I imagine you're thinking from the title of this post I'm about to write about some man and a fairy tale. Not so much, you'll see.
Let me start with this week. If I had to sum up this week, I'd describe it by the following events:
1. I spent all of Saturday and Sunday in bed. I literally did not remove myself from my bed. I watched The Notebook, Love Song, Eat,Pray,Love, My Best Friend's Wedding, The Notebook again, all of the previous week's Oprah episodes. And I slept, more than I've slept in months. I also cried. I'll get to the crying in a moment.
2. I reached the 2-year mark with JC.
3. My parent's put their house up for sale. The house I still call home has a for-sale sign in the yard.
Now zoom out to the last month.
1. We moved. Back to apartment life until I can afford to buy a house. I'm loving it, especially the 5-minute commute and park within walking distance.
2. A tornado ripped through St. Louis, literally within 5 miles of the new place.
3. My best friend sat me down and listened while I broke open.
OK now zoom to the past year.
1. I moved away from a city that I LOVED. And although I loved St. Louis when I left, I feel as if someone picked me up and plopped me down here and it's not MY hometown anymore. Everything is the same, but I'm different and I don't know how to function here.
2. I started a job that I'm grateful to have, but ... well there's just a but.
3. I miss. That's not an incomplete statement. This is how I feel. I just miss. It's not a thing, or a person, or a place. I just feel that I've lost and am losing things... they're slipping away and I don't feel the way I felt one year ago. Maybe it was longer than that. Probably more like 2 years ago. All I know is that I remember feeling hopeful, excited, passionate, confident, content, loved, energetic, and full. And I miss. I just miss.
Back to the love story. I admit that I've watched too much TV lately. One show that I'm not ashamed of watching, however, is Shania Twain's Why Not on OWN. I've always loved Shania Twain. I think she's one of the few famous people that I think I would enjoy just being around. She makes me laugh and I think she's beautiful from the inside out. Anyway she said something that made me say out loud, "Me too!" It was something along the lines of feeling "choked up" all the time.
"The feeling you get when you want to cry but you fight it and you get all choked up ... it's as if now I permanently have that feeling, whether I want to cry or not!"
-Shania Twain
She goes on to admit that she's not a crier and doesn't think every human being needs a therapist. I started thinking about this. First, I absolutely agree. I don't want a therapist. But I feel as if I have slowly shut-up and in turn built up a tsunami of tears. I refuse to cry 99% of my life, but these days I'm always on the verge. I can't pinpoint one thing causing this, all I know is that I turn 25 in August and I feel obligated to start living out love rather than the silent, meaninglessness that I feel I've lived for the past couple of years.
Life's two most important questions are "why" and "why not." The trick is knowing which one to ask.
-Gordon Livingston
As I dwelled on my sadness and what to do about it this week, Oprah encouraged me to do something I don't know if I know how to do. She said to get to that quiet place and listen to the voice, you know the one that tells you what it is that you want and you need to hear. Maybe I know how, I just don't make the effort to get to that place and to listen. I have the weekend to myself, and I think I'm going to work on first getting to that peaceful place and then opening my heart, ears, mind, and soul to that voice. Because the love story I'm talking about isn't a white picket fence and a fairy-tale princess wedding. It's not about a man. It's knowing that what I do each day will leave footprints in this world that spell out love.
