Tag: #lifestyle

My Top 5 Places I wish to Visit

Traveling is one thing that pretty much anyone you ask either loves to do or longs to do. It is the means by which we take a temporary reprieve and escape form the mundane normalities of our lives and explore other worlds. I have had the good fortune to be able to travel to quite a few areas that I have loved to visit, and many that I now regard as “other” homes of my heart. While my travels pale in comparison to many, as I have never traveled out of the country or more than two states away from my own, I am still blessed to see much of what I have. With an open mind and open eye, one can find many treasures that dwell within reach of them: at most, within a day’s drive. I have compiled a list of the top five places I would like to visit, and here is my list:

Random Chicken in Key West

Topping the list is Key West, Florida. While I have had an all too brief visit to Key West already, I still want to go back and have a chance to actually visit the place. My daughter and I took a nice little weeklong vacation last summer while I was still living down in Southwest Florida. For the week, we visited a different beach every day. On our final day, we made the five-hour drive down to the Keys. We stopped in Islamorada, a place in which we had both longed to visit for many years, and we fed the Tarpon at Robbie’s. We then drove down to Bahia Honda State Park on Big Pine Key, where we spend most of the day soaking up the glorious sun and enjoying the water that was as clear as glass with no waves to obscure the view of the coral reef growing along the ocean floor or the various marine life that swam about us. Finally, we had made our way to Key West. It was nothing short of incredible to view. It was everything one would imagine that Key West would be. The island vibe was so enticing. We walked around to find the Hemingway house and see some of his world famous six-toed cats. We had an incredibly delicious cheesesteak sandwich from Fogarty’s on Duvall Street. However, for all the fun we had on our little trip to the keys, we did not have enough time in a day trip to do all of the traditional tourist things. We did not get to enjoy authentic Key Lime Pie from Key West. We were unable to enjoy an incredible sunset at the sunset celebration on Mallory Square. We did not get to take cheesy pictures at the Southernmost Point. In fact, once we arrived on the island, we did not even see water again until we left. Therefore, we missed out on the incredible beaches that are so captivating to see in pictures. We both decided whole-heartedly that we will be making definite plans to return to the keys, in particular, Key West with our husbands and take a nice long few days to take in the whole island and all that it has to offer.

Fogerty’s of Key West

My son and daughter in law recently decided that their dream was to move to Utah. Until that point, I had never really given much thought to Utah. I did not know anything about it and had really never considered visiting that region of the states. However, after they had brought it up, I had begun to look into the things that Utah has to offer. I have been fairly blown away with how beautiful the state is. They have some incredible parks and some even more incredible scenery. They have since decided not to move there, as it would be farther away from family than what they really wanted to be with their three small children, but they still definitely plan to visit there. I have now also added Utah to my list of places that I would like to visit. Specifically, I would like to visit Moab and the Arches National Park.

 For most of my life, I have had a fascination with the Golden Gate Bridge, and it has been my life-long dream to go to San Francisco, California and see the bridge. I cannot even explain how or why I became obsessed with the bridge. But I do remember, even from a very young age, always having this desire to see the bridge. I also think it would be pretty amazing to see Alcatraz, while in the area. I would not only like to view it from the bay, but actually take a tour of the island itself. I have watched documentaries on Alcatraz, and there are some very interesting and fascinating stories about things that transpired there, and it would be really incredible to walk the halls and stand in the place that is at the heart of so much controversy.

Another place that I would love to visit is Ground Zero in New York. I know that it has been several years since the terrorist attacks on the twin towers, however, I have always had the yearning to go there. Perhaps in some way to pay respect. I, alongside the rest of the nation, grieved and mourned that event. It could be the Empath in me, but I have since had a longing to be there; to stand on the sacred place and allow my grief to fully unfold. Beyond that, I have never really had any desire to visit the Big Apple. I am a bit of an introvert and trying to picture myself immersed in the New York crowds is something that I cannot really wrap my head around. But now, I think that if I could ever have the opportunity to visit Ground Zero, the chance to visit New York would not be lost on me. I would like to take a small time out and at least visit Times Square and Madison Square Garden.

