Dream,Hope and choosing JOY

How quickly things can change, literally in an instant.

I was sitting in the woods today absolutely fuming at something that I'm sure will have escaped my memory in the coming months and I began to look over my life- but more specifically the past year. So much has happened and I have been put through so much that I can hardly believe that I am still sane.Maybe my sanity is still in question, who knows?

I have spent the past 12 months devastated at losing my best friend to mistrust and lies, feeling completely worthless as a woman and a failure at being the rock of a mother my children need, fighting panic attacks at the frightening realization that for the first time in my life I must be a sole provider/teacher/friend/entertainer/comfort and confidant to these 4 precious souls; I have fallen in love again and stupidly allowed another flesh and blood man to gain my fragile and tattered trust, realized that even though we are all different and unique we are also all ironically the same;I have cried,laughed,raged,questioned,feared,worried,prayed ,given up and continued on. 
I have felt defeated and crushed but at the same time allowed myself to hope and dream.
I dream that my love of writing ends up slowly creating a ripple effect that happens to touch hundreds, or maybe even thousands of lives for the better. 
I dream that my little hobby of photography somehow earns me enough money to purchase a real professional camera, and the pictures of the ordinary things in life invoke such a sense of beauty and emotion in people that I end up becoming a well known and sought after photographer.
I dream of somehow managing to save up enough money to put 20% down on this beautifully modest home here in West Virginia- the one that I found online today  that sits on a 10½ acre piece of land that boasts a barn and 3 separate storage buildings; I dream of my children playing tag and hide and seek among the tall grass and only their shrieks and giggles at being found can be heard over the crickets chirping and bullfrogs groaning.
 I dream that they grow up unscathed and almost better now then they would have been had everything remained the same. Although there are moments where I seem delusional, even to myself, I continue to allow myself to dream. Why couldn't it happen? Why couldn't miracle after miracle happen for me and my little family? Why couldn't it all work out and I finally get my life's happy ending? Isn't that, afterall, what Hope does?
The night that I started this particular blog, I knew in my heart- that even as tears flowed freely and scowls of resentment twisted across my face subconsciously while I typed away- even then I knew that I wanted this blog to be more than a place where I rant and rave and cry. My writings have never meant to be just about me, but rater to use me and my life's moments for the betterment of others. The Heart of Ruth was all about that, and even though it never became this mega-blog with throngs of eager followers, I consider it my greatest literary success. Now I want to try and continue that legacy that I started, even as I go through this new chapter in my life. I want to do my best to use my fears and failures to bring Hope and the ability to continue to Dream big to those who feel they shouldn't or can't allow themselves the privilege of doing so for themselves. The remaining 3 remain for a reason, and I intend on choosing JOY. Maybe not always immediately or easily, but rather eventually. Even if I never get to live my dreams, at least I tried to be JOYful while pursuing them.

Stupid Cupid

I have officially come to the decision that I am a complete and utter idiot. Either that or I am a magnet for pain.

Ever since I was a little girl, holidays have been an intricate and anxiously awaited part of my life. Every year, my my grandmother would have me or my grandfather climb up into the attic with all it's distant memories and familiar smells to retrieve a box for the upcoming holiday. Easter had painted egg wall hangings and obnoxiously colored wicker baskets with leftover plastic grass; Christmas gave way to the giant plastic manager scene and a cardboard fireplace from the 70's that was riddled with thumbtack holes from "hanging the stockings gently with care" for decades. 

And then there was Valentine's Day.

Red,white and pink overtook the house for a week before til the day after. Hearts and lace and Victorian Scripted "I love you"'s everywhere. My grandfather would proudly have flowers delivered to our house for my Nan and waiting for the florist van to pull up for her was as exciting as waiting for Christmas Eve to give birth to early Christmas morning. Every year she acted as surprised and thankful as she probably genuinely was the first time he did it for her. My grandparents set the stage for how I was to view holidays for the rest of my life.

Which is why I blame them entirely for my yearly heartache and disappointments in these stupid time honored celebration of certain days. I grew into womanhood with the expectation woven throughout my being that someday there would be my loving husband, on Christmas and my birthday and Valentine's Day, our anniversary and Mother's Day, dutifully hearing my wishes and desires throughout the year and lovingly allowing me to cross each and every one off my mental list over time. To me, the love of a man towards his wife was more than just providing a shelter and utilities for his family, it was going the extra mile to do things he didn't necessarily want to do or enjoy because in the end, her smile and her feeling valued above all other women( if even for a moment during a holiday) was reflected in his smile and it bonded them together. Well, I got news for you. 
It's all hooey.
This is what I've learned of holidays and their correlation to love since 1999.

