No Sharks in the Deep End

I take an extraordinarily long time to wade myself into a pool, a friendship, a new environment. I need to know everything I can about a subject before I jump in. So with a stack of maps, menus for highly rated vegan friendly restaurants, and a variety of activities including cheap/free days and coupons, we were on our way. I drove for about an hour approaching LA and managed to yield onto 3 incorrect freeways, map in hand and GPS yelling "Rerouting!" at me. From now on Mike drives unless I am familiar with the road and driving mentality. We also found ourselves walking up hills in the dark looking for a nearby restaurant that would allow a teenager entrance on St Patricks Day. And my teenager gave me the best advice: "When you are walking up a hill toward darkness and on the verge of tears, turn around and walk back towards the bright flashing lights and the sound of people." But this is a foreign concept to me, the girl who hid behind my mom's prairie skirt, my friendly and beautiful sister, my excitable and engaging husband. Too often people go to hug me and say "Oh, sorry, you don't like hugs!" and step back. I don't know where that comes from. I don't initiate hugs and I don't feel any lack of friendship without one, but I don't dislike them. My dad always told me that to have friends I have to be friendly. And apparently being friendly is more than simply smiling instead of sitting in the dark with my arms folded. So I decided that instead of using our vacation to run and hide, kidnap the social people in my family and get them all to myself for an entire week. I did get time with them, but we got to visit a few friends along the way. And those visits were the highlight of our trip. I feel like I'm waist deep in water now, at the point where maybe I won't think so much about things and can just jump in and enjoy life and relationships around me. Or maybe I'm still sitting on the first step waiting for Mike and Autumn to realize its been a half an hour and I'm still not in the pool and pull me in.

Hannah's Guide to Style

Walking into Fashion Square mall in my ugly mom comfy outfit brought back all the Tim Gunn's Guide to Style advice about throwing out your sweat outfits and wearing a beautiful summer dress to go to the grocery store. I always laughed because the sweatpants on the show were expensive and name brand and because I'm even more pathetic in that I wear my pajamas most every day and sometimes to the grocery store. I used to subscribe to the Flylady blog and her advice is to get up, get dressed, put on make up, do your hair, even if you are planning on staying home all day with the baby, and just in case someone comes to the door. So yah, I remember that when I answer the door for a client in my bathrobe because they are early and Mike's still in the shower. Its hard to balance an at home business, being a homebody, and a rather lazy sense of style. Why not get into the mind set of being dressed up to go dreaming every day? Its not backward thinking to wear a party dress and pearls while cleaning the toilet. Its fabulous! Or at least if I push myself in that direction the worst that would happen is I would feel better about myself, more confidant, reflect a better image to our customers, not embarrass the postal workers, and I'll be more at the ready for adventure. Step one was getting out of the house more and enjoying life with my husband instead of hanging out at home catching up on Days of Our Lives and laundry. And I've had an amazing month! Step 2 is presenting myself in a new way, changing from the outside in. So my baby step of the day was to get rid of everything that doesn't fit me. If I ever lose this "last 5 pounds" I will celebrate by buying a whole new wardrobe instead of wearing things 5 years out of fashion.

Magical Powers

My magical power is that I can locate just about anything when asked. I just see a picture of it in my mind. Most likely because I saw it there and was too lazy to pick it up at some point, but sometimes I amaze myself. I've been reading another one of Geneen Roth's books about healing, working through grief and being strong in the broken places. I'm excited that I have always done this, grieve when I realize something in my life has been amiss. I'm happy that through this process I have slowly altered my way of thinking and my life. It is amazing to me the way life and the mind/soul body works, that you become whole over the course of your life even if you do not realize the change going on inside of you because it is built slowly over time. And when you realize what has happened it seems almost magical.