another state. With more than just a duffel bag and a stereo. Sure, I've lived in another country (Canada) and another state (Minnesota), but when one moves away from home for college, it's not quite the same as moving away from home for...life. I'm about to uproot myself and my dogs and head east for a brand new adventure. New friends. New restaurants. New running trails. New church. New lots of things. I'm leaving my family for the first time in my entire life, but the good news is that where I'm heading, I have lots of other family close by...my brother,  about a billion cousins (it seems), and a few aunts and uncles. To be sure, I'm thrilled about the possibility of seeing them far more often than I have in the last 33 years (holy hell...am I really almost 33?!).

But what I'm discovering in all the emotional ups and downs that comes with moving, is that I'm kind of terrible at keeping friends. I make friends pretty easily. After all, I was always the kid the teacher put the new kids next to in school. Always. It's something my parents sort of held as a badge of honor when it came to me...I was the friendly one. But that seems to be about where it ends. I can make someone feel comfortable and at home, and then I just sort of trail off.

So when I think about moving away, I worry about losing most of the friends I've made during my lifetime in Colorado. I made plenty of friends when I lived in both Canada and Minnesota, but the reality is that I only really keep up with one of them. ONE. Granted, she's my best good buddy, but still...I made lots of friends while I was there. Or so I thought. I'm sure, or at least I'm hoping, I'm not the only one that experiences this feeling. I'm hoping I'm normal.

But it worries me. I've made some really incredible friends here and I wonder...when I move away, will all of that just dissipate? Will it all just go away? Maybe that's part of why I tend to be guarded when it comes to friends. I just panic that at some point, one of us is going to move away and we'll forget about each other and what's the point of really investing? It's a terrible way to go about life. Just awful. I have my very best Denver friend and I panic terribly about losing her. I think about going through our big life changes and how we won't be together for them.

I hate talking on the phone. Absolutely hate it. That's probably a huge part of why I struggle with maintaining friendships. I just don't like being on the phone. I can't really even bring myself to call my grandparents because I hate the phone so much. Thank goodness for Skype and FaceTime! I'm not sure why, but that seems so much less...awful. Frankly, I have an iPhone for email, texting, Facebook, and shopping. I hate using it for a phone. If I never used the phone app again, I probably wouldn't miss it. I dread listening to my voicemail. Seriously. It's like a phobia. Nothing about being on the phone excites me.

I've been going through all this miscellaneous relational madness for quite some time now. I often question who my friends are and if I'm even a friend to them. Compounding the issue, I often deal with feeling like I'm forgotten, not noticed, or simply ignored. It's probably all in my head. I'm sure it is. But it doesn't make it any less real, the way I feel.

It makes me wonder, because of this, if the life I'm about to embark on is what I was always meant to do? I'm not entirely sure. But the reality is, I'm sure I'll be moving more and more as the years go by. Friends will come and go. I will come and go. And was my entire life leading up to this just preparation? It's strange because I've always been the one to stay put while everyone else went away. And for the first time in my life, I'm the one that's leaving everyone else behind.

It's all very new. And scary. And incredibly exciting.

On the first signs of love....

So I'm reading this book right now, Captivating. I honestly never thought I'd pick up a book like this. I'm not usually one for the churchy, Jesus-y books. They tend to be more than a little cliche, overbearing, and, well, judgmental. At least, that's my experience with this type of book. But it came on recommendation from someone whose reading taste I trust, so I decided to go for it. I rented it. And now...I want to own it. In paperback. So I can mark the crap out of it. It's been a pretty empowering read for me.

But a conversation I had last night is what's really sparking this post. And since we're less than twenty-four hours from Valentines Day (a day I have come to love and appreciate), this one is about romance.