Lastly, yet, certainly not least one place I would like to visit is Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. Much like the Golden Gate Bridge, there is really no rhyme or reason for my obsession with Cabo. Although, it has not quite been so life long as with the bridge, I still long to see Cabo San Lucas. My love for Cabo actually began in my adult years of life. My daughter was around twelve years of age and we watched a video on YouTube, in which the boys on the video talked of Cabo. So, I decided to look it up. I am a Pisces, and very curious by nature. Following my search for all things Cabo San Lucas, I was blown away with how incredibly breathtaking it was. I decided at that very moment that I would make it my life’s mission to visit there one day. As of this writing, she is currently fixing to turn twenty-three years of age, and I am still just as obsessed with and determined to visit Cabo as I have ever been.

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Pondering on the Days of my Youth

While my childhood, for the most part, is a bit of a blur to me, there are a few things I do remember rather fondly from the days of my youth.

I was not particularly graced with an abundance of toys, and therefore, the ones that I had become all the more special to me. There was one very treasured toy in my somewhat small collection. My beloved Mrs. Beasley Doll. I vaguely remember for years, how I carried this doll around with me and showered her with the most adoring love and affection a child can bestow on one’s most treasured toy. Aside from my beloved doll, I can remember distinctly how from a very young age until well throughout my teenage years, my next greatest love was my radio. Whether it be a small portable cassette recorder, to a small pre- “boombox” era radio. I can still remember the day I finally got my very first Sony Walkman! Boy, did I sure think I was somebody then. I had been blessed with the ability to have portable music pretty much throughout my youth, but now, with the tiny little speaker that fit just over my ears, my music was more private, it was mine, and I did not have to share it with anyone. I am not entirely sure why the idea of having my music all to myself was so appealing to me. Given that today, as an adult, I love to play songs for other people, and I enjoy sharing songs that mean a great deal to me with people that I am closest to. I suppose, in retrospect, during my childhood, there were a lot of things that were out of control and far beyond my scope of comfort, and when I could put on my personal speakers and control the music that only I listened to, it was a form of escape. Ironically, music has long been a form of escape for many people, and I am among those plenty.

I did not have the luxury of having a large group of people in my life throughout my childhood. My family was very reserved and kept a pretty tight circle. Growing up as a child, I only had a handful of cousins, and only three of them were even within my close proximity. The other family members were only present in my life once a year, during Thanksgiving, and then there was one family that I saw sporadically throughout the year, but we were never close. One of my cousins that did live next door to me became my best friend. He was a second or third cousin; we never did actually figure that out. However, it did not matter. He became closer to me than I was with my first cousins or even my brother. We went through a period, as young teenagers, in which we wanted to escape our lives. We had a lot of things in which we wanted to run away from. But we were too young and far too scared to even try running away. So, we created these imaginary fantasy lives for ourselves. I had always dreamed of being a drummer in a rock band and he loved the guitar. With a badminton racket and a few sticks carefully selected and snapped off an unsuspecting tree, we would fire up some music, normally on the portable radio outside, and instantaneously become the heroes in our own little world of rock and roll. Music videos came on the television on weekend nights late into the night. Even though, I knew we would both risk getting into more trouble than we ever wanted, I would let him slip in the front door after midnight on the weekends, and we would sit quietly in the living room, watching videos, and dreaming of one day escaping the world in which we knew and becoming famous in our own rock band. Aside from music, we actually created our own pretend identities. Looking back now, it is really funny and really sad at just how much we craved to be someone else to the extent that we began to really take on the personas of our make-believe personalities. Our alter egos even evolved with us as we grew up as teenagers. We created the identities in our youth, and as we became older teenagers, we changed our characters names and personalities to adjust to our newfound lives from childhood to teenager. The saddest part of it all, looking back, is that my alter ego was always a boy. Things had happened to me that I felt like if I had been a boy would not have happened. My pretend persona was a boy because I despised how being a girl made me feel weak.

