coming home

 i havent written on this for a while.  ive made several different excuses up in my head.  some are the obvious- too busy, too much stress, broken keyboard, blah blah blah.  even though these are all valid excuses, the biggest one was that i was LIVING.  

finally- I have a home.  

this is a very sensitive subject for me to touch and that could be the biggest (and most valid) excuse that i have. 

i grew up in a small house with my three sisters and parents for the majority of my life.  close to a small airport and even closer to a railroad line.  the sounds and sights of planes cutting through the air and the vibrations of the windows and loud sounding horn blasts of the trains have always comforted me in a way.  we would play with the nighborhood kids on our bikes during summer days then have campouts in the backyard at night.  my sisters and i made up games outside- they always involved using our imaginations and made us feel free.  the roof leaked, all four of us shared one bedroom most of the time and one bathroom.  yep- four girls, one bathroom.  there was a red brick fireplace in the livingroom that was prime real estate in the winter time.  we didnt have a basement so you were always near someone.  it was our home.

when my dad had his accident, for reasons my sisters and i fought whole heartedly and in the end had no control over, we lost our home.  there were very few things we were able to retain except the most valuable thing we had: the memories we built together there.  

before we lost it, most of my sisters and i had moved out.  grown up. and begun finding our own places to build our own stories.  my dad always kept the doors open to us if we ever needed to come back though.  it was all of our home- he made sure that we knew that.

when i got married, we bought our first home just over a year later.  it was perfect.  small, charming, cozy and ours.  we worked on small projects; painted every room, installed new lights, grew a garden, had a patio and a back yard for our dogs then started a family to share it wiith.  i put love in every decoration i placed on a shelf and was proud to call it ours.

again, for reasons i had little control over, i had to leave my home.

i found a place and moved out in three weeks.  it was a scramble of what i was trying to live through day to day and at the same time start fresh on my own.  i found an apartment on the opposite end of town, moved what i could with the help of a few close friends, set up a bedroom for the kids and made it work.  when my lease was up a year later- even though i knew it would be tough, i also knew that it was time to stop surviving through what i cant control and make my own home.  

i searched for a while and was picky.  its kinda my thing.  then- i found it....

this is my home.

I'm here and im happy.   

this is my life and i am taking charge of it. 

decor and all.  

Choice

photographic memories

I have aspirations of captuing beauty like this...

http://instagram.com/b3njamin

http://instagram.com/folkmagazine

i always thought it was strange that when i was seeing or experiencing something that i didnt want to forget or that i felt a deep connection to, i would close my eyes, open them, and then close them again.  

i was taking a mental picture of that moment.  

making sure to use all my senses at once. 

listening to the ocean with my eles closed.

taking a deep, body filling breath and capturing the smell of the air.  

feeling the temperature of the air on my skin. 

listening to the music with your whole body.  

feeling what was intended on being brought to the surface through someone elses talents and passions.  

in the last year, in all the difficult moments, ive also had some incredibly powerful, beautiful and progressive moments.  im trying to hold on to those mental pictures.  

remembering the emotional relics that have reawakened a determination to be happy in myself.  unapologetically.   

nurturing those things may seem selfish at times, but i see it as strengthening. 

being strong has always been my core. 

now its time to build off what has made that core solid.  

flaws and all

"you have the right to be selfish with your heart."

"there are times when you need to just stand your ground"

"you are so much more than you give yourself credit for."

"you deserve more."

this was some pretty honest advice/feedback that i heard from a dear friend of mine on a long overdue coffee, pastry and catch up date.   

she knows ME. 

she knows that i DESERVE to be happy.  

she has been there through the ups and downs and never ran away when things got tough.

she is one of the people in my life that i can come to, no matter how long its been since the last time we saw eachother, and she will give me the ear and voice that i need.    

but for some reason, i just cant pull the trigger.  

i cant just STOP.  

i havent allowed myself to see what she has seen in me.

im not one of those people that makes a decison, says something or feels a certain way,  on a whim or becuse its convenient.  

i truely FEEL.  

i have only recently figured out that this isnt how all people do things.

