Lorrie

Over the past 5 days, I've been in Murrieta, California with Travis. His mom passed away a week ago today...That's the reason that I've been all about living life to the fullest.  You just never know when it could be rapidly taken from you.  It has also taught me not to take the people who are in my life for granted. 

 

All too quickly, it can just be over...I only met his mom Lorrie one time.  I met her when Trav and I had only known each other for a a little over a week...Looking back, I'm so glad that I met her.  It's after going to her service, I know what a truly amazing person she was and I can only hope to learn from her example.  I think the most amazing thing that I learned about her in the time that I spent there with Trav and his family was that she saved everything.  She has pictures, her kids old sports jerseys, paper work, old family trinkets, things for her childhood...everything.  It has inspired me to make plans to go home and get together all of my random junk that I've kept throughout the years like bagage claim tickets and receipts from the big things I've bought and actually do something with it all. That may seem silly, but because she kept all that stuff, she has some amazing keepsakes for Trav and his brother.  She was also really organized.  I could learn a lot from her.    At her funeral, the city that she worked in gave her a proclomation.  This was probably the most inspiring part of it all. Residents of the city were calling the city insisting that they do something to honor her memory. As the marketing director at Chick Fil-a she created relationships with her customers.  I was completely blown away by the number of people who came up to Travis and shook his hand and said "I was a customer at Chick Fil-A."   That is the kind of person I want to be.  Some who leaves such an impression on other that it actually does make the world a better place. With that being said, a Go Fund Me account has been set up for donations to help the family...my family with the cost of her services. If you feel like living by Lorrie's example, please click the link and donate what you can.  It means more to Lorrie's family than you can possibly imagine.    If you live in the Murrieta/Temecula/Riverside ish area, there will be a fundraiser on Novebember 20th at Chick Fil-A in Murrieta where Lorrie worked. A portion of the entire day's profits will go to family.   We'll miss you, Lorrie...I wish I could have had the chance to get to know you better.

When Things Go Right

After I wrote all those goals and my little list of things that I'll be working in the next little while, I wasted no time in getting to work.  It is so satisfying to get down to business and acutally do what I tell myself I'm going to.   For example, last night, I told myself I was going to wake up a little bit early before class to do laundry and clean today.  Usually I go to bed knowing that I'm kidding myself with those thoughts.  I was up late FaceTiming with Travis and was pretty sure that thought was a complete lie to myself.   But wouldn't you know it, this morning when my alarm went off at 05:30 I got out of bed, did my hair, got my clothes together to wash, cleaned my room, and changed the wash to the dryer on my way out the door.  Not only that, I got home from class in time to shower and blow dry my hair.  I even had some time to put way all the clothes I washed and get my next load ready to toss in the washer.  When I walked out the door, my room was clean, my bed was made and I was early to work.   I think that when you work on certain aspects of your life and improve yourself, other parts of your life just sort of tend to follow suit.   I got my butt into the gym two days in a row.  I have been drinking a ridiculous amount of water, and I'm finally not behind in my classes.  I'm actually right where I should be.  It's amazing...Maybe it's just this full moon...It'll probably all disappear next week and I'll be back to being an unorganized mess.   I have more to say, but I'm not sure how to organize it all into a real life blog post.  I am currently working on creating posts for...wait for it...the entire year of 2015.  It's not going as well as I hoped and my cutesy blogging ideas are just not working like I want them to.  So forgive me.  My brain is blog-fried.  Hopefully I've got some good things for you in the coming year!   Here's to fresh starts!

A Collections of Moments

Life is fragile.  
I think sometimes we forget that. We act like this day we're living right now isn't even going to be a memory a few months from now.  Sometimes, that may be true.  It's not likely I'm going to remember wanting to pull my hair out over studying for all my tests, but I'll probably remember the A that I get on the test.  Moments are fleeting but it's a collections of moments that make up your entire life.  I don't know about you, but I think I want my moments that I string together and look back on to be some good ones. 
 In an effort to improve the quality of my collections of moments I made a list... I kinda love lists. And this one is mine.  It consists of the things that I'd like to complete in the near future. Near can be interpreted as anywhere from a week from now to 5 years from now. 
1) Toss out the clothes & shoes that I've had since the 8th grade and buy adult clothes 2) Pass this semester
3) Be a good blogger.  Not because I wanna be blog-famous.   4) Read books just for fun.
5) Embrace my natural hair color and quit dying it. 6) See more live music. 
7)  Volunteer.  Love.  Give. Share.
8) Stop eating pizza Lunchable and Bagel Bites. 
9) Take care of my body. 
10) Start a collection so that when I'm old I have something of virtually zero value to pass onto my children.  
11) Write some music 
12)  Get married and have some kids (kids can come later than the "near future" timeline...)
13)  Let go of the things that don't enhance my life in any way.
14)  Spend more time without my phone in my hands. 
15) Don't just write lists like these. Actually do the stuff I put on it. 
Right now my life is sort of crazy and I'm not exactly sure what to do with everything that's happening.  I'm trying to just take this lesson with me.  I'm not going to be on this Earth for forever.  I have to make every single day and every moment that passes by count for something.  
What does your string of moments look like?