1. No man innately wants to do romantic things for his woman.It is purely a ruse- a type of primal hunting,if you will-  to shoot down the female of his choosing so he can drag her off and say he was man enough to get her. He was just that good-that romantic- that she couldn't help herself. Ladies, once he has you...it's over. Your romantic dreams will now have to be scaled down tremendously from once dreaming of candlelit dinners and hotel getaways to settling for lukewarm meals you coked and compromising on a movie/tv program that you don't mind and he loves.
2. "Just Because" gifts exist just because you watched a stupid romance comedy and some underpaid script writer gave the heroine in the film that moment that she didn't actually deserve, and now you in real life are hooked on having that same moment, sans script writer. Good luck with that.
3. Holidays are rooted in evil. No matter how you spin it, when you break down the word you get "holy" and "days". I fully believe that you are responsible for what you know and so now, thanks to this new-found knowledge, there is a whole lot of guilt and inner turmoil for me. I was reared in the joys of celebrating holidays and now I discover that it was all wrong. I have learned that as a Christian there are 7 Holidays in the Bible that God only ever mentioned to be celebrated and observed, none of which include a tree or wall hangings or gift giving. In case you were curious these holidays are :

• Passover
•  First and Last Day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread
• The Day of Pentecost
• The Feast of Trumpets
•   The Day of Atonement
• The Feast of Tabernacles (The Feast of Booths)
• The Great Last Day

I never EVER want to downplay or ignore the importance of celebrating the days that I as a Christian am even allowed/expected to keep observed.But how am I supposed to do that so easily when I wasn't taught this and in fact was taught completely backwards?And on top of that, I am now rearing my children the same way, but confusing the heck out of them because of my new knowledge and being torn between what I know to be right and the things I was taught to hold dear. So thank you Pop,Nan and Mom...for instilling in me a love of generational misinformation and supposedly evil doing.

Look, this little corner of the electrical universe was never meant to just be a daily or close to daily tirade about woe is me and how miserable am I. Truth be told, I do actually have good days. I do laugh-believe it or not I have a pretty intense belly laugh that has caused quite a few headaches. I find beauty in things around, hence the photography page on here that I'm working on. It's just that i also have had an awful lot of really bad and painful things to go through in my life., and when it gets to the point where you have a hard time remembering the days with a smile because the bad days outnumber them or you miss them so much you wanna cry, you need to vent somewhere. Since I have no "right there in front of me" tangible friends that I cry with or on, I blog. I used to be such an encourager and I've always been a great listener. But now, now it's my season for needing to be listened to and needing an encourager. I'm in a lot of pain. I get angry and frustrated at my life and how it twists and turns, and rarely in my favor anymore. I'm angry that there seems to be no end in sight to all the pain and bad and that the people I love around me are going through their own pain and bad and I can't ease it or make it stop.
     This blog was meant to be a safe place to vent and to find the 3 things that remain...Faith,Hope and Love....because they are the only 3 that ever do. Even when your faith feels like it's gone, you know it isn't if you are able to keep hoping and finding away to open your eyes and get out of bed. Heck, there have been days where my act of faith was to open my swollen tear filled eyes in the morning and just stare. It was like my hearts little act of defiance against just wanting to be dead. Faith and hope shall always remain. Love, well the world's idea of love comes and goes. But true Love always remains, never changes, and will always always continue.....because God is Love.
Hey, i actually ended on a good note!

Nothing, I'm just Tired

 One of the most painful parts of going through circumstances like mine is the remembrance of when things were better- days when there was laughter, nights filled with snuggling and feeling loved and needed....like the one who laid beside me could never function an hour without my love and affection.I felt so loved, I felt so valued and treasured. Going to bed angry was absurd.

Now, the reason I say that the remembrance of these things are so painful, aren't just because I don't feel these anymore- but because I can distinctly remember the night I realized that these memories were all false. I was kneeling on the floor in the dark at the foot of my bed; my whole world had just crumbled around me an hour prior and my destroyer lay snoring peacefully in bed, having unloaded years and years worth of secrets and guilt on me out of nowhere. Every good feeling and every moment of  Wow, I'm am the luckiest woman alive was based on something that never existed. I had been in love with a lie that had masqueraded as reality from the very beginning.That's what hurts the most.

I can remember being looked at in intimate moments with so much desire, never realizing at that moment I was not the one that was being seen. Fights never happened and angry bedtimes didn't exist because I held my tongue so hard some nights I could almost taste blood. Simple requests were overlooked or forgotten and I carried on, sometimes feeling unimportant and when I finally demanded things that others receive so freely, they still were not meant to be and I would just shake my head and sigh it away. As long as I didn't complain too much or rock the boat, we were a happy family. The children could laugh and feel secure and memories could be made.

