smile

I've neglected my favorite hiding place (this blog) for far too long now. I can hardly find time for myself lately, which has presented no time to sit down and pour me out onto the page.

When I look around me all day there are so many different people. Yes - I do live in a big city these days so clearly I am going to see a various amount of of differents from a day to day basis. But what really gets me is how do we all stumble upon one another and become so significant to certain people and then just another to someone else. How many people am I just another to? Probably millions with the way our population is constantly increasing. Yet I remember that corny quote of "never stop smiling because you never know who's day you're making." Maybe that smile could turn into making just of of those others you see all the time a significant.

I find myself smiling at basically everyone just because, but what if we all did that regardless of stranger or friend. Everyone needs someone no matter how young or old. Guess my point is that people are going to be people and people need people. Do you have your person that gets you and you don't have to smile all the time? Smile anyway but you need your person or your people.

gone

This past week I have felt the gut wrenching pain of losing my hero in life. While it has been hard to see the small joys in daily life, I've been surrounded in so much love that it almost baffles me. The constant text messages, emails, prayers, flowers, letters and so on have been so encouraging.

I guess it does take a tragedy like this for people to step outside of their comfort zones and express their gratitude for you and your family in their life. Although that's not what my grandfather taught me all these 23 years and that's not how I seem to live my life day to day. So maybe I'm odd and completely set apart (well yes we already knew that), but I try my best to tell those that mean so much to me just how appreciated they are. I am so blessed to have the friends and family that I do. Even if it was a random ex or odd friend here and there, the love that I received for my loss has been so genuine.

The one message that stood out the most to me was an old boyfriend who simply wanted to let me know that my family and I were in his thoughts. He said he was worried because he knew that my grandfather meant the world to me. Even though we did date for about 7ish months, it touched me that after a year or 2 apart he still remembered and had it in his heart that this incredible man was something indescribable in my life. The little things like that have kept my hope up in the past few days. I'm so grateful for them and for the people who stepped out of their comfort zones to let me know I'm in their thoughts and prayers.

My grandfather was a special man and these past few days have been far from special, but the abounding adoration my family and I have felt from everyone who knew my grandfather has been truly great.

I miss him. I miss him more than words can express but I've my own personal guardian angel telling me I'm his monkey.

my John Wayne

Do not stand at my grave and weep;
I am not there. I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow,
I am the diamond glints on snow,
I am the sunlight on ripened grain,
I am the gentle autumn's rain.

When you awaken in the morning's hush,
I am the swift uplifting rush,
Of quiet birds circled flight
I am the soft stars that shine at night.
Do not stand at my grave and cry. I am not there. I did not die.

Robert Hepburn

He had an exuberant personality and a genuine character that made anyone want to be his friend. I will forever hear him saying to me "I'm his monkey" and how much he wanted me to be his daughter. He truly was a diamond among the rough and I was so blessed to be able to call him my grandfather. I love you grandpa.

the old days

I cursed the Academy (Battle Ground Academy that is) multiple times in my many years I attended. There were so many points when I wanted to be out of the small private school sector and go to a normal public school. Yet now a good eight years later I realized how much worth it all had been.

It has been weird for me to be back in my hometown as an adult now and living a completely different life than a little middle schooler I once was. With all this old territory comes all the old friends who know you so well whether you like it or not. At our house warming party last night a majority of the friends that came were good ole Academy people. It's crazy that even after a move in the middle of high school to middle of nowhere Texas and four years of college we're all just the same ole people.

At one point last night I looked up and saw a flashback to where we all were in the sixth grade. Our awkward little adolescent bodies and innovative heads were just at the beginning of where life would take us. It brought the biggest smile to my face to know that a small private school in Franklin, Tennessee brought me some of the greatest people into my life. Most people say when they see someone they went to high school with that they usually just try to avoid them and not make eye contact, but we're not like that in the least. Last night we all were standing in a circle just cracking up about all our years together and how stupid we all had been like it was yesterday. We know intricate details about one another that we proud and not so proud of, but that's the great thing about it. We just love and accept it for what it is.

