“It’s hard to beat a person who never gives up”

In my life recently there has been interest in my free time. When people ask me if I’m getting enough rest or what I enjoy to do in my free time I mostly laugh at them. This has been the story of my life for many years now. I work full-time and I go to school full-time. Those two in themselves is enough to consume my entire life. I find it truly amusing when college students complain they have no time and upon further discussion I discover that they live with their parents and don’t work. It’s around this point that I lose hope in humanity.

If we are raising children to become young adults who cannot carry more than a full course load at a time, then I wonder how exactly they plan on living as a mature adult. I just heard about employees for a company who have been complaining about staying late, going in after hours for meetings and not being scheduled in ways that work with their lives – and then I heard about the fact they sit around and watch television while on the clock. Are you kidding? They’re complaining about a list of things and yet they don’t realize how easy they have it.

What happened to a decent days work? What happened to the work ethics of all people? What happened to the minds of people making them believe that they deserve to be waited on hand and foot – even in their place of employment?

I don’t have a lot of free time on my hands. I do take on many more things than I should. I do my utmost best in all aspects of my life. Neither my work nor my school is lacking. In fact I will brag about myself for a moment – I’ve been on the Dean’s List every semester and have over a 3.8 cumulative GPA. I am a hard worker. Something that seems to be an idea of the past.
I’ve made it through a lot of very difficult times in my life because I have continued to strive.

Babe Ruth said, “It’s hard to beat a person who never gives up”. Great advice, especially to those who fail to see how much they have to be thankful for.

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Follow Your Inner Moonlight…

Don’t mind my random ramblings…

Things are going well, in the full scheme of things. Yes, there are challenges – but that is how life goes. Tonight I am stuck. I have quite a few things to do for school, as well as personally, but it seems as though my mind is on vacation. At the least, it is preoccupied with trying not to dwell on the facts. The facts? The facts are things that are and cannot be altered. There are those which are good. And then there are those which are not. There are the facts which push you to grow. And then there are the facts which seem to stunt you where you are. Any and every part of life has its facts. With school, work, home, relationships, personal and other – everything can be broken down into one of these categories.

Finding the time to sit down and do my school work is challenging. Being motivated to write essays on topics I do not even begin to have any sort of passion for is practically impossible. Putting a project together on a country which I have already visited and didn’t necessarily enjoy is low on the list of interesting things to do. I know what I want to do, but I do not know how to get to that point. Without a doubt, I want to work with children in orphanages. Show them some sort of love and kindness – prove to them that there are people out in the world who truly do care and they are not alone. My heart twists every time I see parents who yell at their children calling them names or demeaning them in any sense. Sadly, I feel like I see that every day.

I’ve always been a great actress, and I feel as though that should be a requirement for my job. So many days I walk in and do not want to smile, talk, or be peppy and warm. All the things which are required to be a great employee in a major retail store. Work isn’t a place to bring your personal life in to, so I leave it at the door. I try to at least. Every once in a while when I’m not helping a customer I find myself feeling entirely overwhelmed and struggling to maintain my composure. I do though, every time. Because I am capable of handling anything that is thrown my way.

My baby puppy, Ava, will be turning two years old soon. It is easy to see she has not had the attention she deserves. It is difficult to give her the attention when I barely have any time when I’m at the house with her. I have found that losing two hours a day driving to and from the house has been detrimental to my ability to raise her properly, and also to accomplish essentially anything when I am at the house. It is “the house” and not “home” because it isn’t my home. I don’t have a home. I don’t have a place where I truly feel comfortable enough to relax, cook dinner, have “me” time. Since moving out of my apartment in Mechanicsburg in August 2010, I haven’t ever felt home. I’m not a person who can survive without a home – I need it. I require it. Otherwise there’s a lot of unrest.

On the outside everything looks great. Everything looks perfect at times. It isn’t until you get into the meat of things do you realize how many things are not even close to perfection. There’s a constant striving – striving to be the best daughter, friend, confidant, equal that anyone ever could be. I’m afraid to disappoint anyone. Every move I make I wonder who it will affect and how. Through this I’ve put myself through more stress than I ever should. This stress has truly taken its toll on me the last couple of months. Since the beginning of the year I have dropped a couple of pounds because I lost my appetite, and when I would force myself to eat I would get sick after only a couple of bites. On my tiny frame, a couple of pounds is impossible to miss. Especially when it’s closer to ten. Attempting to resolve and push my body back into something more normal is no fun, but it’s where I’m at.

