Less Than Five Months...

If you are a regular reader of mine, you know that I am engaged and will be married.  What you may not know is that the wedding is set for October, so the date is fast approaching.  We have a lot of our decision already decided.  We have the venue and catering, date, dress, DJ, photographer, with only the details of each to consider.  Only big things remaining are the flowers, cake, invitations (although our guest list is made) and rings.  It is amazing to consider how fast life gets away from us.  It seems only yesterday that my fiance and I were looking at venues, trying to find that place of our dreams.  Now, we are needing to find time to tie up loose ends.

This caused me to consider how time flies and how we get caught up in life.  All this comes into perspective when you have a moment to reflect.  This moment comes for me everyday when I log into this blog but it also comes when I have a moment to watch something as simple as the birds visiting a feeder.  I got to enjoy the birds, squirrels and other various creatures while over visiting Pawpaw yesterday.  It was during this time that the bright colors of the males were brought up again (not unlike a previous post).  My fiance brought up a point that I had forgotten in consideration of the coloring of the males.  True, they are brightly colored to attract a mate but it serves a deeper purpose as well.  The bright colors makes them more susceptible to being captured by birds of prey, meaning the females are often times spared in order to continue raising their young.

Watching birds go about their business is very comical and peaceful.  To guess which birds are babies, just beginning to fly and as a result, shed their baby fat is an enjoyable experience.  How they interact with the squirrels or how the squirrels work their way around the man-made contraptions we build to keep them out. I hope that in less that five months, I will not miss the life passing us by, the enjoyment and celebration that is the time building until the wedding day.  Almost everyday, we text about looking forward to that fateful day.  And each day, we remind each other that while the day is exciting, we can't wish our lives away.  Afterall, we might miss a lot in between.

As the morning passes, I am enjoying the company of our little dog, Molly and the comfort that only corn muffins and coffee can give you.  Dinner is ready to be turned on and the TV is already on.  I am watching Sex and the City for now, ironic as Carrie Bradshaw is a writer and I am writing while watching.  Work will come soon and the day will continue to progress as normal.  I can rest easy knowing I come home to a puppy that will love me unconditionally, a fiance that will open his arms for me and a bed I can fall into at the end of the night.  And all my family is simply a phone call away.  Life is good.

A Calling, A Whisper and Snowflakes

Everyone do me a favor....go to your calendar and tell me what the date is.


April showers bring May flowers.

Go on, I will wait...

So, if your calendar reflects the same thing that my calendar does, it is currently the 5th of April, 2013.  Can you believe it that yesterday, the 4th of April, it snowed where I am?!?

I found it to be one of the craziest weather activities that I have witnessed in my young life.  Certainly, being where I am in the South, I am accustomed to it being hot and cold, back and forth, until it finally settles into Summer or Winter.  But I cannot ever recall seeing snow in April.

It was beautiful.  I was at work and whispers and murmurs began to sound throughout the building.  My back is to the window so I slowly turned to see what everyone was so entranced by.  Snow.  Big, white snow.  My coworker told me it was like clusters of flakes falling at one time.  It was like being in a snowglobe.

I often joke that Mother Nature needs to get out of menopause.  But at the same time, this is a miracle of our world.  Yesterday made me think of those persistent and courageous daffodils that peek up and begin to show the world they have survived winter.  I thought of how many of them would be harmed by the cold and the snow.  I use to think the same of the azaleas in the yard where I grew up.  Yet, they are so resilient.

We all encounter things in our lives that cause us to feel like we are moving backward.  I know I have.  I have put my life on hold for many different reasons only to wake up one day and realize I don't even know what my dreams are anymore.  This morning, after my fiancé left, I sent him a text message.  It read:

Please pray for me.  I am feeling lost and not fulfilled.  I know I shouldn't as I have you, my family and friends and a job.  I have everything that should make me happy.  But I still feel somewhat empty.

His reply:

I am always praying for you.  Every day.

Now you may say, "Eww, that's gross!"  But that is Love.  I realized last night, on my way home from work, what one of my coworkers told me.  We were talking about the study and practice of law and going on to higher education.  I told him that I never could because of the money.  He told me that if I am not careful, I will soon wake up and half my life would be over and I will not be where I feel like I should.

OK, I took a little artistic liberty with that.  I elaborate and wrote how what he said made me feel.  But those words really hit home.  I have stepped aside for so many things and people in my life that I have lost sight of what I want to make myself.  Is there any healing from that?

No, like the daffodils, there isn't healing.  But there is rebirth.  I have to be resilient like the daffodils and azaleas in the snow.  They have waited so long and couldn't wait any longer for Spring to be sure to set in.  But when the world started moving backward, they, too, retreated.  But that doesn't mean they won't appear again.  Just because I have been foolish in the past, setting my life and my dreams on hold for those around me, does not mean they won't come back to fruition.

The only remaining question is: what are my dreams?  What is my path?  I feel as though I am still fresh out of college and searching for my path in life.  How long will it take to discover it?  I have no inclination.  I do know I have a great support team in my fiancé and my family.  You, too, can be my support team.  Afterall, we have to stand by each other.

The other night, I had a thought that maybe at the end of a year, I might publish some of these posts and elaborate on them a little.  Any thoughts?  Comments, criticism or ideas?  I cannot become a better writer if I do not know how my writing is perceived.

UPDATE: I want to clarify that I am deeply in love with my fiance and thoroughly enjoy my job and what I am doing.  I simply feel like I have a calling for something more, be it volunteer work or going back to school.  I just don't want any misconceptions.