Soldier Up, You're Burning Daylight. (Another Letter To My Children)

There will be people who upset you. They will hurt your feelings. It's going to make you mad, and sometimes you will be so offended you wish you could just destroy the person. No, not vaporize them. Destroy them. Show them for the fraud they really are. Or, more importantly, the fraud you think they are. You are not perfect. Neither am I. I take offense. I get my feelings hurt. Things bother me. It's called life! Finding an outlet for those things is what keeps us all sane. We can get up, go to work, and smile at the people who have wounded our feelings because they heal after we let them go. For some people they can run it off. Others need a touch of violence and shoot paper targets, or obliterate punching bags. Some of us write, or dance, or sing. I have a sister who would get upset and start baking bread. It was delicious! Kneading the bread burnt through the pain and frustration and allowed for a healthy release. Personally I have more than one outlet. Through my life I have used several. Sometimes I danced it off. My most beautiful choreography came from the pain of my abuse. My need to express the hurt, and my longing to be free. Other times I have written about it. Shedding the layers of distrust, and frustration through sentence after sentence of words. Occasionally I can get away with photography. The point is that these activities allow the emotion to be captured. Literally. It is a snap shot to everyone else. To me it is everything I do not wish to hold inside. All of those thoughts and feels wrapped into a cohesive, or not so cohesive, paragraph, pleá, or blurred image. I leave them there. Allowing that place to be the only place they exist. For a long time this will not make sense. But you will see the prudence in it as time goes. And it always goes. Without a healthy outlet the human body will absorb those emotions. Which by technical definition are nothing more than hormones, and electrochemical responses in the system. It's why there can often be a confusion between the emotion of a moment, and the spirit of the moment. They are not the same. Learn their differences. By allowing those chemicals and electric charges to be present for long periods affects the body. When allowing a negative charge, and chemicals to remain we break down the tissue on a very atomic level. It wears you out! Those are the moments when using the technique that releases them into a captive moment in time you trap them outside yourself. Away from you they can be seen for what they are. Things to be gotten over, and left in the past. Do not drag them forward to weigh down the very cells of your body. Let them stay contained in the moment of somato-emotional release. I'm not saying I'm perfect at this process, but I have learned its value and I make attempts to use it as often as possible; albeit at the expense of some relations yes. But I swear to you it is worth it! To be able to forgive both myself and anyone affected. To walk away clean, without any of those bad miserable chemicals running through my blood wreaking havoc. It feels lighter. Now, along with doing this yourself I implore you to recognize when others do it. Do not hang on to their container of hurt. Let it set where it lies. Do NOT over compensate, attempt to make amends endlessly, or throw yourself to their mercy. People get hurt. Though you shouldn't intentionally ignore their hurt, I wish you to not keep bringing it up. It's almost just as hurtful to continue to walk on eggshells around them as the initial injury. Granted not everyone can let go like I try to, but it's wasted energy. People will see the attempts and either abuse them, Mia-interpret them, or be annoyed by them. I have been guilty of intentionally avoiding people because they tried too hard to avoid offending me. Which inevitably offended me. I am a paradox, I don't like the confrontation of a used car salesman, but I can not abide a person who fawns over me with the desire to not offend! Having grown up in an opinionated family; I believe that everyone will be offended at some point. The important thing is to not intentionally offend. Accidents happen. And with proper outlets everything can be forgiven. If I can forgive the Major for what happened during those 6 years I can most certainly get over having my feelings hurt. It will not be the last time either! The world will not see things my way! I'm not perfect, so it bloody well shouldn't! Se le vie. So is life. In other words; put your smile on, saddle up, and get over it. Find a way to let it go. To leave it in the past where it belongs. There are too many things happening around you to be focused on that. So yes, I get my feelings hurt. You will too! I hope that it happens regularly so you can practice letting go of what hurts, and embracing what lifts you up. Find your outlet, make it a healthy one, and don't let anyone change it until you're ready for a new one. And when you hurt someone's feelings, apologize. Then help them let go of the hurt by moving forward WITH them. If they are ready to move past it, don't keep groveling! Walk beside them to a place where it has been healed. You will both be glad you did. And if the person can't let go and you are more than ready to move on.... Go without them. But know that they will never follow you. If you feel that someone who has offended you can't move past it, help them to walk with you into the future. Don't let them debase themselves by dwelling on what hurt they caused you. It diminishes your character and makes them look foolish and weak. Help make them strong. Life is full of disappointments. Deal with them, and let the scars heal. Scars create strength. If you keep moving the scar strengthens without binding. You retain movement and life, and build strength.

