Looking back to begin looking forward

This year has so far been a year for reconnecting, re-evaluating, forgiving, and beginning again. The year started well, one of my sisters just had a baby girl in Dec 2006, and my other sister is pregnant with a girl now. I have reconnected with friends I thought I would never hear from again, and learned they missed me just as much as I've missed them. My husband and I have decided to start trying for another child this coming August now that he has his bachelors degree. I finally know the career path I want to spend my life following, and will hopefully be able to start college to pursue that goal.

I'm learning to find the strength to forgive others, and put the pain of betrayals, and perceived betrayals, behind me. I'm learning that I sometimes judge too harshly the actions of others, and myself not harshly enough. I'm learning that love doesn't have to come with labels, demands, limits, or justifications.

I'm learning that for the first time in my life I like who I am, and the person I'm becoming. I'm learning how to push myself past the anxiety in my life, so I can live my life. I'm learning to laugh again, learning to let go and to have fun. I'm learning to demand better, from myself and from others. I'm learning not to let others walk all over me in the name of love. I'm learning that love is not synonymous with pain, even though they sometimes come together.

Slowly but surely I climb, each day another rung on the ladder leading out of the past and into a better future.

Where I've been

It is on days like today, when my eyes are turned inward on who I've become, where my life is, and where I've been that I feel grateful for all the experiences, both good and bad, that I've had. Many are the times I have weathered the storms in my life simply on the faith that my life has a purpose, thought I may never know what. I believe that everyone does have a purpose in life, and that somewhere along the way I will fulfill mine. I pray that somehow my life will touch on someone else's and make a difference, a true life altering difference. I don't live my life to get somewhere, I live my life to live my life. I am not content to just exist, I am only content when I live each day the best I can. I am content to sleep at night when I know I have given my love to my daughter and husband and been there for them in their times of need.
I have a standing rule with my family and closest friends that if they ever need me, regardless of the time, they can call me. If they ever need a shoulder to cry on or need some advice (advice they likely won't follow) that I'll take their call night or day. I have therefore received calls at obscene hours of the morning from my sisters, but never have I regretted the decision to make myself available to them. Never have I wished to just let the machine get it. Something in me feels fulfilled when I help them, when I'm there for them. I've never been closer to most of my family then now when we've lived so far apart for so long.
I thrive on that connection to the people I love, knowing that they love and miss me daily, knowing that I am always welcome. I pity anyone who doesn't have that, maybe I shouldn't, but I do.

Any of those things

Light, inspirational, funny, insightful....I don't know that my blog will ever come in the vicinity of any of those things. I don't know if the words I write here are read at all, and I can't claim to care to terribly if they are not. Face to face I seem to connect poorly with others, especially those in my age range. I have found that to most of them I seem terribly serious and a bit too dull. I am an intellectual at heart I'd rather be reading than out partying, would rather discuss psych, lit, and NASA's latest 'adventures' than clothes and other fashion related items. I'm only 25, but I look 18 and act 30-ish this seems to leave others a bit puzzled as to what to discuss with me.
It is here, in this rather isolated blogroom that I find my release. Here I have the freedom to discuss whatever I want, without regards to much of anything. I don't have to act the proper wife of a corpsman with high aspirations, I don't have to behave as a lady all polite and a good hostess as well as guest, I don't have to act the loving daughter, or devoted mother, I don't even have to act the caring and concerned friend. Here I can be the colossal bitch, the introverted bookworm, the silly young lady, and the somewhat frazzled and bored wife and mother. So here is where I come to express all that I keep tidily tucked away as I attend to the duties I have lovingly accepted in my life in the form I do so best, the written word.
Out of the limelight, so to speak, I can show my prismatic personality, shining in the rays of anonymity, for only few people who know me in real life know of my blog.

Guilty Pleasures

I love my guilty pleasures, so I thought I'd give them a moments notice.
Here they are in no particular order:

Peanut butter topped English muffins, toasted
Poached Eggs
Carbonated drinks
Bratwurst
Christmas Music off-season
Singing in the shower
Steak fat (sounds so gross, but with a nice hunk of steak meat delicious)
Wendy's Combo #4
Historical Romances
Onion rings, fried
Steak Fries with Nacho Cheese
Quesadillas, just cheddar
Tortilla chips
Popcorn
French Bread, dipped in nacho cheese or as garlic bread
Chimichangas, smothered with guacamole and sour cream
Salads, loaded with ranch dressing, cheese, and bacon bits (no imitations)
Baked Potatoes with butter, cheddar, and bacon bits

okay so most of my guilty pleasures revolve around unhealthy food...
so come on, tel me what some of yours are?