Adding pictures on here drives me crazy. There has to be a much easier way to do it. I wonder if I add the pictures first and then write around them? Help me fellow bloggers, I need your guidance at this time!
I had a crazy week. This is the first time that I've felt calm enough to even get it into words. I have no doubt that it is thanks to my ward family and to the wonderful spirit present in Sacrament, Gospel Doctrine, and Relief Society on Sunday. Bro. and Sis Wentworth spoke of the blessings related to keeping the Sabbath holy and adhering to the word of wisdom. Owen was amazingly good....come to thing of it, ALL of my kids were amazingly good. Maybe they felt, as I did, the need for renewal. My friends were warm and supportive and always fill my cup rather than emptying it. They don't need anything from me, and still want me around. That sure is nice. :-) So now that I am in a better place, I want to get rid of all the "yuck" and move on.
I finally fell apart this week, got down, saw no light at the end of the tunnel, and cried my little amber-colored eyes out (as an aside, the amber eyes thing may possibly be explained in a later ex-boyfriend rant).
That almost never happens to me. In RS on Sunday we talked about looking at negative circumstances and finding the positive in them. That is TOTALLY me. I am the glass half full girl all the way. In fact, I drive Aaron INSANE with this trait. If we run out of gas? Thank goodness we have friends close by we can rescue us! If traffic slows us down or we are stuck by the train? I am sure there's a reason we are being delayed and our destination will still be there when we get there! I guess after all these months of waiting for something positive to come out of this situation we're in, my heart eventually broke.
My brand new car, MY CAR, my Hyundai that I got for my birthday last year, broke down. It worked fine all weekend....heck it worked fine all that DAY. We've taken immaculate care of it. The service records have been kept to a "t". Then out of nowhere! *poof* bogging, shaking....and then the check engine light popped up. I got my car home and just hoped and prayed that it was a mistake. I turned off the car, restarted it and the bogging and shaking just continued. The check engine light was STILL on. Not to be cliche but it was truly the straw that broke the camel's back. I called Aaron to tell him and I just lost it.
There was no positive in me in that moment. There was no silver lining. All there was was the memory of washing my car on Saturday, wiping it down and vaccuuming it and just praying to Heavenly Father and feeling sure that things would work out and I would be able to keep my car. I felt like if I really tried to keep my things nice that something good would happen and I would be able to keep my car (yes, I know this is bargaining, but I still did it). I spent most of the rest of the night in despair.
Happily, the negative did not cling. Being the white, bright, shiny half of the yin-yang that is my marriage, I spring back pretty easily. By the next morning I remembered that we spent the extra 1200 for the super extra coverage (which we did not need because the factory warranty ended up covering the repair). I finally had the presence of mind to ACT rather than be ACTED UPON. I called the warranty people, I called Hyundai, and I called AAA (my father, for the last 10 years, has included me in his deluxe silver blah blah membership and it is a life saver!) The only little black rain cloud that continued to follow me was the wonderful virus that loves to rear it's ugly little head (literally) when I am stressed. No insurance=$400 prescription. Yeah, no thanks. All hail Abreva and it's ability to make me shiny and new...
In the end, my friend Tim at the Hyundai dealer fixed me up. Bad ignition coil. All better now. I've finally accepted that my car will not be mine for much longer. I can finally see the positive in the whole mess because we were at least prepared for it. I have wonderful friends who go the extra mile to help me (literally, ask Melissa just how MANY extra miles it was). We had some other blessings come this week. Though it was painful, the Landcruiser was sold to a collector and I was able to get a beautiful new van (how much it is actually mine remains to be seen, and may be the subject of a later rant seeing as how I am not allowed to put anything remotely feminine on it...). I was happy to be able to spend lots of time with Melissa and Rosa-something I might not have been able to do if I'd been living my regular, comfy day to day.
I was so grateful for the lessons on Sunday. It was really one of those weeks when I felt that the messages were for me. From the trials of Zion's Camp to President Monson's encouragement to be of good cheer for the future is BRIGHT!
Sunday, July 26, 2009
Saturday, July 11, 2009
Saturday Night
Lousy Day. Lousy Week. Amazing how the few good things always get buried under the stinking, slimy, rotten garbage.
