My new Sunday school class

I was introduced to my new Sunday school class yesterday. This was actually the second week with the new 3^rd graders, but I missed last week because I was out of town. So, this was MY first week with them. To say we have a few characters is putting it mildly.

As we were beginning class a little girl interrupted Sam and pointed to me. She said, “I have a question…What is your name?” I answered her. Then she asked, “Who are your parents?” I tell her. She started racking her brain trying to figure out people she knew with the last name Sheffield. “Are you related to that lady that works at school that’s a helper?” “Are you related to so-n-so Watson?” “Oooh, you’re related to the Arringtons?! Are you related to Mr. Junior?” She was full-on wanting my pedigree, y’all. Too funny. You could tell she was a Southerner!

I think that this year will be better than last year. Last year’s kids were a hoot too, but it was hard coming into it during the middle of the year and trying to get them adjusted to a new routine and all. So, I do hope that it runs smoother last year.

Fall, Fall, will you ever get here??

As we are in the midst of the Dog Days of summer, it has been hot (when the sun was actually shining), muggy, nasty, wet, …and of course, HUMID.

My hair is hating this weather. I got it cut last week, and have only been able to really style it once. This damp nastiness that has been our weather now for an entire couple of weeks now has completely ruined my hair. I walk around looking like I have a white woman ‘fro. It’s terrible, I tell ya.

So, that being said, I would like to discuss something far more pleasant…Fall.

Fall is my favorite time of the year. From September to the end of November, I am in heaven.

Things that Fall brings…

1. Better weather. (Can I get an Amen??) Cooler weather. Cannot wait.

2. The desire to scrapbook and watch HGTV. I don’t know why it is, but my desire for both of these things is exponentially amplified during the fall months.

3. Pumpkins. I LOVE Pumpkins. I love decorations, centerpieces, etc with them, and I love to eat pumpkin. Pumpkin pies, pumpkin cake and my new favorite cake “Pumpkin Hallelujer” (said in true Madea fashion).

4. Better clothes. The ¾ length over shirts being my favorite. Jeans, another big favorite. Some may say, “Why couldn’t you wear them during the summer?” One simple response, “I sweat like a menopausal woman.” I don’t why it is, but over at my desk seems to be the hottest place in the Journal. I seem to be hot all the time.

5. The Warm colors. Reds, oranges, deep purple, yellows. I love them all.

Now that I am practically drooling thinking about fall, I’d better end this.

Dear Fall,

Please come soon. Summer is about to get the best of me.

Aleta

"Only me"

You know those weeks when everything seems to go wrong? I’m glad that I still have a smile on my face after all of it.

Picture it…

Tuesday, I went home to comfort Karter Lee. Laugh if you will, but this dog is terrified of thunder and storms. It was raining pretty hard, and she was home alone, so I figured I’d go home to have lunch. I walked into our kitchen to find that Karter Lee had went “dumpster diving” while we were all at work. It was one of those times where you shut your eyes for a minute, hoping that the magical powers of Samantha from Bewitched had suddenly been bestowed upon you. I tried blinking it away, to no avail.

It took me 15 minutes to pick up the trash that she had strung all over our dining room and kitchen. Strips of plastic, banana peels, yogurt containers, paper plates, Ziploc bags, Walmart bags, everything you can imagine. After I cleaned up the mess, my arm hit a little porcelain dish that mom had on the counter, and it fell onto the floor, along with all of its contents. Fun times.

I came home later with intentions of sweeping the floor and swiffering. I cleaned the floors then, broke out the vacuum. Somehow, while I was vacuuming, the cord caught the dog water dish that was next to our bookshelf in the dining room. It spilled all over the floor, some of which seeped into the living room carpet.

Just as soon as I cleaned up THAT mess, I realize that even though I had put clothes in the washer, the washer wasn’t running. I went out to investigate. The washer had filled with water, but hadn’t started. I flipped it off, then, back on. Nothing. I slammed the lid down, (which has worked in the past) nothing. What a nightmare. Mom came home and checked it out too. We thought that maybe something had hung up underneath. So, we pulled all the sopping wet clothes out of the washer (Did I mention that, of course, it was a HUGE load?), there was nothing underneath it.

Our “fix-it” man came by yesterday. He said that he could get the part that was needed to fix it, but it would be next Tuesday before he could get back to it. Great, I thought. Meanwhile, we had a load of still-wet clothes lying in a plastic tub that were now starting to smell (we had forgotten about them, to be honest, after the initial failed attempt at trying to get the washer to work). Then, I got an idea.

