Holidays and Traditions

I love holidays.  I love celebrating as many as I possibly can.  I love decorating and buying my kids gifts. I love getting together with family and creating memories and starting traditions with my new little family.  Growing up, my parents weren’t into celebrating most holidays.  I’m sure most of it had to do with lack of funds, but it also had a lot to do with my parents’ beliefs and convictions of faith.  My parents also tend to lean toward the practical as opposed to the sentimental.   Add those together and it leaves a decent hole in holiday traditions.  Our general holiday tradition was not having one.
Let me give you a ‘quick’ rundown of a typical year in holidays throughout my childhood:

We never celebrated New Year’s Eve as far as I can remember.   I think we went to church events occasionally.  The only one I specifically remember was ringing in the year 2000.  

We didn’t celebrate Easter - other than going to church, which we did every week anyway, so nothing super special.  We didn’t do the Easter Bunny, Easter baskets or Easter egg hunts.  They were pagan.  We didn’t do pagan in our house.  There was one year I remember waking up on Easter Sunday to a small basket of goodies and a Bible with my name inscribed on the cover.  I thought it might be the start of something new, but the next year - nothing.  Ah well.  

We did celebrate Mother’s and Father’s Day by making the respective parent breakfast in bed - which generally consisted of an omelet, toast and coffee.  

Occasionally, we could coax our parents into taking us to the fireworks on the 4th of July.  It never ended well.  My family is not known for their love of driving - especially in bad traffic - and my father is the worst offender.  After the beautiful display of fireworks, we were always treated with a tension-riddled ride home in crawling, barely-moving traffic.  Oh, the memories.  

The most celebrated holiday in our household was Thanksgiving.  There was always lots of good, homemade food my mom made and more often than naught, some extended family or good family friends.  I have nothing but good memories from my childhood Thanksgivings.  Maybe because there’s nothing I expected out of it.  Well, except really good food and those rolls with the three bumps.  My mom stopped making those a while ago and I miss them so much.  Back to my point.  Thanksgiving, more than any other holiday for me, was about good friends and good food.  There were no presents expected (or given), so no disappointment was possible.  

Halloween.  I literally had to come back and add this part in because I forgot it existed.  We never celebrated it.  Ever.  In any way.  Well, there were probably one or two church ‘fall festivals’ that just so happened to coincide with trick or treating.  However, it was a pagan holiday.  As I explained in Easter...my family didn’t do pagan.  The kids in school were always horrified that I didn’t trick or treat.  I felt kind of sad, but not so much after they gave me some of their candy out of pity.  Pity candy is still candy. Even better, I didn’t have to dress up in silly costumes and beg for it door-to-door.

Christmas was an interesting holiday in my family. Every Christmas, my parents would announce that they weren’t going to get a tree that year.  What was the point?  To this day, I’m not completely sure if they were just trying to get a rise out of us or really not planning to get a tree.  They always gave in and got one and set it up last minute.  I found out this past year that it was actually a Swedish tradition they were following - setting the tree up on Christmas Eve.  It probably would have helped if they explained that to us. They might have.  I probably just forgot.  I do that a lot.

My parents were also very adamant about the whole ‘Jesus is the reason for the season' when it came to celebrating Christmas.  We didn’t do Santa.  To the point where I distinctly remember seeing a classmate crying off by himself during recess in 2nd or 3rd grade and asked him what was wrong.  He told me, through a tear-stained face that he just found out Santa didn’t exist.  I looked blankly at him and asked, “Who’s Santa?”  Needless to say, I just made him cry more.  

So, that’s the general run-down of the holiday celebrations of my childhood.  Or lack thereof.  

Let me quickly add that my husband’s family is about as opposite from this as can be possible.  
They are very into celebrating holidays and have a lot of family traditions surrounding them.  Sometimes I get a little down because my family isn’t as into traditions as his because I LOVE celebrating holidays and I’d love it even more if I could do so with my family.  Or, in the very least, bring some of my childhood traditions into our new little family.

