I am warm and fuzzy inside

 Most beautiful babies ever.

Evan Michael and David Matthew

Born 8:02am and 8:03am on January 26th, 2007. 5.3/6.2lbs, 18"/19.25".

Currently Gaming Halo 2 By Microsoft see related

I am once again feeling the need to spill useless thoughts onto page.

Last night I attended a Halo LAN party. For those of you who don't know, a lan party is where a bunch of people get together to play video games, set up multiple tv's, and have one to four people to a screen, all playing in the same game.

It was a pretty fun time, all in all, though I'm not terribly good at Halo.

Good quote: "Look in my eyes, what do you see? Not just the color, look inside of me."

These days are good days, I say.

I turn 21 in a week and two days. It's a Tuesday, which is the silliest day ever to turn 21. Brad, Brett, and I really know how to be silly. Somehow I feel way too old already, turning 21 seems almost like a sick joke. But I'm looking forward to it. It'll be the first birthday I've ever had where my sister wasn't there to say happy birthday to me. I'm really sad about that. I miss her a lot.

The words themselves fade away, and only the feelings remain. When no words can describe how I feel, and at best my mouth opens wordlessly... I know I have once again reached a time when I should lay my head down and cry, cry until I can't any more, cry to wash away all my pain, cry to free my voice, cry to cleanse my heartache and heartbreak, cry until I'm fresh and newly watered, ready to grow again. Ready to start the cycle over again. Cry, plant new seeds of hope, grow, flourish, be cut down, and cry again.

...I can smell my acorn squash cooking in the oven, time to go check on it- Yum!

"This world can turn me down, I won't turn away, I won't duck and run cause I'm not built that way."

The Greeks believed that once there were no male and female, that all souls were one. Then the souls were torn apart, male and female. The Greeks thought that when you found the other half of your soul, your soul mate, that it would be your perfect lover. But I think if you find your other half, you would be too much alike to be lovers, but you would still be soul mates.

I've been reading some older journal entries, from back when I was seventeen, maybe eighteen years old. I've changed so much since then. My view of life and love has broadened exponentially. I understand a lot more of what love really is, means. I see more clearly the love my family has for me, and the love I have for them means something different to me now.

 I still take my family for granted. I still don't appreciate them enough. I still don't love them like they deserve. I still don't love them like I want to love them. I'm still not there for them as much as I ought to be. I still am not as sensitive to their needs. I'm still not as kind as I want to be. I'm still not as warm as I should be. I'm still not as respectful as I need to be. But I realize all this. And that makes me a little closer to being the way I want to be. Because you can't work on something if you don't know it's there to be worked on.

 In these old journal entries I had this view of love that everything was the end-all, be-all. I've grown up a lot. Loving someone doesn't mean what I thought it did. I wonder if I've grown out of my hopeless romantic skin, then realized that it's changed but it's still the same hopeless romantic, just a little older and wiser.

Lately I've been looking into all kinds of beliefs and thoughts. I'm trying to really figure out what I actually believe. What I feel is truth. And not necessarily on a religious spiritual level, I'm talking on the most simple mundane levels, more like truths about me as a person. Who I am. For example, a huge realization that I've adopted as one of my 'truths' is merely this (and of course, by merely, I don't mean merely, I mean MERELY): I love. I am loved.
Sound stupid? Yeah I thought so too. But it was such a relief to find at least one thing I find total, unwavering truth about myself. Who I am. Me. That was a truth about Joy. I mean, I found it delightfully freeing to really rediscover that. Gives me goosebumps, thinking about it.

I was also reminded of lighthearted times... as remembered through the eyes of the angst of teenage years: "I think i'm gunna break out the old keith green record, i'm dying to hear those songs. reminds me of being twelve, putting a record into the record player in the living room, and dancing around without a care in the world."

 And the good advice I gave someone else back then? Still not bad advice, if I do say so myself. "Remember, life is not strung only on one star. And by that i mean, well, you know. Find many stars, and live your life by them all... When a light goes out, find ten new ones and make your own light burn brighter!"

Anyways...

Change is often hard. It's painful. It's annoying. It hurts way more than it is worth, especially at the moment. But sometimes when I look back, I see myself the way I was, and I see myself now. And I wonder: would I want to be the same person I was then? Would I want to sacrifice all the good things I have experienced, just so I wouldn't have to change? Would I let go of years of experience, wisdom, fun, laughter? And yes, tears and heartaches too, would I want to lose the learning experiences where I cried myself to sleep, and didn't know what to do? Would I really be willing to lose that- all of it? I don't know, but I don't think so.
Life is too short not to savor every moment, not to love who you are in the here and now, not to rejoice in your experiences, and embrace the future, and the growing expanding self that is you.
"life is what happens when you're busy making other plans."

   This morning I decided to do something special for myself... as I sipped on my morning tea, English breakfast complete with cream and sugar, I pulled together a big breakfast. Usually breakfast consists of just the tea, maybe cereal too if I have time. But because today is a Saturday, I went all out. An actual stack of pancakes, scrambled eggs, and bacon, all drowned in syrup. And a cup of steaming hot coffee on the side.
   Then I actually sat down and took time as I ate to write in my journal, pull together some thoughts, and just relax. I read through some of my thoughts from earlier this fall... It's interesting to see what I was thinking then, compared to what I'm thinking now. Funny how fluid life is. This summer I kind of had this deadline in my head, like that when I reached a certain date, my ankle would be "well" again, and things would be back to normal. How silly of me. My ankle is really far from being back to normal, and likely will never really be the way it was (the big scars certainly won't go away). The other thing I never took into account was the fact that although it's just my body affected, my body is only one aspect of myself... and my body being messed up affects the other aspects of myself. I kept trying to believe it wouldn't; but of course ignoring a problem only works for so long before the elephant in the room starts stepping on people.