Ah... a nice treat for the night. As I was napping on the couch at my parents' in preparation for work, I asked God if I could be called off of work. I really, really didn't feel like working. Plus, dumb as it sounds, the royal wedding is in the morning and I kind of want to watch it. Well, around 5:30 pm I get a call from my floor. They put me on call... which is better than I could have asked for, because so far they have not called me in and I'm getting paid to be on call.

I ended up staying at my parents' house and my mom and sister and I are going to watch the wedding together. I have a breakfast casserole in the fridge and we figured we'd make it a little fun. Even my mom is kind of excited about it! :) She's my favorite mom.

Hannah and I spent the evening goofing around. It felt like old times, like we were 13 and 9 years old again or something.

We are ending the night finishing The King's Speech. Excellent movie. Another good movie I saw this week: Up. Oh, my goodness, I cried in the first 15 minutes of that movie, and probably spent about half of it in tears. If you ever do watch it, make sure you have a box of tissues ready at hand. It is a very touching movie.

So here's to being with Mom and sister, spending a morning in front of the TV watching the royal wedding, and just being together.

Amanda Amanda Amanda!!

From a little 2-headed monster...

To 2 good friends into adulthood!

Ok, so this is an old picture... circa 2007 at her rehearsal dinner.

This is me and Amanda. I've known her since I was five years old. She came over one day with another neighborhood friend to play with us, and she was almost immediately one of the family- the fifth daughter.

We have always hung out off and on again, but especially rekindled our friendship in 2005 the summer after I graduated high school. She was in between semesters in nursing school, and so we spent a great part of that summer together hanging out. I remember we watched the movie Mary Poppins a lot! Now whenever I watch it, I'm often nostalgic for those carefree summer days we shared.

She is now married with a little girl, but we still find time to hang out about once a week. We call it our weekly Tuesday night hang-out time. I go to her house, where we may watch TV or a movie, talk, take Emily for a walk, and eat dinner. It's become something I really look forward to each week. Amanda is a good friend. She has even hung out with me when I've been nothing but a stick in the mud through the last couple of months. At a time of grief for my grandparents, as well as losing a strong friendship that was once a constant in my life, she has been such a good friend to me.

So, thanks, Amanda! Friends for 18 years (almost 19?)... so here's to 80 more!

I didn't go to church on Easter this year. Well, I couldn't actually. Had to work Saturday night, and get some sleep Sunday morning before being able to be with family. I knew I couldn't do both. Odd that one of the worst nights falls on Easter. But I found myself, though well past the romanticism of most holidays, very at peace with everything as I thought of what that day meant. Usually at work I just go crazy and am stressed to the max, but I don't feel like I let it get to me as much. Why can't I treat every day like that? The truth of the resurrection is still as much truth in September as it is on Easter.

Is it weird that I've been listening to Christmas music? Thought so. Well, I guess it's dumb but that music really makes me think of my grandparents. Many of the family gatherings and memories I have with them revolve around Christmas. I was thinking this past week for the first time, how hard Christmas will be this year. I remember in December telling my sister, Melissa, that Christmas was going to be better next year-- that it had to be. And she turned to me and said, "Or it could be worse. We don't know." I'm not casting gloom and doom on this year's Christmas, as it isn't even going to be a bad Christmas-- just different and harder.

Today I'm going to a big, old used book store with my sister. I absolutely love this place. It has the musty old smell of books. I've recently been getting back into reading (it happens when you have a lot of spare time like me). I'm hoping to make a few good finds.

Hope everyone has a great week!

One of the neatest finds at my grandparents', probably after her wedding dress and veil, was this little hat box tucked in the corner of a shelf, long forgotten. When I opened it up, I caught my breath. I don't even know when my grandmother would have bought this, but I don't think women have worn hats like this since at least the '50s or '60s, am I right?