Yes it may seem like were this little click and seclusive to those on the outside, but there was something about the Academy that just did that to us. It bonded us into the people we are today, but it made us value so much more than just a good education. I can remember when I had the biggest crushes on some of the guys that were at our party last night, but as I stood there just laughing back and forth with them I couldn't help but smile that they really are the same people even after a 12 year maturity spell.

Having good people surrounding you like that for so long with daily interaction or not is something so genuine and special. I hated the Academy then, but I love what it has given me now. I've a best friend (yes with the exact same name) and so many more just from that one school. It's a beautiful thing... as corny as that sounds. It really is beautiful how you're placed in those positions of your life.

ironic

Friday the 13th to many is eerie and presents a looming bad luck, but to me a Friday the 13th just brings sweet memories of a man I miss so dearly. It just so happened that this past Friday, August 13, 2010 did just that and so much more.

Not only was I celebrating my late uncle’s birthday and realizing how great of a life he did live regardless of the pain and suffering a stupid disease caused him, I also turned the page to a new chapter of life. I moved in with my oldest and dearest friend, Jamie (ironic we have the same name… I know) and Lauren, a new and already cherished friend. Through chaos and heat we all got our stuff in that apartment and have a fresh start.

It was weird to entertain my happiness because I at last had my own space in Nashville, while mourning not having my uncle’s physical presence to celebrate the day he made his entrance into the world. I was making a huge step to where I want to be in life while he doesn’t even get to relish his own earthly life. It was conflicting to say the least and made me miss him that much more.

Everyone seems to be close to their families these days and they can’t live without them. What if you truly didn’t have any of those significant people that are so influential on the person who are? What if the one person you want to sit down with and just recap your daily events isn’t around whatsoever? It’s been a year and a month or two since the man that I looked up to so much left me. Even though we knew that his battle was nearing an end, I still hadn’t soaked up the fact that I would never be able to wrap my arms around him any more or share are sarcasm and wit together. All I physically have now is a necklace holding some of his ashes and not his hugs of laughter. He was a jack of all trades and remarkably genuine inspiration to take on anything and everything I wanted no matter what everyone else said.

He is someone I will never forget. He is one of those people regardless of being family are not, he made his mark on my heart that will last forever more. I miss you Uncle Buddy but know my heart lives every day to be a woman just like you... fearless in love.

be your Dr.?

I took Dixie, my grandparents beloved golden, to the vet today. She had some crazy goo coming from her her baby doll eyes. I love to go to the vet because that was my childhood dream of "what I wanted to be when I grew up." So it's like taking a step back into my pee wee days.

But besides a ride down memory lane, the trip to the see Dr. Ladd illuminated on something so much more. Any pet in our family has gone to Dr. Ladd for the past 20+ years. He has become more than just the occasional visit and friendly face. I'm not really sure I can even put words to the meaning he holds to all of us in our family, but it's significant to say the least. Yes he cares for our best friends, the pups, but he also has a heart for every person in our family. I spent the first 15 minutes in the waiting room with Dixie discussing how my grandfather was and if there was anything he could do to help. This man is a remarkable veterinarian, but also a stand up and incredible man He takes all of his work to heart. I say with no doubt that we are not his only clients he treats this way. Granted we have been seeing him for the past 20 some years, yet he hasn't changed a bit since day one.

There is something to be said about the character of a man inside and outside of his work. Dr. Ladd is the same no matter where he is. I left the vet saying to myself how wonderful he is and you know he truly cares. I only hope that I can exude that genuine compassion for my work and my patients when I'm working with them. I want to be able to connect with everyone and anyone I come in touch with in a sincere and real way that shows them I'm more than just a professional face on the other side. Who knows what that could mean to someone on that particular day. Dr. Ladd renewed it in me that it's possible to be successful in your profession and still wear your heart on your sleeve for those around you without losing the greater aspect.

just think

Yesterday at church the message was somewhat intense and disturbing, but it was the kind that you need to hear to refresh yourself. Reminds you of where you truly are. What stuck out the most to me through the entire thing was the reassurance that you can have it all right, but without the relationships in your life you have it all wrong.

