Just a Blip

This is my dog, Jack. Some breaking news about him at the end of this post. Keep Reading!

I was driving home last night and thinking about what makes me feel so connected to certain blogs and not so much to others. I guess this would be different for everyone but for me it is variety. I love a blog where sometimes I see what someone made for dinner, where they went for the day, something funny, something inspirational, a story about how they met their husband or how they decorated their child's bedroom. I like it when I feel like I really know this person and could meet up with them at the local cafe' and chat away like old friends. That is how I want people to feel about my blog and sometimes I'm not sure what my 'style' is. I am often shocked when I visit Google Analytics and see that people actually read my blog everyday. I feel insecure sometimes like what in the world do I really have to say that could be of any interest and what is the real purpose of a blog. I love to write but when I feel the pressure of it I sometimes stop liking it so much. When I write because I just need to get the thoughts and words out of my brain it feels really good. Of course my blog is for me in that way but the fact that it is not a journal on my nightstand makes me ask: What is the purpose of making my life so public. This then leads me back to the blogs of others and why I like them. What makes me return there day after day? This is what I realized: I like to know there are other woman that love what I love. I love that they live all over the country/world because it makes the world feel smaller and more connected. I like to know that others struggle and rejoice over the same things that I do. I love to see how each person puts their personal stamp on their blog and their life. Blogs make me feel less alone so that made me see that if my blog makes anyone feel less alone, makes them laugh, makes them think, inspires them to redecorate their bathroom or go so far as to adopt a child because they are moved by Lilly's story then it is worth spilling my guts on any topic that compells me a few times each week.

Here is what felt compelling to me last night. Making a list. A list of random facts about me and my life at this current moment.
* 3 out of my six family members have puked in the last 24 hours. Multiple times. *Edit: make that 4 out of 6
* My father makes me so sad with his lack of joy for simply being alive
* I am learning a lot about boundaries...where I can step away knowing I have done all that I can but still staying loving and compassionate. I find it is a fine art to balance things that feel opposite. Detached but connected.
* I can see the light at the end of the tunnel after 3 years of a financial crisis. I am not actually at the light and sometimes I still lay awake wondering how to keep my chin up just one more day. Then I look at my kids.
* Sometimes I wonder who I will be after this financial storm is over. I love to pay my bills and I love to pay them early. It has been very humbling to not be able to meet all of my obligations. It has made my husband consider suicide.
* It has threatened our marriage and our sanity
* I miss my Uncle Dick every single day. I can't believe he is gone and have to remind myself of this everytime I see his picture on the table by my couch. I can still hear his laugh like he is sitting right here reading over my shoulder.
* I had to borrow money (a lot) from people that I did not want to borrow it from. If you would have asked me prior to that moment I would have told you it was the last thing in the world I ever wanted to do. I did it for my kids.
* It makes me feel like my life will be under a microscope forever and even getting a pizza or seeing a movie will make me feel guilty.
* An opportunity to follow a life long dream has presented itself and of course the one thing I need I don't have...MONEY....so I find myself having to approach these people with an alternate solution. I have no idea what they will say and when I think about going to talk to them I feel really nervous. Nervous that they will say yes and nervous that they will say no. And knowing my life will really change if they say yes.
* I feel disonnected from my body a lot lately but the minute I go for a walk in nature I feel 'plugged in' again
* I miss Arizona. A LOT. Every.  Single.  Day.
* I feel such gratitude for my friends and family
* I want to turn the heat up right now but I don't feel like getting up from the couch.
* I love how I feel when I eat the Vegan diet. I find it hard to eat that way with three male meat eaters living in the same house. Eating animals sometimes tastes good to me but always makes me feel sad. Sometimes I wish I wasn't so 'awake'.
* I love summertime. Winter, not so much.
* I went to a memorial service the other day and realized that our life is just a blip on the radar screen of life. We can make it extraordinary but we don't have to. God gives us the raw material the rest is totally up to us.
* I hate sweet potatoes.
* I love to travel.
* I want to adopt more children. This time from Ethiopia. Haiti would be a possibility if that door opened up for us. My husband wants to adopt too. He is worried what his family will think. That doesn't even cross my mind. It's not the money he is worried about, it is the skin color. That makes me sad. And mad.  *Just to clarify: it is not him that is worried about race/skin color, he is worried what others will think. I think: WHO CARES WHAT THEY THINK??? I am ebarrassed to be that close to ignorance and racism.
* I did a fundraiser to raise money for us and for others who are in the process of an adoption. I think there are some who might see me as crazy or unrealistic. They don't understand. They don't feel with my heart or think with my mind. That's fine with me. I am willing to look crazy for the sake of orphaned children. I don't lose a wink of sleep over that one.
* I have always have more laundry then I want to.
* I can't believe people expect the President to undo 8 years of a mess in 1 year.
* Haiti breaks my heart multiple times each day.
* Sometimes I think I could just drive away from everything I have ever known, taking my husband, my kids and my pets and letting the rest go and starting a while new life somewhere else.
* This list is getting kind of long.

So that's it for now. I just felt like putting the real me out there in blog land. It was fun to just write without any real censor or trying to make the different thoughts all connect. It was also freeing to not really know who is really reading this and what they might think about what I say. Turning 40 has been very liberating. I care about others more but care about what they think much less. Love that.

Remeber the breaking news about Jack the Dog??? Here it is: The most pressing thing I have to do today is renew Jack's dog license. I got a notice in the mail that they would issue a warrant if he wasn't licensed. A license to be a dog??? Are you Kidding? Really? Seriously? Welcome to my life folks.

Would you go to jail for this face?

So...what are you doing with your blip on the radar screen of life? Is it what you want to be doing? Tell me what it is you really, really, really want. I really, really, really want to know. Really.