Puppy Dog Tails and Guitars

Do you know what it's like to be the loser? It is seemingly a horrible job. A lame position that requires you to be the bane of your own existence. By simple human drive we are all looking and striving and working to be the Winner. I've accepted the fact that I am the loser. I am in no way athletic. I don't have anything that is terribly useful when it comes to competition. I'm the last man picked, and the first man out. the hardest part of this position is learning that you are far more important than you realize. You can't have Winners without Losers. So those people need you. It's a hard role to fill, and it sucks somedays. . . okay, it sucks most every day. You really want to be the winner in SOMEthing. Well suck it up and grab your pull-ups cause it's not getting any different. Learn to own your role. Learn to love and embrace this place in your life like you would being single. Be the best loser there is! Make sure that you are a "good sport" ( which basically means you Lose with dignity). Smile and laugh and enjoy the time spent participating. You could be one of those people who never even gets invited to try. It's not always a bad thing to be the last man picked, because you could be one of the people not picked at all. Remember that everything has it's place, and this is yours. By contrast I would hope that your friends who are Winners would pause for a moment to appreciate the difficulty in being you. That they would make an effort to include you in events that don't require a winning or losing role. That you could be socially accepted by the people who are beating you into an emotional hell. Sometimes the hardest thing for a Winner to do is remember that they had to step on someone to get there. They forget how many people's feelings were hurt, how many dreams were crushed, and most probably don't even know that you've never won at anything in your life. My advice to the Winners of the world, be aware of how many times someone else has lost. Not so you can remember how much better you are, but so that you can try and lift someone who has never had the chance to win. It's a lonely place at the top. Endearing yourself to someone who needs to feel like they're not losing at EVERYthing makes the journey less lonely. I personally believe it a responsibility of Winners to befriend, and defend the Losers in their life. I know not everyone feels that way. I'm not saying everyone deserves a prize. That's bull-crap. I'm saying, be kind. You won because of their less than stellar ability to defeat you. You're not above them. You needed them to suck that bad. Now be grateful and defend them from their own depression and anxiety. Make them believe there's a reason to get up every morning and keep losing. Because I can tell you from experience; some days, most days, you don't even know why you're still getting up if you're just going to lose again.

You're An Idiot- Things I WIsh I could Tell My Future Children.

