It hit me as I was driving home tonight.
As I drove across the bridge above the Big Sioux River and saw the glimmer of downtown sparkle against the rain, the realization swelled over me like it'd been there all along just waiting for me to recognize it. It been a long day, but a pretty productive and uplifting one. Not all my days are like this, but this was one for the "good" category. As I thought about the day and took in the sight before me, it occurred to me that I found what I was looking for — happiness.
I'm not happy because of where I am geographically. I realized a short time ago that location doesn't make you happy. It helps, but if you depend on it you'll only end up disappointed.
I'm not happy because I've got money. Truthfully, I am barely getting by but money never impressed me.
I'm not happy because I'm in love. Also a short time ago, I figured out that another person can't determine your happiness. Only you can.
I'm not happy because of my wonderful friends and family. I'm not happy because I'm chasing a dream. I'm not happy because I feel more beautiful than any other moment in my life. I'm happy because of all these things.
I am happy because I have accepted the person I am and the one I'm evolving into. I'm happy in this moment, but know it's not exactly where I want to be. For the first time, I can enjoy what's in front of me and not look at what's behind or what's in front. I'm living for now.
Tomorrow might bring tears or anger, but today I'm happy. And today is all I got. Finally, I understand that. Finally.
Thursday, October 29, 2009
Sunday, October 25, 2009
All you need is love
My life in commercial form. Sometimes you want to give up, but the feeling never lasts too long because you are cursed with passion. I'm cursed with passion and, deep down, I love every minute of it.
Saturday, October 17, 2009
Grounded
Yesterday, a friend sent me a text message that said “Do you ever feel like you need to be grounded? Like everything is off?”
I did, especially that day. All my worries, frustrations, doubts, questions of fairness banded together to hit me hard. There is no one specific trigger, but several that caused me to put on my isolation cape and zone in on my sorrows.
Leaving work just before the panic attack hit, I fell apart in my car, which was parked outside my office. I cried, slammed on the steering wheel as if I was trying to get the air bag to come out and pleaded with my demons to take a day off. I told my colleague that I was but I couldn’t. I didn’t want to be my in drafty, dark apartment alone.
Lately, I’ve been fantasizing about spending an evening in this small coffee shop near my house. I’ve lounged there in the morning and the afternoon, but never the evening. One night, I took a break from editing to grab some coffee from that place, and there was something magical about the environment. It was low lit with a few people, but charming and cozy. Since that night, I wanted to curl up on one of the leather couches with tea and my journal. In effort to find something that would calm me, I went there.
Following that same logic, I was delightfully surprised to realize the shop also sold beer and ordered one that I haven’t tasted since Idaho. I found my idyllic spot next to a lamp with a warm, hazy glow and furiously stroked my pen against the coarse paper. The tears soon started to fall and my attempts to muster them, and the sobbing noises, failed. The poor woman working must have been frightened by my actions because she pretended not to look in my direction and stayed busy stocking the cooler with apple juice boxes.
All my favorite people were present: loneliness, regret, doubt, hatred and self-pity. They laughed and howled as I tried to coax optimism to show up, but she just couldn’t find her way. The tears poured until the beer was gone. But when it was, so were the tears. And as a real friend show up to keep my company, the others left. The gnarled black pit in my stomach was unraveling and fading. Not completely gone, but it’s strength was severely weakend.
We chatted for a bit and laughed at a nearby conversation ripping on one of my favorite things to rip on. My stomach growled again, but this time for hunger. My friend had already eaten, but agreed to company me to feed it. Along with my coffee shop escapes, I’d been craving a meal at a sushi restaurant, also near my house. We walked across the street to the small local and were seated in a quaint booth. I filled my stomach to satisfaction with tea and veggie rolls. It was comforting, a good friend and good food. The mess of emotions from earlier still lingered, but not enough for me to not enjoy that moment.
When we left, it was raining. The downtown streets sparkled from the lights reflection. This city moment was another idea that retraced back to when my real life called for a timeout.
We hit up a movie and I went home and to bed with calmness. Again, those feelings were not obsolete and they could return another day, but they had surrendered for the night.