Tuesday, July 07, 2009
An Epiphany (may be a little PG-13)
I had an epiphany today while talking to my Bear (Sarah's nickname since she was wee) about love and boyfriends. I heard "Right Here, Right Now" by Jesus Jones on the radio and it took me back. I just knew the moment I said it that i'd have to get it down on (virtual) paper right away. What follows is a story of my youth and my first "real" boyfriend and the first guy who really broke my heart. As always feel free to skip it if it's not your cup o' tea. As a disclaimer, it may be a bit revealing in places, and most of this I did NOT share with my 15 year old... =)
I met Steve when I was 17, barely out of high school. My best friend, Tonya, was crushing on his best friend, Jason. Steve and Jason were "men", both in their 20's and they belonged to the "Seductive" truck club (which is how my bf had met them, she was dating some other truck club guy). Remember those early 90's truck clubs? Ridiculously low trucks you couldn't drive into a driveway without scraping, windows you couldn't see out of, Easter egg colored paint jobs, LOUD stereo systems with the mandatory bass boost button...Geesh. LOL. But I'm getting off track.
Steve was 21 or 22, if I remember correctly, and had married his high school sweetheart when she got pregnant. He had a three year old daughter named Amanda and was recently divorced. He was a carpenter by trade, and was working for a cabinet maker (the smell of wood still reminds me of him, weird how that happens huh?) He drove a burgundy Ford Ranger that was all tricked out and splattered with black paint graphics. He loved going 4x4ing in that thing and his truck club friends called him "Mr. Banzai". He loved Harley Davidsons (they still make me a little weak in the knees) and the Pacific Northwest, especially Tacoma (I always thought it was my love of Queensryche that made me start wanting to live there, but now that I think about it I was planning to live there and make a life with Steve way before I even got into them). He was not good looking. He was tall, and skinny, and pale, and freckled. He had bright blue eyes and curly (yes, curly) red hair. He occasionally wore those bright, obnoxious surfer pants with the elastic waist band. It is not sour grapes, I loved that goofy looking bastard with every fiber of my being.
I think the most significant thing about that relationship was that it was the first time a guy ever pursued me. I wasn't just picking up Tonya's leftovers for a change, or hooking up with a guy who would later tell his friends that he had been so drunk he thought he had been with someone else (as pathetic as it is, that had happened to me TWICE). The four of us had hung out quite a bit right after Tonya and I had graduated and then Steve went on vacation to WA. While he was gone Tonya told me he had asked her all about me and was totally interested, but I was only 17. While he was away, I turned 18. He wrote me a letter from WA-the first, and last, time a guy ever wrote me a letter. He basically said that he was having a blast, but that he missed hanging out with me and wanted to get together when he got back to Cali. Be still my heart, that did it for me and I could not WAIT for him to get home.
I wish I could remember our first kiss. After all that waiting, I am sure it was really something. There are so many other things I remember though. He actually took me out on dates. I know that may sound lame, but I had not really EVER been on an actual date in my life. I'd get dressed up, he'd pick me up, and we would go out. Unreal, right? I remember that we went and saw the 3-D Nightmare on Elm Street and Terminator 2 several times ha ha ha. We (ahem)parked....alot! It was the first time in my life I had ever experienced anything like that...being with a guy who wanted to be with me and not feeling used. My gosh I was so in love with him. And I loved everything about being in love. I pictured us moving to Washington together, raising his little daughter together. But I was only 18...I was supposed to be fun for him, not another potential wife, and definitely not in the running for stepmom. It helped not at all that my mother could not stand him. She said I should not trust a guy who would not come over until after he was sure she was in bed or who expected me to wait up all night just in case he decided to show up.
After a month or so, he started realizing that I was far more into him and the "relationship" than he was and said that we should take it slower. I wasn't having that. I may have been a chubby girl with low self-esteem but I worked every angle I could to keep that boy hooked and coming back. I was so blind that I was in denial about him having this whole other life away from me-work, his ex, his daughter, other friends...he broke up with me in the fall and I still wouldn't give up. We had decided to still be friends and I got invited to his birthday party. I showed up looking fierce and pretty much told him that I was his, no strings attached, whenever he wanted. This was quite a few years before the phrase "booty call" entered the vernacular. Yet there I was, so desperate to be near him that I was willing to sacrifice my own feelings. Of course he took advantage of that, what guy wouldn't?