I couldn’t let our clothes sour. So, I thought I would fill the tubs with water, put a little detergent in them and let the clothes soak like they did in the old days. Not that hard, right?? Wrong. I soaked, pushed around, soaked, pushed around. As I was almost done wringing them out, mom came out and said “You know, we could’ve taken those to the Laundromat.” Are you kidding me? Why the hell hadn’t I thought of that?? It never crossed my mind.

I had to laugh at myself. I’m not going to be worth shooting today, my arms are so sore after wringing out what seemed to be 75 items of clothes.

I hadn’t felt that stupid since I was doing my very first billing at the Journal. I was so timid when I first started there. I know, I am a far cry from that girl now. I hated to even ask small questions, I was new and intimidated. I just didn’t want to mess anything up. That being said, after I had printed off probably 300 invoices, I was ready to put them in envelopes and mail them off. I seriously licked 300 envelopes. Three hundred. When I was finishing up the last few, Mr. John brought an envelope moistener over and put it on my desk without saying a word. Holy Moley. I must’ve given him the look that was a cross between mortified and NOW YOU BRING THIS TO ME! Lol. I still have to laugh about that.

Some advice Girls, always look at the big picture. Sometimes “walk-in-out-of-the-rain” sense is better than book smarts (a department that I’m sometimes lacking in). And never, ever be too afraid to ask for an envelope moistener.

Mid-Twenties Meltdown list

As mentioned in a post written last week, I am dead in the middle of my mid-twenties meltdown. Lol. There is so much I want to do and see and it’s been about to drive me nuts recently. I went to see the movie Eat Pray Love the other night with my friend KW. That movie is amazing. Just as soon as I could, I bought a copy of the book. I haven’t had the chance to get really far into it yet…but Elizabeth Gilbert is so easy to relate to. I won’t go all into it, because I highly recommend that y’all see this movie and read this book, but I’ll tell you something brief. After a messy, lengthy divorce and a bad break-up, she was left searching for something. Actually, she had been searching for something while tangled up in the divorce and break-up. She turns to God and she travels to Italy, India, and Indonesia. As mentioned above, this movie was amazing and inspiring, I’m sure the book will be as well.

I had been talking for the past few weeks to my friend Krystle about my latest revelation (also mentioned in a previous post)…the one about wanting to get out and do more. I’d been telling her places I wanted to visit and things I wanted to do. No worries, here, I won’t be traveling to Italy, India, or Indonesia, although they all looked beautiful. Last night, I compiled a list. Some are silly, some you will be like “why haven’t you just done this?” but it’s my list, nonetheless.

Mid-Twenties Meltdown List

-Take the time to get more involved in church again and start studying my Bible again.

-Get my ears pierced again.

-Learn to dance.

-Dance in the rain (Simple, I realize. But I need to first learn how to dance so people don’t see and think “OMG! That mentally challenged girl is having a seizure!”

-Learn better etiquette.

-Have professional photos taken (I rarely, RARELY like any pictures taken of me…So, to have nice ones done, would be great. And I don’t mean like the church, over-posed photos where they always catch me at the wrong angle. For instance, they will catch my double chin AND my arm flab flapping. Plus, they always make you stick your chin out at a really weird angle, where your neck may snap or you look like you need to be in a neck brace.).

-Write a book. I know that a lot of people say “oh, I should write a book.” But actually, this is something that I am passionate about and am trying to do.

-I want to learn to speak Italian and possibly Cajun French. My mama asked me the other night “Why Italian? Why not Spanish?” Spanish is practical and all, but my response was this “I DON’T want to understand what the field hands are saying while congregated in front of Walmart, looking at every woman that passes by.”

-I want to take more art, history, and humanities classes.

-Search for a career that WONT make me miserable in 10 years.

-Take a yoga class. Here, I question if I’m going crazy. The serenity and stress-management appeals to me with yoga. However, though I am pretty flexible, I have seen some of those poses, and I wonder if I (being the uncoordinated klutz I am) would be able to swing it. I tried one (after I had bought a book on yoga poses), and I couldn’t balance, and fell flat on my face.

-Make a drastic change. I have yet to decide what I want the change to be. I just want people to see and go “wow.”

-Let go. I want to be more willing to let go of my inhibitions and let go of my anger, resentments, and past bitterness. The other day, I compared myself to an aunt of mine. She passed away a few years ago, but when she died, she died a bitter, mean woman. I don’t want to ever get to that place. That really does scare me.

