Ignored?

I have found recently several people have removed me from Facebook. These people were not people with which I once went to school a million & a half years ago. These are not people with whom I haven't spoken in years. These are people I thought were friends. Now I understand people deleting their account but they just removed me.

Once again I stand at the door of social media and wonder why I ever opened the door. I find myself hurt over and over. 

People remove me... I hurt. 

People don't like my status... I wonder if anyone listens. 

People don't comment...I wonder if I have offended. 

I start to wonder if anyone is out there. I start to think my friends aren't real friends. I remind myself over and over that Facebook creates false intimacy. I've blogged about that before. I've struggled with knowing if I should keep my Facebook. Then I do because it helps me stay in touch with loved ones that are far away. 

But then in the end...I feel ignored.

It causes me to write less, blog less, and post less on social media. I isolate in response to being ignored. I crawl into a hole and wonder how I got there. 

The same lovely, amazing people keep showing up in my life just at the right time and encourage me to write. Others tell me they are glad I stay on Facebook so they can stay in touch. They read but just don't comment. 

I think to myself how am I going to leave my footprint on the world. I want to make sure that I always communicate with others clearly. I try hard to like things on Facebook from friends and family just to let them know I am here. I comment to create communication. I write to express the inner me. 

Others do not communicate with writing like I do. They are not ignoring me. They just don't write like I do. It's hard for me to understand that because I always write. It's a natural form of communication for me. It happens without a second thought. I write every day even though I don't post. I write things in my head all the time. If others do not write, it doesn't mean they are not there. 

So are you there? How do you let people know you are there? Do you call? Do you make friend dates? Do you write, text, email or comment on social media? Let someone you care about know you are there and thinking of them today. Make sure they know they are not ignored!

Thanks to all my girlfriends who make sure that I know I am loved & not ignored. 

Words that are so offensive...

Did you know that saying Happy Holidays could be the last thing you ever say?

No I'm serious!

People are really up in arms about this, this year. There are people willing to pick different businesses or quit going somewhere because of the usage of Happy Holidays.

Did anyone stop to think that maybe we are wishing you well in the this entire holiday season? You know...from Merry Christmas/Eve, Happy New Years, Kwanza, or Hanukkah or WHATEVER may fall from Thanksgiving till January.

Good grief people! Get a grip.

I'm a Christian and celebrate Christmas. But maybe I choose to say Happy Holidays because I'm referring to all of it. Maybe I hope you have a wonderful few weeks and are happy. Maybe when you get up in arms because of my words, you've lost sight of the whole reason I said Happy Holidays in the beginning.

Maybe I picked my "holiday" card because I liked the picture. Maybe I said "Happy Holidays" in passing to someone I don't really know.

Why is it okay to be up in arms over words?

Why in December is it okay to be irate for Jesus?

This makes no sense to me. I have seen far to many FB posts about the Merry - Holidays debate.

GET OVER YOURSELVES!!! AND BE HAPPY!!!!!

There are so many words that we as society give power. We don't need to make these words so strong that during the month of December people feel they have to watch their words or pick the right card.

Maybe they bought a pack and send them to Uncle such-in-so that is Jewish. Maybe they just want you to be happy! Maybe they just hear it so much, that's what they say.

I will say that this past week when I was shopping at the grocery store a young gal bagging my food said "Merry Christmas" as she handed me my bag. The sincerity in her voice is what touched my heart. I believed at that moment she wanted me to have a wonderful Christmas. It really made my day.

So people...relax. Yes, continue to think about the words you use. But more than that....think about the words and what they mean. Use your voice and body language to send your message. Don't give words so much power that a card that says "Happy Holidays" will send you into a tizzy. Just remember to send the message with feeling. Really mean what you say. Don't forget what the words mean.

The next time you say, "Have a good day," try to say it in a way that the person believes you want them to have a good day. Do that every day all year long. Then if you choose to say, "Happy Holidays" next year, maybe the person will hear your intent. Maybe it will warm the heart as the young bagger warmed mine.

Lets all stop trying to fix how everyone does or says things this year. Maybe we need to be sincere and focus on letting everyone know what we are thinking and feeling by expressing ourselves "better".

Okay...off my soap box.

And thanks for listening.

She's a mean one...Mrs. Grinch

I really cannot help it. I don't mean to be a Grinch. I don't know what comes over me...

Okay...