So that whole fall I went to school (community college) and I lived in denial, and he strung me along, but I saw less and less of him. As much as I remember of him-the smell of his detergent, the feeling of being in the cab of his truck parked in the desert late at night, listening to Jesus Jones, Marky Mark and Warrant, I most vividly remember the day he broke up with me...for good. See, while I was pretending it was okay to be with him, he was falling in love with someone else. A girl he had graduated with, someone he had known for years, someone his own age.
I think her name was Shonna, or Shawna, or whatever. I had never even heard her name before that day. He and I were hanging out in my bedroom (okay it was a little more TV-MA than just hanging out) and Tonya showed up at my place. Having been interrupted, Steve decided to take off and she whispered to me "just watch yourself, there's something going on you don't know about". I had no idea what she even meant, I mean after all, I was quite happy in my little la la land, thinking he'd eventually come around and decide he loved me. Later that evening he called me and we were talking about how we'd been interrupted and I invited him back over. He said he didn't think it would be a good idea. Out of nowhere he starts talking about how he had spent the rest of the day with this girl, Shawna, and how awesome she was and how she was coaching the girl's flag team at their old high school and blah blah blah. I am not sure at what point I figured out that he was ending it, but once I hung up that phone, I knew that he had moved on and that it was over...
I stayed friends with Jason though and he eventually fell for my beautiful cousin Yvette so we actually hung out a lot. He and Tonya had never really worked out... I heard alot about Steve second hand from Jason. The worst thing was when he told me that Steve and Shawna were going to be married. I don't think I had ever cried so hard in my life. You know that part of New Moon, when Bella describes the hole in her chest? How it festered and ached and burned around the edges? The reason I cry every time I read that part is because of this memory. I felt sorrow to the very depths of my 18 year old soul. I remember laying on my mother's bed, sobbing, and realizing that he HAD wanted to be married, he just didn't want to be married to ME. I was really destroyed. I don't think I honestly, truly, loved anyone like that again until I met Aaron-and by then I was a totally different person.
So what I realized was that there was nothing wrong with him wanting to move on and get married or even wanting just to be with a woman his own age. I was only 18 for pete's sake and barely that! He had a kid and a job and a million responsibilities. Would I not have been just another person to take care of? I completely lost myself in him and relied on him totally and that must have really been frightening to him. So I have come to a place in my life where I have been able to accept that though Steve truly broke my heart, I gave him my heart to break. I was just as responsible for it if not more because I gave him everything. So from the bottom of my once broken heart, I forgive Steve and will try to only remember the fun times we had and those nights when he looked at me like I was the only person in the room and stayed up all night talking to me. I am the person I am today because of my experiences and I wouldn't want to give them up.
If I could go back I would only wish that I had had an understanding of my value as a daughter of God. I hope that with that knowledge I would have made better choices for myself...been stronger and expected better. I hope that the knowledge I've gained from these experiences will help me to advise my own children when the time comes. If you've stayed with this rant this long I truly appreciate it! Hope my bit of cathartic blogging has inspired or entertained you in some way!
I met Steve when I was 17, barely out of high school. My best friend, Tonya, was crushing on his best friend, Jason. Steve and Jason were "men", both in their 20's and they belonged to the "Seductive" truck club (which is how my bf had met them, she was dating some other truck club guy). Remember those early 90's truck clubs? Ridiculously low trucks you couldn't drive into a driveway without scraping, windows you couldn't see out of, Easter egg colored paint jobs, LOUD stereo systems with the mandatory bass boost button...Geesh. LOL. But I'm getting off track.
Steve was 21 or 22, if I remember correctly, and had married his high school sweetheart when she got pregnant. He had a three year old daughter named Amanda and was recently divorced. He was a carpenter by trade, and was working for a cabinet maker (the smell of wood still reminds me of him, weird how that happens huh?) He drove a burgundy Ford Ranger that was all tricked out and splattered with black paint graphics. He loved going 4x4ing in that thing and his truck club friends called him "Mr. Banzai". He loved Harley Davidsons (they still make me a little weak in the knees) and the Pacific Northwest, especially Tacoma (I always thought it was my love of Queensryche that made me start wanting to live there, but now that I think about it I was planning to live there and make a life with Steve way before I even got into them). He was not good looking. He was tall, and skinny, and pale, and freckled. He had bright blue eyes and curly (yes, curly) red hair. He occasionally wore those bright, obnoxious surfer pants with the elastic waist band. It is not sour grapes, I loved that goofy looking bastard with every fiber of my being.