it took too much to get to this point but i finally did.  what i do now is the hard part.

maybe its because my dad drove into my head to be YOU.  to be honest and intentional with what you say and who you associate with..... 

this is one of the hardest things for me to just DO.  

to just stop allowing others to control how i feel. 

everyone needs to have boundaries, to know where your limits are and when to step in and PROTECT yourself.  

but you have to become strong enough to stand alone.  

i know that i am a fighter and why not fight to be "enough".  

yes, im impatient, but i also know that i deserve to know that i am enough right now.  

flaws and all.

i just have to buy into it too.

maps

"MAPS" Yeah Yeah Yeahs

the meaning behind my favorite YYYs song:

Fact: Karen O wrote this song about her then boyfriend, Angus Andrew. MAPS is an acronym for My Angus Please Stay. Angus was set to leave and accept a job offer and this was Karen O’s inspiration for the song.

Another Fact: In this music video, according to an interview with Karen O, she said her tears were real and the reason for this:

"They were real tears. My boyfriend at the time was supposed to come to the shoot – he was three hours late and I was just about to leave for tour.
I didn’t think he was even going to come and this was the song that was written for him…”

I had heard this song so many times before i knew anything behind the meaning of it and liked it.  but just enough to not be annoyed by its catchy, repetitive and obviously sad sound.  then someone pointed out that there was more to the song than what it had to offer at face value..and i fell in love with it.  

how many times do we take something at face value, not really thinking about how it came to be?   how many times do we think we know about something or even someone and come to find nothing but a beautiful moment shared with a stranger?

too many times.

slow down.  breathe.  take the time to know who/what is around you and why you are putting energy into it.  

listen to the story behind the words.  

fall in love with this moment.

http://youtu.be/oIIxlgcuQRU

found

i kinda love this guy right now.  a lot

that is all.

http://youtu.be/wsWSXPKYwPo

sparrek

no words right now

http://www.juxtapoz.com/current/photographs-by-kylli-sparre-aka-sparrek

we should see other people

anger has always been a friend of mine.

we've had a year of closeness that we've never had before.

but some relationships are more damaging than good.  im figuring this out...finally.

im tired of loosing what i care about because anger (along with its close sidekick, fear) cause me to push anything as far away as possible so that i wont be hurt again.

so its time to breakup- im done.  im exhausted.  i want to be happy and anger doesn't like happy.

im sure we will see each other around...but hopefully, we can be cordial with each other.

...much needed

I needed this time today.

my bike, headphones, water and helmet.  

just me, my thoughts and a trail.

i know ive been putting time off for me lately.  ive been too busy playing "catch-up" with life that it seems like ive forgotten to just sit and breathe.

im an expert at avoiding all that i have stirring in my head.  all the things that im figuring out i cannot avoid any longer.  things that have done nothing but become sandbags tied to my feet.  

i have to keep moving forward.

half way through my ride, i pulled off the trail and down to the river.  leaned my bike against a tree and 

just sat.  alone.  it was perfect.

  

i think i rode just under 11 miles and somehow, when i turned around to finish up my ride i realized that i was going so much faster than i had been going the entire first half of my ride.  it had nothing to do with the grade of the trail, catching a "second wind" or even figuring out which gear to be in.

i felt lighter.  

just taking time to really be present and allow myself to really breathe somehow shed some of the weight that i (and only i) keep allowing myself to carry around every single day.

i couldn't stop smiling. 

and i didn't want to stop riding.

warmth

I swear that I will actually write something soon.  just can't stop reading this though 

fer serious!!

survive

I found this on Tumblr and immediately sent it out to some of the awesome people in my life.

heather hansen

http://www.behance.net/gallery/Emptied-Gestures/10063335

wholeness

“I actually attack the concept of happiness. 

The idea that - I don’t mind people being happy - but the idea that everything we do is part of the pursuit of happiness seems to me a really dangerous idea and has led to a contemporary disease in Western society, which is fear of sadness. 

It’s a really odd thing that we’re now seeing people saying “write down 3 things that made you happy today before you go to sleep”, and “cheer up” and “happiness is our birthright” and so on. 