It’s times like these that make it so apparent as to how desperately I need to dance, write or paint. Express myself in one form or another. After 25 years I still prefer to dance even though my body revolts as soon as I stop moving. It’s always been, and maybe always will be, the truest form of freedom I know.

And yes, I still say that things are going well in the midst of this. I have some challenges to overcome, some issues to accept, recognize and ultimately grow from and a lot of fear to deal with.
In some sense or another though that is all of us.

“Follow your inner moonlight; don’t hide the madness.” – Allen Ginsberg

Everything Except the Canvas

One of my roommates in Cali was a painter. A wonderful one at that. When she needed to refocus or just calm herself she pulled out her paints, paintbrushes, canvas and laid it all out – in the kitchen, in the backyard, in her room – it didn’t matter where. From time to time I’d walk by to watch her work. The way the colors all blended together, the strokes which filled the canvas, the layers which added depth – all amazed me. Near the end of my time there she brought out all of her supplies and asked the rest of us if we wanted to join her. After debating, I jumped on board. I love to be creative, and painting is something I haven’t really ever done – unless you count those pictures every child creates with the dollar watercolors or finger paints. As I watched an image that was only in my mind slowly be created on this canvas I was enthralled. When I finished the piece, the feeling of accomplishment was overwhelming. I turned it around and wrote #1 on the back – as it was a gift to a very dear woman who had treated me as her own daughter while we were in school together.

Since then I’ve wanted to paint more. Back when there was a relationship in my life and the other person in it pushed me to find my own hobbies, I figured painting could be one of them. I wanted to be like Allie in The Notebook. Have a guy who loves her so much that even if she isn’t in his life he builds a house exactly like the one she wants – including a room just for her to paint in. *smiles* It’s sweet.  Well, anyway. Once the relationship ended I threw myself into work and activities, absolutely denying myself the ability to express myself in any form aside from this very blog you read. The desire to do something I had found pleasure in while he was in my life was stripped away. Only recently have I longed to pull out a canvas and create a world – one which only I had knowledge of. So what did I do? Well, I went and found a small collection of paints (a 12 color starter set of sorts) and a small bundle of paint brushes – Merry Christmas to me! The only thing I’m missing is the canvas. The blank slate. The empty world. The openness to whatever.

Isn’t that just the way it goes in life? We have to be open – willing for whatever is next before it hits and starts on a new picture (season) of your life.

I think I’m ready for my canvas now…

Hospitals, cars and weddings

Sitting here in the hospital, I look back at this past week and realize how each day was more intense than the previous.
It all began with my car not working on Monday morning… Then spilling things on Tuesday… Overall stress on Wednesday… Thanksgiving had more work than relaxation. Then on Friday things really got out of control.
I hopped in my (surprisingly) working car, drove 2 hours and then headed to the NE Philly area for a wedding. 15 minutes away from the church my car stopped working and died on the side of the road. Thankfully one of our team members was near and was able to pick myself, our other coworker and all of our equipment in order to make it to the rehearsal. My car was then towed back up to my parents house. The rehearsal dinner went well minus our microphone not working. Saturday was the normal wedding crazy, from covering the prep to ceremony to reception there were few hiccups but overall I think we pulled off a decent production.
However Saturday in the morning I received a text from my mom letting me know that my dad who had been feeling bad all week was being admitted to the hospital. He was unable to move his head all week and then had a bunch of other symptoms.
Saturday after the wedding my cousin was kind enough to drive me and my coworker back to central pa but that put me an hour away from my parents, and an hour and a half away from my dad in the hospital.

At this point… I’m borrowing a friend’s car until tomorrow. My car is still dead and I have to figure out how to get it fixed. My dad is in the hospital and they really aren’t sure what’s wrong with him. And overall, I’m ready for a vacation. A beach, drink in hand, floppy hat and a good book. This stress level of mine needs to drop.

Time Fillers

Originally I took on my multiple jobs as a way to fill my mind with thoughts outside of the pain from breaking up and canceling a wedding. Now, 4 months later I’m not dwelling on him or the relationship. I have too much on my plate, plus I’ve moved on. I’m ready to drop my 9-5, go down to two jobs, figure out my immediate plans, and take a break.

The need for things to distract me from my own mind is gone. What happened over summer is no longer in the forefront of my mind. It’s now time to handle my life.

It feels so good to be in this place. Looking forward, not wondering “what if”, being that friendly, flirty, loving, sweet young woman I am. It’s a nice change, for sure.
I’ve claimed to be here before, even said that I’m handling my life – but I wasn’t being honest with myself. I was projecting what I wanted to be truth.

Time really does heal wounds.