There are some of us girls that were (and are) very lucky. We grew up with the World's Best Dad. He's probably got shirts and mugs and ties and posters and cards from years and years of his daughters thinking that. And it's not just that we *think* he's the best. He truly *is* the best. More than a few of us who have this dad probably, between the ages of three and five, asked our dad's to marry us. He's the coolest, strongest, smartest, most amazing dad ever, right?! Dad is the first place we really learn what romance is. Pure, uncomplicated, unconditional romance. Dad gave us flowers and took us out on "dates" and twirled us around when we wore our pretty party dresses. Dad told us we were the prettiest, smartest, most special girl in the world. Not because he had to. Not because he wanted something in return. He did it all just because. Because he could and he wanted to. That's why so many of us girls that have great dads tend to marry men just like him. I see the way my dad is with my mom and that's a lot of what I want. She's a powerful woman. A force to be reckoned with, to be sure. And my dad loves every bit of her and just sort of lets the hurricane that is my mother do what she's going to do...and he's been known to be disaster relief from time to time. But he loves that woman. And he can fix stuff and make stuff pretty and he's crazy smart. He's funny and talented and generous. He's passionate about his work, his life, his family, his faith. He's a leader in every facet of his existence.

I remember learning from my dad the way a boy should treat me. He should open doors and bring me flowers and take me to dinner and show. And he should do it all expecting nothing, but hoping for my thanks and adoration in return.

And isn't that what true love is? Isn't the act of loving someone supposed to be pure and simple? There should be no conditions. There is something strong and beautiful and unbreakable when love comes to us in its cleanest form. It seems, then, that if we expect nothing in return for love, we're basically guaranteed to get everything.

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On missing the words....

Is it weird that I'm unnerved by the lack of writing going on around me? I have so many writer friends and so many of us are just, well, not writing right now...or any more. It's sad. And I honestly hope it's just a season we're all in. I miss reading the recipes, the quotes, the poetry, the rants, the advice, the goings-on, the reviews...I miss all of it. It's few and far between that I see one of us writing and even farther that I find myself writing. There's plenty to talk about, plenty to discuss. So why aren't we?

There have been a lot of things on my mind lately, some important, some absolutely pithy. So maybe as a diving board, I'll just put everything out there, in hopes someone(s) will jump in and we can start writing and talking again.

• Can it really be that, for so long, we (the royal we) were more interested in the Manti Teo nonsense than Benghazi? Or the fact that Hillary Clinton kicked some serious ass on the Hill the other week?
• Am I the only one that actually felt a little emboldended by Beyonce's halftime show? That was impressed when I saw nearly 200 people on stage and all of them were women?
• It's just a little sad that every day, when I read the news, there's nothing happy happening. Someone is always getting killed, killing, or just doing something stupid. I wish that news, for one day, would report nothing but good news.
• I'm on a mission to remove all negative words from my thought and speech. It's harder than it sounds, but when I actually get down to it, you wouldn't believe the shift my mental status makes. It's incredible really.
• There are too many books that I want to read and not nearly enough time to read them all. I picked up a "Jesus-y" book the other day which was, I assure you, a surprise to me as well. So far, I don't hate it. I need more books titles to read.
• Being a DINK was awesome. I want to be a DINK again. Sigh. If you don't know what that is or what it means, it's not really that important.

So there you have it. That's a sampling of what's been on my mind the last several weeks. So, dear writer friends, please...regale me with your own thoughts. I miss you!

On reflections....

Well, it's that time of year. The time when I reflect on the year that's past and what lies ahead.


This was a big year. Bigger than I expected, in many ways. I experience so much more than I ever intended to, in both good and bad, happy and sad ways. The bad and the sad aren't things I like talking about. Does anyone enjoy talking about those things? Probably not. At least, not to anyone who isn't a therapist, right? And I promise I've done more than my fair share of that.

There are many lessons that I learned this year. It's hard to go through some of what I've dealt with and not learn at least something. I learned more about myself than I ever thought possible, to be honest. But there's one big important lesson I learned this year that I hope to carry with me forever.

Patience.

Back in February, when my life seemed like it was falling apart (and, for all intents and purposes, it was), I found comfort in the treadmill. For no reason other than escapism, I started running. I didn't have a goal or a purpose in mind. I just needed something to focus on that wasn't anything going on around me. So I ran. I downloaded a million different apps until I found the one I loved and I ran and ran and ran. I have plenty of friends that are hardcore distance runners so I tried to make my intentions very clear with my running: I was NOT going to run for a reason. I wasn't going to enter races or try to prove anything or try to keep up with them. I just needed something healthy to do.

