Bloggidy Blah

Yesterday I went to the orthodontist. They replaced my wires with the largest wires they have and added 4 rubber bands to my mouth so that it no longer opens even wide enough for a spoon to go in. This is a problem for me. I love food. I need it. In addition, the pain is so severe that I actually feel like I was in some sort of accident. Now I didn't start this blog to whine on and on about my braces or the communists that torture me by adjusting my braces...

I started this blog to let you know, that when I am on Valium (given to me by orthodontist for pain and muscle relaxation in my jaw) that thoughts no longer form into valid whole sentences. Everything kind of floats around. My brain starts processing things about 5 minutes after they actually happen. I look for the right word to say, and by the time I think that I have found it, I no longer remember the sentence it was supposed to go with. Hmmm...

Medicines have always had weird affects on me. Most people can take a Loratab for pain and go on about their day, I take pain medicine of any sort and it puts me into a 12 hour coma followed by a 6 hour fog.

The only enjoyable part being that it actually slows my brain to the point where I no longer feel frantic and stressed because of all the other things on my plate. So my goal, is to find a way to chill out and mellow down when I am not actually injured. What good methods unstress you? What do you wrap your mind around when you want all the daily junk to just take 5?

This is as far as I can go tonight, mostly because right now, I honestly don't care, about a whole lot at all. Russell made dinner and cleaned up last night and tonight, managed to get the 2 little ones in bed, and make sure I didn't need anything in the process. I'm liking his new knight in shining armor bit, it looks great on him. :)

I am feeling so mellow that this is the song that popped into my head to share... enjoy.
Before you listen to it though... let me tell you what I see when I hear this song. Picture a hot June night, deep in Southern America. A field full of wild sweet grass and dandelions. Girl standing in a yellow sundress with bare feet staring up at a sky full of more stars than you could ever count. Picnic basket and blanket on the ground near by, where her favorite boy is laying watching her in awe.... that's what I see when I hear this song. (oh and of course this girl is a rocking brunette that slightly resembles yours truly) hehehe

The Sound of Silence

When the girls finally lay down their heads and fall asleep, and the dogs all find their happy places around my feet, and the cats snuggle in the chair beside me, and Russell is off on a pool night... the house goes quiet. It's a strange quiet that I am pretty unfamiliar with. The only sound to be heard is the soft whirl of the ceiling fan and the steady ticking of every clock in the house.

It never ceases to amaze me how loud quiet actually can become. The clocks... they make me crazy. Tick and then tock... and click click click... the seconds... they fall away... fading into the past... and when the silence is so loud with the passing of time, I find myself looking for things to do. I must do something... listen to the moments passing by!

I am currently working on my very first novel. I found a writing contest called Operation First Novel, and the winner gets a check for 25k and published... It must be at least 75,000 words long, and it is due in September. I feel like the seconds that are sliding past are chances that I need to be focused on completing it. However, I find I cannot write on it all the time. I have to be in a certain mood... imagination has to be pouring out of me. I find I am usually not stuck in front of a computer when those moments hit me. Maybe I need a voice recorder... ideas? Sigh... the clock... it's relentless tonight. I must get up and focus on something...

I think the looming 30 year mark is also affecting me somehow... I have accomplished much... but there is much left to do!! :) I hope all of my readers are not sitting anywhere near the gosh darn clock in the room.

Here's a cool pic I snatched on my way home from work... cloud junky... that's me.

oh and if you have forgotten... here's a classic reminder of the Sound of Silence.

If I Could TAP Dance for You.... I WOULDN'T.

It's been that day... the one where someone says something about you... that they cannot ever take back or undo... where you sit there staring at them.... glaring a hole in the middle of their forehead to prevent you from grabbing them by their stupid ugly face and beating them into the wall. Yep, it's been that day.

Oh... and it wasn't Russell. lol. Guess that's important to get out of the way to start with.

Anyway... some allegations were made toward me today that left me in a state of shock... once that wore off I was absolutely more angry than I think I may have ever been at another point in my life. Anger is a very difficult emotion for me to contain.... I normally get pissed to the point that HOT tears well in my eyes and burn down my face only to make me that much more PISSED off that now someone has made me mad to the point that I am crying over it. If you ever have the ability to make me cry in public.... I highly suggest you follow it with running... because WRATH is following....

To put it lightly it has ruined the remainder of my day... which has also seriously ANNOYED me. I hate feeling this way, but I also know that it is time for me to move on and this is just more proof of the same. Hopefully I can get my brain back to the E side of the pissed off-ometer shortly. DEEP CLEANSING BREATHS.

I need an angry song... hmm...yes this should do NICELY.

Tornado schmamado

Well it's been 5 days since tornadoes went BUCK wild through Alabama, and it will be many months before people even start to realize the magnitude of what actually happened to the state. People have come together, other states have stepped in to help with our power, there's been a lot of kindness through the disaster... but there are also looters and crazy people that do not have the capacity to be civil kind human beings. Alabama actually stated... those people can be shot on scene. I wish that was always the rule. Honestly.