Places I want to visit

(Have I mentioned that I work with two women that absolutely love to travel?? Seeing and hearing their travel tales, only makes my longing to travel worse. :-D )

I want to go to Savannah again. I’ve been once, and I fell in love with it. I love seeing all the historic buildings, walking River Street, hearing the history of the town.

I want to go to the Beach Music Festival in Jekyll Island. They apparently have shag dance lessons. (which I have wanted to learn how to do since the first time I saw the movie “The Shag.”…can I get a Southern girl amen?)

Speaking of which, I want to go to Myrtle Beach.

New Orleans

St. Augustine. I’ve been a few times, but I haven’t gotten to spend much time exploring the city.

Charleston—Again, I’ve been, but didn’t get to take it all in. We went there for church camp.

Salem, just because of the history.

Boston

I want to take an unmapped road trip. Just go wherever we feel like, with no plans and no reservations. Try new restaurants, see new towns, etc.

I want to go up to maybe Northern Georgia or Northern Alabama and see the leaves in the fall.

This is my mid-twenties meltdown list as of right now. Hopefully, I will start checking things off of it, and adding more too it.

Sweet Kenzie Mae

This was a very sad weekend in the Sheffield house. My sister had to make the decision to have our little Kenzie Mae put down Saturday morning.

She had been doing better, she had been gaining weight and the tumor had shrunk…we knew that eventually there would be problems (the tumor was inoperable), but it seemed like she was doing so much better. I went to see a movie with my friend KW on Friday night, when I got home at 1:30 my mom was sitting up and said that she was worried about Kenzie. Kenzie just sat there, she wouldn’t get up, we couldn’t get her to drink anything and by the time I had gotten my shower and was ready to get in bed she had thrown up her supper. I knew that she was really sick, so I laid beside her and petted her until about 3 or 4 (when I finally went to bed). At about 7:30, I woke up to hearing her panting all the way across the house. Her little heart was racing, and her breath was really shallow. My sister took her to the vet’s office at 9 when it opened. The vet that was there hadn’t been the one to see her or the one that had done the surgery on her, but she had known and had heard about Kenzie’s tumor. She, too, was amazed at how bad she had gotten so quickly. The change was almost overnight. She said that she really felt like it was a rapidly-growing, cancerous tumor and that it had probably inched itself up to Kenzie’s heart and had caused fluid to build up. That was why the downhill spiral had happened so fast. She was very compassionate according to my mom and Rheba.

It has been a rough weekend. The house feels very empty. Both Karter Lee and Sassy both watched the door and looked for her when she didn’t come home. My dad has said over and over that he was shocked that this had happened to dog so young, and he “wouldn’t have had this happen for anything in the world.” It broke my mama’s heart, too. She’s been the one getting up with Kenzie every hour during the night the last several weeks, taking her out, and tending to her. We’ve just been trying to keep Rheba occupied, but I will admit, the sadness hits you when you come home and don’t see her running up to greet you.

I will say here that I never thought I would be such an animal lover, but sometimes pets just come in and touch your heart. There have been times in this past year that I have been upset and Kenzie would come up, demanding to be petted. After loving on her a bit, I would feel a little bit better. She has made us laugh in the hard times. Such as the time she came bounding into our living room, hit the standing fan, bounced off and bit Rheba’s toe (as if it had been the one to hit her). She will be greatly missed.

Dad contacted the breeder that we had gotten Kenzie from, and he was shocked as well. He has a chocolate lab puppy right now that’s 3 ½ months old that he’s offered to Rheba. We’re going to go get her tomorrow night. Rheba’s already picked out a name….Kymber Lynn. She will never be able to replace the Kenz, but maybe she’ll make our house feel a lively again.

Here are some pictures of Kenzie Mae. She will be remembered forever, and greatly missed.

Kenzie Mae when we first got her a year ago.

I just thought this was a sweet picture.

The Crazy way Kenzie would sleep

Kenzie Mae and Karter Lee, big buds

They have daddy wrapped around their paws :)

Meet Leeto Cognito the FB police

Ok, I promised someone that I would post a blog about “rules” for facebook (or really any other friend/sharing site) after this weekend’s events. I would like to say here that I absolutely love fb, it gives you opportunities to stay connected with old friends, see photos of their kids, share photos, plan events, etc. etc. I love it. However, me being the easily-irritated (slightly hostile) person that I am, I’ve come up with a few rules that I think every fb member should adhere to.