I take that back. I know exactly what comes over me.

The other night the family was watching Duck Dynasty. It's a family favorite around here. We love that this family is down to earth. They aren't afraid to be Christians and pray. They have values and morals with which we agree and they are outdoorsmen. Love it.

Anyhow...one of the brothers, Jase, isn't into Christmas like everyone else. He said something like, "If you want to celebrate electricity, then put lights on a tree." He said he doesn't like celebrating the make up things of Christmas but just the true meaning.

Light Bulb!

It hit me...that's one of the things I hate most about Christmas. I'm glad my kids are done with Santa though I never really pushed it one way or another. There was always something special under the tree from Santa and the stockings were a "Santa" thing. But I'm glad we're done with that. We still do stockings but the kids know it's from us now.

I am married to a Christmas person. He loves everything about Christmas.

Me?

I can barely force myself to get out the decor. It's a huge job. And though I love certain things about it...I'm not sure I would be all that upset if we didn't do any of it.

Okay, okay, okay...before you freak out on me.

I mean the decorating. Outside lights. Inside lights. The lit up village. The tree...oh the tree. We get a real tree. That's the one thing I demand. Then there's the lights on the tree. The ornaments. Oh...and the tinsel. If you don't know it, the Morrison Clan does it up with tinsel (that's the other little thing that's me). One year we had 10 packages of tinsel on the tree.

Then there are Christmas cards...haven't sent any out yet. I've prepared them 5 years in a row...still sitting in a box downstairs.

Christmas cookies. I follow my mom's old recipe and would rather just sit & eat the dough but the kids, they get out all the cutters and decorate them all.

Shopping...yuck. I just don't like shopping and not just Christmas shopping. I just don't like shopping. It's a thorn in my side. Then you have to wrap it all. Can I just tell you if I had the money, I would so pay someone to wrap it all.

Then there are the 10 places we have to go. There are holiday concerts and parties. There are events at people's houses. Then there is Christmas with the family which happens two different days.

Ugh. I'm tired just thinking about it...because well...I'm a Grinch (which of course is just another made up character).

I have a tree in the living room. We'll decorate this Sunday. I'm sure I'll have fun. We'll make hot cocoa and light a fire and the kids will laugh and there will be a lot of reminiscing. We'll talk about the reason of the season. We'll be around each other and love each other.

And...well...

I'll survive another Christmas season.

My perfect Christmas?

We'd go away to a destination. No decorating. No gifts. We would spend the holiday together, around a fire, and make memories. We would remember the reason for the season and if I did any shopping at all, we'd donate it to needy families.

But here's the thing....

It might be perfect for me, but not for anyone else. My whole family loves all the things that I find to just be a lot of work. They have traditions and memories of years past. They want to make new memories. They want to decorate. They want to make cookies. They want to have gifts to open and watch others open gifts.

So Mrs. Grinch over here will just pick herself up and put on her "big girl pants" and just "suck it up buttercup" (to quote Hals). I'll have fun in the end and be glad we did it all. I just have to find that thing that will make my heart grow two sizes too big so I can give my family another great Christmas.

The Like Button

The words are missing.

I don't even know why.

I have things I want to say but the words...they just don't seem right. I write something and the hit delete. Then I write a bit more and...delete. Then I think I have it and...wait for it... d e l e t e!

Why are the words so hard to find today? Why am I trying to write when I don't have the words? What is my purpose? Where did my voice go?

At the end of the day, I find myself writing stories in my head each and every day. I think I've done it my whole life.

Sometimes I dreaming of a world I want. Sometimes I'm dreaming of a world that could be. Sometimes I'm trying to correct things in my life.

Today...I'm just writing. There are no words but I write. My thoughts are jumbled but I write. My fears are growing but I write.

I don't understand why I continue to write. I have a few faithful friends and family that read but mostly, it would be safe to say this is just a journal. It seems to make little to no difference in life.

I'm just another person with a blog. Doesn't everyone have a blog now?

I don't have a niche, maybe just a glitch. I'm not clever or funny or witty. I'm not an authority on anything. I don't have a fantastic story to share. I don't have tales from far away places. I just write.

I feel like all I write about right now is that I write.

I think it's because I'm hiding.

I'm hiding from sharing what's really inside.

I'm an insecure person. Yep. I said it. I have lots and lots of fears. Anxiety and I are old friends.