I think the most significant thing about that relationship was that it was the first time a guy ever pursued me. I wasn't just picking up Tonya's leftovers for a change, or hooking up with a guy who would later tell his friends that he had been so drunk he thought he had been with someone else (as pathetic as it is, that had happened to me TWICE). The four of us had hung out quite a bit right after Tonya and I had graduated and then Steve went on vacation to WA. While he was gone Tonya told me he had asked her all about me and was totally interested, but I was only 17. While he was away, I turned 18. He wrote me a letter from WA-the first, and last, time a guy ever wrote me a letter. He basically said that he was having a blast, but that he missed hanging out with me and wanted to get together when he got back to Cali. Be still my heart, that did it for me and I could not WAIT for him to get home.
I wish I could remember our first kiss. After all that waiting, I am sure it was really something. There are so many other things I remember though. He actually took me out on dates. I know that may sound lame, but I had not really EVER been on an actual date in my life. I'd get dressed up, he'd pick me up, and we would go out. Unreal, right? I remember that we went and saw the 3-D Nightmare on Elm Street and Terminator 2 several times ha ha ha. We (ahem)parked....alot! It was the first time in my life I had ever experienced anything like that...being with a guy who wanted to be with me and not feeling used. My gosh I was so in love with him. And I loved everything about being in love. I pictured us moving to Washington together, raising his little daughter together. But I was only 18...I was supposed to be fun for him, not another potential wife, and definitely not in the running for stepmom. It helped not at all that my mother could not stand him. She said I should not trust a guy who would not come over until after he was sure she was in bed or who expected me to wait up all night just in case he decided to show up.
After a month or so, he started realizing that I was far more into him and the "relationship" than he was and said that we should take it slower. I wasn't having that. I may have been a chubby girl with low self-esteem but I worked every angle I could to keep that boy hooked and coming back. I was so blind that I was in denial about him having this whole other life away from me-work, his ex, his daughter, other friends...he broke up with me in the fall and I still wouldn't give up. We had decided to still be friends and I got invited to his birthday party. I showed up looking fierce and pretty much told him that I was his, no strings attached, whenever he wanted. This was quite a few years before the phrase "booty call" entered the vernacular. Yet there I was, so desperate to be near him that I was willing to sacrifice my own feelings. Of course he took advantage of that, what guy wouldn't?
So that whole fall I went to school (community college) and I lived in denial, and he strung me along, but I saw less and less of him. As much as I remember of him-the smell of his detergent, the feeling of being in the cab of his truck parked in the desert late at night, listening to Jesus Jones, Marky Mark and Warrant, I most vividly remember the day he broke up with me...for good. See, while I was pretending it was okay to be with him, he was falling in love with someone else. A girl he had graduated with, someone he had known for years, someone his own age.
I think her name was Shonna, or Shawna, or whatever. I had never even heard her name before that day. He and I were hanging out in my bedroom (okay it was a little more TV-MA than just hanging out) and Tonya showed up at my place. Having been interrupted, Steve decided to take off and she whispered to me "just watch yourself, there's something going on you don't know about". I had no idea what she even meant, I mean after all, I was quite happy in my little la la land, thinking he'd eventually come around and decide he loved me. Later that evening he called me and we were talking about how we'd been interrupted and I invited him back over. He said he didn't think it would be a good idea. Out of nowhere he starts talking about how he had spent the rest of the day with this girl, Shawna, and how awesome she was and how she was coaching the girl's flag team at their old high school and blah blah blah. I am not sure at what point I figured out that he was ending it, but once I hung up that phone, I knew that he had moved on and that it was over...
I stayed friends with Jason though and he eventually fell for my beautiful cousin Yvette so we actually hung out a lot. He and Tonya had never really worked out... I heard alot about Steve second hand from Jason. The worst thing was when he told me that Steve and Shawna were going to be married. I don't think I had ever cried so hard in my life. You know that part of New Moon, when Bella describes the hole in her chest? How it festered and ached and burned around the edges? The reason I cry every time I read that part is because of this memory. I felt sorrow to the very depths of my 18 year old soul. I remember laying on my mother's bed, sobbing, and realizing that he HAD wanted to be married, he just didn't want to be married to ME. I was really destroyed. I don't think I honestly, truly, loved anyone like that again until I met Aaron-and by then I was a totally different person.
