What I want

I need to make my board of what I want to come into my life. Usually you do this with magazine cut outs and posterboard but I thought maybe I could make a blog one!
First I'll list then I'll try to find photos

-Financial abundance...so tired of worrying about finances and Randy's parents finances, I envision great financial abundance because I deserve it. I deserve financial freedom.
-Job with art....I will have a job that is creative, with good coworkers and doing what I love whether that be photography, editing, graphic design, etc
-Cat...yes I will have a cat again one day, I miss having a cat!!! So even if it means I have to get a hairless cat that won't cause allergies
-An older home (1800s?) with wood floors, redone but still maintains the charm of an older place. Also with a wooded lot, barn if I want to have a horse again, and have to have my little watergarden with a fountain. Also a big weeping willow just like the one that used to be at grandma's house.
-A degree in graphic design or something of that nature
-Travel...I want to be able to go see cultures, I love learning about things and seeing new places. I will have the ability and means to travel all over the world.
......more to come

line of events

Sometimes its strange when you look back over a certain amount of time and see a tie in line of events. I'm having one of those moments.
The last time I went to California something changed in me. At the time I was in a harmful relationship though probably one of the most life changing ones. I remember the artist in me reached new heights. My piano playing, my writing, my painting, my photography. Tears were wept often and smiles were rare but a girl grew.  Upon my time in Cali we went to this piano bar Casablanca (sadly its not there anymore) and came to understand that I had to let this relationship pass. I came home and in a few short months we broke up for real and I moved on with life. I got my own apartment (the kind I always wanted), my cat Flannel and I moved in and life started fresh. Its funny because in that short amount of time is when Randy came along, so different from the past relationship that I almost thought it wasn't real or he had alternative motives.
(sorry this is so choppy, I keep getting interupted by Alan and my thoughts are scrambled)
So now on this second journey to Cali, once again something has struck. I have noticed how my inner artist as been trying to show its head lately. I have been wanting to write more, show my pictures, etc.
I am also currently reading a blog of a friend that has had to go through a very painful experience with losing her twin babies at 5 months. I didn't realize that as I have been reading along her journey so of my stuff is coming out. Our second miscarriage was at 4 1/2 months, almost the same amount of time as this girl and her babies. I guess I have buried a lot of stuff since ours happened 3 years ago, I wasn't ready for a second baby so I just chalked it up to the fact I didn't want it so I was able to get over it quickly. But I don't think I did get over it, I think since I've been trying to find myself and what my purpose is again. I struggle between 2 sides...the side that wonders if I am suppossed to be a mother or the side that longs for the artistic before kids side.   Reading this girls blog is taking me on a journey that I'm not even full aware of yet, I think going through her pain is in a way healing a part of me that I have buried. Other wierd things that have happened is I rented a movie last week called "the other girl" and it ended up being about a girl that lost her baby after it was born 3 days later from SIDS. The movie moved me, very great acting and just a touching story. Randy came in and thought it was dumb after watching it for 10 minutes. This pissed me off because he didn't even give it a try. Yet on a deeper level I wonder if there is a part of him that hasn't healed either?
Right now I'm just vomiting all the thoughts in my head, which is making this a very random writing. I haven't been good at journaling in the past couple years so I'm attempting to climb back into it.  This is the blog that I'm reading http://www.colleenslife.com/
Funny that her name is also Colleen....
An interesting thing is her struggle with God, she is very spiritual and I feel like maybe God is speaking to me through her since we seem to share the same thoughts on things.I don't know? Signing off for now....

Tatoo

I really want a tatoo, i've always wanted one but chickened out when I was 19. Glad I did because it probably would have been a stupid one, now I know...I want a small thing on my inside wrist. An inspirational word or name...maybe something gaelic? Maybe a gaelic bible verse? I will have to think more on that.
Red wine has graced my lips tonight and left me pleasantly warm and fuzzy. I love the invitation wine gives me. It invites me in, warms my soul, inspires my muse and leave me wanting more...
if only I could find  a man like wine :)

What no one tells you

#1.)Developments suck- Yes they appeal to the general masses because you can get a nice house for a cheap price but if I had only known all of it. You also get nosy neighbors that watch when you leave and come home. You get people deciding that your lawn doesn't look fake enough and that it should be more fake. Hello people lawns are not suppossed to be emerald green in the summer, did you know there are children in other nations that don't have water and you are wasting it watering your weed called grass???
Honestly the only thing a development is good for is sidewalks for biking your kids...absolutely only thing.

