hump day

here

2012. you are challenging me. not in a good way. i had high hopes for you. i said it was going to be a great year. a year of new beginnings focused on finding peace. you are making peace difficult for me right now. i am at the end of my little rope. 2011 was a giant challenge, i needed a break. it hasn't arrived yet. all i have to say is, you better not be a 2006 or i just plain quit. seriously.

however, on that note... things, i suppose, could be worse.

one. i am thankful that i did not hit the poor pedestrian in the sidewalk when i got rear-ended last night.

two. i am thankful that i am not so seriously hurt. just sore.

three. i am thankful for my first snowboarding adventure.

four. i am thankful i get to get on a plane friday morning for a mini-vaca with jim.

five. i am thankful for the patience of good friends who continually try to show me the sunny side. (my ability to see the sunny side and choose joy is temporarily derailed, but i will snap out of it quickly. hopefully.)

always there are things to be thankful for. see them. i'm trying, are you?

to learn to snowboard... attempt one.

this is not crossed off the list yet. because i didn't learn how to snowboard. i'm trying though.
i did go down the hill, holding on to my oh so patient teacher, lyle, for dear life.

we all know it was about the outfit anyway. kidding. sort of. i just thought i would make a cute snowbunny. turns out, i do.
it was about more than fashion though. it was about finding a way to not loathe winter. finding new fun things to do with friends. trying new things during this year of new beginnings.

i was thinking this morning about other people i may have tried to learn from over the years. other people who may have been willing to teach me (or other people who said they would take me and leave me at the top of the hill). in my head it looks like a recipe for disaster. yet this experience, this first attempt, was a laughter filled day.

it's a work in progress, my oh so sore body can attest to that. yet i'm looking forward to attempt number two. maybe, just maybe, i'll try going down the hill by myself next time. i make no promises.

saying it out loud

here via here

sometimes saying things out loud is too much. it's too hard. or if i do say it out loud it turns sarcastic to cover up the truth.

sometimes i write things down just so that i can re-read them. just so i can know what my heart is really trying to tell me.

sometimes i know the truth, i just don't want to admit it. admitting it to myself is hard enough, let alone to other people.

yet sometimes it is the writing or the speaking that makes something real. today, that is what happened for me.

there is a goodbye coming up. someone who has come to be a dear friend, parting ways. in trying to figure out how to say goodbye i wrote a letter.

what i wrote didn't surprise me. it was something i knew all along. yet it made it real. it made the situation real. the goodbye real.

my feelings... real.

some days i wish things were different. i wish that i was the kind of girl you wanted to be with. i wish i was the kind of girl you wanted to bring out. like the night you suggested i come out with your crew. when you walked around with a hand on my back, as if you wanted to be by me, not like you felt you had to be. you introduced me as “your girl” even though i knew i wasn’t. despite the fact that some days i wish these things to be true, i know that they won’t ever be. too different, wrong for each other when it comes to love. i know that we are not meant to be together, but some days knowing to be true and wanting to be true aren’t the same.

saying it out loud doesn't bring the knowing and the wanting into congruence, but it is an acknowledgment of what's real. that is all i ask of me. to be real and honest. my full-disclosure policy.

perhaps it is why i have always loved writing so much, so i can say it out loud at my own pace. in my own time. letting my heart speak, my words ringing true.