It’s not that my family didn't have any traditions; just not in conjunction with holidays.  Old Sturbridge Village was a long-standing tradition throughout my childhood.  My parents would buy a family membership and we’d make the couple-hour trek down a few times every year.  We would mosey oh-so-slowly through the first few buildings and finally make it to the general store - where we were allotted between $1-$2 each (depending on how rich our parents were feeling) to get whatever we wanted.  It was usually stick candy because that was the cheapest and, therefore, we could get the most.  Mom and Dad would get a coffee and a cookie.  I’d always look at their cookies and wonder why I didn’t just use my money for one.  I didn’t really like stick candy all that much.  Cookies were much better.  I'd get a cookie next time. When the next time came around, I’d get stick candy again because, well...you could get more! 

After sitting outside the general store eating our treats, we’d continue on to the Towne House and then over the covered bridge and beyond.  If we were lucky, they’d be running the horse-drawn shuttle tours and we’d go on that all the way around.  We’d skip rocks in the pond and watch the sawmill (or “WooshWoosh, as Sam liked to call it).  By the time we got to the Freeman Farm and potter, my feet were usually killing me.  But I didn’t care - those were my favorite.  I loved watching the woman bake in the kitchen and the potter make beautiful containers out of blobs of clay.  

At some point in the day (usually around 1 or 2), it would be lunch time.  Thought there is a tavern inside OSV that serves food, it was always a little steep for our whole family, so we’d head back to the car and pull out our trusty cooler full of food.  It was tradition to have egg salad sandwiches, cookies, chips and warm soda.  II’m sure there were healthy foods in there, too.  

After lunch, we’d head back in and explore all the places we’d missed the first time around - always exiting at the garden and the clock room.  It was tradition.  In a way, OSV was my own personal Santa Clause.  I still remember the day I realized the people didn’t actually live there.  It was like finding out Santa didn’t exist.  

Last weekend, my family went to Old Sturbridge Village for the first time since 2002 (it’s true - I looked it up.  I have pictures to prove it, Dad!).  A lot has changed in our family since then.  Most importantly, weddings and children.  It took my family months to find a date that everyone could go.  Even then, there were two who couldn’t make it.  My husband was on a road trip to a good friend’s wedding and my sister’s hands were tied with work and previous promises she’d made.  

Though my husband wasn’t there, I loved spending the day with my children, parents and siblings - reveling in old traditions and creating some new ones.  I spend so much time celebrating holidays with my husband’s childhood traditions that it felt really good to share some of my childhood traditions with my kids.  The Boy LOVED the horses, sheep, cattle and chickens.  And running. Especially after the chickens.  He loved not having to hold someone’s hand all the time and just exploring.  The Girl was a little young yet, but she loved snuggling up with me and looking around when she wasn’t sleeping.  

 Everyone enjoying their treats outside the General Store.

The Girl, The Boy, my Mom and Me enjoying a stylish carriage ride.

I can’t wait to go back in the years to come - hopefully as an entire family (large or small) - continuing a tradition that is as good as any holiday.  

I Wish They All Could be California Moms

In light of it being Mother’s Day on Sunday, I decided to share about my mom and, inevitably, my dad.  I apologize to any of my readers who also read my Brother's blog as there is bound to be some crossover (since he wrote about our parents this week).

My mom got married the same month she turned 19 and then proceeded to move across the country from California to New Hampshire with her new husband - a man she had known about a year before marrying.  They were engaged after about two weeks of dating and married 6 months later.  

My Dad was 5 years her senior, in the Navy and had a...questionable...past.  My mom only had one boyfriend before Dad and was about as naive as one can be.  She was even voted by her high school “Most LIkely to become a nun.”  If I was friends with my mom at that time in her life, I would have told her he was bad news and to keep looking (I’m pretty sure family members did).  I’m glad she didn’t.  I would not have been born.  My 3 brothers and 1 sister would not have been born either.  

