TOTALLY ENGAGED!!

Yes, it happened!

It was perfect. We went to Nashville to look around all the cute little shops and such, just spending a day together. We hadn't had a weekend day that wasn't filled with packing, moving, unpacking or cleaning and organizing for about three months. We were due some quality down time.

We walked through this adorable area beside a store where the trees had grown over and it made a small little tunnel. There were flowers everywhere and not a lot of people. It had been raining most of the day, so the bench was wet, but we stopped in the shade and rested a bit, by his suggestion.

I kept talking about how much I liked the way the trees hung over and all the flowers, and he said, "I like you", reached into his pocket and pulled out the ring. He said, "I would get down on one knee, but I'd get all muddy and wet and you'd have to help me back up and we both don't want that. I love you. Will you marry me?"

Of course I said yes. Of course.

Thirteen years in the making. I still get a shock when I look down and see the ring and how it shines. It's beautiful. And we have plenty of time to plan and make the day perfect.

Oh, it has been so long

My poor blog. I have forsaken it for the glamor of Facebook.

I'm not sure if anyone will even read this, but I'm posting this more for myself than anything.

I have had a wonderful moment where I realized that I have healed and learned so much over the course of the last four years. Those four years were very difficult and painful for the most part, but the pay off has been well worth it.

I have finally attained what I have been looking for. I have attained balance between sacrificing myself and compromise. I have found a healthy way to discuss my feelings and needs and wants.

I have found that love. That love that I never thought I would have again.

And it just so happens, it's with the person I first (and really only) ever felt it with.

When I first moved back, there was something pulling me here. I didn't know what it was, but there was a void that nothing would fill. Buying my house, getting the job, all of it was amazing and wonderful, but there was still something lacking.

I knew last July what it was. I just still wasn't quite sure how to go about it the healthy way.

Fast forward to today. Today, I am in a healthy relationship with someone I've loved for 13 years. It's better than the first time we were together, because we both grew up and figured out what we wanted. And what we wanted was each other.

I have a very strong sense of calm about me right now. Normally, I am filled with this obsessive, almost manic feeling, thinking about what they are thinking and feeling and doing and always in the back of my mind, who are they doing.

With Riley, there was never any doubt, never any fear. The trust was so strong, so well earned that there was never any reason to doubt.

For as much as we have both changed, that is still the same. The respect we have for each other is just as strong as those feelings of love. The trust is an unspoken guarantee.

So mom and Christi can have their "We knew it all along" party and I will gladly show up, wearing the face of a woman who has lived it, learned it, and is now loving it.

I am so excited for my future. I am so excited for the promises that are made, because this time, I know they will become truth.

How I love Stephen King

This is an excerpt from "The Langoliers" in "Four Past Midnight"......


Deep in the trenches carved into the floors of the Pacific and Indian Oceans, there are fish which live and die without ever seeing or sensing the sun. These fabulous creatures cruise the depths like ghostly balloons, lit from within by their own radiance. Although they look delicate, they are actually marvels of biological design, built to withstand pressures that would squash a man as flat as a windowpane in the blink of an eye. Their great strength, however, is also their great weakness. Prisoners of their own alien bodies, they are locked forever in their dark depths. If they are captured and drawn toward the surface, toward the sun, they simply explode. It is not external pressure that destroys them, it its absence.


I just re-read that a few days ago and remembered how much that stuck with me from the first time I read it. I used to totally understand what that character (the one like the fish) felt, since I couldn't live without that pressure.

Now, I can't imagine living with it. Ever again.

It's moments like that that truly make all the changes sink in.

All those changes used to feel so alien to me. All of it, every day, I felt like someone else was calling the shots and deciding things for me. Nothing felt like it fit right in my head. I am finally to the point where there are only a few things that feel like they don't fit right. Looking back on the way things used to be, THAT feels alien to me now.

I am so thankful.

Are hands really that creepy?

The X-Files. Fringe. Medium. All of these shows have images of hands on the opening credits. I simply do not find hands (or x-ray type images of hands) creepy. Or surreal. Or other-worldly. Maybe because a lot of people, um, have hands and use them daily?

Side note...I move in 15 days. In 14 days I will be an official home owner. I have nothing packed. I *just* printed off a Real Simple check list and have started switching my info online. I am also losing my mind. Slowly. It's partly my new job and the stress of starting it at the same time as buying a major purchase and moving.

The new job...the new job is great. It was very stressful for the first month. It involved crying on my couch several mornings. But now things are starting to make sense. It was a great decision I made.

I am now addicted to soft pretzels and hummus. Not at the same time, mind you. Whole wheat pita with the roasted garlic or eggplant and olive hummus. Pretzels with mustard.

Kitten Fat Cat is having a very bad day today. She didn't just wake up on the wrong side of the bed this morning...she woke up on the wrong damn bed in the wrong damn house in the wrong state in the wrong country. Moria thinks she wants to try mustard for the first time. I am betting it may be her last time of thinking that would be a good idea. Although she does like weird food. Avocado. Rice Krispies. Olives. Peanut butter. Various other things.

Alright, time to wind my ass down for the night. I hope I don't have images of *gasp* hands during the night! OOOOOHHHHHHH!!!!!

I need to own "Parenthood".

That is all.

I feel like I have been in large moments of change non-stop for the last four years. Just when one change happens and I get adjusted, there is something else that is huge and needs to happen, creating more change. I know life is all about adapting, but it would be nice to have a breather. Some calm. Some stability that is long lasting.

I know each thing I have done has helped to get me closer to stability, and I appreciate that. I really do. But I'm getting a bit tired of looking to the future and seeing the next big thing that needs to get done so another big thing can happen to allow yet another big thing to happen.

I tried to take a mental vacation and ended up sleeping for two weeks and gaining 15 pounds. I am comparing my life here to my life there, and my life in all of the 'there's' I have lived at in my time.

I know once my job makes sense I will have stability. I know once I close on the house and move in, I will have stability. Those things will be happening soon. But in the meantime, there is packing and training and learning and frustration and anticipation and sleepless nights and backaches. And apparently an abundance of bitching.

God knows I don't want things to be stagnant. I can't handle that. But small, good changes are in order. Small. Things I can deal with over a 24 hour period.

Or having Leo show up at my door. I can handle that change....