I love using Pinterest. I have a pretty amazing little setup with mostly all private folders. Some are shared but other than that it is just basically a private little organizer for my brain. If there ever were one that made sense to others. I mostly do nothing with these saves. However, I do understand a lot more about myself as I go Pinteresting around. The feed comes through and the shit I save and create new boards for blows my fucking mind. Last night was no exception. I have saved pins for over 12 years and two of my favorite boards to add to are places that inspire me to write, yeah yeah, I know, I could write this crap hunched over naked in an alley eating people’s leftovers but mostly sharing it with the stray dogs…I write other things, Brad. Deep meaningful shit with big fucking words and a poetic mind. The second is home design in general. I like to type in keywords like, “gold handles” and just see where it takes me, I usually end up pinning some step-by-step instruction on how to walk backward in a handstand whilst smoking a cigar with an otter on my stomach and then add on what to do if I have to sneeze and how do I teach my kids how to do this. I do not have to create a new private board for these shenanigans as I have had this important category covered for many years now. Priorities, duh. But I was absofuckinlutely shocked last night when I discovered I like dark homes. I don’t know why it was so shocking to me, I live for the night and dim lights and we all know a good dinner with me can be sabotaged with the wrong lighting. But I never realized how much I actually love dark homes, dark walls, dark countertops, and dark furniture, paired with lots of floor-to-ceiling windows and of course, a forest to tuck the home away from the world. So Pinterest has been feeding me these super clean white modern homes which I love for others and when I go to their homes, I just never relate to them. I  have never known what would feel like home, what my style is, what my dream home looks like. I was yesterday years old when I learned this about myself and I feel so fucking in touch with myself now, like hey there girlllll…speaking of which, I got a text today that stated “It must be hard to know better than everyone, know everyone else better than themselves, and to be the smartest person in the room…” and I was like oh my gosh, well now that you understand the burden I have been carrying, it is not as hard as it has been all these years, so thank you-what a relief. Hah, if only they knew my bar was set as low as discovering who the fuck I am on some stupid fucking app while saving photos of places I will never see, things I will never do, and otters that will never be able to stay on my stomach while I do handstands without me mastering a one hand handstand so I can hold that little fluffy son-of-a-bitch. I have so many more discoveries and growth to do…it is fucking hard being me, dude so I cannot tell you how nice it is that you sent me encouragement. I actually did not reply with this, I know, shocker. I kinda felt sorry for them because it just seems like there is a lot of pain there and although I am past the point in my life of constantly making myself feel like shit to make other people feel better…I still care, and so I work on developing new ways of communicating. Mature ones that are as private as my Pinterest boards…like making a full-blown fuck you face to my phone (imagine Lucille Ball mixed with Post Malone and I am choking on moms spaghetti-much to Eminems disappointment as he would prefer it to be on my sweater, but we know damn well I don’t waste that shit. I will choke and swallow before I puke.) and getting it out of my system and then sending a super nice text where I thank them for being honest with me and feeling comfortable enough to share their opinions and feelings about me with me and that I will try and adjust in our exchanges to better help them be able to deal with me. I can’t deal with me, so I mean good luck, bro, and let me know how it goes because I am struggling with me too, but I will try-ish for you-ish because that is what the smartest person in the room does, duh. 

I am a very sensitive person believe it or not. It has been said that my entire family can dish it out but cannot take it. I have never really seen it this way but I kinda understand why someone would think that. I think for me with my sharp tongue and quick wit combined with my ninja memory and constantly absorbing who someone is at their core and soul…I get sad with the mean thoughts I have, the information I have retained could turn into something negative instead of positive and endearing or quirky. Me stopping after I dish it out or they dish it out is purely a choice because I am sensitive and don’t want to hurt you. And yeah sure, I get sad, but not because I cannot handle being on the other end of it. I can roast a motherfucker and be content with being the only person in the room laughing and then have that person stand up and dish it back even harder. I would probably fall in love with them for it so I try and avoid this negative cycle because my sense of humor tends to run the show, my heart included. Growing up my crush was Screech on Saved By The Bell. Screech would never say anything mean, but had he, I would not have hesitated to pursue a relationship with him because I know it would have been said in humor. When I get ready for my part of round two and I realize the shit that I know I could say is so incredibly deep, I tell myself no. I don’t want to go there and so sometimes I don’t and then they take their round two and I’m like man, fuck you but I still won’t say what I had lined up because it is fucking brutal. That’s how my brain works. I always have more to say, I am working on saying less-at least in my personal life and relationships. What was it that my ex-husband told me…oh, right. “Just because you think it, doesn’t mean you have to say it.” I finally understand. Kidding. I always did, he just didn’t know there was so much more I wanted to say and did not. I will say that I have learned how nice it is to be around someone/people who you want to listen to. People to learn from and look up to. People who love you for the goodness inside of you and see you. People who are not incapable of loving you properly because of their insecurities. There is so much value in relationships where you feel comfortable being silent in their presence and equally in speaking. Someone you can feel their emotions before maybe they have (there I go knowing people better than they know themselves again) and that is fulfilling enough and sometimes it is even deeper than any words that could be exchanged. I don’t know, I really fucking like to talk though. 