31 years later, they are still married. Not to say that they haven’t had their rough patches.  What couple married for that long hasn’t?  But they have always taken their promise to love and cherish each other through good times and bad very seriously.  I’d say two major things have kept them together in the hardest of times and brought them closer during the good times: their love of God and love of music.  These loves are what, as their daughter, I see as the foundation their relationship is built upon.  

Soon after they moved across country, my mom gave birth to my oldest brother.  She went back to work for two weeks and couldn’t stand being away from him, so my parents made the decision for her to stay home full time.  It’s a good thing, too, because within the next two-and-a-half  years, she had given birth to three children!  There was a bit of a break in the childbearing after that.  I’m not sure if Dad thought they were done, but I know Mom knew they weren’t because she had been praying back before she was pregnant with her third child and felt God tell her that she would have her ‘Samuel’.  So, when she found out she was pregnant, she was sure it was her Samuel.  So, when a screaming baby girl was born, she was a bit surprised.   You’d think I would have a complex after being told this story countless times, but I really don’t mind being a Sarah instead of a Samuel.  And I don’t feel that she was sad I wasn’t a boy.  She still got her Samuel - four years later.  He’s the favorite.  Not my Mom’s favorite (she’s been amazing at not showing favoritism at all), but everyone’s favorite.  But now I’m not only getting off topic, I’m encroaching on Josiah’s blog even more than anticipated.

Growing up with my mom at home was amazing.  I absolutely loved my childhood.  We lived on the edge of State Forests and would spend hours walking the paths to the river, picking blackberries or just exploring.  We built forts in the back yard with fallen (and felled) trees, and swung from wild grape vines (not kidding - it was AWESOME!) like Tarzan.  These are things that we would not have had time to do if we were in daycare all day.  At least, not to the degree that we did.  

I am so glad that my mom was not a helicopter mom.  She was very laid back and let us play so long as it wasn’t obviously life-endangering.  She also let us be kids.  We got dirty and messy and then proceeded to trudge through the house, sit on the couch and be generally oblivious of the mess we were making.   Mom’s attitude was, “meh, it’ll wash out,” or, “That’s what vacuuming/sweeping/ect is for.”  Which we did.  A lot.  At least, the three oldest of us.  My mom made sure to teach us how to clean properly.  We had chores.  Lots of chores.  I thank God that she taught us how to clean because that has come in handy now that I have my own place.  

My mom also made sure that we had a very musical childhood.  My two older siblings had piano lessons and we were all in children’s choir growing up.   I loved singing and making up dances to music at home.  Mom always had music playing during the day.  I now understand more than ever why she did this.  It can keep you from going stir crazy while staying home with little kids!  She also sang ALL THE TIME.  There was one time that my sister and I woke up to her singing...in a microphone...past midnight.  I’m pretty sure we got up and told her to knock it off (in the nicest way, of course).  She didn’t just sing at home, though.  She sang while grocery shopping and running errands.  Sometimes I loved it, other times it embarrassed the hell out of me.  I’m still on the fence about it, though I catch myself humming to my children while being out and about.  

Mom and Dad assumed our family was complete with their four children.  However, four years after Samuel was born, we were all surprised by the arrival of my parents’ fifth and final child.  the wild child, Josiah.  My mom had a bit of a rough time after he was born because she was homeschooling the three oldest of us and chasing Sam around.  Josiah was born smack dab at the end of August (which, anyone who knows public schools in the Northeast knows that’s when school starts).  This was a pivotal time in my mom’s life...and my parents’ marriage.  Up until then, she had been trying as hard as she could to fill the role as ‘perfect mother’ and ‘perfect wife’ (not to mention teacher) and it all came crashing down after Josiah was born.  Not necessarily because of Josiah.  I think having a fifth child at that time of the year was just the straw that broke the camel’s back.
 