1. For crying out loud, don’t put other people’s information out there for all the world to see. Have you no common sense? I am not going to disclose the information that was given to me (by the person that asked me to write this blog), but I’ll touch the situation. Say a friend calls and asks you a personal question. You give them the answer because you think it will help them, and because of the content, you think that the conversation will stay between you two. You later go on fb to read “Well, So-n-so said….” Really? I mean, you were too embarrassed to plaster the question you had on your wall, why on earth would you think that posting a friend’s answer would be ok??

2. One of my biggest hang-ups, by far, is reading the same thing, day-in and day-out on people’s statuses. –I will put here that if you are counting down to your husband coming home from the military or something, that is sweet, and this doesn’t apply to that-- (The worst, in my opinion) Example: “Day one of my P90X. It’s awesome!” next day… “Day two of my P90X. I’m really feeling it. It’s so awesome.” Next day… “Day three. P90X is so great. I love it.” --Ok. I don’t give a damn about P90X or how well you are doing with it. If you love it, that’s great…I hope that it works for you. I just don’t want to hear about it all. the. time. FB statuses aren’t meant to be used as infomercials. Another thing, while I’m on this… Don’t use lyrics to songs as all your statuses. Especially if it’s the SAME stupid song. Every single day. Monotony is boring. Try to spice it up. I swear to goodness, someone used the lyrics to “Smile” by Uncle Kracker for like 2 weeks, every stinkin’ day. Every time my home page popped up, there was that stupid song. And the thing was…I liked the song before that. Not now. I will say here, before I sound like a complete hypocrite, that I’ve done some of the same statuses before…but I would catch myself doing it and think “people don’t care…”

3. Grammar, spelling, etc. -- Texting is going to be the ruin of spelling/grammar/punctuation. I am certain of that. As a friend of mine just pointed out, there is a difference between “there,” “their,” and “they’re”…and they are NOT INTERCHANGEABLE. My hang-up is the sentences that go on and on with no punctuation marks. Ex: I’m going to the mall omg the vera Bradley purses are so cute I’m thinking about getting one but I’m not sure if mama will let me I hope she does though btw I’m loving Mike he’s the cutest boy ever and the best boyfriend y’all should be jealous. …….WTH? My eyes cross when I read posts like this. Use a period! Use a question mark! Have you ever heard of a comma?

4. I get invitations all the time. “Aleta, will you be my neighbor on Farmville?” “Help so-n-so raise their barn.” I don’t want to help you raise a damn barn. I’m not going to help you locate your missing cow. I’m not going to feed your stupid fish. Lol. Stop sending me invites!

These are my fb pet peeves of the moment.

Until next time….

Leeto Cognito

Supervisor of the FB “you’re annoying as H” department

I would rather...

Let's play a game called “I would rather…”

I would rather…have malaria.

I would rather…be stung by a jellyfish.

I would rather…lose my underwear at a funeral (again, hehehe ).

I would rather…ingest a package of thumbtacks.

I would rather…be the Character Council’s Personality of the Month.

I would rather…be hit by a mack truck.

I would rather…burn my tongue on hot soup.

I would rather…have my girdle pop and roll while singing karaoke in front of a large crowd.

I would rather…dance to “Ride Sally Ride.”

I would rather…wear a sign saying “throw your chewed-up gum at me.”

I would rather…be locked in a room with my Sunday School Class of 9 year-olds for 10 hours.

I would rather…have to listen to an old lady talk about how prune juice is a lifesaver for her digestive system.

I would rather…try to watch a Tyler Perry movie with teenagers right behind me.

I would rather…slit my wrists with a plastic knife.

I would rather…be stuck in an elevator with a man that has serious body odor.

I would rather…have “redneck thug” kiss my hand and call me Angela.

I would rather…be trampled by an elephant.

I would rather…take another semester of Phalin’s Research Methods.

I would rather…teach a Pre-K Class.

I would rather…watch a Crocodile Dundee marathon.

Honestly, I’d rather do all of these things than do what I’m going to do this afternoon. What is that, you ask? Go to the doctor. I HATE GOING TO THE DOCTOR. I have white-coat syndrome. The last time, my blood pressure went up and I started crying at the doctor’s office. The girl who rarely sheds a tear cried the last time she had to go to the doctor.

