old photos and stuff….

Derek recently gave me a couple of sacks of family photos and old letters. It was difficult for me to go through and look at my life as it was. I’ve successfully avoided looking at things that remind me of how much I’ve lost these past few years but today I had the desire to forge ahead and face it square in the face.

What did I see?
I saw my beautiful children. All four as I remember them in so many different places and spaces and ages. I don’t know how much of this is prejudice but I swear I have the most beautiful and photogenic children of all time. Soon, I’ll scan some of the photos I looked through and post them on a page on my site so you can all see. Then you’ll know what I’m talking about.

What else did I see?
My marriage. In all it’s phases. Derek and I put in almost fourteen years. I can honestly say that we tried everything we could think of to try to make our family stay together. Divorce is ugly and sad. Neither one of us wanted to give up. But I can also honestly say that we are both so much happier now that I know we made the right choice. I can feel God helping us make the best out of the mess we made for our children’s sake. And I’m so glad that my children’s father is such a great dad and that he found a great woman to bring into their lives. I feel God everywhere in my life.

What else was there?
Old photos of my childhood and art I had done in junior high school, letters and cards from my parents and grandparents and high school report cards. It was strange to see young me. I feel like it was ages ago, a hundred years, not 20. I had long permed hair in a few photos. I gained and lost weight. I looked sadly lost and broken in many of them. In a few I look almost happy.

I think I’ll make a photo album.

I like to think I’m a fairly positive person. I’ve had hard things in my life but so does everyone. And I don’t like when people do the comparing thing and say to me that my things where harder than theirs or other people’s. Hard things are hard things and I think God doles them out fairly according to what is hard for you and challenges you. What seems overwhelming to me might just be the right degree of hardship for you. So when I’m looking back on my life and seeing hard things or looking ahead at things that seem like they might be too much for me, I’m getting pretty good at just talking to God about it and trying to find the good things to think about. The hard things are going to happen no matter what my frame of mind is. I might as well look at the positives while they happen.

I just re-read what I wrote and I come off sounding all mature and everything…yikes…..

Joe put me on his back today and spun in circles. Not only does that seem like it couldn’t have really happened according to today’s physics laws but it seems like a bad idea all the way around in general…..except I loved it and so did Joe. Strange….the little things that make me happy……..

quick recap for the kids:
i faced some of my fears today, you could all be in the movies and i hope none of you will be, your dad and i both love you very much and we’re both happy and i hope you all are too, i’m trying to be positive, God loves us all, i still act like a kid sometimes even at the risk of breaking people’s bodies with my weight…..