My grandma came out to help with the children, but had to go back to California after a couple of weeks.  She wisely saw that my mom wasn’t ready to be left alone with five children in her state, so she drove my mom and all five kids to my aunt’s house in Missouri.  We lived there until Christmas and started going to public school while my mom recuperated and my parents worked through their issues long-distance.  As an eight-year-old, I didn’t realize how strong my Mom had to have been to finally come to terms with her shortcomings and the fact that she couldn’t force herself to be someone she wasn’t.  After years of trying, she essentially told my father, “This is who I am and what you can expect from me.  Take it or leave it.”  I can’t imagine how scary that must have been.  Especially with five kids!  To my father’s credit,  he accepted this and they worked things out.  

Soon after Josiah was born, my dad got laid off.  I’m not completely sure when this was exactly.  It feels like it was right after we came home from Missouri, but it was probably a few years later.  Either way, Dad had no job and Mom had no post-high school education.  My parents made the tough decision that it was time my mom started working outside the home.  She went to school to get her CNA license and started working in various nursing homes.  Sadly, she worked 2nd shift, so we didn’t see much of her.  It fell to the oldest three of us to help keep the house running, which included watching the two younger boys.  

As much as I would have loved to see my younger brothers have the same childhood I did, I know my mom did what she had to do to keep food on the table and a roof over our heads.  I admire her for plunging back into the workforce and still managing to be an amazing, supportive  mother to her five children.  

As we grew, my mom encouraged us to find our various passions in life.  To find out who we were, what we wanted out of life and to take chances.  She refused to tell us what to do in various situations.  That’s not to say she wouldn’t listen to our concerns or talk decisions through with us, but her inevitable response when we asked her what to do was, “Pray about it.”  Whether or not we actually did pray about it, I think her pushing us to make our own decisions about the paths in life we chose to take helped us become the unique individuals we are.  

There wasn’t much my parents wouldn’t let us do.  If it was something they didn’t agree with or had an issue with, they’d let us know their stance and then let us make our own decision.  They’d rather us make a mistake while we were still living at home and have a support system in place to help us back on our feet than to make us wait till we were out on our own and have nowhere to turn when things went south.  

Now, all five of us are grown up and out of the house.  We are each our very own person with our unique personality but all love each other very much.  This is largely due to our very unique, loving mother who made sure to raise five distinct, creative and music-loving children.  

I love you, Mom!

Archiving Memories

I find it ironic that I’m an extremely sentimental person, but I have the absolute worst memory of anyone I’ve ever met.  Seriously, it’s scary how bad my memory is.  I half-jokingly tell the Husband that he won’t realize I have alzheimer's until it’s too late because my memory is already so bad.  I’m pretty sure he secretly agrees with me.  Through the years, I’ve stored my memories through keeping mementos, taking lots of photos and journaling.

I used to keep everything remotely sentimental in shoe boxes in my closet when I was younger.  Ticket stubs, random party favors I received, and lots of random knick knacks that meant something to me but probably just looked like junk to everyone else.  As I grew up and started to fear that I would become a pack rat, I forced myself to go through said boxes and weed out anything with which I couldn’t attach a specific memory.  Soon, I became painfully aware that I was doing a disservice to such precious mementos by keeping them in ugly shoe boxes (plus, I’m pretty sure my sister complained to me about all the ugly boxes in our closet), that I decided to upgrade to nice memory boxes.  Being too young to have any disposable income, I asked for some for Christmas.  My siblings looked at me in horror as I opened empty boxes that Christmas and was absolutely thrilled!  They asked me what was inside and, when I said, “Nothing.  They’re boxes to put things in,” they just looked at me like I was crazy and went back to building their Legos.  I still keep mementos, though not with the fervor I did when I was ten .  As I grew older, photos and journaling took over most of my memory keeping.  They take up much less space!

I love pictures for the memories they hold.  I’m not necessarily good at taking pictures, but I take a LOT to make up for that.  I figure, the more I take, the better the odds are that one of them is bound to come out decent.  The problem is, I have trouble bringing myself to delete any.  Thank God for digital photography!  I can’t imagine how much money I’d be wasting if it was all film!
I take a lot of photos in a row figuring that I’ll weed out the bad ones and have one or two from that particular pack as keepers.  When it comes time to hit that ‘delete’ button, I grow weak.  What if that is the specific look in my child’s face that I’m looking for later in life?  What if the other photos don’t catch the nuance quite the same way?  I’ve finally been forcing myself to weed out the out-of-focus and obviously bad ones.  I’m a tad embarrassed to admit that it’s been a very emotional time for me.  