This is just a check-up. But I swear to goodness, I WILL NOT cry this time. But because I’ve been dreading this for oh—I dunno—Six months? The doctor better be on guard. He called my mama “feisty” when she was in the hospital….oh, y’all, he hasn’t even scratched the surface on feisty.

I’d better add here that he is an awesome doctor. He’s been so very good to my mama. For me, however, the jury is still out. I don’t like many doctors. Y’all need to pray that not only will I get through this…but that he gets through it too.

Cynthia Kay's Big Day

My mama's friend, Mrs. Ann, and Cynthia Kay--the birthday girl

Saturday was a busy day for me. I had been trying to plan for my mama’s birthday for a few weeks now…but as always, there are the finishing touches that seem to mount on the day of. I had decided that we would do finger foods. That always sounds good in theory, when in reality, a person would be a whole lot better off just buying pizza. Haha.

The menu was cheese ball, hot dogs wrapped in bacon, meatballs, spinach dip, nachos, and three different types of bar cookies (dixies, white chip lemon bars, and double fudge fantasy bars). It seems like there were several other things…but I’m drawing a blank. The thing about it was, I waited until Saturday to really start cooking. I felt like I was up the river, without a paddle, with a hole in my boat. But, never fear, super girl kicked in at about 11 a.m. and all the work got finished.

The party-goers

The party-goers that thought they could escape this photographer by congregating outside.

We had a really good turn out and mom really seemed to enjoy herself…which was by far the best part.

Cynthia Kay's red wig (see Taryn eyeing it??)

The first gift she opened was a red-ish wig from Aunt Meryl. The girls, Taryn and Rachel, loved it. My uncle yelled out “She looks like Esther from Sanford and Son!” We did get some funny pics of mom in her red wig.

Mom loved her party, and we all got to catch up with people that we hadn’t seen in a while. It was so nice. I’m so glad that mom had a special birthday :)

Taryn loved the wig :)

Finally! A good one!

So, if you’ve been reading my blog for a little while, you know that I’ve not really had the best luck with birthdays in the last few years. We will revisit for a minute. 18^th—we wound up watching Deadliest Catch (not my fave show) during my birthday party b/c someone stole my remote. 19^th—We went to Cedar Key where I got into a fight with one of my friends. 20^th-- wasn’t so bad. 21^st-- my grandma wound up having heart surgery (feel bad for her, too, here. My grandma and I have the same birthday). 22^nd-- I had gall bladder issues and mono and was sick as a dog while staying in New Smyrna Beach. 23^rd –I went to Carrabelle, and wound up crying in a bar while trying to fight off a guy that looked like a redneck thug, who kept called me “Angela,” told me I had beautiful cheeks, thought the word “polygamy” was too big to use in normal conversation, and (forgive me here, PG13, this only came up because someone made a “cheer” about woman’s vagina being “space”) kept saying “I LOVE space.” –Can you see why I was crying?? I wanted to vomit.

So, needless to say, I’ve had some awful birthdays.

This year was different. I had an awesome birthday weekend. Friday night, (July 30), Krystle, Jess, and I went to the Ivy House for dinner. So so yummy. AND Krystle made me key lime cupcakes. To die for. :) Then we went to see the movie Ramona and Beezus. I love, love, LOVE that movie. It was so funny. There were kids in the Theater with us, but we were cracking up the loudest, by far. With KW and Jessica’s one-liners, my face was hurting from laughing so hard when I got home.

The next day, Krystle and I went shopping for pajamas. Well, that was the intention, anyways. We DID both get some new pajamas, but while out and about, we wound up shopping for shoes, headbands, earrings, some gifts for my Mama’s birthday, etc. It was a blast.

Me and Aunt Angie

My mama and me

Margaret (my adopted Grandma)

Aunt Angie, Rheba, Whitney, and KW

That night, I went over to Aunt Angie’s. I had known about the party she was throwing for me, but she hadn’t told me the theme. I walked in to find her dining room and kitchen looking like a luau. Flip flop streamers hung from the ceiling, bead curtains hung from a doorway, a half-naked man was plastered on the wall…and the food…you must see the pictures of the dessert table. T, being the perfectionist that she is, did an awesome job. Check this stuff out (look at the details).

Please note the detailed swimsuit and bikini on the teddy grahams

The super cute scallop cookies

the dessert table

the half-naked man

All of the food was wonderful, too. Chicken kabobs, pulled pork sandwiches, spinach dip, pea pickin’ cupcakes, and the list goes on and on, it was sooooo yummy.