Sometimes I sit and wonder at the type of children I will leave the world. I think about how they will behave, and how much of that behavior I will have a say in. I wonder if the things that I teach them will be who they become, or if they will run to the opposite end of things just to get away. I wonder at how I will screw them up in totally different ways from the way that My parents screwed me up. Every parent does the best they know how. Inevitably, and without exception, it screws their kids up in some small way. Who will the people I create be? How will they change the world we know? What will they think of me when they're old enough to sit on a laptop and blog about what rattles around in their head? I am the Youngest of 14 siblings. We are a blended family. We are strong,and we are bonded. each of us has a role we play. We have a Diva, a Nerd, a Musician, a Teacher, a Passive Aggressive, a 'Too Honest', a Cutie-Pie, a Jock, a Special, a Golden Child, etc. You get the point. Me; I don't have a place. I've messed up a lot which you would think would make me the "screw-up". But I'm not. That role was taken before I got here. So all in all, I'm the LAST person most people in the family would come to for advice. I don't know anything. Here is what I know: It isn't enough to find a man who CAN take you to the temple. You must find a man who WILL take you to the temple. This world is falling apart, and it isn't going to get any better. Now I'm not saying it's all doom and gloom. I'm saying it can't. Literally. All those times you got told to go clean your room, and you didn't know where to start? you kinda look around, zero in on something cool. . . that's where you start. Suddenly the room is full of junk, and you're cleaning and sorting, and making SO much progress! . . . then you turn around and look at the room. It's a disaster! things get worse before they get better. So it's not getting any better! that means you must have, not only a companion who say's they're willing, but is actually worthy to take you to the temple. It wont make sense for a while. And you will spend MANY hours alone. you will feel like you are worthless because if you had value, or were worth marrying some one would've found you by now right? You'll look at the people who pay attention to you and long for their companionship. It's a trap. The right person is out there feeling just as lonely as you. But if they can't take you to the temple to be sealed for time and all eternity than they were never the person God intended for you. Walk away and be alone. It will be the most miserable time in your life. . . or so you think. I spent a very long time "looking" for Mr. Right. I married the wrong guy because I figured it had to be good enough, and he COULD take me to the temple ... eventually. It ended badly, and lets face it I wasted a lot of time being married to the wrong person. I spent 3 years crying myself to sleep trying to understand why I had to be alone. When all I had ever wanted was to be a mother, I was the one without a husband, or even a boyfriend to give me children! I watched nieces, and cousins, and siblings raise children and complain about the burden. I doted on a dog who had become my only release for my mothering instincts. I prayed harder than I had ever prayed in my life! I tried desperately to understand. I tried dating men who could've taken me to the temple if they wanted to change their lives. They were, and still are, good men! I kept trying to figure out how to "fix" them. I was lonely, I was depressed. I gave up. No really, I gave up. I had stopped researching how to have children without a man. I started researching dog breeding, and the housing market. Talked to a Mortgage Broker in San Diego, Ca about buying a house. Looked at what I was going to need to start a life as a "forever alone" woman. The Crazy Dog lady. That would be my title. I would wear it proudly. I would treat my dogs like children, and let them swim with me, and sleep in my bed, and eat at my table. I was settled with the idea that I would be single. I'm not talking about just saying " ok Lord, you win... I'm ready to be single." and secretly hoping inside you still had a chance. I had given up to a point where I didn't even mention it to him anymore. I just stopped trying. I stopped looking, and I started planning for my life as a Single Woman. I was going to make it! About 2 years into my plan God dropped Kendall into my life. it took me 2 years of hard work to be a self-sufficient, independent woman for Him to believe I meant it. But because I had finally decided not to settle I ended up with a man who not only COULD take me to the temple, but WOULD. And would do so often. Kendall made it a point to go as often as we could. That was more than worth the wait. I can honestly say I would live through the heartache, and misery, and loneliness ( and there was more of that than I could ever fathom communicating), and depression just to have Kendall. I would do it all again, and only change one thing. I would be lonely, and miserable longer. I would forgo the wasted relationships that just prolonged the agony, and get straight into the loneliness and the giving up. Embrace it. Love it and enjoy it. Find comfort in the loneliness by building your relationship with you Father in Heaven. He will teach you what a real man feels like when he enters your home. You will begin to recognize His presence in your life and when the one who is supposed to be your eternal companion walks through your door. . . it'll hit you like a ton of bricks. You'll know him because he knows your Father in Heaven, and it is written on his soul.