This morning I went for a run along the Sioux River. Besides one biker and a mother and child out walking, I was alone on the trail. I reacquainted myself with a few running songs and enjoyed the fast beating of my heart. My to-do list and left over feelings from last night soaked up my thoughts, but it was all pleasant.
Then I stopped. I stopped my music. I stopped running. I stopped thinking. There it was. It was wrapped in the fall trees that had lost a bit of luster from an early snowfall. It was presented with the thick brown river, looking still and fast at the same time, and the sound of water thrashing over chunks of rock. It was tied together with the coffee shop, the sushi restaurant and the downtown streets.
It was resolution; it was peace.
All that ailed me in the last few days, weeks, months all disappeared. The river and trees swiped them away and finally allowed me to let it go. I let go of the little day-to-day things that kept me up at night. I let go of the hurt caused by failed possibilities. And I let go of loneliness, regret, doubt, hatred and self-pity.
When I did that, I found me. I found the woman I know that I am and the one I know that I can be. A few tears fell, but they were peaceful. I was peaceful. I was grounded.
I did, especially that day. All my worries, frustrations, doubts, questions of fairness banded together to hit me hard. There is no one specific trigger, but several that caused me to put on my isolation cape and zone in on my sorrows.
Leaving work just before the panic attack hit, I fell apart in my car, which was parked outside my office. I cried, slammed on the steering wheel as if I was trying to get the air bag to come out and pleaded with my demons to take a day off. I told my colleague that I was but I couldn’t. I didn’t want to be my in drafty, dark apartment alone.
Lately, I’ve been fantasizing about spending an evening in this small coffee shop near my house. I’ve lounged there in the morning and the afternoon, but never the evening. One night, I took a break from editing to grab some coffee from that place, and there was something magical about the environment. It was low lit with a few people, but charming and cozy. Since that night, I wanted to curl up on one of the leather couches with tea and my journal. In effort to find something that would calm me, I went there.
Following that same logic, I was delightfully surprised to realize the shop also sold beer and ordered one that I haven’t tasted since Idaho. I found my idyllic spot next to a lamp with a warm, hazy glow and furiously stroked my pen against the coarse paper. The tears soon started to fall and my attempts to muster them, and the sobbing noises, failed. The poor woman working must have been frightened by my actions because she pretended not to look in my direction and stayed busy stocking the cooler with apple juice boxes.
All my favorite people were present: loneliness, regret, doubt, hatred and self-pity. They laughed and howled as I tried to coax optimism to show up, but she just couldn’t find her way. The tears poured until the beer was gone. But when it was, so were the tears. And as a real friend show up to keep my company, the others left. The gnarled black pit in my stomach was unraveling and fading. Not completely gone, but it’s strength was severely weakend.
We chatted for a bit and laughed at a nearby conversation ripping on one of my favorite things to rip on. My stomach growled again, but this time for hunger. My friend had already eaten, but agreed to company me to feed it. Along with my coffee shop escapes, I’d been craving a meal at a sushi restaurant, also near my house. We walked across the street to the small local and were seated in a quaint booth. I filled my stomach to satisfaction with tea and veggie rolls. It was comforting, a good friend and good food. The mess of emotions from earlier still lingered, but not enough for me to not enjoy that moment.
When we left, it was raining. The downtown streets sparkled from the lights reflection. This city moment was another idea that retraced back to when my real life called for a timeout.
We hit up a movie and I went home and to bed with calmness. Again, those feelings were not obsolete and they could return another day, but they had surrendered for the night.
This morning I went for a run along the Sioux River. Besides one biker and a mother and child out walking, I was alone on the trail. I reacquainted myself with a few running songs and enjoyed the fast beating of my heart. My to-do list and left over feelings from last night soaked up my thoughts, but it was all pleasant.
Then I stopped. I stopped my music. I stopped running. I stopped thinking. There it was. It was wrapped in the fall trees that had lost a bit of luster from an early snowfall. It was presented with the thick brown river, looking still and fast at the same time, and the sound of water thrashing over chunks of rock. It was tied together with the coffee shop, the sushi restaurant and the downtown streets.
It was resolution; it was peace.
