What love looks like...

The amazing, adorable, cute little face that you see here is my baby sister. She is 7 years younger than me and absolutely one of my greatest joys in life. She inspires me daily with her absolute determination to be the best that she can be. She frustrates me constantly with her stubborness that she knows best about everything (wonder where she got that?). She literally can make me laugh until I cry with her dry sense of humor. She humbles me with the way that she loves and cares about me, and others. She makes me worry with the way I sometimes hear myself come out of her mouth. She is probably more like me than I am comfortable with, but at the same time, she has a magic and beauty that is all her own. I am probably way too protective of her, but I don't care. I love how she knows by the look on my face when a week has been too hard or there's a situation that I just can't let go of and she'll come and crawl in my lap like she did when she was three and just cuddle. I marvel at how we'll show up at the same family function coming from two different cities wearing the same earings. It slays me when her tender heart is broken because of how open and loving it is and yet I can't ask her to change that part of her. I think its awesome how she knows I steal almost all of her socks when I am home because I forget to pack my own and yet never complains to me. She worries me at how much the weight of other people's opinions sit with her because she is so uncertain of her own, but I know she will grow into her confidence. I am so proud of her ability to sit down at the piano or run on a soccer field and play her heart out at both equally. Of all the things about her that I love, the one thing that I probably value and treasure about our relationship the most is the fact that she consistently pushes and challenges me to be the absolute best person I can be because she is watching and learning and imitating. And because she knows me better than alsmost anyone in the world- with her, I have to be absolutely and achingly authentic and real and vunerable. Because that is what love is. Its being able to absolutely real and raw and true to who you really are with another person and allowing other people to be the same with you.

"And it will change in time, and we'll feel more alive....."

I'm sitting in Panera listening to some tunes and working on some stuff.... you know- taking advantage of wireless while I'm in a place that has it.... and to my left is a table full of (what I assume) are freshmen in college who have gotten together with old friends and an old coach (apparently they all used to wrestle... I've learned alot tonight) and they are talking about school, and their hopes and dreams, etc... you know all the typical 19 year old ideas...

And its so funny, because I remember having these conversations with my friends at the start (and the middle and the end) of college. You meet and tell each other what's been happening and what you plan on happening. You lay out your life plan and you are so confident that everything will happen just like that....that everything will end up nice and neat. That you are at point a and you can see point b which will lead to point c.....you get my drift.

Part of me wants so badly to go over there and let them know that life doesn't happen like that. Tell them that you can't draw a map of where you are going and what you are doing- because inevitably, things will change. Problems will arise. Detours will happen. I want to let them know to not hold too tightly to their plans, because that will lead to disappointment.

But there's another part of me (that wins the inner battle) that will keep her mouth shut and let those wonderful young hopeful kids dream their dreams and lay out their five year plans. I'm going to sit here and listen and enjoy their overall hopeful tone. Soak in their hopes and dreams and plans.... because there is an innocent beauty in that.

And as I sit here listening to them, I realize that although my five year plan hasn't quite followed the route I mapped out.... I wouldn't trade it. But despite of the fact I'm not where I'd thought I would be and I'm not quite sure where I am going- I still continue to plan and hope and dream and imagine possibilities....

Because I believe in the future....even if I don't know what it will be- I have confidence that it will be.

If you're not living, then you are dying

I remember something I learned in high school Anatomy and Physiology (one of my favorite classes ever).... Simultaneously, we are all living/growing and dying. While we are young, we are living/growing at a much faster rate then we are dying, we kind of even out in the middle, and then at the end of our lives we are dying at a faster rate than we are living/growing.

Maybe a slightly morbid thought- but I don't really think so.

I think the most morbid thing, is to be in the living stage- but not really live. I think that saddest thing is to simply exist. To simply live, and not to thrive. That is scary for me. To be dying while living- that is much scarier.

So recently I bought a book- 2001 things to do before you die (or I like to call it my how to really live book.) And it always cheers me up to read it, because I've actually done quite a bit for my mere 24 years.

For example (as suggested in the book) I've:

-organized a food drive

-flirted

-mastered the art of letter writing (or so I like to think)

-stayed in bed all day

-given someone a reason to believe in God (hopefully)

-done something scandalous

-built a tree house

-decoupage a table

-wrote a letter to the editor

-spent one month without a TV

-spent a day in the nursing home

-cleaned out my closet and donated to the needy

-donated books

-read Atlas Shrugged

-read to children

-spent a day with a toddler

-found a long, straight road and saw how fast I could go (I don't suggest this)

-fossil-hunted

-dried some flowers

-gone on a silent retreat

-traveled alone

-learned to sew

-gone paintballing

-skinny dip

-go on an unplanned trip

-caught fireflies

-swim with dolphins

-made my own icecream

-done cartwheels for no reason

-rolled my own sushi

-walked on the beach in the winter

-left my umbrella and took a walk in the rain

-gone someplace where I saw a moose and a bear

-talked a cop out of a ticket (more like cried out of one)

-vote

-dyed my hair

-swallowed my pride

-line danced

-write a haiku

-talked to my grandparents about their childhoods

-sung the Hallelujah chorus in the shower

-change jobs

-mended fences

-played Hamlet (yes, I have)

-run through sprinklers with my clothes on

-harmonized

-started a conversation with a stranger

-written thank you notes when it wasn't required

-carried someone else's burden

-thrown a surprise party

-finger paint

-caught a snowflake on my tounge

-seen a rode0

-cut off a bad relationship

-had a really great foot massage

-moved

-given a friend a copy of my favorite book

-eaten salt water taffy

-sung Christmas carols in August

-climbed a tree

-hang a spoon from my nose

-write a personal note on Chrismtas cards

-had a cookout that ended with s'mores

-enjoyed a moment without expecting it to last

-taken the Meyer's Briggs

-roll down a small hill

-made soup from scratch

-picked a lock

-pulled an all nighter

-win a game of Trivial Pursuit

-ordered from the kids menu

-shopped from a farmers market

-coached little league

-been a godparent

-skipped rocks

-worn two different shoes

-found out if blondes do have more fun (they don't)

-gone down in a submarine

-sat in an empty church and sang

-visited an ice cream truck

-made my own recipe for chili

-attended an outdoor blue grass festival

-finished a game of Risk

-mamboed

-left cookies and milk for Santa

-read banned books

-been a write in on a ballot (thank you TTU bio department!)

Apparently, I'm living. And I plan on continuing the trend....

Believe....

I believe that:

-a hug can change perspective

-laughing until you cry is necessary

-sometimes a good cry really does cure all

-driving with the windows down is just better

-everyone has at least one great novel in them

-conversations with your best friend about nothing can actually be lifechanging

-the best season is the one you're in

-no memory should be regretted. You live, you learn, you grow

-mistakes are how you learn

-staying in your pj's all day on Saturday should happen at least once a month

-I figure more out about life at 3am while I clean house

-smiling at strangers confuses

-big, obnoxious sunglasses are fun

-silly songs should be sung

-hot chocolate and sm'ores have miraculous healing powers

-sometimes only Momma can make it better

-miracles happen every day

-surronding ourselves with people who make us laugh is true wisdom

-if you don't take risks, you risk more than you know

-love always wins, even if not in the way we thought it would

-there is not a single person who can save our country- it takes us all

-there is no one who can make you happy outside of ourselves

-we are the answers to most of our questions

-life is good.

We fight so much about what we disagree on, we forget thats its the little things we all believe in that unite us and give us power