I saw you

I saw you at the grocery store last month on one of those beautiful days that we get treated to occasionally in December where we can actually go without coats. I haven't stopped thinking about you. You were ahead of me in line, in fact you were the only person in line.  I couldn't help but notice you.  The pallor of your face made me wonder if you were sick.  I noticed your arms after that.  Your skin was so dry and the bruises ran from the top of your arm down to your wrists.  I have never seen that in someone so young.  Then I noticed what you were buying and I wanted to tell you that you didn't need to buy that, my heart screamed say something but you looked so fragile I didn't know if it would put you over the edge.  The checker noticed what you were buying too and even though she was but a teenager I am sure she knew, like I did, that your dry skin wasn't from a lack of moisture and your bruises weren't from something easily explained.  I can still see those four boxes of laxatives in my mind, just four boxes, no food, and how you quickly paid for your purchase in cash and left as quickly as you could.  I can't get you out of my mind and I have prayed for you to realize that you are beautiful, exactly as you are and that you see it before you kill yourself to be some version of beautiful that for the majority of women is not realistic. Everyone is beautiful in their own way and that is part of what makes this world so wonderful, we are all different.  If this ever is put in your way to read I hope you know that I think of you and pray you'll be fine in the end.  The next time I'll listen to my heart and tell you that you're beautiful, we all need to know that.

What's Going On?

There's a radio show I listen to called "The Catholic Guy with Lino Rulli" for entertainment, learning and to make my ride more enjoyable.  A segment on this show is called "What's Going On?".  I find myself asking that question more frequently as time goes on.  We are living in a world where planes are shot down and no one takes responsibility, where a nation is torn in two and both sides are bombing each other, where people are so busy fighting about their differences that they lose sight of what we have in common.  I don't think of myself as being innocent and seeing the world through rose colored glasses but there is beauty in our diversity and embracing it would be so much easier than fighting about our differences.  Why can't all the extremists in every facet of this world see that?  Maybe I am more innocent than I think but I want to know what's going on?

Change of focus

I started this blog years ago with the best of intentions to blog regularly and on life in general, baskets, kids but regular blogging did not happen.  I've been mulling it over for a while and I think the focus was off, I have so many other things that I would like to talk about.  I'll still write about those topics but I'm also going to write about other things and thoughts that are important to me, that inspire me, intrigue me, make me question or just plain get my mouth running.  I think changing my focus will allow me to write regularly and maybe, just maybe there will be some discussion down the road.  Here's to changes, let's embrace them and use them to make us who we are meant to be.

Still plugging along

Ever feel like life's going too fast and you're moving too slow?  That's life lately.  I had planned on taking this year that I am not working to do all the things I dreamed of doing while I was working.  Four months into my year and I have not accomplished much of what was on my list but what I have managed to do is take time to smell the roses.  Are we sometimes too busy living that we forget to notice what's important?  I know my year will end before I want it to but I hope that when I go back to work I remember to smell the roses.

An open letter to Miley Cyrus

Dear Miley,
Wow.  That was all I could say for a couple of days after your performance at the VMAs.  Wow.  I was speechless and as anyone who knows me could tell you that does not happen very often in my life.  I am still trying to figure out exactly the message you tried to send with your performance and I am sure the message I received was not the one you thought you were sending.  I saw on stage a girl, yes a girl,  not a woman, who was attempting to show that she was no longer a child but a grown woman. I saw a child who did not have an idea of how to embrace her beauty and power as a potential woman.  I saw a child who was emulating everything that is negative about sexuality and in her actions bringing down the status of any woman of a similar age.  Before you write off this letter as just another old person who does not "get" your artistry let me tell you a little about myself.  I have sons your age and I hear the way they and their peers think of girls who behave in a manner far tamer than your performance in a flesh colored vinyl set of underwear.  They have seen girls in action in years past who threw themselves at boys in the past and they do not want to have anything to do with them.  You see, those girls are the ones that everyone "had a good time with" but not ones that anyone would think of spending a life with.  With one little action, one mistake, you can miss out on some wonderful people and times in life.

 
Years down the road you may have children, I hope you do, and one day they will see your "performance".  Will you be proud of it?  Will you have words to explain it to your son or daughter when their "friends" taunt them with it?  Will you want them to do similar things in life or will you do everything in your power to stop them from making mistakes that last a lifetime?  You see, in our world nothing is temporary, someone can always find it on the internet.

I want to say thank you for giving me a teaching moment with my sons, albeit an awkward one.  With one shining example they now have a grasp on who they do not want to bring home to mom & dad.  Thank you for that.  I just hope you can live with whatever the future lays at your feet.

Sincerely,
A mom

Whew- where does time go

It seems the older I get the more time flies.  I look at the calendar & it clearly tells me that it's February but my mind's stuck back in November.  Somehow the holidays are a blur and I don't feel like I finished anything that needed to be done but the calendar tells me that Valentine's Day is already in the past and I'm looking at St. Patrick's Day and Easter on the horizon.  We were talking Lent songs at choir, we're waiting for our Easter music order to arrive and I'm still stuck somewhere in the Fall.  Time moves on whether or not we take the time to enjoy all the everyday events.

New Year, New Ideas

It's a New Year and it's time to do new things, change things & move on with life.  Look for the positive, fix the negative and thank God for them both.