rambling...

Happy Thanksgiving to all my faithful readers and friends (some of who are one in the same). I hope you all had an enjoyable holiday with friends and family and whoever else you spent it with. we had 2 thanksgivings this year. the first was with my parents, our good family friend, my cousin and my boyfriend and i. food was good. we laughed, A LOT, which was much needed after the past few weeks and i lost $15 playing poker b/c i had to buy in for not only myself but for my cousin and bf too... something about that doesn't seem right. at least i know i'll see the money from the bf but my cousin... doubtful. friday night we went to Mohegan Sun to see boyfriend's all time favorite band Staind. they have a new album out which is a little on the hard side if you ask me, but none-the-less, we went. i'm more of a fan of the solo stuff, but that's b/c i really like all of their mellow songs and he tends to play the mellow stuff when he is solo. but i digress. one of my most favorite slots at Mohegan is the Wizard of Oz machine. i LOVE the wizard of oz so the fact that i can gamble on it makes it ever so much better. but... when i got over to the one i like, there was only one seat open. unfortunately, some lady thought it would be okay to play 2 machines at once. NOT okay i don't think. at all... then, when another opened up, the lady who took it (she was there before me so it was fair) jumped up and down in her seat every time she won even $1. and then, these 2 other dudes just kept switching off... so i was getting super heated... especially when i realized it was 7:45 and we had to go into the concert. the show was good- shorter than i anticipated but i think they usually talk more in between the songs. he played 18 including one off his solo album- country boy- which i love. i'm also a fan of his new song "paper wings"

Make some paper wings
And learn to fly

while i'm sure the lyrics mean something totally different, i feel like there is something to be taken from them... it's like, at some point, you have to just do it. you have to trust that you can and will be okay if someone pushes you to do something you are unsure of. you have to learn to fly solo. a friend sent me a card for my birthday and since then, we have had a few conversations stemming from this card. it said "leap and the net will appear" it's from a series of cards/mugs/paper etc. from quotablecards. I LOVE LOVE LOVE these products. did i mention that i love them? i do. it stemms from my love of all things quote related (no really?) and b/c they are done in cool fonts and colors and just... i love them. anyway. back to my original story.

leap and the net will appear. so many times, we are afraid to do things. to try new things. to take a leap of faith, or a leap of no faith. to move on from the thing we know to that which is unknown. i used to be afraid to take the leap. to jump in, both feet, unsure of how close the bottom would be. until recently. i hated where i was, liked the idea behind what i was doing, hated where we were living even though i was lucky to have the unwaivering support of boyfriend. so i lept. literally. i got a job interview appointment on a thursday for the next day (friday). i called out of work to go to the interview. i took the job before i quit the one i was working at. i quit the first job and spent the next week preparing to transfer my case load. i was sad to leave the kids, and some of the staff, but i needed something different. i couldn't be miserable. i couldn't keep holding on to something that made me want to come undone at the very thought of it. i cried on a daily basis. i cried when i left meetings (even meetings that went well) and i cried during my entire drive home each day. then, i would cry again when boyfriend would get home or when i would see him. i worked from 7am-3pm most days (some days not till 8) and then would drive home, run errands if i had any, and work from then till it was time to make dinner, sometimes while cooking dinner and then after dinner. i watched tv from my computer, turning around periodically to see what was going on. boyfriend and i argued about my working constantly... it hurt us... not enough to break us up, but enough that he would be really frustrated that i was doing work again... it was never ending. but i lept. and somehow, out of thin air, the net appeared. similarily, a friend also took a leap. left. moved. tried new things. was scared. and just like that, the net appeared.

so i've learned... it's okay to be scared. it's okay to leap and it's okay to not know what to expect. it's normal to be completly freaked out and not have any idea where your life is going. on some days, i still don't know where my life is headed or if it's headed in the right direction. but i know that it's okay to leap. that it's okay to not know where i'm going every day but to know that if i jump, somehow, i'll be okay...