Then the end of spring came and, like clockwork, I broke my own promise and thought, "If I can run one mile, surely I can run 13, right?" and I signed up for a race. The one thing I said I wouldn't do. But it gave me a goal which, retrospectively, I really needed. And I slowly - very slowly - began the process of training for a distance race. It was hard and often unpleasant. I discovered each weekend how many damn hills are in my city and how those hills would slow down my already dismal pace. But patience. All I had to do was finish. I wasn't racing anyone buy myself. I would be gone for hours and hours on the weekends, just running. I'd find myself in "therapy sessions" with my best good running friend for additional hours during the week and in the mountains. Patience. Patience. Patience.



I took a week off and discovered I had to scale my training back in order not to hurt myself. I hate that feeling. I hated feeling like I was moving backwards in my training. I hated feeling like I wasn't keeping up with whatever I wasn't keeping up with. Except that I *was* keeping up. It was just me and my trusty tennis shoes and we were doing just fine.



I finally ran my big race with one of my best friends (a girl is lucky to have one...I get to have two! And - bonus - they're both runners!) and OH. MY. GAWD. The patience it took to finish it. I started too hard, too fast, and two-thirds of the way in, I was just about down for the count. I'd run for 15 steps and walk for a quarter-mile. And this is how I finished the race. My best friend had extraordinary patience with my injured knee and me. She kept me on track and simultaneously focused and distracted (a skill we should all perfect at some time) and we finished together.



My knee (actually my IT band) took me out of the game really fast. I haven't been able to really run since September 30, but what I've learned is....patience. My knee knows what it needs. I know it will take time to recover and that I *can* recover with just a little time and, well, patience. So I take it slow, knowing that one mile will eventually turn into two, then five, then thirteen again before I know it. I have time so I might as well use it. I train, albeit slowly. Because nothing worth having happens fast...at least, not from what I can tell.

On the dead and the dying....

Today is Halloween which means in two days, many people I know will be celebrating Day of the Dead. I'm always fascinated by this tradition. Two of my oldest friends (and many of their family members) gather at their grandparents gravesite and have a big picnic and celebrate the magical lives of those they've lost. It's a wonderful tradition, if you ask me.

I had the chance, over the summer, to do something similar. I visited my grandma for the first time since we buried her about seven years ago. It was sad, to be sure. It was the first time my sister had seen Grandma's headstone so she was a bit teary for a little while. But after a bit, the tears subsided and my sister and I, along with one of our friends, spent nearly an hour running around the cemetery, chasing fireflies...it was the most appropriate way I could think of to honor my grandma's life. She's the first one that ever showed me how to catch a firefly (ah, the wonders of the midwest in the summer) and use it as a nightlight. She loved all the pretty bugs...fireflies, butterflies, ladybugs. I think Grandma was all kinds of smiles that evening, watching us run around like that.

Not long after my grandma passed away, one of my grandpas left. It was pretty gut wrenching to lose another grandparent so quickly. But there are two things I gained from those losses:
1. I was 26 years old before my first grandparent ever died. That's a really long time to have all of them around. Like, a REALLY long time. I am a lucky girl.
2. Spending the weekend of the funeral with my family was the first time I really remember connecting with Crazy Cousin Jackie on a deep and meaningful level. Makes me sad we didn't grow up living near each other, but there's nothing in the world I'd trade for the friend I've made in my cousin since then. She's pretty badass. You should all be so lucky to have a cousin like her.

I've experienced some pretty significant loss in the last few years, but this Halloween, rather than wallow in the sadness of the people I've lost, I think I'm going to choose to remember everything about those people that made me smile....the butterflies, seashells (an absurd amount, really), gravy, swing music, books and bookmarks, shopping, fresh bread, swimming, newspaper clippings, nicknames, eccentric hats, after-dinner tea...there's a great deal of happiness to be had!

So this year, I challenge all of us, while we're enjoying the candy and scary movies and costumes, to think of the people we've lost and try to remember the happiness they brought to our lives while they were a part of them.