Taking lots of pictures as often as I remember to is my antidote for a bad memory. Not only do they carry sentimental memories, the pictures act as much of a reference.  When I can’t remember how old the Boy was when he took his first steps, I just look for the pictures I took.  The digital date stamp is a life saver!  I’m not talking about the ugly orange stamp you can choose to have your camera stamp on the front of your photo, but the one that is in the picture’s digital data.  I love that I can just click on a photo in my computer and see what date it was taken.  There are a few people who have taken photos of events that I was unable to photograph or was too busy being in to take myself (wedding, children’s first few days, etc) and they were very kind and gave me the photos.  I’m not sure if their cameras dates weren’t set right or the files lose something in editing, but some dates were off by the year...others are just out there.  I have some photos that claim to be from 1970!  I wasn’t even alive in 1970!  Luckily, most of those events are pretty much ingrained in my memory, so there’s no question in my mind of when they occurred.  

Before I had a camera to capture my memories and archive my life, I journaled on an impressively regular basis.  I slowed down in college and have pretty much stopped at this point in my life.  I think I write in my journal about twice a year.  I do miss it.  There is something cathartic about just getting everything out on paper and then looking at it from outside your brain.  It definitely takes more work than just snapping a picture or two (or 100) and there is more of my actual thoughts and memories in journaling than photography.  And this is why I choose the latter over the former more often than not.  

Up until I started this blog, I have always written faster and more fluidly on paper than the computer.  In college, I wrote all of my outlines and rough drafts on lined paper.  I felt more at home with that medium because of my journaling.  I was rather surprised and a bit saddened when I realized that I now think better while typing than writing.  My brain also works so erratically and I forget (only to remember later) what I wanted to write or expand on that it is much more conducive to be able to go back a few sentences and interject an idea...or switch around paragraphs.  All that to say, I realized soon after starting this blog that it is my new way of journaling.  A bit more public, so therefore a bit more guarded, but it feels good to get my thoughts out of my head and onto ‘paper’.  

Sociable Hermit

At my heart, I’m a hermit.  I’m a homebody.  I need to be alone.  I need ‘me’ time more than naught.  However, I also crave interaction with other people.  Not just any old conversation, though.  I crave understanding and connectedness.  I loathe small talk.  It baffles me.  It’s clunky and awkward for me, though I’m slightly better at it now than I was before.  If there’s no real meaning or importance to what I’m talking about, it seems pointless.  Why waste my breath?  

I’m an introvert.  But not.  I'm a sociable hermit. I go crazy if I’m alone with my thoughts for too long, but people scare me.  Intimidate me.  I’m not sure why, but they just do.  I assume the worst.  I assume that I’m boring them to death with my constant nervous chatter.  I assume that what I have to say isn’t nearly interesting enough to be said. There are few people I feel comfortable enough to be myself and talk to in a meaningful way.  Yet, when I’m around those people, they can’t get me to shut up.  When I get going, I talk too much.  Waaaay too much. 


Staying home with my two children has proved interesting in this regard. Most of the time, I absolutely love it. I’m home almost all the time, I don’t have a car most days as we only have one and my husband needs that to go to work.  So, for all intents and purposes, I’m home-bound with a two-year-old and a 9-month-old. The hermit me embraces it.  Loves it.  Thrives on it. The social me feels suffocated.  Isolated.  Trapped. That said, when I start talking to a friend or family member, I have a hard time ending the conversation.

