All The Small Things

"You are always your biggest problem, and always your only solution."

It's the little things that add up. Rather it is something like a song that reminds you of a moment, or when you go to get a shirt out of your closet and its gone, the little things make you or break you. Today while sitting in the car on my way home from Des Moines the song Come On Get Higher came on and I had what you could call a flashbulb memory. Summer before my junior year I had just gotten out of my boyfriend of 9 months pool and we were laying in his bed talking. It was the first time I remember someone actually taking my breath away ("when you breath out and I breath in"). I could recall every detail of that moment, how the sun was coming through the windows, what his mom was cooking upstairs, and how it felt. It was that little thing in the car today that reminded me that that relationship wasn't always as bad as people want to make it seem. It is also the little things that turn you into the person you are. Who I am has been built on liberal beliefs, Christmas's sitting on the stairs waiting for presents, cereal for dinner and misunderstandings. One of my biggest misunderstandings in life is the importance of not just first times, but the importance of the following times. I generally think that once you do something once it has less meaning and therefore not as big of a deal. Like cheating, having sex, peaking on presents, or even speeding. Once the nervousness of doing anything the first time is over you can't seem to stop doing it. In the car I realized that my biggest problem, underestimating the meaning of things, is a problem no one can fix for me, it is a problem I have to fix myself. Change is a big part of life, most people use New Years Eve, birthdays, or the start of school to bring about change (or at least try to for about a week) but for me change comes with realizations. In the past year I experienced a lot of first, big ones in fact, and once it happened, once the story was finished, doing some of these things again & again with reckless abandonment didn't matter as much. I realize that yes, when people ask questions they ask stuff like "When was the FIRST time you got a speeding ticket? When was the FIRST time you had sex? When was the FIRST time you skipped class?" & so on, no one asks you about the other stuff, but just because that is all that matters to them doesn't mean that it should be all that matters to you. Today I realized that there is a time & place for everything & I have been having bad timing and reckless placement for a while with some of my decisions. I realize that love is necessary for a lot of things that I try to pretend it isn't, and that just because you did it once doesn't mean that you need to do it again. It is a hard change, a small change, but a change that will nonetheless make a difference.

I Hope They Serve Vodka In Hell

If the Westboros Baptist Church is what is in heaven then I think hell is going to suit me just fine. If you don't know about Westboros Baptist Church, type it in to google, its one of the few things that actually makes me ashamed to be from Kansas. I won't ever say I hate the Westboros because my hatred for them would make me no better, but instead because they hate something I love and believe in so strongly, I'm just going to love it more. The comedian Lisa Lampanellia, was promoting her book in Topkea, KS (home to the church) when they decided to protest her show. Lampanellia made it known that for every person who showed up to protest with the church she would donate a thousand dollars to a gay mens clinic. 44 people showed up to protest her show (congrats Fred Phelps, your family showed up!) and she donated 50,000 dollars. Their extreme hatred of homosexuality baffles me. In my world I believe that no one should be allowed to tell you what to do with your body or what you do in the bed room. But I guess the bigger picture I'm getting at is the characteristics that qualify someone to go to hell. People say that they don't care if homosexuals get married as along as it isn't in the church because it goes against the bible. So does being drunk or getting a tattoo, so if you want to apply that then I won't be getting married in a church either. People say that it ruins the sanction of marriage, I think someone should talk to Britney Spears and Arnold Schwarzenegger about how "precious" their marriages were to them. The divorce rate is 50 percent, I don't think anyone is risking too much. Homosexuality is close to my heart, I have family members that are gay and friends that are as well, and I would never want to see someone hold them back from being happy because their sexual orientation is sending them to hell (bullshit). How can you say that this person can fight for their country but they can't get married, that they can die for their country protecting your arrogant self but Fred Phelps right to freedom of speech trumps their right to having a peaceful ceremony? If we are living by the bible so hardcore then if I do recall God says to love everyone, so the hatred of Westboros Baptist Church, or anyone who looks at someone else who is different and feels hate, is contradictory & it's looking like hell is going to be a bit overcrowded with all of us down there, I sure hope they have vodka if I'm sharing a space with Fred Phelps for eternity.