All that ailed me in the last few days, weeks, months all disappeared. The river and trees swiped them away and finally allowed me to let it go. I let go of the little day-to-day things that kept me up at night. I let go of the hurt caused by failed possibilities. And I let go of loneliness, regret, doubt, hatred and self-pity.
When I did that, I found me. I found the woman I know that I am and the one I know that I can be. A few tears fell, but they were peaceful. I was peaceful. I was grounded.
Saturday, October 03, 2009
The 25th revolution
Here I stand, at the onset of 25. Never once did I expect my life to be where it is when I reached this milestone age. Am I content where I am? Not really, but I appreciate it. All those ideas of where I thought I would be at this point are small towns along the highway leading to my eventual destination.
At 18, I was in caught up in my first love, who was serving our country on foreign land. Naïve and shallow, I believed my happiness was found in a sold gold band. When my beliefs and opinions began to deviate from the traditional, conservative lifestyle, I quietly hushed those thoughts, saying “Heather, those are not appropriate feelings.”
At 21, I found a new love of my life, or so I keep saying with each hopeful relationship. On the night of my birthday, I assumed that there would be a small diamond on my left finger before 22 came. We were that couple – the one everyone envied and agreed would last. We didn’t. My idea of the future was marked with skyscrapers and airplanes. His didn’t go beyond state limits and he knew, long before I could accept it, that our futures would never align.
At 23, I sat in a chain Italian restaurant, scarfing down fettuccini alfredo, hoping the other customers didn’t notice my tears. I was in a new place, on my own, but it wasn’t nearly as glamorous as I imagined a new life would be. I wanted to be with my family, my friends, my latest boyfriend (who I broke up with a week later) and the life I left. I imagined a dinner party with genuine smiles and jokes, all in honor of my birth. Instead, a dinner that wasn’t a $1.00 frozen pizza before covering a high school volleyball game was my gift to myself. After the game and my story was filed, I met some coworkers at our favorite local bar. It was another month until I finally realized it, but that night, I made a small acceptance to this new life. And although I thought it was an insult to the people and life back home, I kinda liked this life, the one of a poor, young reporter. Maybe in a few years, I’d be at a bigger paper, in a bigger city. Yeah, I thought to myself as I took another shot, I’ll plan on that.
At 24, my Brookings apartment was filled with faces that defined yet another chapter. Many of these people were extras in my life before Idaho, now there were leads. The backdrop was not what I had hoped for this birthday, and the people not expected, but I didn’t care. For one day, I let go of the grudge I held against myself and soaked up the joy. I realized that this is where I was meant to be and maybe I was OK with that. I knew the next day I might not feel the same way, but tonight I would allow myself to be OK with my decision.
My 25th birthday is a week a way and I am having a hard time deciding what that means. For goodness sake’s, it’s 25. I am still so young, yet I feel like my life is chipping away with each October. I think about all those things I thought I would have by now: a husband, children, a thriving career, a big-city life. I possess none of those things.
Last April, I decided to run the Twin Cities Marathon, held six days before my 25th birthday. At the time, I was trying to find another way out of South Dakota, applying for jobs all over the world. Nothing worked out, but none of those jobs felt right, just temporary satisfaction that could lead to a huge mistake. Grasping for some type of definition, I made it my goal to run a marathon before I turn 25.
But, like with so many of my goals, life intervened. A new endeavor absorbed much of my free time. I still made some time to run, but not much. To screw up my training schedule even more, I moved. I settled on the idea that once I was in my new city and apartment, I would devote my life to this marathon. Three days after I moved, I went on my first run in Sioux Falls. The pain started about a one mile, but it was tolerable. Then stings shot through my inner knee, each surge gaining pain. By the third mile, I couldn’t walk. I hobbled back to my apartment, believing it was just this run. A few days later, I was almost finished a three-miler when the pain forced me to topple over. Each run was like that – surrendering to pain at mile three.
Still, I thought I could do the race. I even led myself to believe that I would run as much as I could and then drop out. On Wednesday, I ran three miles, without much pain. Until, I climbed my stairs. I could barely bend my knee or stand for long periods of time. Oblivious to reality, I still planned to go as far as I could go. My body strongly disagreed and I fell sick to the exhaustion of two jobs. In a fit of tears and the idea of potentially hurting myself even more if I did run, I finally gave in. It’s always been my goal to run a marathon and my first would not be a half-assed attempt. I would not run the race.