Now it's my time to be "selfish". Right here, at 2am...I make no apologies and I just don't care. Right now, I don't care what anyone thinks, how they take what I am about to write....I will worry about that tomorrow.Or maybe the next day.So here it goes.....

I have had it. 

I am broken and I am tired and I have had it. I am a freaking human being. I get just as tired as the next person and I demand the same respect and rest time and help as anybody in my situation would. I am sick of being the only to do laundry and organize piles of clothing that are sky high. I am fed up with being the only one who can replace an empty toilet paper roll for everyone else's convenience but there is never one there for me. I am tired of cooking meals for people who are unappreciative and nit pick it apart from the way it looks to the way they "know" it tastes without ever even trying it. I am sick of everyone boo hooing about their lack of comfort when their level of comfort is something I crave. To wake and sit in front of a video game or computer or TV with my eyes glazing over....to have a hot plate of breakfast and a cold cup of coffee is something I have to wait for a holiday for to enjoy. To just decide, Eh-I don't see those toys strewn about or the spill on the table or the muddy paw prints tracked through the house. I'm gonna lock myself in my room, drop the curtain and let someone else deal with it- for me would be lunacy but for other's it's called Monday-Sunday.

I have had it.

I have been robbed of time. And dignity. And respect. I have to lend an ear and endure long conversations about others' woes and  insignificant hardships and heartaches while the very fabric of my sanity somedays is barely a thread's worth. I have to pull pieces of myself apart like string cheese to this one and be a loving daughter, and these 4 to be a strong and capable mother, and this one to be a true and loyal friend and this one to be a patient and knowledgeable teacher, and this one to be a good-natured and sweet....whatever the heck I am, and this One to be a pure and blemish free servant.

 I CAN'T DO IT!!!!!!

Ya wanna know what I want? I want to wake up every morning in someone's arms and hear Good Morning my Love and get sweet kisses. I want equal distribution of housework, and not it all put on me, along with educating the children, and making and cleaning up the meals, and cleaning up every mess I see, and raising the children alone and breaking up fights and disagreements and remembering what bill is due when and staying up til 4am trying to make finances balance and appease demanding debtors, and getting up to the minute reports on which- kid- did- what- thing- you- don't- like on top of texts starting out with "If you're not busy" or "Could you do me a favor?"....

When the Hades am I not busy?!

I want what every girl wants and deserves. I want compliments and lots of them. I've been stress eating and I'm too poor to go to the gym and I wanna know that I'm still beautiful to someone other than my 3year old. I want gifts- and not just scribbled drawings and yarn necklaces. (Do you know I lost a yarn necklace tonight? It was made by 7 year old daughter for me for Valentine's Day, because even she knows I never get anything on that day. She gave it to me early a few days ago to cheer me up because I had been crying about something. And do you know I bawled when I couldn't find it? What 30 something woman goes sobbing hysterically to a 7 year old to ask for forgiveness for losing a pink yarn necklace?? ME! While her father stood there asking what's the big deal? You're acting like some died, right there in front of of her!!  Really?!

I don't care if holidays are pagan or commercialized or whatever the new reason is I have to get used to killing the natural excitement and anticipation of days where every other woman is spoiled....if it's on the calender and I grew up celebrating it, I want it to continue. A freaking handwritten note. A stolen flower from a wild hedge by my pillow. A $5 necklace that I can treat like a string of diamonds. Yes, i sound like a spoiled brat and like I said at the beginning- I don't care. Anyone who comes into my life is going to have exes that will have experienced and received things I never have and never will.That's not fair. Anyone who comes into my ex's life will get to experience and receive things I didn't.That's not fair. I will always either have arrived too late or have been the lesson learned from, but never the one babied.

I have spent my ENTIRE life caring and worrying about others' feelings, and what are they going to think and what are they going to say. The devil with my feelings and what I may say. No one replays their words in their heads for my comfort level, so screw it. Like the saying goes, If people can't handle me at my worst, they don't deserve me at my best. I can say with full confidence there is not one person under my roof who is hurting as much or is as scared or screwed or uncomfortable or jipped or robbed or broken or angry or whatever as me. I based my whole future, my happiness, my trust, my sanity, my security and my strength on something that NEVER EXISTED. Take everything you have been taught and known to be true...your very foundation and discover it was all a lie and then try giving your all and function properly and that's where I am. And you know what? I think all things considered, I'm doing a d@!* good job.

So, tirade over. GASP! I'm human. Welcome to a sliver of what goes on in my head when I'm not speaking. So just remember people, the next time you ask a woman, "What's wrong?" -you better actually care and be willing to hear it all....You may have no idea what's behind her casual,Nothing. I'm just tired.