I want to write my book. I want to share on my blog. I want to put it out there but then... maybe no one reads it. Or maybe no one comments. Or no one hits the "like" button.

Then I laid it all out there and well, I proved myself right...no one is there. I'm all alone.

I know it's not true but then little things happen to confirm my fears. I have friend who have never read a word I've written. I have family that didn't know I wrote. I have been blogging for years and no one follows me. I have my steady 30 readers and then something different happens.

I share these feelings and fears with a few close friends. One quotes me. I almost cry. One said, "Wow 30 readers" and then commented that she thinks I might be the only one on earth that would read her blog. Then my blog gets shared on another page and more than 100 people read one post.

It felt really good. I was excited. But the comparison game starts...

I look at a blog that I have seen several of my friends share. This woman writes less than I do and man when she does write, thousand and thousands read what she wrote. They share it and share it and it goes viral every single time.

Then I read another blog. This guy doesn't even know what he's talking about and he has thousands of followers.

I try to tell myself these things don't matter but in the end, I think the "like" button is ruining my life. I wait to see how many hits I get, how many likes, how many comments. I check over and over and over. I look at the stats obsessively.

Then I almost break and I try to talk myself off the ledge. I call some close girlfriends and get reminded of the truths I know. I know I have a way with words. I know I am able, capable and called. I can hear my mother's voice very clearly. She encourages me to keep writing.

I allow my friends to remind me that I like writing. That I'm good at it. That I wasn't out to be the biggest, badest, bestest. I just wanted to write what was on my heart and in my mind.

So I start a blog and I babble a lot. I write about writing. I write to get it out. I have fears and anxiety about writing. I don't ever feel like I'm enough or even have the right words to write.

Today, I won't fret too much. It's really not about the "like" button. I will not let it ruin my life. After all, Facebook could come out with a "dislike" button. Then I certainly would have lots to fret about...like how many "dislikes" would I get?

My hero...a 14 year old?

No really, I'm serious. My 14 year old daughter is my hero. She really is. She's amazing. She's so loving. She's so strong. She's so beautiful.

The other day, we were just sitting around chatting. I told her she was beautiful and she started to tell me why I was wrong. Knee jerk response is the best was to describe it. It was an instant response. I was baffled for a minute. I thought, "Where on earth did she get this behavior?"

Then it hit me like a ton of bricks...me.

Oh no! My worst nightmare!

My daughter has picked up my "bad" habits. She cannot take a compliment. She denies positive words. She negates any affirmation. The worst of this is she learned it from me.

That old lie that we should shove off compliments with a minimizing statement is just wrong, wrong, wrong. You know what I mean. People say things like, "Oh I love your hair." Your response is, "Ugh, I need a hair cut." Not, "Thank you" or "You're so sweet" or "I take really good care of it."You simply explain to people that they are wrong...that you are not beautiful or worth the compliment.

My daughter actually told me she doesn't like to smile because she doesn't like her teeth. I know she needs quite a lot of cosmetic correction. She'll need braces and veneers. She might need more than that but I had those bad teeth too when I was young. I remember not smiling. I remember hating my teeth. I got braces and after they came off, I could not stop smiling.

But there's a problem with this. My mom did the same thing. She didn't smile because her teeth were damaged from years of taking medications for her complications with diabetes. When she did smile, it was closed lipped. Now that she's gone, it makes me want to cry. I have no good pictures of my mom smiling. Every time the camera was out, my moms lips were pierced shut. That wasn't her natural smile, but that's all I have...lots and lots of pictures of her mouth sealed shut hiding her teeth.

As her daughter, I didn't care what the meds had done to her teeth. I loved her smile. Her true smile. I just want to look at a picture of her smiling. I want to remember her smile. Those memories are fading and the pictures do not bring back her true smile to memory.

Now I have a daughter that learned this same behavior...three generations of fake smiles concealed behind closed lips. I found my smile only after having dental correction. But here's the thing...I wish I found my smile even when my teeth laid crooked in my mouth.

I wish I had embraced a true smile in spite of my less than perfect teeth. I wish I allowed myself to be happy with how I looked. I wish. I wish. I wish.