Hot Chai and Chocolate Croissants

I've spent a good portion if my life trying to make a name for myself. Which has always really bothered me. I have a name. My mother gave it to me at birth. It's written on a certificate that's got a Washington state seal on it. So why do I care how people use that name? Why do I feel like that name is not name enough? And why, instead of declaring that we want a reputation for ourselves, do we request the option of "making a name for ourselves"? What's the difference in the long term if no one remembers you? Why does the idea of flying through life on someone else's coat tails unacceptable? What makes someone who is a "self-made man" so much better than the man who wisely used a predecessors reputation? I pose this as the argument in favor of the self made man. Do you know your place? I don't. I've never belonged. My family said I was weird. My friends left me and did mean things to me because my brother died. My church peers couldn't stand me because I was "the teachers pet"( actually I just paid attention). My boss thinks I'm expendable and totally replaceable. My teachers found me overly inquisitive and annoyingly curious. My co-workers see me as a know-it-all who is better left alone. My in-laws.... Well, we already know that they find me less than amazing, and we all LOVE being compared to the ex-girlfriend. So where do I belong? Where is my island of misfit toys to call home? What's my place in life? Will I ever find a niché? What is the purpose of me being here on this earth?! See. . . It's hard to not have a name. To not know your place. Some of us have been so long without a place that we'll accept any that is given. I spent 6 years in an emotionally and physically abusive relationship because it was a place. If I was there than my name, my place was his punching bag. It wasn't a nice home, but it was mine. It wasn't the right one, but it was mine. I've seen more than one person walk away from what they COULD have become because they couldn't get anyone to reassign their place. Sometimes we have the fight within us to be great. We don't have the permission to belong. There is such a sense of loss, of chaos, of utter and total despair! You have nothing. No home, no name, no place, no label, no direction, no end, no beginning. There is nothing in your life that will feel like it fits. It's like walking around in someone else's skin; Only you can't give it back, or exchange it, or even grow into it, or ever fit! you change, and it just changes too! NEVER fitting properly.All in all it is one of the most annoying situations to be in. You never stop feeling depressed, or hurt. You always feel lonely. People accuse you of being short, curt, sassy, or withdrawn. They tell you that if you'd just "try and be more friendly. get to know people" it would be better. Problem is that there's nothing about you to get to know. You have nothing to offer because you don't, by social definitions, exist. You are not His ex-girlfriend, and you never will be. You're not the pretty smiling dutifully graceful woman she is. You wouldn't know how to be that passive if you tried. And it's not like you're intentionally trying to confront people, you're simply being honest. You're doing your best to make sure that you are clear, direct, and concise as possible. To avoid the long awkward conversation they don't really want to be having with you anyway. It always backfires. And reality sets in... you will never have a home. So how do you deal with people like that? I'd be grateful for a place. A role in life in which I can be the best at whatever it is I'm supposed to be good at. Sometimes, simply having someone look at me and accept the truth as it leaves my lips is wonderful. Being able to simply give you the best description I happen to have is relieving. It's also nice when people dont take it so personally. So my life is no fairy tale. Accept that my reality is far more harsh than yours, but that I have come from a very dark place to the bright light of day through a LONG arduous journey that, despite almost killing me, has left me with both a very literal view as well as a fantastical one. Not an excuse, just an explanation. I just get really tired of not belonging anywhere. I just want to find my home and not have to leave. Not have to be judged, or explain myself. I just want to be loved, and appreciated for what I have to offer. To have someone acknowledge the value in what I'm doing, or saying. To know that the hard work I do day in and day out means something to the world. That it hasn't all been for naught. But isn't that what we all want?

Compare and Contrast

Is married life supposed to be all fair tales and magic? Is it really any different than the regular life you've been living with your best friend? I suppose that in most of the world where men and women live together long before the wedding that it isn't any different. I suppose that people asking me all the time "Hows Married Life?!" is just a conversation starter, and that they aren't really meaning to pry. But for someone who, although not secretive, can be private the question is annoying and feels more like prying than anything. What happens in the closed doors of my home with my husband is no ones business but my own. I tend to not understand where there's supposed to be a major difference between life before I married a good man and after. It also seems that My response distresses the In-Laws. Like I don't know that my husband is amazing. Sometimes people are not more amazing than the other person. Sometimes two amazing people find each other, and one is not more amazing than the other. My family has a tradition; we leave the married couple alone. We ask how the individual is doing. We know and understand that both are extraordinary people and that their lives together aren't made better or amazing BY the other person. They are merely combined and stay amazing. So the idea that just because I've never trusted another man the way I trust this one would change my life. . . I guess I'm just that jaded. My life is no different. He doesn't go home at night, but other than that there is no difference between what I am now and what I was 8 months ago. I am insulted at the idea that I was incapable of creating an extraordinary life before He came along. That it took another human being to make me amazing. I have worked my whole life, through troubles, and through some of the darkest moments to find joy and happiness. To come out the other side clean and happy. There are a lot of scars, but that doesn't mean that I'm imperfect. That I'm not as amazing as the other half. For a marriage to work both halves must be wholes, and they must be equals. So no, when two amazing things come together that are equal there's not much change. They just stay amazing. It would be a lie to say that it doesn't hurt to think that I am somehow viewed as less than the man I married. The idea that just because he was a good man that my life becomes something more than what I was aiming for to begin with. I don't understand why life should be any different. It's the same path, the same route, the same goal. Now there are merely 2 pieces traveling the road. No load is lighter, no goal is different, no real change other than a little conversation along the way.

Three Months Late, and One Fiddy short.