That crew always has such a blast when we all get together. They my birthday so special this year. I will always remember all the effort they put into it. Sending big thank you’s to Aunt Angie for planning and throwing my party. T for putting so much effort into it. Jackie for all the help with it :) Krystle, for planning Friday night out and for pretty much spending your whole Saturday doing birthday stuff with me. And my mama, for helping with the cooking even though she was exhausted. I had a blast and couldn’t have asked for a better birthday!

Oh, I’d like to mention here that I got a beautiful zebra striped watch (my favorite) from Carrie and Allie Claire. It got AC’s approval, according to Carrie, because she kept taking it out of it’s box to look at it and kept saying “ooooooooooh” :) I felt special :-D

In my defense...

I’ve been trying to remember to get my birthday pictures off of my camera…and I keep forgetting to. Oh, well…hopefully tomorrow.

This week I’ve been struggling with something. Actually, it’s been bothering me now for months, but it just came to a head this week…

For about the last six months, I’ve felt like I’ve been at a standstill. People keep asking me “What are you going to do?” “Are you going back to school?” “When are you going to move?” (apparently, they haven’t discussed this with my dad…every time it gets brought up,--because I have thought of moving out all on my own, people-- he flies into a tizzy), the best is “When are you going to meet someone?” (ummm….—crazy look here--) I am SOOOO sick of questions. The truth is, I don’t really know the answers yet. I really don’t. I’ve mentioned this before…It’s not as if I’m lacking ambition, but when people ask me, I draw a complete blank. I just don’t know.

Things I’ve learned about myself.

1. At present time, I’m not equipped to be a counselor. You could ask me what medicine is generally prescribed for bipolar disorder. I could answer. Ask me about psychological disorders. I could answer. You could even ask me about some neurological disorders, and I could answer. But since 2007, I haven’t quite been the same. It’s not that I lack compassion, but I believe that there are some emotional situations that I am not able to help people with. There are some situations that I wouldn’t be able to help people with, because I, myself, am not ready to face. Not because this is relevant to the counselor thing, but because it’s relevant to where I stand on this… Recently I nearly went into a full panic attack at the thought of seeing a sad movie. My friend and I had discussed seeing a specific movie for my birthday…but when I looked at the reviews, I knew that I couldn’t watch it. I hated to tell my friend, because it was just a weird thing to say, and because I didn’t want to disappoint her (seeing as how she wanted to see it too). But I hate crying, I’m almost to the point where I hate to show much emotion at all. It’s just odd, but I am not the same person that I was when I decided to get my degree in Psychology.

2. All of the things I love to do DON’T MAKE MONEY. I love to write. I love sewing. I love researching things. There is so much more…but I’m drawing a blank at the moment. But does any of it have careers that make money? Nope.

3. The way that I am, my personality, according to a website, is very prone to being treated like a doormat. It makes me susceptible to being in relationships with abusers, substance abusers, etc. Nice. I pray to God that I’m smarter than to put myself in that kind of situation. I will say this, I have been a bit of a door mat to some. I see that now, and I’m going to try my hardest not to let that situation happen again.

4. On the whole “When are you going to find someone?” thing. Let me just tell anyone who has questioned this: I want the RIGHT guy, not just someone to settle for. Because, if you haven’t noticed “settling” never works. Five, ten years down the road, you’ll look back and maybe see what could’ve been…and you’ll regret it. The truth is, I’ve been in love with a guy since I was 18. Some things just aren’t meant to work out. And I know that no person is ever the same as another. But I want whoever I find to have the same qualities and characteristics and values that this guy has. That is what I’m looking for.

Considering all of this, though, and considering the whole standstill thing…I’ve felt like I was being suffocated for the past six months. One of my biggest hang-ups is the fact that I regret a lot of the things that I didn’t do. I’ve felt like my life’s been put on hold, it’s began to eat at me because I haven’t been doing the things that people my age do. Due to some of the stuff that’s been happening in my life, I haven’t been able to get out and do as much, and it’s bothering me. In fact, I’ve been miserable, to say the least. There’s so much I want to do and see…and I’m tired of waiting. Things at home are getting better, and I’m ready to take charge of my life again. I’m ready to go and do.

That being said, I’m not sure if I can get all my business in order before October, but I am going to start school again. Hopefully for spring, but if not, next fall. I think I might have a plan :) “Think” being the key word here. lol