We’re kind of teaching our kids that happiness is the default position - it’s rubbish. 

Wholeness is what we ought to be striving for and part of that is sadness, disappointment, frustration, failure; all of those things which make us who we are. 

Happiness and victory and fulfillment are nice little things that also happen to us, but they don’t teach us much. 

Everyone says we grow through pain and then as soon as they experience pain they say “Quick! Move on! Cheer up!” I’d like just for a year to have a moratorium on the word “happiness” and to replace it with the word “wholeness”. 

Ask yourself “is this contributing to my wholeness?” and if you’re having a bad day, it is.”

-Hugh Mackay

find your therapy

I realized today that i engulf myself in blogging when i seem to be going through something traumatic or overly emotional  

....this fucking blog is my therapy

it just hit me. 

i started my first blog, kandjlewis.blogspot.com, it was during my pregnancy with my first son, Parker.  that blog ended when my dad had his accident and passed.

and now ive started this one as i go through a roller coaster of a year (to put it insanely mildly)

so when i was told that i couldn't start a blog until i had a theme or vibe in mind and i did it anyway...it was because THIS is what its about- getting better with    me

DFS doesn't even begin to describe it.  

Stateless - Bloodstream

glow

fin

here he is.....

kick ass

I have this incredible drive right now to find "happy".  its hard to figure out the older you get and the more you change.  im pretty sure that when I was little,  "happy" was anywhere i was with my sisters.  any place that we were just able to play and BE kids was happy.  

no yelling, no fighting, no judgement, no fear, just Happy.  

through my entire educational career i was always, as my fifth grade teacher put it in one of my parent/teacher conferences, "a social butterfly".  so naturally, i was happy with friends.  i was (and may still be) a perpetual people pleaser.  this lead me to compete.  constantly.  i didnt just compete in the social realm, i was also extremely competitive in a physical way in sports.  i played a sport every season of the year as soon as i was old enough to.  "kick ass and take names" as my dad would constantly encourage me.  

i fought mentally to stay strong while i watched my parents marriage implode.  strong while my mom focused her jealous anger at me because my dad loved me so much that she felt threatened by it and had to mentally tear me apart every chance she had.  strong while i kept her secret affairs that i witnessed with my own eyes, hidden from everyone because she threatened my life and the happiness of my family if i ever let that secret out.  the whole time still competing with her drug addiction.  for her love.  for the real her.  

when she left us.  i shut down.  i really dont remember much from that chunk of time.  although it turned into a roughly 6 year blur- I survived it.  and that made me feel a twinge of pride.

pride in survival, pride in being strong enough to "make it through".  

that pride has become this sort of monster that makes me feel like failure is not even close to an 

option.  it has created self doubt, sef conciousness, and at times a good case (or ten) of the crazies.  

i am struggling to find a new comfort zone now.  i thought i had it in a husband, a home, a family, plenty of friends, a job that allowed a sense of comfort, and pride in...(my act was TIGHT!)  

now it seems as though one by one i have seen these go away. FAST.  

i am grasping to hold on to some piece of "me" that kept the life i had together.

strength has kinda always been my thing- and i lost that....until recently.

i am done waiting on others- i am going to be happy.  to FIND happy.  

as scary as that may be- i am ready.  

i am taking a step back, in a way.  back to my uber competitive days where i just fought constantly to BE STRONG.  i may be competing in a new environment but im used to fighting.  i just needed to allow myself to be weak for a while.  you cant be strong all the time.  its exhausting.  you cant be present in the moment and really soak in what youre experiencing: good or bad.  and arent those experiences what have made us who we are?  its strange to say it but im excited to take the challenge.  i have had to really be honest with the people i have been effected by the last year about where i am.  thats not fun to go through on either end.  but how can you expect to not have regrets down the road if youre not honest about how you feel right now?

i dont have the answers. 

i just know that i am ready to live my life passionately. intensely. honestly and fully.       

im ready to kick ass and take names again. 

   

“Think only of the past as its remembrance gives you pleasure.”

— Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice