I'm fascinated...

...with the Talk Show hostess, Wendy Williams...I'm not entirely sure what she's about. It's clear that she's attractive (by some standards), articulate, humorous, interesting, fun, controversial, the list goes on and on. She appears to be a woman, an Amazon woman at that, but at first glance, I was certain she was once a man, or a man in drag?! I've not done the research, so I really don't know. I guess the latter really doesn't matter...I'm just curious?!

Anyway...if you watch her program you know she has a segment called 'Ask Wendy' where members of the audience are invited to ask questions they would like for her to answer. Typically, the questions are in reference to the participant's love life or lack of. She gave an answer recently that was simply profound...my favorite kind of statement. I leave you with that answer and a question:

"The way a relationship begins is how it will end."

In her own words, "How you doin'?!"

I'm going to be a GRANDMOM!!! :))

Clearly, I've not kept up with the blogsphere lately. There are a number of reasons for this. I've been traveling out in the real world and accomplishing more there than I feel I had in the past ten years. I hope this proves to be a good thing. Aside from that, I feel very inadequate as a blogger. I've kept journals for most of my adult life and silly diaries in my younger years. I have lots of thoughts bouncing around in my head, but my insecurities leave me feeling so frozen. I can't seem to put them into print the way I want to. My feelings seem to dominate my thoughts and thus the conflict. I can't always trust my feelings and that muddles my thoughts. Clear?! Ha!!

I must say that I'm proud of the journals I began to my children while I carried them in my body! I still try to update those two journals from time to time, and I especially like reading back over them.


Today I decided to browse through the blogs I've listed here that I used to frequently read. Some of them belong to my son, and I was a bit ashamed that I'd forgotten the fact that he, too, blogged. I'm happy that he is still keeping up with his blogging. I'm especially proud because when he was in ninth grade an English teacher (who was unsupportive of kids with learning disabilities) gave him a failing grade on his term paper (which, btw, was written with the supervision of a tutor, so we knew there was bias on the teacher's part...I digress...you get the point...). After doing all we could to support his education by making sure the system did not fail HIM, we discovered he, in fact, had a lot to say and that he could even state it very well. (From there he served on the high school newspaper staff. Go figure!?!)


Anyway, in January my son will become a father to a baby girl, and I will have my first grandchild to love and adore. While reading through his blog today, I found this post that made me once again so proud of him. I wanted to share it and use it as inspiration to let go of my own insecurities and feelings of inadequacy and just write from my heart without worry...maybe even with total abandon!! I'm so happy that perhaps my attempts at journaling and my support of his many talents and rights as a human being have influenced and encouraged him in some small way.


I give you, Will's post:


"I'm often up too late in Austin. In Virginia, there was an acute feeling of night. It could be the lights and sounds, or maybe just the pacing of the city but it's hard for me to rest here. There's a feeling that I constantly need to be accomplishing...something. Most of the time, I'm not even sure what it is. This week it's manifested in work, creative, and leisure, taking the form of plowing through novels, working on a new video, and finishing projects well ahead of their deadline.



If I explained my current predicament to Jacob, I'm sure he'd tell me I was nesting. I'd like to think I'm honing my life; I also like having a little Jacob on my shoulder when he's not around.



My little girl is under three months away. I could feel her pushing both her feet against Solange's stomach tonight. She would spin around in the opposite direction applying her newly directed force. In doing so I could feel her tiny spin press up along Solange's skin. Everyday becomes more real. Soon the world will be hers, and she'll be my world.



I used to think parents lives' revolved around their children because they'd seen the infinite potential in their children, while coming to terms with their limited capacity. In all my half pretend / half inflated ego, I believed this was too be true for myself as well. For many adults this is the case, even if it isn't as exaggerated as the obese mom who forces her daughter into beauty pageants or the dad who forces his kid to play baseball, then constantly yells at the kid's coach for not playing him enough. However, I now believe it's something different. While becoming an adult has some limitations, I honestly believe it brings unknown potential in bloom. Maybe it's wanting to be a better person for your own or maybe it's just fear of the unknown, but I'm trying very hard to level up.



Since I started on sleep, this seems to be a good point to say goodnight. The words are beginning to blur and I'm as exhausted as they come."





Now I must share baby girl with you (I know...many people cringe upon seeing yet another sonogram pic...sorry!!! I must indulge myself...it is MY blog, ha! Not only that, I have one, maybe two followers tops, so big deal, huh?!):

I'm going to be a GRANDmom, and I could not be happier!!! :))

Validation!!! :))

"Smile, though your heart is breaking...






...just SMILE and pass it on!! :))

EXCESS, EXCESS, EXCESS...

...that is what I accumulated during an empty marriage...today would have been my thirty-first anniversary! Yes, I look around and see that I filled the void left in my marriage with stuff...admittedly, I hoarded it...ugh!! Clearing out is a pain, but rather than look back, I think I'll consider a donation to this organization as a means of moving forward. God knows my closet needs a removal of this item!! It's a beginning!




I also have another reason to celebrate! This is the first year, in the ten I've spent alone (doing my homework), that I've been seeing someone!! Not too serious, but fun! It's about time!! Life goes on and there is still plenty of love to be found out there in this big world!! :))

The Path to Serenity?

I once heard that the truth is significant in all situations, but especially in three areas of our lives. I learned that it's important to tell the truth to yourself about yourself. I also learned that it's important to tell the truth to another about yourself. And last, but not least, it's important to tell the truth to yourself about the other. I often have to remind myself to practice this way of thinking.

As I become more self-aware and truthful about myself, I am open to the truth about others. Hopefully, this keeps me from being so self-righteous! I believe it is human nature to blame others when something is wrong in our own life. By finding fault with someone else, I often dwell on that aspect of a relationship and excuse my own behavior.

If I can become truthful about myself to myself, then I can perhaps become open to understanding another and their behavior. Sometimes that involves the recogntion that the other is not being honest with him/herself. When this occurs on either side we tend to manipulate and play games for the attention we feel we need or desire. Sometimes we just want to escape and remain in denial and often that involves elaborate attempts to hold another accountable or to appeal to another in inappropriate ways. The motive for this kind of behavior is generally not so clear. Instead, it is confusing and unsupported which ultimately creates frustration, defensiveness, etc., and can lead to anger, resentment, and more.

Today I'm struggling with staying focused on the things about myself that I can change rather than trying to appeal to the other so they won't shut me out. I know that when I seek to please someone else for the attention I want, I compromise and cater to bad behavior -- either mine or theirs or both. I believe this is very dysfunctional behavior on both sides. If I don't participate in the 'dance', then I may risk losing a partner. I've got to be okay with that. I'd rather dance alone than to pretend to be on board, when deep in my soul, I know I am not.

Examples are difficult to share because I would feel so exposed and vulnerable. Perhaps this is why we do not seek the help we need or actually change. It is too revealing to be this truthful, and as the formula states...it IS important to tell the truth to yourself about yourself first. If I can't accomplish this, how then can I tell another?! If I don't tell the truth about myself, how can I expect to discover the truth about that person? My own sense of guilt has been in the way of the latter. How can I sit in judgment (as it would feel), or just practice discretion, if I'm not being honest about myself? This has kept me involved/linked with others in undesirable ways for most of my life. Such an unhealthy relationship becomes so tangled and intertwined, it's difficult to know who is to blame for the outcome. It's time to accept being alone over being involved in such an inappropriate way.

Perhaps if I can fully grasp this, I will find there are like-minded people to take the place of those who have nothing to offer me when living in this kind of denial. It's a comforting thought -- to believe that I can practice this in my own life. I do think it would be rewarding on so many levels to live this out.

The thought helps me to better understand The Serenity Prayer by Reinhold Niebuhr which states:

"God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference."

The prayer goes on to read:

"Living one day at a time, enjoying one moment at a time; accepting hardships as the pathway to peace; taking, as He did, this sinful world as it is, not as I would have it; trusting that He will make all things right if I surrender to His will; that I may be reasonably happy in this life, and supremely happy with Him Forever in the next. Amen."

God grant me the serenity...