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! :)