I am a bit disappointed in the way some of this is being handled, but hey... I suppose that's life. Let me tell you about the good parts.

When the weather was about 30-45 minutes out, the schools called (at 11:30 am) to tell us kids needed to be picked up from school by 12:15. We had coworkers in town from Washington D.C. and we were at lunch (we had taken Russell's truck). I relayed the message that I had 45 minutes to pick up the girls, so we haul tail back to the office. As we are getting there to drop of our coworkers, the sky is turning a freaky black/green color... like a week old bruise.

He looks over at me... he still has a meeting to go to.... he asks if I will be okay driving in this... I look a little nervous towards him... and he jumps out of the car and goes and collects his things from the office. We leave my car in the parking lot and head towards the kids school.  This is what is moving toward us at a scary alarming pace:

As we start to head down the highway, the first wall hits us, hail starts pelting the truck, barricades from the road work are flying across the street and then flying back the other direction as quickly as the went right... they went left again. Signs began blowing down, trees bending at alarming lows. I was so incredibly thankful he left with me and we were in his truck and not my car. After the remainder of the day panning out in similar terrifying moments followed by a break in the clouds and spots of sunshine... we were left totally in the dark with no cell service at all.

It wasn't until the next day when we got up... we started to realize how close we had been and what was complete devastation around us in both directions. Here is what one side of our main street looks like... and within a half mile on the other side of us... it looks the same. This is so close to us it's still freaking me out.

Now I am not one to throw out that, "God was looking out for me line..." because then it sounds like He wasn't looking out for any of those other people who are experiencing an insane loss in their life right now either losing family members or their homes and all they own. I do believe all things happen for a reason though, and we'll leave it at that. It could have been us. That's the real reality of it. But it wasn't, and I feel very humbled in that fact.

Since the storm... we emptied the fridge and freezer into the garbage, and headed south where there was family and electricity. The last couple days have been a really great bonding time for Russell and I as well. I cannot imagine going through that without him. He was absolutely there for me and the girls. He calmed us, prevented any panic, and made sure we felt secure. Drove to Florida until nearly 3 am in the morning... woke to make us breakfast Saturday morning.

Then he did something that maybe I shouldn't share... but made me feel... that warm sweet girlie feeling that I have thought was hopelessly locked up in my head somewhere and unachievable.... I was feeling dirty and grimy from the past two long days... very stressed out but relieved we were all together and safe.... once i was in the shower he washed and conditioned my hair  for me. He took his time, rinsed it thoroughly, running his fingers over and over again... the stress poured off of me... as I relaxed...  we spent Sunday checking in with friends and making sure all of our peeps in Alabama were doing ok... but we were also able to take a nice little walk and dig up some blackberry bushes to take home to our yard... Headed back to help our neighbors out, now that we won't be hindering them. Keep Alabama in your thoughts, cause you really never know when it will happen wherever you are standing.

The Road Less Traveled

Things seem to come and go so quickly. We move through our days in a rat race situation... alarm goes off, shower, dress, kids on bus, drive to the office, sit at desk, check work email, check facebook, focus on work, decide what is for lunch, go eat, come back, check work email, check facebook, focus on work, stare accusingly at the stubborn clock, get back in car, avoid the gym, pick up kids from school, listen to them argue on 5 minute car ride, make dinner, help with homework, do dishes, run to some sort of extra curricular activity, showers, crash.... REPEAT.

But on extraordinairy days, those days where the stars are aligned in different patterns, new things come into our sights. My experiences over the last several months have been a combination of typical rat race days mixed with excitement, terror, panic, anxiety, prayer, friendship, and love.

I have made new friends that I will no doubt have for the rest of my life. I have been learning that I am indeed a strong woman whose weaknesses do not make me less of a strong person, but in fact help add depth to my character.

Realizing these things have made me see that my NOTEBOOK analogies, may be a little far fetched... and not in the sense that I no longer believe that kind of love is real... but in a whole new aspect. There are people I could come in contact with for the rest of my days that I would bond to, have strong chemistry, endure trials and tribulations, love to explore the world next to, or have incredibly passionate sex with... but the reality is that I already picked someone to do those things with everyday.

Russell may not be my Noah... and I am okay with that... because... well he is my Russell. There were vows spoken that have bonded us to each other that in today's day and age seem to easily fall to the wayside. To put in the work and effort together to be bigger than today's NORM is worth it. I believe that people can change when they encounter situations that can cost them their entire world. My world was altered several months ago, his realization came later... but came.

Today is Easter Sunday, and I spent the weekend being completely open to the idea of our family being reconnected. It was quite difficult at first, I won't lie. I was jaded, sheltered, hiding... but the reality of it was I could only give him a real chance if I gave it 100 percent of me. Being open and honest, earned me 150 percent of him.

Choices to go left or right... they're complicated. Going one way or the other doesn't necessarily mean a choice between wrong or right. Both roads may lead to somewhere exotic and fantastic. Both roads may lead to even harder left and right choices... and once you take a road, you realize you will never be back to take the other path... but that's part of the journey. Set your course, allow room for some adjustments along the way, but in knowing yourself and letting God steer your direction is all the assurance you should need.