So I told my daughter I loved her smile. I told her I wanted to see her authentic happy smile. I wanted to see the smile that happens after a solid laugh. I want to have pictures of her that look like the happy girl I know and love. I told her it broke my heart that her Nana wouldn't smile for pictures. My daughter was so very close to her Nana (my mom). I saw tears in her eyes when I told her how hard it was for me to not have Nana anymore and not have a single picture of her Nana smiling her natural smile. I told her that Nana spent a lot of time hiding her teeth. I told her the only thing it did was make me sad.

I hugged my girl. I told her she was beautiful and when she tried to dodge the compliment, I told her to listen not talk. I told her I loved her smile. I loved her laugh. I loved her. I told her she was beautiful. I told her that her hair was gorgeous. I told her that her eyes were stunning. I hugged her and affirmed her.

I told her I was to blame for her not being able to take the compliment. I told her it was a lie that we needed to negate compliments. I told her that when we speak poorly of ourselves, that self talk does damage whether we say it out loud or in our head. I told the first act of being authentic was to take a compliment. Believe that the person meant it. Love that someone cares enough to say it. Then tell yourself those words are true.

Here's my beautiful girl performing with the Color Guard at a Marching Band performance at our first football game.

She's smiling...and her teeth are showing.

It's not the biggest smile I've seen, but she's smiling.

She's my hero. She heard me. She listened to the people who love her. She smiled. I know she's going to be okay. She's going to hear the world's compliments and believe them. She's going to smile for pictures. She'll eventually get braces...but until then, she'll smile. Teeth showing. Why? Because she's amazing. That's why she's my hero!

Turning another page...and saying goodbye

It was the last home football game last night. As the color guard coach, that kinda means my job is over for the season. It was our last performance. During the game, they honored the Seniors (football, cheerleaders and band members) I have two girls on color guard that are seniors. The band members got roses from someone they picked. It was sweet and there were lots of hugs.

After the game, there were lots and lots of pictures. Seniors taking pictures with each other, with directors, with coaches and with family. They were preserving memories in time. They were hugging and laughing and a few tears were shed. I told the band director that I didn't know how she did this every year. She joking said that she hated it and didn't want them to go off and live their lives. Somehow, we both knew it was only partly a joke.

One of my senior girls wrote notes to everyone in the guard including me. She's been amazing to get to know. She's a wonderful young woman and I cannot wait to hear about what she discovers in life and where she goes. She has the whole world ahead of her and made several profound statements last night, one of them being that she never thought this day would come.

Boy do I know what she's saying! I never actually thought I'd ever had a high schooler. I know its three years till I have a senior getting ready to leave my home, but nights like last night remind me it's a lot closer than I thought.

All of the sudden my heart ached for her parents knowing this was the last bunch of holidays that they knew all their girls would be living at home. The last year they knew they would all sit around the table for Thanksgiving. The last year they knew that on Christmas morning they would all wake up in the same house. The last year they knew that they would ring in one last New Year with their family.

It was a picture of a not-to-far-away future for our family. We have so little time with our kids. I know friends who have had adult children come home, but that's not the same. We only have a snap shot in time with our kiddos in our home, under our protection and guidance, living by our rules and being fed physically, emotionally and financially by us.

As I said goodbye to my first color guard, my heart ached. I know I will see these girls again, but this part is over. It was the last performance. For the families of seniors, it's a year full of lasts. The list gets long and as I talked to this one mom, she said it doesn't feel real. She said she didn't think it would set in until her daughter moved out.

It seems like yesterday when I was marking calendars with firsts and now I'm getting ready to celebrate lasts. My kids are growing. My life is forever changing. I guess I never thought about that the milestone would go from the first laugh and the first bite of food to the last performance, the last school dance, the last day of school.

For the last color practice, I had the girls relax a bit before the game. I'm going to miss this a lot.

Last warm up finished with a bang.

By they way they were relaxing...not collapsed because of practice. 

  

Last line up.

Ready for the very last pre-game show.

I didn't take nearly enough pictures.

Date night

So date night means hubby & I are trying to figure out what to do.

We finally get showered & dressed. 

We get into the car. 

We have now successfully shot down every suggestion the other makes. 

We get in the car...still no plan. 

We drive up Academy. 

We make it into one parking lot. 

We go a different direction. 

Hubby gets a text from friends with whom we had back up plans. Their plans canceled. Meet them. 

They are actually only a few blocks away. 

We have a nice dinner with friends. 

We go home & throw on a movie. 

I end up with a cuddle partner. 

It was a great date night.