Think about it. Money is paper that buys things that usually don't even speak or touch back unless it's a TV, etc. Why have all those things if you don't have anyone to enjoy it with or to just simply discuss it with? To me it seems pointless. Relationships are the beating thrive through all of us, yet a lot of people shut down and don't let them in. Don't get me wrong I'm a second guesser with trust and so on with any sort of relationships because vulnerability is scary, but living in a constrained box like that is straight up boring and just stagnant. Where does the enjoyment of just existing come from when you have no one around you?

This may all sound corny and I'm just a push over, but people really are life. You can know all the formulas and facts to make you a billionaire but that's lame when you're sitting alone knowing those things day after day. Where's the realness in that. So I'll say it again... people are people. Let it be and have the relationships that stretch your boundaries. You're not living if you don't.

i wish i still was...

I love to just watch kids just being themselves. I enjoy kids in general. If you know me well enough I often refer to them as "little nuggets" and enunciate on the nuggets of course. There is something to be said about the naive and youthfulness they display and it automatically always and I mean always brings the biggest smile to my face.

Yesterday I made the weekly trip to Bread & Company to get one of my grandfather's favorite lunches - tomato basil soup and their fruit tea. It was prime lunch hour so people were everywhere but I couldn't help but notice this mother who had taken her two sons to lunch. They were just finishing up as I was buying my goodies. The mom just was cleaning their plates so she could throw away the trash and make sure everything was taken care of. Motherly things like that... then the boys jumped out of their seats and ran to the door before mom could even get it our her mouth to slow down, don't run into people and wait for her. It just seemed like another Friday outing for lunch to them, which is just great in general. I walked to my car and was putting everything on the other seat when I saw the boys outside waiting for their mom. One clearly had his football gear still on and the other younger boy had his gym shorts and t-shirt on, but the clincher were his shoes. He had cowboy boots on. As I sit here writing I'm smirking. It brought the biggest grin to my face as I stopped what I was doing and continued to watch the boys. It was the authenticity of this kids love for those cowboy boots. Even though it wasn't the "right" thing to have on, he wore them anyway and his mom let him. I loved it.

It's little things like that that remind of me of the glorious days of childhood. That little boy didn't have a care in the world except for getting to wear his cowboy boots to lunch that day. He was on cloud 9 and couldn't be happier parading around in them. I miss that simplicity to daily life. You begin to grow up and everything builds up until you realize that being a kid really was almost the best it could get. Maybe I should put my cowboy boots on today with my gym shorts and just live once again. To be a kid is like breathing all the fresh air for the first time because it all is this great experience. Wearing those boots to lunch yesterday was the greatest thing he could have wished for and he loved it. I want all that over again instead of the complexity of being a serious (well I'm not THAT serious) grown up. It's good to be a kid at heart. I always will be.... I just can't forget to remember my own boots every now and again.

so many years but still the same

Isn't it funny that your parents can be friends with people or grow up with certain people and automatically their kids become your friends. With no questions asked you're connected to them from then on out.

My mom knows just about everyone in Nashville. Through the years she has maintained a lot of friendships and one that is very dear to her is an old Harpeth Hall classmate. Who would have thought that 20 years later their daughters would reconnect at a summer camp and realize all the younger years they had spent together.

Sally Anne and I wouldn't have recognized one another from anyone else standing around. It had been at least seven years since the last time we had seen one another. Last summer as fate would have it we both worked at Camp Ozark in Mt. Ida, Arkansas. There were far too many coincidences for us not to know one another and then it clicked. Since then it has been just as our mothers were and still are... uniquely and forever attached. She shares the same quirky passion for life and our faith as I do. Every time we see one another it's like we pick up right where we left off. For instance today, we sat in the Green Hills Starbucks just smirking at the characters that ran through to get their daily fix. It was like we had just left camp last summer where we spent every waking and strenuous moment together. There aren't many people who know every in and out of you and your family and still can just accept you for what you are. Sally Anne has always been that and I know she genuinely will never be any different. What if our moms hadn't attended their all girls school together back in the day? There would be no Sally Anne and I.