Today's Song...

A Tale from a Jeanna Past

Whenever my heart is heavy and my pen is empty I pick up journals from times gone by in my life. Journals from days when I used to actually write for hours on end, and keep dozens of blank beautiful journals on hand for my ramblings. Today I read through the journal I kept when I was pregnant with Hailey (my 10 year old daughter...my oldest).

I was 19 when I was pregnant with her, and it was quite a trying time for me. Funny.... as I look back... some of my writing remains the same today as it was then, and some of my writing then shows my naive youth in all it's glory.

May 21, 2000
Dreams are plaguing me these days. Dreams of being alone for the rest of my life. Waking up and not recognizing anything around me...not my furniture, people, the house. No one can understand me, we aren't speaking the same language. They all look away from me when I speak. Then I dream that I am awakened, the man sleeping beside me is there to comfort me. The moonlight pours through an open window, and in the distance I hear a train. Then I hear a child screaming.... faintly. The clock reads 1:15am I listen as closely as I can, I hear the child again. I shake my husband, he rolls over. I shake him harder, tears building in my eyes. he wakes. Did you hear that? No.... he listens... he hears nothing... he closes the window and tells me it was a dream.
The tears fall as he drifts back to sleep. I wonder if I am ok. Is that child ok... or is it surrounded by a bunch of closed windows and broken dreams? Will all it's hopes be pinned on dreams? Will someone ever realize for the screaming child that a dream will only let your mind free through an open window.


August 7, 2000
Today I dreamed the dream of many, life of few, future for some, desire for all. I dreamt of a happiness nearly unexplainable. I went outside and sat on the grass barefoot...just to feel it between my toes. I ran my fingers through the fresh cut blades and took a deep breath just to smell life. It smelled clean, fresh, and anxiously delicious.


There is power in your vision and wisdom in your words....Good night world.  Check it.

The Honey Do...Due?

One of the unique perks/downfalls of moving is leaving old neighbors and meeting new ones. Where my new house sits, I really only technically have one neighbor. We'll call him Bob. Bob is a very friendly Asian/American man near.... 60ish...? (Give or take a few years). He is retired military.

Every weekend since I have moved in, as I am unpacking, I see Bob diligently working in his yard, washing his cars, putting in sprinklers, carrying in boxes of tile, adding Bonsai bushes... you name it. His yard is beautiful. His grass was even green in January. I am positive he has white carpet and furniture in which my children even laying eyes on would cost me 10k in damages.

We speak casually every time I see him, and there is where my story lies.

His wife died a year and a half ago. They had been married for a long.....long.... time.

She loved their house very much. All of the work that he does to this house now, are things that she left for him on a Honey do list. Every weekend, he goes out and tends to flowers that she picked for their yard, he fluffs the pillows in the vibrant colors she wanted on the back patio, he walks her tea cup yappy dog.

Today, he was tiling a back splash in the kitchen. Again he tells me, "My wife left me a honey do list, and I'm slowly crossing things off for the last year and a half." I tell him that his yard looks beautiful, and he tells me, "It's exactly how she wanted it, her dream."

Thinking about it later, I am so extremely curious how their relationship was when she was here. Did he take the time to do the things on her lists when she was present? Or is this a guilt list? The romantic in me, says he was always doting on her, and in doing the things on her list still a year and a half later, he finds his way to be connected to her, in their home.

I want that. I'm due. I watch him from my kitchen window, as he cuts the grass and then waters the flowers. I know already he will work this way both Saturday and Sunday, and when I see him again, he will wave, and tell me about the Honey Do list. I find, I'm actually looking forward to the story. The reminder that love like that is real, is always nice to hear again and again.

Kinda makes me think silly little songs like this are for real people.... (yes I have an immature crush on this song)

Inspiration Comes When You Aren't Expecting It

It always seems to amaze me where I find inspiration. We planted our garden today. Today was one of those postcard perfect Sunday's as far as weather is concerned and it did the first day of Spring up just lovely. There is something strangely exciting about putting seeds in the ground that will turn into little sprouts, followed by plants, and eventually turn into fruits, vegetables, and spices. Watering the dark black dirt after all was planted, such a peace and hope spread over me for this little 6x12 piece of earth.

The symbolism of course as always began to rush over me, as I sat there this evening from the porch, staring out at my fresh turned soil. It is the beginning. Tomorrow a new day will dawn on this small garden, that was not there yesterday. With prayer, and work, and lots of love there will be fruit from the labor. Isn't it funny how God shows himself to us? 

My mother always had a garden when we were kids. I remember I used to catch her after a hard day of yard and garden work, out talking to the grass or a little plant. She spoke to them all, as if they had feelings and could speak back. I thought she was crazy. But as I pulled strawberry plants from cups today, I was careful of their little arms, and I spoke to them as I covered them in soil. I prayed for them, and a little bit for myself, and my ability to continue to grow, like the garden, towards the Sun. Direct sunlight it seems, is what brings forth the most fruit, and I find that truly inspiring.