I did this again.  Acting.  I’ve been focusing on other things lately {which has been good}

but…

It was oh-so-good to be back in the saddle.

Not gonna take such a long sabbatical anytime soon.

Thank you Mahonri for writing an excellent play.

It’s a wonder at all

that I

survived

the war

between your

heart & mine.

-Ingrid Michaelson

“This is War”

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Go so far away that you stop being afraid of not coming back.

-Eve Ensler

“I like you in yellow,” he said.  “It makes your smile even brighter.”

“Just as the desire not to fall may prevent us from learning to walk on our hands, the desire to protect our own egos may prevent us from fully knowing ourselves and from having an authentic encounter with another person.”

-Jennifer Lavy

Boy: Yeah, well, you like never sleep.

Me:  That’s actually not true.  I sleep like, 9 hours most days.

Boy: No, at night I mean.

Touche.

Then he added

If I’m ever on facebook at 2 AM, I can count on you to be there.

Given that I’m posting this at 12:48 AM, I still have an hour’s homework to do and I need to shower…and I took a four-hour nap this afternoon…he’s pretty much dead on.

Okay.

Here’s the thing.

I’ve kinda hinted at this, but I feel like I need to just come out and say it.

Right now, my life is far better than it has ever been.

Ever.

I’m spending my days learning and learning and learning.  I’m surrounded by amazing friends.  The best & strongest network of friends I have ever had.  I have people I can call and go to lunch with.  I have people I can call and pour out my heart to.

My clothes fit me.  I look in the mirror and I like what I see.  And that isn’t just because I lost 40 pounds last year.  Because chickadees, I am currently a size 8.  And we all know plenty of size 8s who hate their bodies.  When I was a size 6 I hated the way my legs looked.  As a matter of fact, I’m pretty sure I lost the weight after I first started loving myself & my body.  In any case, the point is, I look in the mirror and I like what I see.  I look in the mirror and I think that my size 8 legs look pretty fantastic in my jeans.

And I thought that would never happen to me in a million years.  I spent so much time vehemently hating my body, day in day out, all day every day.  Hate hate hate.  And I didn’t see that I would ever be able to pull myself out of it.

{Perhaps there’s a moral right there: even if I can’t see a way out at this moment, doesn’t mean that I won’t find one eventually.}

Another thing that I never thought would happen in a million years is that I have spent the last year dating.  Dating dating dating.  After rarely dating for years.  After being legitimately concerned that I was going to spend the rest of my life single.  {Because yo, you can’t get married without first dating at least one person…}

And it turns out that dating is just as stressful and crazy-making and fun and delightful and grin-inducing and happy-making as I suspected it would be.

And I am figuring out how to dress myself, and how to feed myself, and how to force myself to complete all my assignments (no matter how silly I think they are).

I don’t have it figured out by any stretch of the imagination.  I still stay up too late and sleep too long and get blue.  I spend too much money and I’m socially awkward and I haven’t figured out my career.  And I’m scared.  I spend too many days with fear in my heart.

But I’m happy.

I’m happier than I’ve been in a long long time.  It’s been a rough few years, you see.  I sort of failed at the transition to college.  It was really, really hard for me.  And before I could figure it out tragedy piled atop tragedy.  And for a long time the weight had me barely keeping my head above water.

But now, instead of barely surviving, I’m thriving.  After four years of being on the edge of drowning, I feel like I’m practically lounging on the beach.

And since I’ve documented so much weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth in this space over the years, I figured I better document some of the joy that is currently seeping out of my pours.

Me, discussing a boy I’m dating: He’s not as emotionally available as I am–

My therapist: You’d be hard pressed to find a man who is.  And you don’t need that.

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In the words of my dear friend Aubrey,

In the history of decision making, this is the worst decision anybody has ever made.

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everything is going to be okay.  in fact, nothing was wrong in the first place.  but i panic easily with this one.  he’s broken my heart before.

i’m giving him another chance.  but trusting him is harder to do.

but i’m not ready to let him go.  so i’ll just see how things unfold.