At 25, I’m single, watching each dime, drowning in the demands of two jobs and trying to figure how I am going to fix a bum knee. This marathon was supposed to help me accept this birthday and things I haven’t accomplished. But I couldn’t even do it. And failure is laughing at me, like it has done every single birthday.
Yet, failure doesn’t win this one. At 25, I am the editor-in-chief of my own newspaper, pay the bills with a job I still rather enjoy, live by myself and have the best friends I’ve ever had.
I am a very different person going into 25 than I was going into 24. A friend recently commented how much I’ve changed in the small time she has known me. That makes me smile.
In my 24th year, I finally started to adopt those beliefs and opinions that I silenced for so long and now they are reflective in my lifestyle. I let go of unworthy friendships and am more selfish to my own needs. I am finally stronger than my eating disorder and can smile in the mirror, thinking, “Man, I am beautiful.” And a relationship or the number of friends at my side no longer define my happiness.
My life is far from ideal and sometimes it’s too much. Most days are a battle, but it’s one I am fine with fighting. I accept where I am in life and that this is just another town I pass through. Unlike other birthdays, though, I honestly have no ideas or plans for where I’ll be at 26. I like it that way.
To 25 …
At 18, I was in caught up in my first love, who was serving our country on foreign land. Naïve and shallow, I believed my happiness was found in a sold gold band. When my beliefs and opinions began to deviate from the traditional, conservative lifestyle, I quietly hushed those thoughts, saying “Heather, those are not appropriate feelings.”
At 21, I found a new love of my life, or so I keep saying with each hopeful relationship. On the night of my birthday, I assumed that there would be a small diamond on my left finger before 22 came. We were that couple – the one everyone envied and agreed would last. We didn’t. My idea of the future was marked with skyscrapers and airplanes. His didn’t go beyond state limits and he knew, long before I could accept it, that our futures would never align.
At 23, I sat in a chain Italian restaurant, scarfing down fettuccini alfredo, hoping the other customers didn’t notice my tears. I was in a new place, on my own, but it wasn’t nearly as glamorous as I imagined a new life would be. I wanted to be with my family, my friends, my latest boyfriend (who I broke up with a week later) and the life I left. I imagined a dinner party with genuine smiles and jokes, all in honor of my birth. Instead, a dinner that wasn’t a $1.00 frozen pizza before covering a high school volleyball game was my gift to myself. After the game and my story was filed, I met some coworkers at our favorite local bar. It was another month until I finally realized it, but that night, I made a small acceptance to this new life. And although I thought it was an insult to the people and life back home, I kinda liked this life, the one of a poor, young reporter. Maybe in a few years, I’d be at a bigger paper, in a bigger city. Yeah, I thought to myself as I took another shot, I’ll plan on that.
At 24, my Brookings apartment was filled with faces that defined yet another chapter. Many of these people were extras in my life before Idaho, now there were leads. The backdrop was not what I had hoped for this birthday, and the people not expected, but I didn’t care. For one day, I let go of the grudge I held against myself and soaked up the joy. I realized that this is where I was meant to be and maybe I was OK with that. I knew the next day I might not feel the same way, but tonight I would allow myself to be OK with my decision.
My 25th birthday is a week a way and I am having a hard time deciding what that means. For goodness sake’s, it’s 25. I am still so young, yet I feel like my life is chipping away with each October. I think about all those things I thought I would have by now: a husband, children, a thriving career, a big-city life. I possess none of those things.
Last April, I decided to run the Twin Cities Marathon, held six days before my 25th birthday. At the time, I was trying to find another way out of South Dakota, applying for jobs all over the world. Nothing worked out, but none of those jobs felt right, just temporary satisfaction that could lead to a huge mistake. Grasping for some type of definition, I made it my goal to run a marathon before I turn 25.