It may seem like just another friendship. We all have them, but to me Sally Anne is different. Yes our mothers are close and so on, but we don't have to be. I can sit here today and know that she will be there for every monumental event in my life and she will still be the beautiful person inside and out that she is today. There's no one like her and for that I'm so blessed that she's in my life. From birth to Amy Grant concerts then Mt. Ida for camp adventures and now just doing life together, Sally Anne is a piece of my heart I will never forget.

a picture is worth a 1,000 words

My newest roommates (Jamie and Lauren) and I found an old school disposable camera this past Friday. So of course our first reaction was to just be ridiculous and bring the wind up camera wherever we went that evening. Needless to say we got stares from all around us as we whipped it out of our purses to snap a photo.

I took the camera to be developed today and came across a quite friendly photo specialist at Walgreens. I wasn't sure if he was just being kind because he had to or was it because he was a young buck himself and was spitting game towards me. I awkwardly smiled as i asked for my disposable camera to be developed even though we are in the year 2010 and full of widespread technology that discounts a disposable. After a quick joke back and forth he gave me the pick up time and I mentioned not judge the pictures that were taken because we were acting like complete fools.

As I walked out of Walgreens my head immediately went spinning about how many pictures this guy has seen in his specialist days. Think of all the bizarre, strange, beautiful, unique, odd, cute, poetic, and so on pictures he has flipped through in his days. He's seen hundreds upon hundreds of peoples memories and countless family vacations. When you think about it, he could have seen all parts of the world through photographs just being processed in that Walgreens he works in Nashville, Tennessee. So why do we push around the every day employee just because we think we can. He is just like us... working to get by day to day. He just gets to witness different aspects of so many peoples lives. It's irritating when I hear the person in front of me in line hurry up and get through the line as quick as possible. They never stop to ask their cashier or waitress, etc how their day is or how their life is going today. They're people too just like us. Appreciate the grocery bagger, gas station clerk, Target re-stocker, or even the Walgreens photo specialist.

All the pictures that my new specialist friend has gone through made me realize how precious and priceless pictures really are. Don't get me wrong I'm totally the person who complains usually when there is a big group picture, but in the end it's more than worthwhile. Pictures place a personal bookmark on every single chapter of our lives. They make a memory even more present and wonderful to us. And think we wouldn't have those physical memories to touch if it was for the photo specialist guy just around the corner.

the heart does grow fonder.

My life is and will always be all about people. That's what makes me the happiest and shine my pearly whites. So this blog is where I begin sharing the day to day people of my life. May they be strangers, friends, family or foe. I want to look back and be able to say that I have and always will appreciate the people in my life. For people are people and they will be who they are among life, but that is what I love the most. People are people.

I've been living with my grandparents for the past two and half months since graduation from UGA. It's been nothing like my life in Athens, but I truly have enjoyed every minute. With that said, the events of this past Friday hit me whether I was ready or not. My grandfather's health has been in decline for the past two years. He has battled his lymphoma cancer and neuropathy in legs day after day. The man has always been made of steel and refuses to let anyone know he's hurting. Yet Friday afternoon his John Wayne mentality broke down and to the hospital he went. With a sharp pain stabbing him in his lung, he could barely inhale any oxygen needless to say talk. So for the past two days he's been at St. Thomas Hospital dealing. My partner in crime for the past two months hasn't been around for our comical banter or even just for a tongue stuck out at one another. I've tried my best to remain optimistic and see what comes ahead is all for a greater reasoning. I miss him. The man that I have respected and honored for the past 23 years is slowly but surely slipping. It's a reality that we all have to face at some point because we all to have our time and place to leave. However I'm not ready quite yet to say bye to him. In the past two months he has taught me so much on our lunch dates every week and I'm getting to experience what it was like for my mom to grow up with such an incredible man as her role model. Yes he is my grandfather, but he is so much more than just that one word. He's a man I'm never going to forget.

So I start this blog in a dedication to him really because we can't take for granted the family and friends we have right in front of our faces. People are people regardless of their hair color, religion, sexual preference, race or anything someone wants to judge another based upon. People are people and my grandfather happens to be a remarkable one.