A Bushel and a Peck

Tonight, I'm feeling defeated. By a zit. A lot of zits, actually. I'm 28 and I have cystic acne. The past few days, it's gotten painful. I look awful. I feel like a walking pizza. I gross myself out when I look in the mirror or see myself on camera. This is becoming physically and emotionally unbearable. Of course, I have a million other things running through my mind as well. Tomorrow is the first anniversary of the last time I was physically attacked by my abuser. I have a handful of assignments due tonight and I just can't focus. I have bills piling up, people I need to call, decisions to make, things to clean... I've also been allowing myself to open up, emotionally. Instead of trying to force myself to be "productive" and try to fit into the boxes I think other people want me to, I've been sitting back a little, listening, watching, learning, understanding. I'm letting myself be sensitive again: to everything. It's interesting how my...

It's 5:34 am. I'm thinking about letting go. The interesting thing about learning how to let go is that it first requires holding something: hurt, fear, anger... Love. Letting go requires vulnerability because it means acknowledging that I'm trying to remove something from my life that I once clung to. It means opening up my heart, my mind, my soul to find the deepest roots of those emotions so I can gently, perhaps slowly, remove the harmful pieces of them. It hurts. And it leaves a scar. So the question becomes: would I rather experience the sharp, temporary pain of surgery and a corresponding recovery, with the possibility of limited mobility and occasional aches and pains? Or would I rather try to ignore it, leave the emotion there, buried under layers of bandages, and risk infecting and debilitating my entire soul? I've been told that giving myself this spiritual surgery is brave. Perhaps it is. But I feel that I no longer have any other viable option. I ...

I spent 30+ minutes today trying to fix a little measuring tape that belongs to Sweet Boy. Baby Girl broke it this morning. I was pretty sure I could fix it, so today after school I grabbed a screwdriver and started taking the thing apart. Baby Girl was in the garage, asleep in the car, at the time. Sweet Boy was very curious about the whole process and watched closely, giving suggestions and asking questions every once in a while. I figured out what was wrong and did my best to put it all back together. There were some issues that I had to keep resolving over and over. I was determined though. Baby Girl woke up partway through the process so I went and tried to get her out. She was mad and wouldn't have it. I told her to come in when she was ready. Finally, I thought I'd figured it out, so I put it all back together and proudly showed Sweet Boy that it worked. For about two seconds. Then it did the goofy thing again, and when I tried to pull it out further, the whole tap...