Thought: You live and you learn. But if you don’t live you will never learn.
Hello dear blog. It has been a while. I have much to say in this post. This past month has been full of living life and learning lessons. Many realizations were made and I am going to try to attempt to share them with you. I can only hope that I am able to convey what I want to say!
I guess it makes sense to start at the beginning of the month and work my way through. So if you are ready, let’s walk through October 2009.
At the beginning of the month I went on a beach trip. The trip was amazing and something I definitely needed. I cried a lot though. You see, people are frustrating and downright annoying sometimes. “Well, yes” you’re thinking. Seriously though, I don’t think I will ever understand this one particular person or what they think. While on this trip, this person stared at me…like hard core watched my every move. What’s up with that? It wouldn’t be so bad but homeboy has a girlfriend! I can totally understand if you have a girlfriend and want to ignore me…or if you want to be a player and flirt with me. But taking no action and just staring? Dude, c’mon. I can feel your eyes burning holes through my body. Knowing that this was happening and that there wasn’t a thing I could do about it frustrated the heck out of me. So much so that I broke down a few times when it happened. Not knowing what else to do, I grabbed my bike, iPod, and pedaled around the island we were on. Riding, I came to several conclusions:
1. No matter what homeboy’s actions are, if I am myself no one can fault me for that. It doesn’t matter how he acts toward me as long as I don’t do anything to lead him on or make people think I am trying to take him away from his girlfriend. I’m not. I don’t want to do that. That is the worst possible thing I could ever do. Besides I think the girl he’s with is amazing.
2. Kelly Clarkson is amazing. I listened to her albums (I own all 4…you know you do too!) while riding and let me tell ya, I can’t get enough. Several of her songs convey how I felt that weekend.
After coming to those realizations, I went on a quest and asked several guys I know what they thought of homeboy’s behavior. They all have come to the conclusion that he must feel something for me. Worst part? This has been going on for a month…if it was for a little while I may have been okay with it. Then I didn’t know if I should be flattered or not. Now? I try to ignore it….but I can’t. So I am doing only what I know how to do: be myself and live my life. If someone wants to watch my every move so be it. At least I am having fun knowing that I am living life to the fullest.
Which brings me to a new topic: spending time with your girlfriends laughing is one of the best things ever. There are certain moments in life when you need to get dressed up, go out and laugh your head off. Not only does this bring you closer to your friends, but laughing is a great medicine. It fixes anything and takes your mind off of everything.
Going out with the girls, proved to make many memories…many of which I can’t describe. Not because they are inappropriate but because they probably don’t make sense to anyone but us! Our best moments have happened in restaurants when we get looks from wait staff or in Barnes and Noble when we were told we were a fire hazard. Some of them have been in IHOP taking pictures of our breakfast or while dancing the Cupid Shuffle. If you ask, I will attempt to tell you the stories. I will also attempt to do so without laughing.
Speaking of laughing, a friend made the remark to me the other day that had I not made some major changes last year at this time I probably wouldn’t have laughed as much as I have in the past year. October 2008 was a somewhat challenging month. I was in a relationship and thought that I was going to marry the guy. That, however, did not happen. We decided to end it. The night it happened was difficult. Through the pain, tears, and other emotions raging, I knew that it was the best decision (whether it was mine to make or not) I had ever done. Usually when one goes through a break-up they do not wake up the next morning singing hymns. That, um, ordeal changed me; it gave me a new lease on life and the decision was made to be the best I could be and to not be afraid to be in a relationship again. So since that time, I have allowed myself to have crushes. I have allowed myself to go through all of the girlie emotions and put myself out there. Let me tell you, there is no better confidence booster than rejection!
You must think I am a bit off my rocker by now. But by letting myself be interested in guys, and in most cases not have an interest returned, it made me almost determined to be more and more myself. Odd motivation? Perhaps. But it worked. I am completely and utterly confident in who I am. And I am not afraid to say it! Knowing this, made me value myself even more…
…which lead me to another realization this month. It is nice to get noticed for your looks or body but you can’t base a relationship on that. Well you can if you want it to be meaningless and unfulfilling. If you know me, then you know what I look like. Because this is a public blog, I’m not going to describe how I look…you can never be sure where the creepers are. HA! But I will say that I am somewhere between not needing a bag put over my head and Jennifer Aniston. Vague much? But being that I am somewhat decent looking (now I sound vain…nahh, it’s that confidence thing) guys are attracted to me for that reason alone. Normally I’m flattered because I never thought I looked good….but this time, it just pissed me off. Now, I’ve learned to ignore the cat calls and cheesy pick up lines…I’ve even went out with people thinking that they would go after me for my looks then fall in love with the real me…the quirky me…the smart me…and normally I am right. Not this time. One particular guy I ran into this month hadn’t seen me since August. Apparently he was smitten by my looks then…and this time was no different. We went out a few times and he was a nice guy. But quickly, I decided that he was only in it for my body. I didn’t think that he really wanted to get to know me…well, he did want to get to know me but not in the way I am talking about now. It started to make me mad after a certain point. Then it made me mad at guys in general…because they are kind of that way…all about wanting a girl’s body…and girls are totally different. We want to be respected and wanted for more than how we look. Being angry at all men lasted about 5 minutes though. Why? Because I caught myself checking out a guy. I didn’t want to feel hypocritical so I gave up on that one.
There has to be something else major I learned.
Oh yeah. There is.
If you are confident then you are sexy. And being “sexy” isn’t about posing the right way or wearing certain clothes. I get just as many looks in jeans and a hoodie as I do when I’m all dolled up. Being sexy is about having fun and not trying too hard. I have learned that when I try is when I fail. When I don’t care and have a fun is when I win. Seriously, that is applicable to every area of my life…especially my fantasy football team. I am kicking it and I haven’t done a thing! Anyway, when I am myself and not caring too much how others perceive me is when I get asked out or noticed. When I am trying to get noticed is when you’d think I was invisible. So I’ve come to the conclusion that sexy is being you. Thus making me sexy all the time because it is my life’s goal to be myself….
….and it just occurred to me that I essentially just said that it is my life’s goal to be sexy. That’s humorous right there…
All that being said, October taught me many things about life. Things that I am sharing with my friends and one day my kids…
….which reminds me – I also realized that I am in no rush to have a boyfriend or get hitched. I love my friends who are in relationships….that is awesome for them and they are totally happy. I wish them the best. But I know that I have some stuff to do before I settle down...granted, that makes it sound like I am going to go spread my wild oats and party it up but that is totally not what I mean. I like to think of it like I’m a missionary or something and have some work to do before I have a family. I say that knowing that everything I have experienced this month is preparing me for the time when I am supposed to settle down. I would rather learn all of this stuff about myself now while I am able to work on it and not hurt anyone instead of learning it and putting someone else through the hell of me not knowing who I am. That would be really bad. They get to know me thinking I am one person then they realize that I am not that way at all. Plus, my great-grandmother gave me some wise advice once. She asked if I had a boyfriend and when I told her I did not, she said “good, you’re young go out and have some fun”. Or something like that. She basically told me to enjoy my youth and to live while I am young. I will have the rest of my life to settle down. She was the first person to tell me it was okay to have fun and be single. I will never forget that.
I am quite certain that I am forgetting something. But, I think I will leave it be for now. Don't worry, I will not neglect blogging again for such a long time. I like it too much.
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