Sunday, February 19, 2012

Happy Ever Afters

Day 18- My wedding\ my future wedding\ my past wedding.

As all of you know, I'm the biggest hopeless romantic anyone will ever meet, so naturally, i have my wedding day all planned out.

I want my wedding dress to look something like these.


I want my invitations to look something like these:

I would love for my rings to look something like this!


I want an outdoor wedding, maybe even a casual picnic reception like this:

I love these cakes!:


I love these flowers!:

Friday, February 17, 2012

If I Should Have a Daughter

If I Should Have A Daughter by Sarah Kay

If I should have a daughter, instead of Mom, she's going call me Point B, because that way she knows that no matter what happens, at least she can always find her way to me.


And I'm going to paint solar systems on the backs of her hands, so she has to learn the entire universe before she can say, "Oh, I know that like the back of my hand."


And she's going to learn that this life will hit you hard in the face, wait for you to get back up just so it can kick you in the stomach.


But getting the wind knocked out of you is the only way to remind your lungs how much they like the taste of air.


There is hurt here that cannot be fixed by Band-Aids or poetry.


So the first time she realizes that Wonder Woman isn't coming, I'll make sure she knows she doesn't have to wear the cape all by herself.


Because no matter how wide you stretch your fingers, your hands will always be too small to catch all the pain you want to heal.


Believe me, I've tried. "And, baby," I'll tell her, “Don't keep your nose up in the air like that. I know that trick; I've done it a million times. You're just smelling for smoke so you can follow the trail back to a burning house, so you can find the boy who lost everything in the fire to see if you can save him. Or else find the boy who lit the fire in the first place, to see if you can change him."


But I know she will anyway, so instead I'll always keep an extra supply of chocolate and rain boots nearby, because there is no heartbreak that chocolate can't fix.


Okay, there's a few heartbreaks that chocolate can't fix, but that's what the rain boots are for.


Because rain will wash away everything, if you let it.


I want her to look at the world through the underside of a glass-bottom boat, to look through a microscope at the galaxies that exist on the pinpoint of a human mind, because that's the way my mom taught me.


That there'll be days like this.


When you open your hands to catch and wind up with only blisters and bruises; when you step out of the phone booth and try to fly and the very people you want to save are the ones standing on your cape; when your boots will fill with rain, and you'll be up to your knees in disappointment.

And those are the very days you have all the more reason to say thank you.

Because there's nothing more beautiful than the way the ocean refuses to stop kissing the shoreline, no matter how many times it's sent away.

You will put the win in win some, lose some.

You will put the star in starting over, and over.

And no matter how many land mines erupt in a minute, be sure your mind lands on the beauty of this funny place called life.

And yes, on a scale from one to over-trusting, I am pretty naive.

But I want her to know that this world is made out of sugar.

It can crumble so easily, but don't be afraid to stick your tongue out and taste it.

"Baby," I'll tell her, "Remember, your mama is a worrier, and your papa is a warrior, and you are the girl with small hands and big eyes who never stops asking for more."

Remember that good things come in threes and so do bad things.

And always apologize when you've done something wrong.

But don't you ever apologize for the way your eyes refuse to stop shining.

Your voice is small, but don't ever stop singing.

And when they finally hand you heartache, when they slip war and hatred under your door and offer you handouts on street-corners of cynicism and defeat, you tell them that they really ought to meet your mother.


Monday, February 6, 2012

Wings

“I want to think again of dangerous and noble things. I want to be light and frolicsome. I want to be improbable and beautiful and afraid of nothing as though I had wings.” -Mary Oliver

Unity Through Tragedy

This is the fifth person at my school who has died this year.

First was an English teacher, from cancer.

Then Corey and Christina from the car crash back in November.

Next was my friend’s cousin, Chris, who committed suicide a couple weeks ago.

Now, the football coach’s daughter died in a car crash on the Thursday night of the week Chris committed suicide.

It’s weird, in an awful way. Our school family has been through so much together. We’ve had happy times, for sure, but the loss this year has been immense.

People always say that they didn’t know people our age could die, and I would think “Are you stupid? Everyone can die!” But now I understand. You know they can die, you just aren’t expecting it. They’re so young; they have so much life ahead of them. They haven’t lived long. You just don’t expect it to happen to someone as young as them.

The girl who was killed in the car crash on Thursday night, she went to a school nearby that my friend’s mom taught at. We made a banner for them, like they made for us when Corey and Christina were killed back in November. We’ve been having fundraisers, to raise money for her family, just like our rival schools did for us.

My friend’s mom told me that they were stunned by everything my school has done for them, and I remember back in November. A week after Corey and Christina died, our principal came over the announcement system, and told us that one of our rivals raised $5 thousand dollars for us and the families, and our other rival raised $3 thousand.

I remember being shocked, and even though I was gutted about the accident, knowing that even though we were opponents, that they really came around us and supported us when we needed it.

I truly believe that God is using these tragedies to pull us together and bring us to him. Please pray for our school, and the other schools that have lost someone. Thanks!