<INSERT THREE DAYS, LOTS OF SLEEP, NOT TOO MUCH TALKING, AND TIME WITH MY SISTER AND MOM>

I am a brand new woman. Hah. Kidding. I did however wear a skirt that made me look like a Hershey’s Kiss and I have zero regrets about it. I love walking into a store and knowing inside lies everything I need to put together an outfit from head to toe that I will look forward to putting on. I envision the feeling, freshly showered, hair and makeup done, skin soft and moisturized, perfume applied, jewelry on and my outfit just sitting there staring at me like are you ready, momma?! So with this feeling, I pop in my AirPods, walk into the store(s), and find something that speaks to me. I start to build this whole image in my head. If I saw this out on someone else what would she have on with it, what would draw me in and cause me to want to wear this if I was online and noticed this item, what would the background be for the photoshoot, what mood would it create, etc. If I went missing and they used a photo of me wearing this, would that be ok? That is how I shop. Should this end up being my last outfit, am I cool with it? I was totally cool with looking like a Hershey Kiss for my ending. I was casually dating this firefighter once and he knew I was a little twisted in the head so during the Christmas party he offered to take me to the office and show me the photos from car accident scenes. He did not even finish the sentence and I was halfway up the stairs to the office like I worked there and had offered to show him. I will say this. The images fucking stuck with me. I can even remember the colors of their shirts and how they were positioned. It was everything I imagined but then not. I am a visceral-minded person. I want to know and experience things hands on and often I feel so close to what it would actually feel like before even doing it or seeing it. That fancy imagination I have at work. Anyway. This Christmas party experience along with my own when we had our accident left me with this top priority when I leave the house. Shave, change your underwear, and be cool with dying the way you left the house. Yes, I am aware this is negative and likely part of my anxiety and anything else you want to acknowledge. I hear you. I know me. I get it. Remember the text I got three days ago?

Trying out a new paragraph…I a well aware these entries “should be” divided into many, many different paragraphs and that maybe my photos would be more fun if they were actually related to what I was talking about, that my grammar is subpar, and that putting you on a train through a part of my brain may be an asshole move…ask me if I care. No question mark. I don’t. Look if you are here, you are here for your reasons. And is that not the case in every aspect of our lives? We choose where we are, even when it doesn’t make sense. When it isn’t positive or the best choice we could make. When others do not understand and sometimes when we don’t either. I have many dreams, big ones, and little ones. An entire life I want to live. Probably if I try and sort it out into Pinterest categories, I have many lives I want to live. Sometimes I feel like setting out and embracing it and sometimes I am content with just staying in my pjs for days on end and raising my sons, hanging out with my friends, and feeling that life is special enough in this world that I have built around me and that I am just greedy for wanting more. Once in a TV show, this man was talking about how big the world was and the man he was talking with responded that he thinks our backyards are plenty big enough. I guess sometimes I get stuck in between these feelings, but the older I get the more I recognize the importance and the definitiveness of having one life to live. A dream of mine was to be one of the people who mow the highways throughout Texas and eventually make my way across the country. To sit alone and listen to music, to see nature all around me, to see birds, and to uncover what they have been looking down and through from the wires above our heads. I remember my dad’s response when I told him this. He told me, I could absolutely see you doing this with a pair of clogs on and a big sun hat. Not too many times do people who really know me say, YES I can see this for you! So when it comes my way, especially from my parents, I know it’s pretty legit. Whenever I see these men in these tractors on the highway, I always flip them off and scream at them that they stole my job. I of course know they did not. And I am of course happy they have this job. I just like to be a shithead instead of acknowledging I was never determined enough to go for it. I once researched it and found so many articles discussing how it’s generations-deep, male-dominated, and extremely competitive to get contracts after obtaining licenses, insurance, etc. And I just shut down to it. I do that a lot. I get excited and then I get mired down in some bullshit aspect that will keep me from moving forward. WHAT IS THAT? I chalk it up to just not being certain, being indecisive, being afraid of commitment, and being terrified to wake up and know what my life is and then I realize that is all true regardless of whether I decide to do something or not. So why not just fucking embrace a new path and use my imagination, sense of adventure, and love for life to create a constantly evolving world around me. And I think it is because I know what it takes to bring it out of my head and into life, and honestly, sometimes I just don’t want to shave or change my underwear…