#2.) Marriage is hard ...ya people grow up saying marriage is hard it takes work, blah blahh. But do they really tell you? Its not just hard its sometimes boring! You see eachothers every nitpicking habit, trust me i'm not perfect so I have plenty of these myself but usually you only have to deal with your own. Well here you are having to deal with another persons habits. So what kind of hard work do you have to do to keep marriage alive? That is what should really be told..

#3.) The West Coast is a bunch of political "hippies".  I guess because I grew up from an East Coast family I always thought it was in my blood. Don't get me wrong, I love some of the Eastern states but after my visit to San Fran I have a whole new view on myself. I def go with the flow, I like to experience life and all of its treasures, I hate stress, materialism, fast pace...all of the things that make the East Coast alive. Maybe I really am one of those "Californians" people talk about.

#4.)Cats are smart. yes all of you dog lovers I know its the eternal battle of cats vs dogs. I love them both but got to hand it to the cats...they outsmart even some humans I know.

#5.) To be continued

Tony bennett

I LEFT MY HEART IN SAN FRANCISCO (Tony Bennett)
The loveliness of Paris
Seems somehow sadly gay
The glory that was Rome
Is of another day
I've been terribly alone
And forgotten in Manhattan
I'm going home to my city by the bay.
I left my heart in San Francisco
High on a hill, it calls to me.
To be where little cable cars
Climb halfway to the stars!
The morning fog may chill the air
I don't care!
My love waits there in San Francisco
Above the blue and windy sea
When I come home to you, San Francisco,
Your golden sun will shine for me!

I left my heart in San Francisco?

One look at this picture says what I felt all week...a world away. 

I was quite surprised by this city that threw me for a loop. When I think of large cities I think of hustling and bustling...flashy cars...loud noise....rushing around. San Francisco was different, it was quiet in a way that I have never seen a city before, sure it still had a flox of people running around and lots of cars on the highways but there was a stillness. Maybe it was the fog that rolls in every morning and blankets the city, deafening out the rush madness of life..

The architecture was amazing too, it was like you could see different periods of time walking from one end of the street to the next. Sure they were all on top of each other but not in an overcrowded city living way, but more in a following the mountains this is where the house needs to be built kind of way. There was a mountain behind my sisters house that was the highest point in the city. We walked up (not an easy feat) twice and at the top was this amazing view where it makes you think of how our lives are just hamster wheels turning around and quite insignificant. 
One important memory of the mountain we walked was the aroma of Euclalyptus Trees. The mountain air had a vibrant, fresh, cool minty smell that seemed to resonate with my soul. 

I did not get the feel of materialism in this city, cars were old, clothes were what kept you warm, money was not flashed.  

It was also odd to have a week away from Alan. I am ashamed to admit it was nice, am I a bad mother for saying that I honestly did not miss my child for a week? It seems something I should not write because who can fathom that, but it was a glimpse of a life I once had where I could do what I wanted, go where I want to go. I guess every once in awhile its nice to get a selfish week to yourself. 

This city left an imprint on me, almost as if I took a part of it home in my heart, I have never felt that before in travels. I never would have thought of myself as "West Coast", you could say I've always been an "east coast" snob. But after this trip I have to wonder if that is what I had grown up thinking and what is really true. I very easily settled into this go with the flow, easy living lifestyle that I was a part of for a week.  It made me wonder if I hadn't been so afraid to fly for the sky when I was young and single where my heart would have lead me, maybe it would have been somewhere on the west coast.

I have heard the song "I left my heart in San Francisco" before but I'm curious to listen to it again after visiting. One would think this song is about someone they loved who they left in the city and the heartbreak that followed, but just the title of the song to me relates to a feeling I have.  

Maybe I did leave my heart in San francisco..

Returning to the hustle and bustle of life, and its only day 1 has been quite a jolt for me. The social calendar for the next week is filled to the rim and I almost just want to block off a week of time to just linger on the relaxation and peace that I had been filled with for the past few days. I feel it slipping away fast as the grains in an old sand timer filling up with empty space of obligations.  How do you find that balance of time alone and time with life? I haven't learned how to do that yet, or even know where to begin.