As a child, I remember developing a strong love for reading. I suppose it was yet another means of escaping reality. I could sit for hours and read about anything or anyone. I still remember one of my most favorite books of all that I read at about the time of transitioning from a child into a teenager. I cannot remember my exact age, but I remember I was young, but still old enough to comprehend reading a young adult fiction. The book was titled, The Summer of the Sky Blue Bikini. I have long since looked for that book in my adult years, as I would love to sit and re-read one of my most favored reads every. But, alas, I have yet to find it. We had a small creek that was behind my house, it was just a small hike through some deep woods, but definitely worth the trek down to it. There was this bend in the creek that had this huge rock tucked in the curve that made a perfect place to sit and watch the water streaming by. It was deep enough in the woods that there was such a sense of peace and solace, yet it was close enough to the house that my parents never concerned with us being down there for hours on end. I would often take me a treasured book down to the creek and assemble myself comfortably on the rock in the bend. I would take in the serenity of my surroundings. The ferns, the moss, and the babbling of the water racing past me. Then, I would sink into my treasured book. During my teenaged years, it was mostly a Stephen King masterpiece. I would sit and read until the light of the sun was getting just about too dark to see to get home. Then, I would reluctantly make my way back out of the woods and back to reality.

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Ten Years From Now

Ten years from now…

Ten years from now, I will be about sixty years old. Ten years from now, my first granddaughter will be old enough to start driving. Ten years from now, my car will be long paid off and likely ready to fall apart. Ten years from now, there will be a lot of changes that take place in my life.

But I choose to think about the types of changes that I can affect taking place in my life. Where I want to be ten years from now, and the things I would like to accomplish ten years from now. I have always believed in and maintained a five-year plan, and now, I am giving consideration to my ten-year plan.

Ten years from now, I would like to be an accomplished author. I would ideally like to have written forty books by then. At the very least, I would like to have at least half that much. Twenty books written and published would be adequate for me ten years from now. As long as the books are of good quality and will sell. I could be ambitious and set a goal of writing one hundred books within the next ten years, but if every one of those books are rushed and of low quality, every single one of them would be a waste of my time. I would prefer to have only written two books of high-quality work that people will want to read because they feel as though they have something to gain from them. However, for the sake of my ten-year plan, I will simply say that I would like to have written and published forty books ten years from now.

In addition to writing and selling books, ten years from now, I would like to have generated other streams of income. I would like to become a life coach and help other people set their sails on the right direction for the stormy seas they face. Ideally, I would like to become a successful life coach only after creating my own successful life free of the self-doubt, anxiety, insecurity, and lack of self-confidence that I currently have.  I would like to create a bonafide system for overcoming the mental and physical obstacles that prevent me from living a truly happy and free life, in which I have defined the ability to shed mental and physical clutter that prevent the clarity and freedom of living life fully. Ten years from now, I would like to share my own life success story with the world. I would also like to host a successful podcast in which I share my own life story, a memoir of such, and give others the courage to face and overcome their own demons and battles.

Ten years from now, I would like to have my ideal body and achieve optimal health. I have a significant amount of weight to lose currently and have been battling depression and high blood pressure for years. I would like to see myself overcoming both of those hurdles. My blood pressure can easily be managed by reducing my body weight and maintaining a healthy diet. Reducing my body weight can be quite a challenge, due to the fact that it will require a great deal of work on my part. The work will not be easy, nor will it always be fun. However, I owe it to myself and to my family to do the work necessary to gain better health and have a healthier and more active lifestyle for years to come. There is evidence of a direct correlation between depression and obesity. However, it is a vicious cycle and a catch 22 of sorts. Depression tends to lead to overeating “comfort foods” or binge eating and being overweight tends to lead to depression. They go hand in hand and one can create the other. Therefore, ten years from now, I would like to have gotten a handle on my weight and reversed the damaging effects of high blood pressure and lowering my risk of heart disease. As well, I would like to have overcome depression by living an active life that includes hiking and participation in many family events.

