everything is better in Polaroid

Thank God for my friends. THANK GOD FOR THEM. It's so easy to get caught up in what all the "signs" are pointing to... even when the "signs" are wrong. Being able to do the right thing... being able to be there for them like they've been there for me makes me happy. As much as I don't like to admit it... when my blood family is so far away... the people who are close to me become my family... as much as they don't want to believe it. I love my family... real and those falling into the "because they're close" category.

I've been going over my mother's history... her life... all through old pictures and film. Lots of what she's been trying to tell me without really explaining comes out in the photos. She... at my age... already was married and had a three year old. Many pictures she is smiling in... many she is not. She was a strong woman to go against what her parents wanted to do what was right. Her faith is ridiculous [as is my sister's]. Being away so long I never realized how much of her strength comes from her upbringing in the church... from God. I aspire to be the women who have come before me... my grandmothers... my mother... my sister. Because their lives turned out one way doesn't mean mine will the same... doesn't mean I cannot hope for something more. It does mean though... that the mistakes they have made I do not have to make. That the base line was drawn... and because of their choices I have the whole world in front of me.

POLAROIDS TO COME TOMORROW! :)

don't say "just"

i've missed home so much. i haven't been back in a while... @ least not back for more than 24 hours @ a time. i drove home the way i used to when i was 18 and stupid. everything's changing since they're putting in the highway. i hate the idea of less country to enjoy. no matter how much i hate getting behind slow traffic because the road is only 2 lanes... the fact that it's only 2 lanes makes me happy. you drive with your shoes off and crank the country tunes... changing stations about 3 times because of distance.
we used to drive to Columbus once a week for me to take ice skating lessons. on those many drives i found a house i said i would buy when i grew up. it was a gorgeous old farm house with big windows and a green roof. i passed it coming home today... and it's just a shell of a house. it's getting torn down for the highway. guess i'll just have to find another green roofed house to live in.

April Fool's day is just another excuse to...

trick me into falling for you for the 74th time...

i have been searching, what seems like, all my life for good enough. i am no closer now to knowing what that is than when i was head over feet in love four years ago. [i understand now what i thought was love then was a kind of relationship that was unable to grow... and so both him and i have moved on.] i try and try and try to become this good enough i so want to be... that others expect. i have changed my appearance over the years. i have had short hair, long hair, all types of make-up... and thanks to using running as a stress reliever i am not a terrible size. i am not a bad person... i am a good friend and someday will make a wonderful mother. i am driven... in a year i will be done with school... i have been able to take something i love doing and made it something i can build into a lovely career. myself as a person i wouldn't change. there are a few things i would like to work on... but that's just growth. so why can't i just be good enough damn it.

MORAL OF THE STORY: don't believe the man who cried buffalo... because buffaloes have been extinct since long before i was born. good enough will happen when i accept everything above and stop comparing myself to others. we all have our insecurities... we all have trust issues... it's human to. finding happiness in being human is the goal.

above picture by Allie... she is awesome... the end.