I'm 99% sure it's real fur, though I don't know what kind. It is still very soft, and I would think that if it were fake it wouldn't have retained that. I don't even care though, I just think it is so cute and reminds me of how classy my grandmother always was. I love that it still has hair pins attached to it, which is how she would have kept it just so on her head. I can't even figure out how it would have been worn, either. Women typically had the more cropped haircuts in those days, so it was probably worn back more on the crown of the head. I love it because it reminds me of I Love Lucy.

That little hat box on my dresser is, to me, a picture of simpler times. Or at least seemingly simpler. I have recently begun reading Laura Bush's book, Spoken from the Heart. I don't care what side of the aisle you are on, it is an excellent read and is not political. She speaks of her childhood, which was very simple in the post-war days. I suppose that because of my grandparents' deaths, I'm finding myself regretting that I didn't ask more questions about the Depression, World War II, and the years after. I've developed a renewed fascination with those years.

Life was blissful for many after the war, I'm finding out. Marriages and families could finally begin for so many. I believe the reason my grandparents' love was as strong as it was can partially be attributed to their four-year wait for marriage during the war, writing letters back and forth all that time. And although I'm sure not all stories turned out so happily, I think that it was that way for many. I think when people returned to "normal" life after the war, they lived very privately, closely-knit with their own family and friends. The simple American life that people now often make fun of in the '40s and '50s with the nuclear family. But I honestly believe that it truly was that way for a time.

Ah, well, here I go, dwelling on the past, and all because of a hat. I go back to work tomorrow for the first time since coming back. I'm not especially looking forward to it. Why does it seem that no matter how good or long of a break I get, I'm never ready to go back?

Do you ever find yourself constantly longing for the past...
At the same time, anxious for the future, for "life" to truly begin?

I have spent the majority of probably the last six years, stuck in this paradoxical mindset.

In longing for the past, I failed to simply find contentment and thankfulness that I was given such wonderful memories, whether they be that with my family, with friends, or at church. I resisted (and still do resist) change, usually to find out in the end that I liked it (usually when another change came along to replace the old one). I can remember when my Aunt Georgia was very sick, I spent a lot of time wishing for us to have the more vibrant, healthy Aunt Georgia back with us. Instead of being grateful that we had Aunt Georgia with us. The same could be said about my grandfather, although I think I had a strong sense of knowing from a very young age that each moment with him was precious--he was just that kind of guy.

Whenever I looked too far into the future and wished it were here now, I never realized what I was wishing away: time you can't get back. Time with people who grow old, a carefree youth that you only get once, and so much more came with that time that I wished away. Do I rush through the moments with my own parents, completely unaware that they will not be here forever? Thirty or forty years isn't such a very long time, or at least it will go very quickly. Sometimes I do wish there were a way to turn back time, to recapture such beautiful moments that you can never get back, when instead I fail to look for the beautiful moments now.

And yet here I sit: lost in memories of things that once were, but also longing for a happier, more secure future. Why can I never seem to find contentment in my life where I am? I have my parents, my sisters and my brother, I still have two wonderful grandparents on my mom's side, and many wonderful aunts and uncles and cousins. I have a job, as much as I am stressed out of my mind by it, that pays the bills and lets me spend a little, I'm independent and self-sufficient financially. It occurred to me the other day, as I felt very sorry for myself, that perhaps there will come a time that I look back on this and say, "Those were the days."

I'm going to make an effort to find the beauty in life in the now. Even in the moments that I feel angry, or that I don't have a good life. This week, I had a lot of special time with my little brother which included a fun trip to the zoo one day, and a trip to the St. Augustine fort another day. I have another day and a half off before I have to go back to work. Let's see how awesome it can be!

I flew back in with my little brother yesterday. My parents are on their way right now with a truck load of furniture and other odds and ends from my grandparents' house.

It was a wonderful five days. When we flew in very late Thursday night, Air Tran misplaced our luggage and we weren't able to get it until Friday afternoon. Melissa, John, and I went to the St. Louis Arch that day. We got to join my Uncle Philip and his family for a fish fry, which was fun. I haven't ever been to one of those (I don't live in a highly Catholic area).