I blame my parents for my social awkwardness.  They are hermits.  Two hermits who found each other and managed to have five children.  Most of whom are also hermitish in their own way.  Some more than others.  Growing up, I hated staying home.  I wanted to go out and do things.  Be around people.  Spend time with the few friends that I had.  There was still an aspect of me that needed alone time, but generally I was the outgoing one in my family.  The one who communicated and made sure everyone else communicated while they were happy to be in their own little world.   
I remember in high school, my sister and I were both in the nuns’ chorus in the school musical.  I loved staying after school for practice because most of my friends were also in the musical.  The best part for me was once practice was over and we all just hung out and goofed off until our parents came to pick us up.  I would drag my feet once Mom came and keep trying to talk and joke around with my friends.  It drove my sister insane.  All she wanted to do was go home.  That was the last thing I wanted to do.  

I’m not sure when I went from more social to more hermit.  I think it was probably college.  I went into shock in college.  There were just so many people and so many strong opinions flying about that I shrunk back inside my shell in record time.  I made a few lasting friendships there, though most were my roommates at some point in time.  I threw myself into studying and working 3 jobs to stay afloat.  I forced myself to get involved in a few clubs in hopes that it’d help me come out of my shell, but it didn’t really work.  Mostly, I just wanted to be home.  I’ve never missed home that much.  I tried to go home every weekend that I didn’t have to work, which was difficult since I didn’t have  car.   I both loved and hated college.  I loved learning and picking the brains of my professors, but I hated being alone all the time.  I just couldn’t connect with many of the students there.  I was surrounded by thousands of people, but felt isolated.  

The isolation I feel now is a different type of loneliness.  It’s a temporary kind.  I am home.  My own home with my own children.  The little family my husband and I created.  Sometimes I miss having an adult to talk to that can talk back.  However, I realize the fun part right now is that I get to do all the talking.  The Boy is a tad speech delayed.  He’s a little over two and has enough words, sounds and gestures to get his point across.  Mostly.  So I’m pretty much the only person talking between the hours of 7:30am-5:30pm on weekdays.  I know that will change soon enough.  I know as my children grow up, they will not only be talking over me, they will be old enough to take out for day trips and play dates more often and easily.  Then they will be off at school and I’ll miss the days when we could all be home all day and I could embrace the hermit in me.  For now, I will continue to try and get out when I can, keep the radio on and call family and friends to chat when I find a break in my day.  Or do this.  Blog.  It’s not much, but it helps me feel more connected to people.  Even if it’s a bit of a one-sided conversation.  It gives the social me enough of an outlet to stay sane.  

Love and Marriage...and Motherhood

In my teen years, I was sure I’d be married by the age of 20 and having kids by 21-22.  It was my life’s goal to be a stay at home mom.  I remember sitting there on my 20th birthday thinking, “Well, that didn’t go as planned.”  By that point, however, I had stopped looking for ‘the one’ and was actually actively trying not to date.  I had been so burned by my last relationship, I didn’t want to have anything to do with dating until after college.  Being who I was back then, I made a promise to God that I wouldn’t date in college.  I made a lot of promises to God like that.  I don’t know how many of them I actually kept through till the end.  Not many, I’m sure.  

I am an extreme person in that I can’t do anything halfway.  Have my heart broken by a boy?  Why not swear off guys for 4+ years and add an extra-heaping helping of inevitable guilt by making a promise  to God that I’ll give this time of my life to Him?  
I didn’t make it, by the way.  

I fell in love with my husband just after spring break my Sophomore year in college.  We got married the August after I graduated.  
I fought falling in love with him for months.  I explained to him that I had promised God to not date until after college.  He said he understood.  I’m sure he thought I was nuts.  If I was him, I’d have just moved on.  He waited.  About a month or two into it, I caved and realized it was futile.  Who was I kidding?  We were dating even if we weren’t calling it that.  We now agree that we truly started dating in April of 2006.  

He was the constant source of light in my life at a time when everything started to crash down around me.  Everything I held dear up until then seemingly abandoned me.  
My faith was shaken to the core.  No.  Not shaken. Broken.  Obliterated.  Not only my faith in God, but my faith in people.  In humanity.  The thought that people, at the heart, are good.  Especially Christians.  Being brought up as a Christian, I always believed that we were supposed to constantly be striving to be better people.  I was sorely mistaken and that was a hard lesson to learn.  
I am only now starting to rebuild what was torn down.  Starting to see the good in humanity again.  I have my husband to thank for that.  First, for his sickeningly optimistic attitude about nearly everything and secondly for helping me to bring life into the world.  Twice!