Ten years from now, I would like to have achieved obtaining my master’s degree in psychology. I would like to take the things that I learn and understand about the human psyche and human behavior and apply them to my writing as well as the topics discussed in my podcast. I have always had a great fascination with what makes people do the things that they do. I would love to develop a great understanding of that and develop the ability to put it in ways that can help others understand human behaviors as well.

Ten years from now, I would mostly love to have the ability to live my life as a reflection of the success and achievement of accomplishing all of the things that I have set forth in my ten-year plan. I would love to own a quaint little farmhouse in north Georgia, the place I call home. I would like to have small parcel of land to accompany the home, in which I would have space for gardening. I would love to have a large rocking chair front porch with a white porch swing. I would love to be able to spend morning sitting in the swing with my morning coffee and watching the world come to life with the morning sunrise. I would love to have family over and enjoy holidays and meals with the people I love most. In addition, I would love to own a nice little codo in the Gulf of Mexico, the place I call the home of my heart. Going back to the multiple streams of income, I would love to have the ability to use the condo for a rental place when we are not there. I would love to spend time sitting on the balcony overlooking the teal blue water and watching some of the most incredible sunsets my eyes have ever had the pleasure to behold. I would love to have the ability to walk down to the beach and just sit watching the waves and birds, while contemplating what an incredible life I have and gaining inspiration and insight for new writing material.

There are no guarantees in live, and by no means are there any guarantee that I can achieve any of the things in which I have set forth in my ten-year plan. However, nothing that I have chosen is such a massive dream that it cannot be accomplished. The reality is that nothing I want for my ten-year plan is unrealistic to me. I simply have to be willing to do the work and make the effort to take the chances on myself. Ten years from now, I would love to look around at the incredible things and people surrounding me and think back fondly on this blog post and remember when it was all just a dream. It is often said that a goal without a plan is just a dream. Dreams are good and dreams are important. However, dreaming about my ten-year plan, will never make it come to fruition. Each of these accomplishments, require a solid plan. A plan that will include hard work and possibly many late nights or early mornings. But the reality is that each of these things are worth it to me to put in that work.

A New Year’s Perspective

Often, we find ourselves looking out into the horizon and for the life of us, we have no idea how to get there, or how we even got to where we are at this point in life. The new year is always a time of reflection for many people; a time to reflect on the year that has come to an end, and what it brought us, and a time to reflect on the year ahead of us, and the promise of opportunity that it lays out before us.

All too often, when people look back over the year that has come to an end, they are filled with regret. Regret over a broken relationship, perhaps they did not make that job change they had been contemplating for some time, or maybe, just regret over doing absolutely nothing throughout the year that brought about a sense of fulfillment to their soul. A true sense of peace and happiness from within generally originates from personal growth, and most people rarely step out of their all too familiar comfort zone to reach the level of uncomfortable that is required of growth.

Sometimes, looking at the year ahead can be a damn scary thing for many people. Maybe their job has changed; maybe their family dynamic has changed because some family members have moved out or moved away; perhaps, they are the ones that have moved to start a new life in a new town, or even a new state, and they see themselves, for the first time, surrounded by total strangers instead of family and friends. Fear can be a very overshadowing emotion that can obscure the view of the future.

Some people are fortunate in that they do not look to the past year, nor the upcoming year with any regret or fear or dread. They view the changes that have taken place in their lives during the past year and the changes that they will face in the new year as opportunities to learn, not just about new places or the world, but learn about themselves. When we have been surrounded by family and friends for our entire lives, we develop a level of comfort in that, and in knowing that while family and friends will not always see eye to eye with them, they will always love them and be there no matter what. People fear less failing when they know they have loving and supportive people there to help pick them back up afterwards.

To face a new year that is already latent with big life changes, provides one with a chance to see how strong they can truly be. If failure comes, there is no loving family or supportive friends to comfort you. Likewise, if great successes arise from the changes that have transpired, those same family and friends will not be there to provide hearty congratulations or help celebrate the joyous occasions.