Saturday's memorial service was beautiful. People had so many wonderful things to share about my Grandma. She wasn't just special to her family, but to her community. That was wonderful to see. A lot of reality about both of my grandparents set in on this trip. Although it has come and gone in waves, it really hit me Tuesday night as I stood over my grandpa's old work bench in the basement, where he used to work on various carpentry and projects. Although he hasn't worked there in at least five years or so, and it has been picked through by various family members since then, it still looks as though he just stopped working on it yesterday. A wrench hanging on the nail here, spilled paint on the counter top there. I really cried as I stood there and realized how much has changed, how much is going to change. I miss them both so much, and I want them here with us.

Today's plans are a possible trip to the zoo. We are watching Voyage of the Dawn Treader for probably the fifth time in the last five days. Time to get back to life, to the swing of things.

Two more nights of work, and I'm out of town again for about a week for my grandmother's service. I feel like I've been traveling a lot lately, although I really haven't. I guess being gone for two weeks in March though, then turning around to do it again just a few weeks later is a lot of time to be out of town.

Life really has gotten quite a bit better. I went to the beach on Sunday with Amanda and Tricia and their families. And, despite my wearing sun block and a t-shirt for most of the day, I still managed to get a pretty bad sunburn on my back. Which is weird, because my back was probably the part that was the most covered up. My conclusion is that sun block does not last very long, since I used the stuff I bought last summer. So I'm throwing it all out and starting fresh this year, and will never use an old bottle of sun block again.

And while I'm at it, here's my PSA (public service announcement- not prostate-specific antigen! haahhaa a little nursing humor for you there! I'm sorry, I can't help myself). Though I don't sit on my high horse when it comes to taking care of your skin, because obviously I get my share of sun burns, I do think that I am in a position to talk to people about skin care. I had melanoma when I was 18, and believe me, I was no sun goddess nor did I spend much time in tanning booths before then. Melanoma is very dangerous, and if we hadn't caught it in time, I either wouldn't be here today, or I'd be battling metastasized cancer at this point. It's no joke and getting multiple sun burns, or even sun tans, each year is so dangerous. I'm not saying you have to keep yourself looking like a porcelain doll, but please be mindful and take care of your skin. You may not get skin cancer at a young age like I did, but the more time you spend in the sun now, the more you are increasing your risk of getting it when you are older. Are those odds you really want to mess around with?

Off my soap box now. I really don't want to work tonight. I'm very nervous, because I'm going to be precepting a nurse the next two nights. She has nursing experience, but not on the floor. So she either might be very efficient and know what she's doing, or she will be absolutely drowning. I've known people with previous experience that felt both ways. The floor is no easy place to be. Sometimes I honestly wonder why I keep doing it to myself. I do like nursing, yet at the same time I hate it. But I don't know what I really want to do the rest of my life. I put all my eggs in one basket when I went to college. I suppose you could argue it was a good basket, in that it's a secure place to be job-wise. But let me tell you, it makes me a nervous wreck half the time, and a vegetable at home on the couch the rest of the time.

Well, off to a busy week and a half. See you on the other side!

Girls, remember books like this? I recently picked this one up again. And to be honest, it was one of my favorite of the Christian fiction romance novel genre.

I place a little blame on these types of books for the disillusionment in my adult life. Oh, you mean everyone doesn't meet their future husband (probably named Thad or Tucker, or something along those lines) when they are 20, and he doesn't come striding in to sweep you off your feet when all else seems lost? Oh, 16-year-old Natalie, there are so many things I want to tell you. Yet sadly, I cannot.

I still like to re-read some of these books more for nostalgic purposes. But boy, did they lie! I really believed they were a true portrayal of love and romance. You could say that about any romance fiction, but the danger in the Christian romance genre is that it always seems like once a person gets their spiritual life figured out, the next thing you know, the right person has come along and they are getting married, and all is well. Which gives a lot of people the false belief that marriage is somehow a reward, and being single is some sort of punishment.

I'm still waiting on Dalton Acuff's Christian fiction romance novel to come out. Until then, I'm stuck with the same old stuff.