But, like with so many of my goals, life intervened. A new endeavor absorbed much of my free time. I still made some time to run, but not much. To screw up my training schedule even more, I moved. I settled on the idea that once I was in my new city and apartment, I would devote my life to this marathon. Three days after I moved, I went on my first run in Sioux Falls. The pain started about a one mile, but it was tolerable. Then stings shot through my inner knee, each surge gaining pain. By the third mile, I couldn’t walk. I hobbled back to my apartment, believing it was just this run. A few days later, I was almost finished a three-miler when the pain forced me to topple over. Each run was like that – surrendering to pain at mile three.
Still, I thought I could do the race. I even led myself to believe that I would run as much as I could and then drop out. On Wednesday, I ran three miles, without much pain. Until, I climbed my stairs. I could barely bend my knee or stand for long periods of time. Oblivious to reality, I still planned to go as far as I could go. My body strongly disagreed and I fell sick to the exhaustion of two jobs. In a fit of tears and the idea of potentially hurting myself even more if I did run, I finally gave in. It’s always been my goal to run a marathon and my first would not be a half-assed attempt. I would not run the race.
At 25, I’m single, watching each dime, drowning in the demands of two jobs and trying to figure how I am going to fix a bum knee. This marathon was supposed to help me accept this birthday and things I haven’t accomplished. But I couldn’t even do it. And failure is laughing at me, like it has done every single birthday.
Yet, failure doesn’t win this one. At 25, I am the editor-in-chief of my own newspaper, pay the bills with a job I still rather enjoy, live by myself and have the best friends I’ve ever had.
I am a very different person going into 25 than I was going into 24. A friend recently commented how much I’ve changed in the small time she has known me. That makes me smile.
In my 24th year, I finally started to adopt those beliefs and opinions that I silenced for so long and now they are reflective in my lifestyle. I let go of unworthy friendships and am more selfish to my own needs. I am finally stronger than my eating disorder and can smile in the mirror, thinking, “Man, I am beautiful.” And a relationship or the number of friends at my side no longer define my happiness.
My life is far from ideal and sometimes it’s too much. Most days are a battle, but it’s one I am fine with fighting. I accept where I am in life and that this is just another town I pass through. Unlike other birthdays, though, I honestly have no ideas or plans for where I’ll be at 26. I like it that way.
To 25 …
Thursday, October 01, 2009
Shameless self-promoting
Hello all,
First, my deepest apologies for the lack of activity on this blog. My life has been nothing but insane since the beginning of the summer and almost uncontrollable since Sept. 1. Nevertheless, life is good.
I promise to have a real update about my life and all the great things going on, but until then, I want to ask three little favors from my blog readers. These are simple things and they are actually directly related to my absence on this blog. Here they are:
1) Please visit www.ahamoment.com/vote/heather and vote for my video. The Aha Moment crew, a program sponsored by Mutual of Omaha, traveled the country to record peoples' aha moment. My video is one of 75 selected as semi-finalist in the Aha Moment contest. You have until Oct. 15 to vote for my video. The top 25 will move on to the final round and the top 10 will be featured on national television. So, please go vote for me!
2) Watch this great video KDLT did about the online newspaper I started.
3) When you are through with all of that, go check out the inspiration behind 1 and 2, The Post. We are celebrating our one-month birthday and it have been nothing short of awesome the past few week. So, please, go check it out.
I promise more later.
Love,
Heather
First, my deepest apologies for the lack of activity on this blog. My life has been nothing but insane since the beginning of the summer and almost uncontrollable since Sept. 1. Nevertheless, life is good.
I promise to have a real update about my life and all the great things going on, but until then, I want to ask three little favors from my blog readers. These are simple things and they are actually directly related to my absence on this blog. Here they are:
1) Please visit www.ahamoment.com/vote/heather and vote for my video. The Aha Moment crew, a program sponsored by Mutual of Omaha, traveled the country to record peoples' aha moment. My video is one of 75 selected as semi-finalist in the Aha Moment contest. You have until Oct. 15 to vote for my video. The top 25 will move on to the final round and the top 10 will be featured on national television. So, please go vote for me!
2) Watch this great video KDLT did about the online newspaper I started.
3) When you are through with all of that, go check out the inspiration behind 1 and 2, The Post. We are celebrating our one-month birthday and it have been nothing short of awesome the past few week. So, please, go check it out.
I promise more later.
Love,
Heather
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