Regardless, as the very cheesy and cliché saying goes, the new near brings with it three hundred and sixty-five new opportunities; three hundred and sixty-five blank pages on which you have the chance to author your own story, make it a good one. As a matter of fact, I believe that is the best way to look at the upcoming year. There will be good days and there will be bad days; days that come easy and days that will present a variety of challenges to get through. But days that have no concrete story line to follow as of yet, and days that can be faced with determination and anticipation. After all, we learn the most and obtain the greatest amount of grown through the bad days and the challenging days. Those days will only make the good days sweeter.

So, as you stand on the threshold of a new year, take the regret of the past year, and put it away, we cannot do anything to change what has already been done. Rather, look forward, knowing that all days will not be easy or fun, but you have the opportunity and the power within you to make them as good as you can make them for yourself. Every year, the flowers die out from the harsh conditions of the winter, yet, every spring, through thawed ground, they inch their way back to life, and put on a glorious showing for the springtime. See yourself as a flower in the spring at the beginning of the year. Inch your way back to life and put on a glorious show!

Yes, good days will come and go. But after all, “it can’t rain all the time.” (Eric Draven- The Crow)

Making Peace with the Past

It is often said that you cannot go back home. Although, some people try to challenge that ideology by eventually returning to their hometowns, to former lovers, or moving back in with their parents. Therefore, one is left to question, does it really work out in the end? I have myself had the occasion to return to my childhood home to live with my mother for a time, following the bitter ending of a broken relationship. At first, it was very awkward for me. But I just assumed it was the whole “I’m not supposed to be moving back into my parents’ house” pride thing. However, as the time lingered on, I began to realize that it was so much more. I found that the demons who haunted me in my past were still dwelling in that house. I found it to be a cold and unwelcoming place.

I had been in therapy several years ago and was under the impression that I had already dealt with all of the haunts of my past life, in particular my childhood. As I stood within the wall of this darkened paneled house, I figured out fairly quickly that I had not. I was taken aback by the torrential flood of emotion that befell me just being there. It did not make any sense to me. I mean, I had stopped by there to visit my mother numerous times. I had spent many a holiday with my family at her house. We had shared laughter and joy, and hugs abound there in the past few years. So, I could not understand what was happening to me. For the most part, during the evening hours, when I would arrive home from work and we would have dinner together and then sit in the living room watching various programs on the television set, I was fine being there. Even she and I had laughed and had some relatively good talks between ourselves. But, at night, when I was shut in behind the door of the bedroom, all alone, that is when every emotion I had ever felt in that house would come to pay me a visit. I could not shake that resurgence of sorrow and pain and utter heartbreak no matter how hard I tried. I began to watch television in the room until I would fall asleep at night, or I would read myself to slumber. Still, the darkness shrouded me like a heavy cloak.

My mother and I was working so hard on repairing a long-time damaged relationship, and I did not have the heart to tell her that being in her house was absolutely driving me insane and slowly crippling my soul. But I knew I could not stay there for much longer. The feelings and the memories proved to be far too hard to deal with alone in the night.

After a few months, I made the decision to move out, and got a place for myself and my daughter. It was probably, of all the choices that were available to me, not the most sensible or ideal place for us. But it was a quick move, and, at the time, I felt like anywhere had to be better than reliving my nightmare childhood night after night.

Ironically, shortly after my daughter and I had moved into our new place and were getting more settled in, I had started new classes at the college I was attending. During the semester, I had an internship placement. The internship was volunteering at an agency that did community counseling. Part of the process to be allowed to volunteer for the agency was to sit in and participate in two of the counseling classes offered. With the time frame that I had available between my full-time job and full-time course load at the college, I had one class that was on effective parenting, and one that was about making peace with the past. I believed those to be simple enough. I had, after all, already had therapy several years ago and dealt with many things from my past. Although, I had not given any particular thought to the experience that I had recently had while staying in my childhood home with my mother. Being that I had since moved out and into my little hipster cottage on the mountain, I had not given that a second thought. As it turns out, however, I should have considered it more significant that I had thought.

