booyah

Dear Diary - 
Tonight I made a delish meal in our new house and called my mom to come over for dinner.  Because I can:) Because we live in the same town.  Booyah.


I've written the opening sentence to this blog post no fewer than 50 times.  It's been 27 days since my last blog post.  Well, one that wasn't a photo challenge.  Anyway, it's not a big deal.  To the world I mean.  It's not even that big a deal to those that check in here once in a while.  Most of them (you) know me and know that I moved to another planet.  Sometimes it feels that way.  But it's a cool planet and my parents live here, so that's nice.


So yeah, in the grand scheme of things, 27 days without a  blog post from the leader of the nerd herd is no biggy.  Except to her (me).


If you blog, you do it for a reason.  For the emotional outlet, the attention, the creative outlet, the sharing, the crafting, the adoration of your doting mother who thinks you are the most brilliant writer since writing was invented.  Unless of course you have a fantabulous skill like sewing or baking and photography and you really do have something amazing to teach the world.  That is not why I blog (see reasons before having a skill).


For me blogging is a joyous mental dump of what is in my heart, my mind and often my camera.  I honestly started doing it strictly for myself.  I wanted to somehow preserve the flow of positive energy that comes from my babies and my husband. My cousin brothers and their families.  My parents, my Aunts.  The city, the farm.   About the same time I started this blog, I edited my Facebook profile "about me" section to simply read

"I am happy"

For reasons unknown to me still, I felt a push to document joy.  Love.  Support.  Family.  Positive energy.  Cheese.


And then...things changed.  As they do.  And so much was lost and suddenly I was documenting things that were so very different.  Sadness.  Loss.  Heartache.  Strength.  Courage.  Tears.  Fear.  Change.


And still there was Joy.  Love.  Support.  Family...cheese.


In the last 27 days, we've plowed through a change that was somewhat unplanned and fairly spontaneous.  I abandoned my career to come home.  I asked my husband to do the same, to abandon his career and come home with me.  To leave his home.  I asked my kids to leave the first home they have known and first close friends they  made and trust me when I told them this would be awesome.  It feels good, it feels right, but it feels very different.  For the first time in a long time, I'm intimidated by what's in front of me.  Time to grow again.  Life...phase 4.


Tonight, I write from my desk in my home office in the great state of South Dakota.  I have 15 windows surrounding me in this office...it's incredible.  Every night I sit here with the shades open, marveling at how dark it is in South Dakota.  There are so many stars here.  And they are so quiet.  At times it does feel like another planet.


The only other thing I can see is the word "Inspire" hanging on the wall.  Yes, time to grow again.  Phase 4.

What I did this summer by Fricka...leader of the nerd herd.

I took my son out in a white onesie all the time because the heat of hell has come to the Midwest.

I let him plop in the kiddie pool in all his clothes for the very same reason.


I begged Grandma to come over every single weekend so we could pack.

I waited very impatiently for him to come home whenever he could.

I wished I hadn't unpacked 3 years ago.

I promised her she will be fine in her new school.

I dreamed of my new office in my new house.

I went to back to corporate school and learned corporate stuffs.

I laughed at muffin jokes.


And promised Baby Calvin his new house would fit him better.  It does.

I ate way too many treats.

I made the trip to see, to paint and to move.

I came home.

good enough

On this...the last day of our month off, I had planned a blog about lessons learned during this time.  Or perhaps one about preparing to inject ourselves back into society.  Or about our new path and how everything happens for a reason and unbeknownst to us...this month off happened because we would need clear minds and refreshed bodies for unexpected challenges to come.


I'm sure any one of them would have been fine...I have it all jammed in my head and that is how these posts get life...a dump of what is in my head, my heart, my camera.


But then, I received the first guest blog submission.  And it left me feeling a little exposed.  As if she wrote it for me, to explain why I ducked out of the world the last 30 days.  


Everything happens for a reason. 


You've seen her face here a million times.  I rarely use names.  If you recognize her face, you know her...probably by a nickname you've affectionately given her.  If you don't, you can call her TT.  

She is my girl, my sister, my gestational partner.  She is strength and light and the most faith filled woman I know.  Optimism radiates from her, able to fill worried hearts with hope even in the worst of times.  Like all of us, she has things to say.


I'm thrilled she decided to take the leap and write and even more thrilled she decided to share it here:)

::
Something has been brewing in my mind for awhile . . .

Barrett: I want to live my life with variety.

Teresa: Yes, but let’s not kill ourselves trying.

When did we evolve into multi-tasking, “I can do it all” creatures.  It is not okay anymore to just be proficient in one thing.  So much, that each moment gets lost into the next trying to be, or say, or know.  We are a generation expected to be everything all at once.   In believing I am superhuman, each day I wake up with my own self expectation to be:

A brilliant mother, wife, sister, daughter, employee, friend

An expert in art, technology, pop culture, politics, fashion, finances

A good, honest, optimistic and faith-filled self

And those are just the “A” list.  There are also all the things that I dream to be brilliant at if I only had a few more moments.  There is the saying, “when life was simpler” and I believe that it must have existed and can exist in my life.   Not to the degree that life is stripped of the adventure, action and challenge but back to a time when I didn’t have to be brilliant at all things, all the time, all at once, every day.  I am over stimulated with choices and overwhelmed with guilt when I allow one of these expectations to slip.  It’s a lot to ask. Now I know that it is not healthy to compartmentalize my life, nor would it be fulfilling.  I want to feel, see, learn and ponder .   It is just like when Barrett and I go out to dinner, 9 times out 10 I convince him to order an array of appetizers instead of dinner because I want to taste all the flavors.  That is why I wouldn’t give up any of the things that are on the “A” list.  I enjoy every flavor that they add to my life. 

But when is it okay to admit failure, give something up or just abandon a task or hobby because it has become so overwhelming that  we no longer are best at the things that matter most in our lives? My frustration with this expectation isn’t solely selfish.  What I have begun to notice in those I admire the most is they are burning out.  That this internal “A” list we each have is weighing us all down and we are left some days with only enough energy to go to sleep.  I think we spend far too much time focusing on what we are not being instead of all the things that we are.  I want to inject satisfaction into people.  Make them feel comfort in knowing that the people who love them most only define them as brilliant and no one is focusing on their unwritten and unaccomplished to do list for that day.  We waste so much energy on this kind of thinking and does it really benefit us? 

When Maria died I wondered if I was too optimistic that I actually failed to notice the end.  I questioned that for a really long time (still do) that I might have made other choices our last Christmas, the weekends in SoDak, the phone calls, the emails.  But every time I come to the same conclusion, that if I had focused on what was to come or all the things I didn’t do, I would not have actually lived the moments we did make.  So my first lesson is to embrace my optimism as a gift. And the second is that I am back to believing that “when life was simpler” can exist right now within me.  But it doesn’t come without going against the grain.  The grain of my own being: my inner leader, striver, and goal seeker.  Not that these traits will ever disappear but I am going to introduce them to contentment and self pride and acceptance.  

ee

i say, and so say i
my morning thought
it knew itself just fine
until across the room
it caught its first glimpse of my afternoon
how can it be
that these things live in me?

i say, and so say i
my morning's day seems nothing like its night
my night so self assured
was all at sea when faced with dawns strange world
how can it be
that these things live in me?

How Can it Be? by Forever Thursday

TT