So what I realized was that there was nothing wrong with him wanting to move on and get married or even wanting just to be with a woman his own age. I was only 18 for pete's sake and barely that! He had a kid and a job and a million responsibilities. Would I not have been just another person to take care of? I completely lost myself in him and relied on him totally and that must have really been frightening to him. So I have come to a place in my life where I have been able to accept that though Steve truly broke my heart, I gave him my heart to break. I was just as responsible for it if not more because I gave him everything. So from the bottom of my once broken heart, I forgive Steve and will try to only remember the fun times we had and those nights when he looked at me like I was the only person in the room and stayed up all night talking to me. I am the person I am today because of my experiences and I wouldn't want to give them up.
If I could go back I would only wish that I had had an understanding of my value as a daughter of God. I hope that with that knowledge I would have made better choices for myself...been stronger and expected better. I hope that the knowledge I've gained from these experiences will help me to advise my own children when the time comes. If you've stayed with this rant this long I truly appreciate it! Hope my bit of cathartic blogging has inspired or entertained you in some way!
Saturday, July 04, 2009
Saturday Night-A Rant
I HATE staying in on Saturday night. I am bored to death right now. Oh yes, there are a hundred chores that could be done-dozens of shelves that need straightened, drawers to be organized, PILES of laundry to be done. But I ask you, isn't that what the whole week is for? In my case, anyway? Since I took leave from school I have tons of extra time to spend with my family. I tell you, it's awesome! But right now...I could honestly pull my hair out. I really wanted to get my date night this week and the frustration comes from there being NO reason not to go...hmpf.
My husband hates crowds. 4th of July=crowds. It seems like we also only ever go to movies anymore. I love movies. I could go to a movie every day. Counting the free movie in Brighton on Weds. and the Ice Age matinee this morning I could almost pull it off! I don't think that he's up for that though...which means unless I can come up with something fabulous that's not too expensive and not too far away that is NOT a movie, I am stuck here. With my kids looking at me...and my husband getting more and more frustrated that we live in the boonies with nothing to do.
I don't typically get bored easily, I can usually find peace in whatever I am doing. Get into a good book, watch a great movie, etc. This cabin fever usually comes as a reaction to the behavior of my beloved companion who LIVES bored. Of course this is the same person, when overscheduled, complains there is never enough time to relax. Whether this is true or if it is an indication of something deeper (perhaps an inability to EVER be satisfied)remains a mystery. I also understand, that at this point in time, he is dealing with some pretty major issues related to work so I am trying not to complain. Okay, let's be honest I am trying not to complain OUT LOUD. =) It's not like the boredom is a new thing. I've been with the man 14 years, it's been pretty persistent...job or no. None of this solves the problem that it's only 7pm, everyone's clean, video game and computer time is tapped out, and I spent most of the day making sure everyone else was entertained. SOMEONE ENTERTAIN ME FOR PETE'S SAKE!
My husband hates crowds. 4th of July=crowds. It seems like we also only ever go to movies anymore. I love movies. I could go to a movie every day. Counting the free movie in Brighton on Weds. and the Ice Age matinee this morning I could almost pull it off! I don't think that he's up for that though...which means unless I can come up with something fabulous that's not too expensive and not too far away that is NOT a movie, I am stuck here. With my kids looking at me...and my husband getting more and more frustrated that we live in the boonies with nothing to do.
I don't typically get bored easily, I can usually find peace in whatever I am doing. Get into a good book, watch a great movie, etc. This cabin fever usually comes as a reaction to the behavior of my beloved companion who LIVES bored. Of course this is the same person, when overscheduled, complains there is never enough time to relax. Whether this is true or if it is an indication of something deeper (perhaps an inability to EVER be satisfied)remains a mystery. I also understand, that at this point in time, he is dealing with some pretty major issues related to work so I am trying not to complain. Okay, let's be honest I am trying not to complain OUT LOUD. =) It's not like the boredom is a new thing. I've been with the man 14 years, it's been pretty persistent...job or no. None of this solves the problem that it's only 7pm, everyone's clean, video game and computer time is tapped out, and I spent most of the day making sure everyone else was entertained. SOMEONE ENTERTAIN ME FOR PETE'S SAKE!
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