At first, I thought it was going to be interesting, and a little bit fun, to get an inside view of how group therapy worked. I was given my workbook to follow along. I also originally thought I would just be sitting idly by as a quiet observer, since, after all, this was my internship I had not signed up for this group therapy class. I could not have been more wrong. In order to get cleared to begin volunteering and complete my subsequent internship, I had to take an active role in the therapy sessions, and was expected to complete the exercises and journal entries in my workbook just the same as anyone else in the class. Initially I was a little shaken up about the idea of having to take group therapy. But later decided it would be the best way to learn how a group therapy session works. Plus, I would have the added benefit of free therapy for myself. With that, I was ready to embark on my path to making peace with my past.

The first two group sessions, I was reluctant to speak up for the most part. I immediately began to feel emotions stirring deep within my core. But again, this was an internship setting, and I was still unsure of just how involved I was expected to be with the actual counseling of this class. The leader of the class was very good at her job, and after the second session had called me aside to let me know she could tell I was holding back and let me know matter of factly that she fully expected me to participate as much as anyone else in the group beginning the next week. I was called out. I was expected to address the emotions that I had begun feeling from the first session we had. I was still unsure about how I felt sharing anything personal with a group of strangers. Yet, at the same time, I was feeling all of these emotions coming to the surface during the first two sessions and I felt like I wanted to talk about them, to get them out, and understand what they were and why they were there, haunting me. I was beginning to get scared. If I had already felt this much emotion surfacing in only two sessions, how would I ever make it for the following ten weeks if I did not deal with what was happening to me?

For the following ten weeks, I cried, I felt, and I hugged my fellow group participants. We all learned so much about each other, and subsequently, ourselves during our twelve weeks together. A lot of what had happened to me while staying at my mother’s house began to make a tremendous amount of sense to me. I learned that while I had been in therapy in the past, I dealt with a lot of things, but I had only touched on the subject of my relationship with my parents. I had dealt more with the relationship with my mother, because she was still alive, and I still had to maintain a relationship with her. But I had not ever fully processed or dealt with the relationship with my father completely. And, while I was staying in that house, all of those repressed and unresolved feelings came flooding back, because they needed to be met head on and processed, so that I could officially and finally move forward with my life in a more  healthy and happy way. During those twelve weeks of my free therapy internship, I met every single one of those feelings head on and dealt with them. But I did not have to deal with them alone. I had one- an amazing counselor, and two- a group of five other incredible women who were at the ready to hug me, cry with me, and encourage me at any given moment. And I was ready and willing to do the same for each and every one of them.

I have often said that I believe everything happens for a reason. Often times, we may not know the reason or the how or why behind things that take place in our lives. Regardless, sometimes, things just happened that we later realize we really needed. That internship that year was actually an accident. I had originally signed up for a different internship for the semester. Somehow, the paperwork had gotten messed up, but this was not realized until the semester was beginning and the placement at the counseling office was the only placement left available. I had planned to be a silent observer and just learn how to conduct a group therapy session. Yet, I was prompted and encouraged to speak up and take an active role as a genuine participant of the class. And, something amazing had happened. Over the weeks of the class, I learned that I still had a lot of unresolved things in my past that I have never dealt with, let alone made peace with. With the help of the counselor and the other ladies in the group, I was able to put so many things to rest, to move past a lot of hurtful things that had held me captive and crippled for so much of my life. I made peace with my past, and I was able to free myself in ways that I had not realized was possible previously. I have since moved forward, and have a close relationship with my mother, and have buried the heaviness and dark feelings that had once consumed me just being in her house. I have been able to develop a close and loving romantic relationship, which I also came to realize was near to impossible in the past because of the many things that I had left unresolved kept me from allowing myself to get too close to others, or allow anyone to get too close to me. I am grateful for the opportunity that I had in getting put in the wrong internship placement and the ability to make peace with my past.