When we found out that I was pregnant with our first child, we were shocked to say the least.  I knew in my heart that I wouldn’t be able to stay home when our child was born.  We hadn’t even been married a year and were pretty much dirt poor.
I held out hope, though.  Even going into maternity leave, there was part of me that still believed I’d never return to work.  The day I realized we couldn’t make it work with one income was a very hard day for me.  I held my little baby boy and cried.  I wanted to be the one to take care of him.  It was my one goal and I was failing miserably.  

I was starting to finally get in the swing of things.  It took 9 months, but I was finally feeling like I was balancing mothering and work and being a wife when the last one got the better of us and I found myself pregnant. Again.  If I thought I was shocked the first time around, the second was...ummm...what’s more shocking than shocking?  I was actually terrified for a while.  After I got up the courage to tell Scott, we waited a little while to tell anyone else.  Mostly because we didn’t want to hear the inevitable, “Again?! So soon?  You know how that happens, right?  I thought You’d figured it out the first time.”  Blah blah blah. 

It didn’t matter, though.   Our daughter completed our little family.  While I was pregnant with her, my husband was promoted at work which meant that we could now squeak by on his salary alone.  I had finally reached my goal as a stay at home mom!  The funny thing about reaching a goal, though.  Now I have to figure out what to do next.  Obviously, raise my children.  However, I never really looked past the whole stay at home mom thing.  It didn't occur to me that it would end decently soon.  20 years max.   


What then?  

What do I want to be when my kids grow up?

Perspective

I have always been interested in the way people think. It amazes me that no two people think alike and I’m often intrigued as to why people think what they do or how they perceive the world around them. Because I have been aware to some degree that everyone thinks differently, it lead to my own views and opinions on various ideas and topics becoming excessively passive. Why did it matter what I thought or believed since every other person on this planet thinks differently than every other person?

Up until semi-recently (around 2005/2006 to be more exact), I just took on the opinions and views of those around me. Oddly enough, I had the reputation of being extremely opinionated and speaking my mind (especially within my family). What most, including myself, didn't realized is that the opinions I was spouting so assuredly were not my own, but of those around me. Now, I understand that this is very common with children - how else are they going to learn how the world works around them and where else are they going to create their world view but from those who raise and surround them along the way. It’s also very common for said people to come to some sort of awakening around the the time they leave the nest (which, for me was 2004).

My awakening was a gradual yet sudden realization. It was a perfect storm of my life as I knew it crashing down around me and I was abruptly alone with my thoughts. Only my thoughts. It was scary at first:
What do I think about this?
 Ummm...wow. I didn’t realize I thought that.
 I thought I thought that, but I really don’t.

The person I am now is thanks to all the turmoil that went on back in 2005 & 2006 - forcing me to be alone with my thoughts and realizing I am my own person with my own thoughts. I pulled away from a lot of people, hid inside my own head while I sorted it all out. It took a long time, but I finally like where I am. I like who I am. I am starting to finally piece together who I am and what I believe. I think if people who knew me pre-2005 could have an honest conversation with me now, I would shock them to some extent with my actual views on life and the world.

In realizing who I am, however, I’ve become much more timid about spouting my opinions. It’s harder when your opinions are your own and not ones you’ve adopted from those around you. Especially because those opinions now differ greatly from those closest to you. As much as I love picking people's brains about what they think and why they think it, I have become excessively protective of my thoughts and views. Always wanting, needing, approval from those around me, I have publicly become a non-person with no obvious views on anything because I wish not to offend or disappoint those around me. My hope in writing this blog is to put into words my own perspective on various events and ideas: some through personal experience and others mere opinion - some banal, others controversial but all make me who I am.

So, I'm throwing this out there potentially to the world at large, more realistically to one or two curious individuals.

Welcome inside my head!