Kansas Princess

Since the beginning of August I've had to constantly say that no I do not live on a farm, nor do I own a tractor, I don't only like country music, and yes my town is larger than just my family. I fight like crazy to make it known that my "accent" isn't an accent its a speech impediment I have had since I was little, and that while yes there are farms and fields, my town has a population of 175,000 and is the Top 7th place to live according to CNN. I sent a lot of time fighting to the bone that I wasn't a country girl. But I am. I live in a suburb & have my whole life but if I could I'd live on a farm somewhere in the middle of rolling hills next to a lake. I own a cowboy hat (and wear it), I'm always in the mood for country music, Tim McGraw was my first crush, I like to run around barefoot, I'd rather walk or boat somewhere than drive, I'd rather drive 30 miles to get groceries than 4 hours to get out of a city. I say and do some of the most red neck things & although I hate spiders and snakes, I love nature. Sometimes I even say y'all. I know people who describe cities as beautiful, but I think cities are cool and landscape is beautiful. I'm a country girl. I want to live in Wyoming and have a house at the lake, drive a couple of four wheelers and jet skis, I want a huge truck. I love the country & I love who I am, so poke fun all you want but just know there are farm lands in all states, and Kansas isn't the south.
I went to Table Rock this week no cell service, it was beautiful. I'm not all about technology being a bad thing, in fact I think its great, but for 4 days I was not able to talk to anyone but the people I was with which was fantastic. I wasn't ever worried about where my phone was, no one could bother me with their drama, and for once I could breath. I won't lie my phone being off had a lot to do with having no service but it doesn't change the out come. I got to think a lot and explore some things about myself that I've always wondered about. I missed the people I usually talked to but that made talking to them on Monday so much better.
So I guess I just want to say this, live your life as much as you can now, turn your phone off and stop denying who you are because of some stupid stereotype.

"You are never more alive then when you're almost dead."

My Country Tis of Thee

I want to attend a hot air balloon festival in Alabama (and hopefully ride in one). I want to just see Alaska first hand, and take one of those tiny scary planes to get there. I've already seen the Grand Canyon, Painted Desert, Highway 69, and the Petrified Forest in Arizona, but I want to take my kids there one day and watch their faces light up. I want to see the Hot Springs National Park in Arkansas and stomp grapes, make wine and drive along side the shore in California. I want to go skiing in Colorado, and attended a play at the Westport County Playhouse in Connecticut. I want to watch the sun set behind a historical light house in Delaware, and go to Stone Mountain Park and the Underground of Atlanta in Georgia. I think I'll go to Disney World in Florida and maybe even take a wild spring break at Panama City Beach. I want to see the volcanoes in Hawaii and lay on the beach, and on the total flip side I want to go to the Idaho Potato Museum. I've seen the Bean and been to top of the Sear tower in Chicago, Illinois, but I'd love to go to a Gay Pride parade. I want to hear the roar of race cars at the Indy 500 in Indiana, and while I go to school in Iowa I want to go to the crookedest street in the World, Snake Alley. And I suppose I've lived in Kansas my entire life but I'd love to get out and attend the symphony in the Flint Hills. I want to watch and bet on a horse in the Kentucky Derby (& hopefully win), I want to earn beads (sorry parents) at Mardi Gras in New Orleans, Louisiana and eat lobster in Maine. I want to go to a Baltimore Ravens game in Maryland and visit the Salem Witch Trails site on my way to Martha's Vineyard in Massachusetts. One day, I'd like to go sail boating on the Great Lakes in Michigan, and go to the Mall of America in Minnesota. I want to take an RV and go camping in Mississippi, and while I've been to the Arch and the lakes of Missouri I've always wanted to go to Silver Dollar City. White water rafting is something I've always thought would be fun so maybe I'll do it in Montana, and once I make it to Nebraska I've heard amazing things about their Zoo. It would be pretty cool to spend my 21 birthday in Las Vegas, Nevada, and maybe see Cirque De Soleil. I'll have to start working out more but I'd love to climb Mount Monadnock in New Hampshire. I'd love to walk along the Jersey Shore in New Jersey and I want to fully explore the culture of Albuquerque, New Mexico. I want to stand in Time Square on New Years Eve in New York and have a midnight kiss with someone I love. & it would be so cool to stand on top of a mountain in North Carolina one day and be on the beach looking for sea shells the next day. I want to learn to pick corn in North Dakota, and I want to spend a weekend in Ohio just to say I have. I've been to the Oklahoma City Bombing Memorial site, but I want to take my kids there just to show them that some times bad things do happen to good people. I'd like to explore the end of the Oregon Trail, and see the Liberty Bell in Pennsylvania. Perhaps take a Newport Harbor Tour and see the Victorian Natural History Museum in Rhode Island. I'd like to take a mini vacation and head to Myrtle Beach in South Carolina, or go to Mount Rushmore in South Dakota. I've always wanted to see the Elvis Presley Museum in Tennessee after seeing it on Full house, and I've seen the spot where JFK was assassinated but after making the Alamo out of sugar cubes in fourth grade I'd like to see it in person when I go back to Texas. I want to go to Salt Lake City in Utah just to see what all the fuss is about, and have some syrup in Vermont. In Virginia I'd want to see Colonial Williamsburg, and in West Virginia I'd like to explore a coal mine.  In Washington it would be cool to see Mount Saint Helen's, then I'd go to a Green Bay Packers game in Wisconsin (and take my lovely roommate), and lastly I'd go to one of the most haunted places in Wyoming, The Sweetwater County Library. 