Chasing Dreams and Finding the Way Back Home

Often times in our lives, we are prompted to develop a desire. A dream. A longing that keeps us up late at night, dreaming and plotting. Whether it be figuring out a budget over and over to achieve the means with which to chase this dream or planning out the right time in life to pursue this desire. It is not uncommon for anyone to have dreams and goals that may be considered unrealistic by others around them. Or, at the very least some may say that your dreams and plans are not easily obtainable. They will chastise you for such dreams, and even try their best attempt at directing you back into a state of realism in which you will see the insanity of the dream and think more logically on how absurd it is. Then you can settle back into your little life of balance, and structure, and mediocrity.

For some of us, however, the irrationality of the dream is what drives us. The idea that someone, anyone would dare be so brave to tell us that our dream may never be ours to realize, is a mere fuel to the fire that burns within us. The more that people tend to push us in the opposite direction of our dream, the harder we fight to hold on to them. They are, after all, the only thing that is truly ours. The one thing that we hold on to, that no one else gave us, and therefore, no one can take them away from us.

There was a time when I once believed that my life belonged in my tiny little hometown. That I was destined to grow old and eventually die there, without ever knowing anything of the great big world outside of that town. Little did I know that a walk on a sandy beach would one day change everything. The first time I got out of the car and stepped on to the powder soft sand of Gulfport Mississippi, I was forever changed. I quickly developed a love for the feel of the winding knots about my face, and the smell of the salty air. I had always believed myself to be a “mountain girl” and never considered that I would have a life beyond where the North Georgia mountains fell. The ridgeline of the mountains seemed to draw the proverbial line in the sand, and I never even questioned that I would have any desire or reason to cross that line. Yet, here I was, rapidly becoming fond of the beach life, and the more I was around the quaint little beach towns of the Gulf of Mexico, the more I was determined to have more and more of it.

As time went on, and I later found myself in a broken relationship. Facing the death and subsequent ending of my marriage, I longed for something different. It was not that I did not love my little hometown, or the people who dwelled there. I had family and I had friends. They meant a great deal to me. But, at the end of the day, when the world had grown silent, and it was just me alone with my thoughts, I had come to realize just how alone I really was, even in my own town amongst my family and friends. The demons of my past were all around my town. They were among the people that I knew and would encounter on a generally regular basis. I was close with my children, but my son was true and true devoted to our hometown. My daughter, however, she had begun to come of age, moving into her teenage years, and she found herself also wishing for a fresh start in life, far away from our hometown. We had made the decision that once I finished with school, with  my marriage ending, and no better time to make a fresh start, we would pack what we could fit in the car, get rid of what did not fit, and head out west toward Biloxi and Gulfport Mississippi to find us a new place to start over. A clean slate where no one knew our names seemed to be the ideal place for us to start embarking on our new lives.

But, then one day, something happened. Something that would change everything. As I was nearing the end of my degree program at school, and we were making our plans to get away, my son informed me that he and his fiancé were now expecting. My daughter and I concluded that there was no possible way that we could ever leave and miss the birth of my grandchild, and her niece or nephew. It was not even debatable; we would remain in our town and gladly welcome this incredible blessing into our lives. My granddaughter was born in the fall of that year. She was beautiful and an absolute treasure. She gave me a hope and a reason to remain in the place that I had spent so many years trying to get away from. Someone once told me that moving away was no more than running away from my ghosts of the past, and that was not going to solve any of the issues that I had. Perhaps, they were right. But, then again, just perhaps, I had already thought of that. Both my daughter and I had endured a lot of hardship and heartbreak in our hometown. It was never as much about running away from our past as it was just looking for a clean break of those memories that haunted us, and start over in a place where we could have the chance to make new memories without the continual reminders of people and things that had broken us in the past. But, Kenlee had taught us that starting over meant merely to take that first step with an open mind and open heart. We did not have to leave our hometown to get a clean story to write. I was now a grandmother, and she was an aunt. Both roles in which we accepted and leaned into with the reverence and anticipation of a child on Christmas morning.

