Every year, I always plan to join the mad dash of discount shoppers swarming stores at 5am the day after Thanksgiving. This year is the first time I actually did it.

Two words: never again. Continue reading →

It’s the same story. Every single time.

Well, not every single time, but definitely every time in the past 1.5 years. Here I am once again doin too much. Paula Deanda wrote this song for me:

I know, I know, I know. Guys like a challenge. And that right there is a challenge for me. I don’t really understand the rules to this game and just when I thought I wasn’t in the game anymore, I was disqualified. My offense: doing too much. Again. Continue reading →

I put in my two weeks notice at my job on Friday, Nov 13th. Technically, my last day is Friday, Nov 28th. That’s a holiday and I need to train someone, so my real last day should be in about two weeks. They haven’t hired anyone to replace me yet. I hope they do soon because this waiting period is cruel. Continue reading →

“Love at first sight is only realizing an imagination that has always haunted us; or meeting with a face, a figure, or cast of expression in perfection that we have seen and admired in a less degree or in less favorable circumstances a hundred times before.” - William Hazlitt

I saw this quote today and immediately thought of him — who I have not thought of a name for yet — I should just call him Dream Come True. Okay, that’s a little dramatic, but he is great. Seriously. Friggin. Great. Haha. I wouldn’t necessarily call this “love” at first sight (again, a little dramatic) but you get my drift. It really is like I’ve realized an imagination that has always haunted me. I ask him sometimes, “did I dream you?” Im only half-kidding when I say that.

This guy is great. It’s weird because the way things are working out. I don’t want to jump the gun, put the cart in front of the horse or count my chickens before they’re hatched or any other saying that means I’m doing too much before necessary. I don’t know.

Only time will tell.

 

I got my very first car all on my own today. A 2010 Ford Escape Limited….ALL BLACK EVERYTHING! It has leather seats, sync system (I can talk on the phone through the speakers), satellite radio, heated mirrors. The works. It’s only been a few hours and I love it!!! Continue reading →

“I said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope. For hope would be hope for the wrong thing…” - TS Eliot

I was an emotional trainwreck for most of 2008 and 2009. Every road leading back to where I was and the decisions I made is covered with more red flags waving than an Ohio State football home game. It seems I made one decision after the next with no regard to common sense and reality. Being the persistently realistic person that I am, it’s difficult for me to admit the rationale behind a lot of my actions. I had so much hope, so many expectations, so much desire — I relentlessly pursued what I was after and avoided all reason. It’s embarrassing to even think about it. Now, I am a wiser person because of it and I promised my heart I would not set myself up for debilitating disappointment like I did in the past.

Yet here I am…against my will…hoping against hope…AGAIN

Continue reading →

I’ve always loved this poem. It speaks to me now more than ever. Sometimes I wonder about the road not taken.

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth.

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same.

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I-
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.
— Robert Frost 1915

“Anyone can give up. It’s the easiest thing in the world to do. But to hold it together when everyone would understand if you fell apart, that’s true strength.” -Unknown

I think about my life and all that has happened in the past six months. If I wanted to, I could use it as a crutch or as a reason to not get out of bed in the morning.

People would understand.

They would say, “She’s a mess. But that’s understandable. Her dad died. The guy she loved broke her heart. Her sister drives her crazy. Her mom lives far away. She doesn’t make that much money at her job.” There is a list of excuses that I can make for myself. And people will make those excuses for me. I have the choice to lean on those excuses — one arm on one side, the other on the other side and hobble through life doing the bare minimum. Or I can throw those crutches to the side and walk on my own two feet.

Still Standing by Monica is one of my favorite songs. In it Ludacris raps: “Still standing like the Statue of Liberty”. I love that line. That’s what I’m going to do: stand. Besides, who needs people to feel sorry for them? Certainly not me. I figure people are going to talk behind my back anyway. I’d much rather people say “Wow. I can’t believe she made it after all she’s been through.”

I’m not making excuses for failure in my life. Things are hard. A lot of things aren’t fair. I make mistakes. I get chopped and screwed. And in those times, I allow myself to scream in my car, cry in the bathroom stall or furiously tweet rants on Twitter. But after that 30-seconds to two minutes passes, it’s time to pull myself together and move on.

Every day I have a choice: I can make excuses or I can make progress.

The choice is easy. Especially when you have this memorized: Excuses are tools of incompetence that build monuments of nothingness and those who specialize in using them seldom amount to anything at all.

The truth is, I’m blessed. God has blessed me tremendously. It’s when I take my eyes off the blessings in my life and start focusing on the things I want or what someone else has, that’s when I get discouraged. Yes, bad things happen. But, good things happen too. I’m thankful for that.

Where do dreams go to die? Where do they go to get the possibility sucked out of them? Where is the land of dreams unfulfilled?

I want to know, so I can stay far away from that place.

I fear. I fear being one of those people who had so many dreams and aspirations yet ends up working 40hrs a week as the supervisor at the Post Office. No one aspires to do that, so how do they end up that way? How does someone end up being the customer service rep at Insight Cable? I go to pay my bill, but can’t help staring at the woman behind the counter forcing myself not to ask her: “What happened? How did this become your life?” I want to ask the middle-aged Walmart cashier “what happened?”

I want to know, so I can be sure what happened to them doesn’t happen to me. Continue reading →