I've been meaning to write this for a while. I saw a friend post something to Facebook. Something I don't typically take too seriously. It happened right after the election and referenced the way each man talked about his wife. The emphasis placed on the word "chose", to be exact. Here's my thought. I would rather be "chosen" than not. My logic comes from this line of thinking; Most people who are considered chosen are above the caliber, and higher quality than those surrounding them. It implies that the man saw his wife as the woman of his dreams. Like so many "chosen" people in fairy tales, only she could save his world from desolation. The barren waste of lonely existence could only be averted if she saved him. Not just any woman would do either, mind you, there was only one. The idea that it would be degrading for a woman to be the chosen person in a mans life is beyond me. Granted we don't tend to lean that direction when thinking about it, but I like to believe that the romantic in that man ( which I saw because I bothered to observe)saw this woman as his saving grace. That without her, he would be a lonely miserable, worthless human being. Oh what honors and Grace is bestowed on a woman who can win a man's mind to the point where he knows he is nothing without her. That his only choice to be saved from a useless existence is the one where he musters every ounce of courage, places his pride, his dignity, his very life on the alter and begs her to marry him. THAT is the choice. The one where he stoops below what his ego would allow and asks her to save him. Again, I offer that it is better to be chosen, than to have been the one to choose. Although marriage is a solemn ordinance in which two people help to save each other through encouragement and growth; I do not believe that either one can say they did not feel the uplifting love, and compassion of the other in the courting process. As well, it can be measured that healthy, solid relationships are usually made from two people who will, often times, willing admit that the other person is the most amazing person they've ever known. There is a mutual adoration that should always be there. Each should lift the other, and not forget that it was an act of Agency that brought them to that place. That they sacrificed pride, and ego to get Home. Either way, I find it romantic that he admitted to a nation that he chose a woman to make him a better man.

Keep Calm and Chive On

Love is a craving we all have. It fills the deepest parts of our engines. We are fueled by it and we know it. Somewhere deep in our inner most parts we know it. Our confusion over Lust and Love is understandable. If you don't have true Love as a child you have no idea how to replicate it. We go from Lust to Lust and feel mildly satiated, but never full. It is then a strange and undefinable moment when we suddenly encounter true Love. I'm not talking about the Snow White singing to with the birds, and rabbits, and dancing raccoons. I'm talking about the Love that drives the human spirit to unending hope, humility, and insane bravery. It's the sort of things that gets you to buy a plane ticket home for Christmas after not having talked to your family for 10 years. It tells you to drop money in an old mans cup as he sits hunched on the sidewalk. It tells you that the morning will be beautiful even if you're living in hell. And what does all this mean to me? It means I have a 12yr old husky who doesn't like to sleep, a wedding reception I'm trying to plan for some people who seem to think the only way to get married is with a huge party, and bills to pay. on very little sleep i've managed to upset my healthy diet with copious amounts of caffein, get most things for the wedding done, and convince my dog that she can hold still for 3 hours while I sleep. I really don't understand what's wrong with Punch and cookies. Most receptions are over the top and annoying. People HATE them. The best wedding I ever went to was one where the whole thing was 3 hours. from the bridal march to the send off. It took them 2 minutes to exchange vows after a pastor had taken 5 minutes to wed them. then they cut the cake, danced, and invited us to dance. 3 hours later they were on their way and we were all headed home. Wanna know what they served? Russian Wedding Cookies.. or mexican wedding balls; which ever you call them, and punch. BEST. RECEPTION. EVER. I hate those cookies, but I loved the simplicity of it all. I will never forget the conversations, the photo's, the laughter. It was small and intimate. Personally I will take intimate over the public spectacle. I'm not a celebrity, and I have no desire to be. So why would I want hundreds of people to parade through a room and pretend to be happy for me when they have NO F&$%ing clue who I am?! " oh but Deb, the more people you invite the more presents!". . . I have lived on my own for 10+ years. If I need something I earn the money to buy it. I've got everything I need, and even somethings I want. I don't even want presents! I want simple. I want to be surrounded by the people who care for me the most, and I want to enjoy them as we celebrate the beginning of a new chapter. THAT is what weddings are about. people just get out of control. I will confess that I've reached a place where I'm not even sure I want to get married anymore. Pretty much done. I just think there are things more important that presents. I think the time with family is of more significance to quality of life. I gotta walk Makaio. She's starting to whimper. Plus I had laundry in the dryer I should probably get. So, I'll go take my dog for a run and retrieve my laundry. You find a reason to do more than Lust, and discover what true Love is.