Chesterville note 1

I've been procrastinating on this blog writing. It isn't for lack of experiences, no. More it's because I have felt so much in one small window of time that I really don't want to deal with it. Emotions... scare me. They're like something (try to remember this from when you were little) on Ripley's Believe It or Not or something. They are so obviously real and happening, yet you are trying with all your might to deny them into nonexistence because of how weird they make you feel.

Here's why I hate emotions and try to avoid them. There are two possible outcomes:

1) Sorrow. Let's just ask, who the hell wants to get to this point in the first place? I also lump anger into this category because anger stems from disappointment and I believe at the root of disappointment is sorrow. So yeah this option is usually a terrible experience. I don't count the days when I just want to yank my comforter over my head and hide for hours as.. successes.

2) Joy. Now, this looks like it would work out, however, things that are joyful are temporary. I simply can't handle the thought that what may currently taste so good will most definitely fade away. Or worse, maybe your perception and value of something joyful isn't the same as someone you think should also be feeling joy like you are. This then leads to sorrow, which is sucky option 1. 

Welcome. To the ever beaming perception of a realist who never chose to be one. 

However...

Like many of the things I say and probably do frequently, I'm wrong. Both these scenarios are limited and can very much be flipped; sorrow is only the absence of things that are joyful, and things that are joyful don't have to most definitely end. These situations are only fabricated and potential avenues of self-defense.

Well, I'm gonna take a shot in the dark and say that self-protection is DEFINITELY not worth the potential  of having to deal with sadness. Emotions affirm the fact that we're alive.

I'd rather know that I'm alive than waste away days doing nothing.

So I guess they'll be more blogs to come.

*I'm going to use the word Chesterville to describe my experiences in Chesterfield that more reflect my thoughts and imagination rather than reality. (author's note).

Nicholasville, note 1.

One time we stepped into territory a little over our heads.

It wasn't really our fault. The curiosity of childhood is something to be cherished, is it not? And the large metallic dial just begged to be touched. Secretary Anna sat at her (my) desk, spinning in the rust brown office chair as the boys clamored in. This was the game where Cody was the trainer and Tyler and Jacob his trust wolf sidekicks, and what professional trainer wouldn't need a secretary?

I don't even remember what the game was. That's probably an okay thing.. (wolves?? Whaaat?). However, the game quickly took a different turn when Cody wandered to the secretary desk and started touching those silver buttons. We were only six year olds so no one paid any attention to Cody until he leaped back from the desk and under the guest bed covers. Up to his nose, he was buried in surprise and widened baby blue eyes. "I CALLED 911!" he blurted, high pitched and quick. This was one of those moments when kids get those awkward looks on their face because they don't know what to say; half smile, half grimace, eye brows furrowed a bit.

Not until the policeman was at the door did we believe him. Mom was more forgiving than we anticipated. Maybe she was just relieved we didn't actually need him. The day ended with a spanking.

This is what I thought of when I opened the guest room closet today, searching with Tyler for Apples to Apples. Certain smells take you to exact moments, and that's where I went. Doesn't your heart just ache, sometimes, for moments when you were little? When your teeny bare feet could run through tiled kitchens and up bedroom walls and onto mattresses that could throw your weight back up into the sky? Gosh, I felt so old.

Today was our last day.

Was it an... era? No idea what the proper classification of time for this one is. Lifestyle? Childhood? Just a decade or two? Who knows. I do know that when I pictured that excitable little boy in a marine uniform, my heart just jumps a little.

Are we prepared for anything at all? And who cares, really. Today, I don't care. I only wish to wrap my grip around the ropes of these moments, and pull them towards me until they can't go away.

When the marine comes home, he probably won't want to squish onto the master bed with the rest of us and try to watch another action movie all huddled together. Will he tolerate Apples to Apples? Will he still eat poptarts with me?

Most salient to my worries; will he still have the carefree spirit he had as a young one? Will any of us?

Gosh, I'm going to miss us. Drying dishes in the kitchen with a solidarity no one could break. Singing, fighting, being thrown into the pool on multiple occasions. Late night swims, late night ice cream, early mornings at church listening to the boys sing in the choir. Hot rides in the truck, blasting music, confessions under the umbrella on the desk and mattress forts. Hide and seek for years and years and years and getting stuck in the laundry basket.

Thank God for the beauty that was so good we still long for it.

Now I pray for safety, and more beauty to come. God bless our marine.