I know this is a long post, and no one probably read it, but lets be honest, I don't care, I blog for me not for you (sorry!). But I believe as a fairly wealthy country we should help other countries. But there are a lot of problems in America that we have to address too. Like the tornadoes that have recently ripped through tornado ally leaving towns devastated, for example Joplin, MO and Reno, OK. I think sometimes I forget that our country has its own problems and on the flip side, its own beauty, that I over look. Part of my schools mission statement is to become a global citizen, and while I want to travel to all of those different countries, I'm going to be a teacher, a mother, I have to be realistic. My mom tells me every day that our country is becoming a melting pot, so instead of focusing so hard on trying to get out, I feel like I should explore the country people seem to be fleeing to.

Year By Year

“Don’t count every hour in the day, make every hour in the day count.”

There are just some moments in life when you realize that a year really isn't that long. Today was one of those for me. I was running in my neighbor hood this morning and realized a year ago today I was laying on my friend couch in the basement with 3 of my friends totally hungover watching movies the day after my high school graduation. It was a good start to an amazing summer. Now, I've been running, made breakfast, skyped, printed off pictures from my freshman year of college and am now blogging. But it seems like yesterday I was laying on the couch with those three goons watching movies that I still can't even remember today. And now I only talk to one of them that often, one of them every so often and one of them not at all. There are moments, where a year isn't that long but the events that happened in the year seem to last a life time.
I drove around with one of my best friends a couple days go, my little sister Caylin. We talked about the events that have made up our school year, from my dad being in the hospital, my graduation, me leaving, joining a sorority, getting in trouble, losing something I had held on to for 18 years in a way I never thought I would, losing friends, gaining friends, and a lot of deaths. It wasn't an easy year. It was a rewarding one.
To say I don't miss high school wouldn't be a lie, but it's not really the truth either. I miss my friendships from high school, the unbelievable bond I had with those girls on my dance team that could never be replicated no matter what. I miss my friendships with the people in my grade. I miss a lot about high school. But thats normal, rather we want to admit it or not, you wont ever have the history you have with your high school class with anyone else, rather you talked to all of them or just a few select people, we all went through an amazing amount together. But I gained a new type of friendship with my family and a new type of friendship with all sorts of girls that I love dearly (aka my roommate & C1).
A year isn't that long, when you are sitting in the first class of the semester in August a year can seem like an eternity, but the way you live your life in that year, the events that happen and the events that effect you and change you, well in some way, I'd like to think, one year can last a life time.

From Point A to B

Lets talk for a second about the term "end up with". We use it all the time (ex: whoever I'm going to end up with, wherever I end up). I've decided that I hate it. Now fair warning my blogs until I get back to school could be the strangest ones yet, when you spend most of your time with little kids its hard to think clear. However, on my way home from work one day, and through a long thought process I thought back to when my friend told me that it was just all about ending up in the right spot. But we don't truly end up any where do we? There's a story behind every move, and to me the term "end up" makes it sound like something you don't really want to do. I would never want my future boyfriend or husband to say that he "ended up with me", actually I would prefer something more along the lines of "this is my beautiful wife that I am so lucky to be married to", but that's beside the point :). I believe that we don't just end up somewhere. I believe that, yes there is a plan for us, but that we don't make all these decisions to just end up somewhere, we go where we are suppose to. We do what we want, what we need, what is fulfilling to us, and to end up somewhere sounds like settling, which none of our wants and needs should ever be. Now I write this as an optimistic 19 year old sophomore who still believes in love and that things will happen in my favor the majority of the time, so maybe in 40 years if I'm unemployed, single, and bitter my thoughts will be different. I know what happens to those people who end up homeless, divorce and many other things, they don't (usually) choose for these things to be the out come of their endeavors, so yes maybe sometimes we do end up somewhere, I'm not naive, out of most of my friends I know best that life happens, that we are not invincible but I like to think the bad things happen so that good things can come from it, a new appreciation is made out of the wreckage. I don't know about anyone else but I sure as hell don't want to "end up" anywhere and I never want anyone I'm around to feel like they just "ended up" there either. Ultimately I like to think I control my travels through life and that my destination is ever changing at my will.

Child's Play

"I understand the need for miracles they keep reality from paralyzing you"

It's amazing to me children's ability to make believe. Now bare with me. I babysit these little boys, and they are a handful about 90 percent of the time, but I spend a lot of time with them & they say things I don't understand, run around chasing things I can't see & they love every second of it. I think that's the peak in our lives for most people: childhood. Everything is cheap, a cardboard box can entertain you for hours, and you escape your reality as much as you want. Nothing can't be fixed by a band aid & mom's kiss. But with all things considering as you get older the pleasures in life change. Graduating high school & college are great, get married and have kids and you've never been happier, but after that there are bills & fights & the impact of a break up or a death hits hard because you understand the impact of these things. These little boys make me smile but sometimes it makes me sad to think they can go to a world I can't see anymore, they can escape reality but they leave me here to watch from the outside.

Another great song :)