back to reality.

i started this blog four months ago when i came home after a long 8 months of being on the road.  plans were finalized this week.  i return to the skies mid-month.  i'm still not sure how i feel about this.

i started writing because sometimes i think i took for granted the minutiae of everyday life.  routine.  comfort.  i think i like the boring parts of life more than the exciting parts just because i feel more at home.  i needed an outlet to make sure i started thinking about life as more than just vacations and holidays and huge change-your-life moments. thus, the blog came to life.

i'm really glad i like my job as much as i do, because that makes everything easier.  i chose this position this time around and i'm very thankful to be given the opportunity to keep doing something i'm really good at, but i've gotten so settled back into my minutiae that i don't know how i will trade normalcy for constant change.

i preach change, i teach change.

i can't handle change.

i'm not thrilled about trading 7:30 alarm clocks for 4:00 alarm clocks (that 5:30 to charlotte's a bitch), my 5 minute car ride to work for two and a half hours in the sky.  my bunn coffeemaker and bubba keg for starbucks from concourse d in charlotte. (it's always less crowded than the one near the concourse c security checkpoint.  yes, these are things i have to take into account on a weekly basis.)  but i am excited about trading apathy and disinterest for excitement and appreciation, maid service and waffle wednesdays. being surrounded by like minded people that share my work ethic and strive for improvement.

i will miss being able to run on wednesdays and fridays.  i will miss coffee with the girls.  i will miss waking up in my own bed 7 days a week.  i will miss my poor attempts at home cooked meals, feeding the cats every morning, and the cries of "medic!!" as thomas plays team fortress.  i will miss inevitably falling asleep on the couch.

but it's a stepping stone to something better, i'm certain.

right?

reflections on a percentage.

i am twenty-four years old.  yesterday marked the point where i realized i had spent twenty-five percent of my life with my husband.  wow.  it really made me take a step back and think of what that meant.

i met thomas after playing a gig in beckley.  special guest had played that night with a few other bands and it was a homecoming of sorts for me, having not played since i went away to college.  he was there supporting his brother, who had played bass for one of the bands that night, and it was the first time i had met him, even though i had agreed to spend the rest of that week before christmas helping him on a film, lifting and toting and the like.  i had no idea what i was getting out of the deal.  i thought it would just be some work experience in my field.  look what i ended up with.

fast forward to now.  we've been married three years, together for six.  as i posted on love several weeks ago, my ideas on what marriage is and isn't have changed significantly, though i believe it's for the best.  i got myself locked into a partnership, not a romance.  it's a series of challenges, a teammate to help me get through this thing called life.  i love where we've made it so far.

there are a lot of people i know that knew me for many years before they knew my husband.  it warms my heart to know there are also a lot of people that have never known us apart.  to many of our friends, we have always been a unit, our names generally used together, not ever knowing one without the other.  and while we are both very independent people and i sometimes cringe at the idea of being even slightly dependent on someone else (i am thankful for someone who can reach the cabinet above the fridge and unscrew stubborn jars), i like knowing that without that twenty-five percent of my life with him in it i would be a very different person, probably not nearly as happy and successful as i am now.

love.

i got to thinking about a lot of things today.  hours and hours in a car with nasty weather will do that to you.  i started thinking about love.  there are so many different types of love, and i hate that.  just because apples and oranges are both fruits doesn't mean they're the same.  we all have different kinds of love for different kinds of people.

back when i started dating my now husband, i wanted to keep the kind of mad, whirlwind love we had.  it happened so fast.  love at first sight?  not quite, but i sure was crazy about him.  i wanted it to last, i wanted to feel that rush of romantic love forever.  needless to say, it didn't last.  you fall into patterns and routines and you get so used to each other that well, it's not the kind of love that takes your breath away anymore. but it's the kind of love that i love the most.  the "old people still together after 60 years of marriage" kind of love.  i like nothing more than to fall asleep on the couch, the cat sleeping above my head, him playing video games, a comfortable kind of love.

what's so wrong with that?  i think people get so hung up in the kisses and roses that we lose sight of what love really is.  just wanting to be around another person, not having to talk to them or engage them.  you just want to be in their company.

i have a habit of saying "i love you".  i didn't used to, though; it took me a long time to be able to say it.  i wouldn't tell my family i loved them because it wasn't cool.  i wouldn't tell my school boyfriends i loved them because that felt too weird.  and then i met the crew, who used those words so freely it drove me crazy.  and probably because of them, and because i love them so much, i say it all the time.

i leave the house in the morning and those are the last words i say to my husband. i hang up the phone with my best friend in the world and i tell him i love him.  i always tell my parents and family i love them, every time i depart, whether its when i see them or when i talk to them.

maybe i use it too much but i'm just full of love these days.

i suppose this is a post to everyone who reads this blog.  probably because i know its only good friends and family, but just so you know, i think you're fabulous.

and yes, i love you.

nana.

a year and a half ago, my nana passed away.

the weekend of july 18th, i had planned on going out to missouri to visit her, riding with my dad out there so we could save on gas and make the twelve-hour drive a little easier, but things just didn't quite work out.  instead, i loaded up my husband and my brother and we made the trip a week early.  if i hadn't made that trip i would have missed her.

 i stayed with my aunt in the city where she was in the hospital.  we went to visit her that saturday, and then sunday before we took off for home again. she looked so frail, not that she was a big woman to begin with, but so, small.  fragile.  she was quite talkative, though, and in a great mood, telling us about the nurses, and how she got ice cream every day.  she called me by my cousin's name the whole time.  then, it bothered me because i felt like she didn't know who i was, but looking back on it now, i laugh, remembering how she always did that, to me, to my dad, my brother.  we stayed until i just couldn't hold back the tears or stand the smell of hospitals, the stench of urine and antiseptic and sadness.  i went back inside to give her one last hug and to tell  her i loved her.

i was in my hometown the night i got the call.  dad was on the other end of the line while i sat in a gas station parking lot, sobbing, heaving, wondering how he was able to speak so clearly when i could barely breathe.  sarah found me like that when she got back in the car and somehow we got to the house.  i walked in and all i could say to thomas was "she's dead."

three days later i was back in missouri.  it was the strangest time i've had to date.  there were the funeral arrangements, figuring out what to do with all of the stuff you accumulate in 89 years, emotions running high and low.  it didn't really click until we made it to the funeral home, and then it sunk in.  so many thoughts in my head:  she's gone.  i really won't ever see her again.  at least they did her hair and makeup well enough, she'd hate to look bad the last time we all see her.

when it was all said and done we went back to the house with the whole family.  i wish i could say that it was a time of sadness but i think we were all so uplifted from the funeral that we were ok.  it was a time of storytelling, learning what a badass my nana was, laughing at geico commercial references and being in awe of her war stories.  we got trashed throwing lawn darts at beer cans in the backyard.  it was a true alabama/west virginia good time with the cousins.  all in all i think it was all exactly how she would've wanted it to be.  even after she was gone, the house was filled with love and laughter and plenty of red wine.

her house finally sold, so my parents brought me some things from her house to then fill my house with reminders of her.  the shinto artwork guarding my front door, happy god of wealth to grant my wishes.

i didn't cry until i pulled a japanese figurine from a box.  i shook off all the packing peanuts and the scent of her perfume wafted into my living room.  i can still smell it.  its one thing i always associate with her.

i'm going to wear her hat again this weekend; another treasure from nana's house.  i felt so classy in it.  i love my nana so much, and while i know i'll never be as tough as her, as classy as her, as strong-willed as her, i can feel it for a little while when i'm "making a statement" in a bold feathered fedora.  i know she'd be proud.