In so many ways, Kenlee saved me from myself. There were times when I was so broken, I had all but lost my will to function. I lost all hope in ever finding true joy again, let alone, ever knowing love. But one evening, as I sat holding her, it became so apparently clear to me. I had said that I wanted to know what it was like to love again, and to feel the love of another human being felt toward me. For so long, I believed that could only mean to be loved in a romantic sense. I had lost romantic love and had lost all hope of ever feeling passionate toward anyone else again. I thought all the while that I needed to feel the love of a romantic partner to understand and experience true love again. But I could not be farther from the truth. Kenlee showed me. I understood fully what it would feel like to fully love another human being again. Because I loved her so dearly. And, as she grew in herself, with her own little personality and her attachment to others, I felt, for the first time in so long, the unconditional love of another. I had the idea that finding a true love again could only come from a romantic relationship with a man. Yet, true love is perfect and it is unconditional, and when one gets the chance to experience it, no matter the source, it is something that should be held in the  highest regard, never taken for granted, and always, above all, appreciated and valued.

Still, somehow, over the years, I always seemed to still have this inner longing for the Gulf of Mexico. Most people thought I was crazy. I have been thought crazy for most of my life, so this was nothing that was going to deter me. I eventually become obsessed with the idea of living in the Gulf of Mexico. As life and circumstances changed over time, my daughter found herself living in Minnesota with her finance, and my son and daughter in law had talked about moving away to Utah. At this point in my life, I had two beautiful granddaughters, and was crushed at the thought of them moving all the way across the country from me. Yet, my life had changed as well. I had, several years earlier, met someone who I had fallen in love with and we eventually got married. We had talked about taking the plunge and moving to the Gulf, once all of the kids had moved away. Just to get out of this area that had haunted me for so much of my life. As luck would have it, my son and daughter in law changed their mind about moving to Utah. They, instead, moved to Southwest Florida. My husband and I decided that it was an obvious choice, I would be close to the girls, and it was, after all, the Gulf of Mexico. There was no hesitation, the plans were set in motion for us to move down to Florida with my son. Within a few months, we were living in an apartment in the same complex as my son, and with the exception of missing my daughter who was still in Minnesota tremendously, my life was coming together in the most magical way.

However, sometimes, even the best laid plans go to waste. This was one of those times. It turned out that my son and daughter in law, could not fall in love with Florida, and within six months they were packing up to return to Georgia. Only this time, they had one more plot twist to add to the equation, they were now expecting my grandson. When they left, I was devastated. I missed them terribly and thought daily about the times I had spent with the girls while they lived there, and suddenly, it was far from enough. I wanted to make the most of still living my dream come true by being in the Gulf of Mexico, finally, after almost ten years of longing for this moment. Somehow, being there without my family proved to be less than all I had dreamed of in my gulf coast life. In addition to missing my family terrible, I had one other major factor that played into my less than dreamy dream life. My husband had also failed to fall in love with Florida. He missed Georgia and our family and friends terribly, and subsequently became depressed over the whole situation. Adding to the already crushing heartbreak I was already feeling, I knew leaving Florida was the right thing to do.

We have been back in Georgia for a short time now. Everyone is happy to have us back. My heart is still feeling a space of emptiness being that my daughter is in Minnesota and my family is not quite complete without her and her fiancé here with us My husband is happy to be here. It is fall and he is loving the cold weather and is heartily anticipating the first snow we will see. While I have to admit, I do enjoy a nice little snow myself, there are some days when I would still trade snowflakes for sandy beaches. I missed my family terribly and am grateful to be back with them. But I have to admit, there are days when I do miss the spaces where the sea meets the shoreline, especially the sunsets. As it turns out, Southwest Florida has some of the most breathtaking sunsets. I likely always will miss living in the Gulf, at least a little bit. After all, it was my dream for such a long time. But, just like Kenlee had taught me five years ago, sometimes our dreams and plans may take a detour, and starting over does not always have to be in a new or foreign place. Quite the contrary. Often, it is right where you began that you realize was the place you were meant to be all along. I love Florida, and the Gulf of Mexico, of that there is no doubt or question. But Georgia is family. Georgia is home.

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