November At a Glance

This awesome thing just happened where I completed my homework for the entire week (and the beginning of next week) And I feel so good. I updated my "November-at-a-glance" calendar and It hurt my heart.  Ouch.  Gonna be a rough month.  However, it really helps to stay organized.  I had a little lapse there earlier in the semester...But I'm back on track and keeping my grades exactly where they should be.  Now that I have a pre-loaded excuse for being a the worst 5-days-a-week blogger ever, you don't have to be shocked when you see that I haven't posted in a while.  With that being said...I've got some November goals.  

 

My goals aren't that specific, but I think that for this month I need a broad target.  Hopefully I can stay on top of all my goals and see how things go!

 

Making It

Well, I'm not sure if I was ever all that clear about this, but I've returned to work.   My schedule for the past week has been pretty dang crazy.  It's like I haven't had time to do much of anything at all.  That's part of why I got stuck on a little Travis Hiatus. I'm not allowed to see the boyfriend all week unless I complete everything on my to-do list...   Scary right? I don't know if I got behind or if my teachers are just sadistic and tried to make this happen to me. Regardless...Dis is ma lyfe.   However, it feels good to be back at work. I'm working with the same company where I started my first job:  CaptionCall.  It's a pretty awesome company that works to caption phone calls for those who have a hard time hearing.  The only reason I really left was, well, boredom.  But it feels pretty great to be back. I'm surprised how much I actually missed working for them!   Balancing work, school, boyfriend, and the band is going to get increasingly difficult.  I already registered for my classes next semester and I can feel the head ache setting in.  I just keep telling myself that all of this is an investment in my future and worth it.  All the time and money spent on this little life of mine...it's worth it.   Do you have anything you tell yourself that gets you through the day? I have a few little mantras that I say that help me succeed.

The Midterm Blues

Right now, my brain is so fried from writing an essay (that still isn't done, in case you were wondering...Due in exactly 24 hours) that I simply had to take a break.  I had to write something that isn't horribly labored. Maybe blogging a little will help the creative juices flow and make it easier to crank out a stupid "evaluation essay".
That whole intro was basically just me trying to convince myself that this procrastinating is necessary for my mental health.  It's most likely a lie I generated to make me feel better, but...maybe it will work. 
This is the part of the semester were everything sort of...seems to fall apart.  On Saturday, I cleaned my room down to organizing my drawers to avoid working on this paper that has been giving me so much trouble.  If you know how I am about cleaning, that should be a pretty impressive thing.  I guess I should hand it to myself, at least I'm being a productive procrastinator.  I don't only not do what I need to, I complete something else that I was putting off. 
However, Travisland is still fantastic. 

On Sunday, he stopped by my weekly gig at the Arts Factory. After that, we went out for pizza at the Four Queens hotel on Fremont Street.  Let me tell you something about this pizza...It was freaking amazing.  It cost about $18 for a 16 inch pizza that we demolished...The coolest thing about our little pizza excursion, is that the place is really quite unsuspecting.  You wouldn't even really think to order pizza at the restaurant.  Luckily, we know a pizza connoisseur that sent us to the right place.   

Well, now that I have stayed up too late and made some progress on my paper, this blog post can come to a close.  I hope that you all have a wonderful rest of your week. 

When We Make Plans

October is a big month for me.  It marks an anniversary that sometimes I want to forget altogether...But other times, I remember as being a huge life changing event that sent me on a path I wouldn't have picked.  And it's better than the one I did.
In October of 2011, I was preparing to leave for Marine Corps Boot Camp.  I was so ready.  I was going to make it.  I wasn't scared.  I knew I was doing the right thing for me.  Unfortunately, I made the decision to go for a little bike ride.  That little bike ride down a mountainside completely changed my fate for the rest of my life.  At that point in time, my plan was as follows:   Marine-->Wife-->War-->Mommy etc.  
Well, it has been three years now and I'm none of those things and I don't think I could be any happier that my plans didn't quite work out.  Sure, sometimes I wonder what it would have been like to be an active duty Marine, but I found something else.  I created a new career for myself.  One that I'm almost definitely better off in.  Not only that, I was inspired to go to college after my little break from life.  Part of the reason I chose to join the military was that I wasn't ready to go to college.  Breaking my arm gave me some time to grow up and get ready for it. 
I didn't end up marrying that boy and living with him happily ever after.  Again, sometimes I wonder what it would have been like...but where I sit right now, I'm happy that we didn't stay together.  We probably would have had a few months of wedded bliss before the realization that a mistake had been made... Right now, my injury is a faint scar and a distant memory.  Sometimes my fingers go numb or my arm tingles...but I don't really notice any limitations. My plans that didn't work out are lessons that I've learned.  Life is amazing for me.  I don't think I have ever been so happy.  If I could go back, the only thing I would do is hit myself on the head.  The bike ride was a pretty stupid idea.  But hey...shit happens.  I suppose this is where I say that I'll chalk it up to better luck. 
I suppose the only thing that's left to do...is ride a bike.  I haven't in three years.  If I ever do that again, I'll let you know how it goes.