No song, just pictures. :)

Part of our day in iPhone snapshots. There was lots of singing in convertibles, basketball, swinging, baseball, hockey and even a coke bottle explosion using Mentos. It was a good one. Hope yours was too! :)

The Best Day

Listen (on the playlist below):

The Best Day-Taylor Swift

Sometimes you have to ignore your priorities and just let loose. Sometimes you have to leave one thing on your to-do list off of your to-do list...decide that it can wait until tomorrow. Some days it's good to procrastinate. Today was one of those days.

My plan for today was to sleep until I woke up and then write a draft of the speech I have due this week. Instead, my mom woke me up at 11 and told me she wanted to go to the mall. I took drafting my speech off of my to-do list and set off with my mom to begin what ended up being one of my best days in a long time.

We started it off going to Rocky Hill to get scrubs for an old neighbor who had had hip surgery. Maybe that seems boring, like a chore, but it bought me even more quality time with my mom, so it was great. Then we decided last-minute to go to the other mall so that we could go to Dick's for sneakers (which I didn't end up getting and just resulted in a painfully awkward run-in with an ex.) We went to Macy's for a coffee maker and then to the food court. We ordered Cajun food and sat down next to the carousel we used to take Cameron to ride almost every weekend. (Those trips were completed with an Orange Julius, Arby's fries and pennies thrown into the fountain. But the carousel was the best):

We ate our chicken and talked about their trip to Germany and where we would go. And then we ordered ice cream and talked about the boy. We began our search for sneakers, which yielded no results. We went to Build-A-Bear and made a bear together. I wish I could remember my mom's comments on the cat pictured below verbatim, but the words, "tramp" and "cankles" were used and it was funny.

Checking that our bear was soft:

Giving her a heart...Complete with a wish:

Introducing Lucy Cassandra, the teddy bear version of my mommy when she gets home from work. No really. The resemblance is frightening. ;) :

After Build-A-Bear we got a lemonade to share and headed over to Pier 1 Imports for a chair. She may ground me for this photo, but it's funny. 'Cause she was yelling at me for taking another picture. But even more funny because that chair was an outdoor chair and we were looking for an indoor chair:

And we took a picture together and practiced our duck-faces:

And then we got home and the boy wanted to go for some fries and a shake. So we took a ride to McD's. But their shake maker was broken. So we took another ride to a different McD's and I borrowed my mom's shoes to go inside and she smelled them when I got back to the car to make sure I hadn't ruined them, even though I was only wearing them for 3 seconds. Seriously? The kid is cute even with a seatbelt covering his face:

And once we were back home, shake (and fries) in hand, he was happy:

And I tickled him:

And it was just a wonderful ending to my perfect day....

Yes, I left something off my to-do list. I completely switched up my plans and the world didn't end. In fact, it was all sunshine and rainbows. And I LOVE sunshine and rainbows.

But not as much as I LOVE her.

I had the best day with you today.

We are all the same.

Listen (on the playlist below):

Let Me Be Myself-3 Doors Down

One Day-Matisyahu

Beauty in the World-Macy Gray

We are all the same. We all live, breathe, bleed and break. We all have nights where we cry ourselves to sleep and mornings where we push the snooze button one more time than we should because we just don't want to get up. We all lose our tempers, we all lose our minds and we all lose sight of what's important. We are all the same.

So why is it that so many people focus on what makes us different as though different is a bad thing? Because it's not. The people we fall in love with, the things we believe in, whether or not they make band-aids that match our skin tone? None of those differences change that we are all the same-they don't change the fact that we are all people. People who struggle sometimes just to get through the day. People who look back on the past and think, 'Where did the time go?' People who experience hate and love, heartache and bliss, pain and pleasure. We're all just people, living life day by day, hour by hour, minute by minute. We're all trying to live instead of merely just being alive. Instead of just existing.

But it can be really difficult to do anything but exist when you are being told that your existence-who you are-is wrong. It can be really difficult to hold your head high, throw your shoulders back and walk tall. It can be really difficult not to let that little shadow of doubt creep into your mind and leave you asking yourself, 'Am I doing something wrong? Am I wrong?'

Maybe this doesn't seem like a big deal. Maybe for you second-guessing yourself is helpful and good. But it's not helpful and good for me. No, for me, self-doubt is downright destructive. Self-doubt can leave me in a slump for days, weeks, sometimes even months. But in moments of clarity, in moments like this one, where there is no shadow of doubt, no questions, no wonder, I know that who I am-even with all of my flaws-is not wrong. That I am fine just the way I am. And that everyone else on this planet is fine just the way that they are. No matter who they love, what they believe in or whether they can walk to CVS and get a band-aid that matches their skin tone. Because we all live, we all breathe, we all bleed and we all break. We are all the same.

Choosing to dance...Like no one's watching

Listen (on playlist below):

Rain-Mika

It is 3am and my room is flooded with white light. Really bright light. Blinding light. And every few minutes there is a huge bang that could battle the likes of the sound of an explosion. But I'm not mad that the noise and light woke me up out of a dream...a really good dream.... No, I'm not mad at all. I'm grateful and excited. Because finally, after what seems like forever, I've gotten the thunderstorm I've been wishing for. Yes. Wishing for.

I sit up in my bed, wrap myself in my comforters, close my eyes and listen. Listen to the raindrops methodically hitting the windowpanes. Listen to the crack when the lightning turns the night sky fluorescent-so bright I can see it with my eyes closed. Listen to thunder roll in like a wave at high-tide at the beach. I listen and it takes me back. Back to other storms on other nights, but mostly, back to one very specific storm...

I am 7. And 3/4. (Those 3/4 were very important back then.) It is nighttime and it is dark. I lay in bed, Winnie the Pooh comforter wrapped tightly around my head (Mr. Kidnapper? I am not here. Obviously. 'Cause you can't see my head! Or my feet! So you can just leave now and go to someone else's house!) And I am scared. Of the dark, of the aforementioned kidnapper who was totally on his way to come get me, and of the thunderstorm going on outside. I wasn't just scared, I was petrified. I ran downstairs to find my mom when I just couldn't take it anymore. But when we got upstairs, instead of turning towards my bed, she turned in the opposite direction. She turned towards my closet. She opened the door, pulled out a pair of flip flops and a jacket and told me to put them on. And then she left me wondering what alien had abducted my mom's brain as she went to her own room and did the same. Still unsure, I followed her down the stairs to the front door. She walked into the rain, threw her hands up in the air, face towards the sky, and danced. And she looked at me as if she expected me to do the same. There wasn't a chance. What if I got struck by lightning? What if Mr. Kidnapper was right around the corner and my mom closed her eyes just a second too long? Nope. There was definitely no way I was walking out that front door...But. It looked like my mom was having a lot of fun. And maybe I wouldn't get struck by lightning. And maybe the kidnapper was sick that night. So I did the unthinkable: I stepped outside. I danced in the rain. I faced my fears....

I chose to dance in the rain....Like no one was watching. And I loved it.

Fast forward 11 years. I'm a little older and it's a little later. But it's the same kind of storm and I'm not scared anymore. I have turned my fear into joy, my pain into pleasure, my hate into love. I have learned to dance in the rain. I have learned to face my fears, to take risks, to jump into the unknown. I have learned to trust myself, believe in myself and let go of my inhibitions. And those things? They translate well in most all aspects of life. And that's what this blog is going to be about: about not waiting out the storm, but instead, choosing to dance...like no one's watching.