Homesickness: The Ghosts of Oklahoma

Winded, I plop myself onto the ground, leaning back to enjoy the warm sun on my face. Bittersweet... I would happily trade a dozen of these moments to hover over the old floor furnace in my childhood home. For just a little while, and absorb the sensory overload that IS my family and friends; just a minute... maybe two.

Homesickness weighs on my shoulders and sours in my stomach. Choking on the warm air, I can feel my heart, burdened by my heavy tears, sinking down through me into the hard ground below. Anchoring me on the spot and stopping time to draw out a single, torturous moment.

It's a warm January birthing a hot February, hotter March, and a baking April; a scattered litter of hot and sunny days bleeding into one another. In Oklahoma, the children are bundled in their cozy layers while ice frosts my hometown. Kids out of school; enjoying snow days with soaked mittens and pink noses.

Life goes on...

A fog of secrets and complaints will fall on other deserving ears, but my head hums with a loud silence. Ghosts of stories that will reach me too late lose their significance and fall sleepily to my feet. I shove them aside. Kicking up the dust and dirt that Arizona gifts me.

Oklahoma hasn't even noticed, and I am forgotten in Arizona.

Killing Time: 2 Goobers and 1 Camera Phone

Sometimes it's hard to imagine what it's like to be normal. Is there even such a thing?

The other day, waiting for Stormy to get her hair cut, Gabe, Brynn, and I killed some time... the only way we know how... being strange:

or

They practiced some method acting:

Gabe and Brynn - Happy

Gabe and Brynn - Sad

Gabe and Brynn - Monsters

Gabe and Brynn - Mad

Gabe and Brynn - Getting a Puppy

and

Gabe and Brynn - Being Their Parents

I'm not sure what the finger pointing is all about

Gabe and Brynn - Movie Stars

We're easily amused
~2

Happy New Year!

It's been a while, and a great start to the New Year so far. I spend the 31st sick, and Chris made a trip to the Gallup, NM (we were driving back to AZ) emergency room the morning of the 1st. Lucky me; Strep Throat, for the first time in my life. I really hope this isn't a reflection of my year to come.

Maybe the worst part is out of the way, and it can only get better.

I feel pretty good now, and thanks to the strep, I am about 7 lbs down on the regular weight loss resolution. Did you make any?

I am always overly ambitious with the resolutions, and then at the end of the year I get bummed out when it's time to make resolutions all over again. This year I didn't really get to think about it because I was sick, but besides the weight loss thing, I think I am going to try finishing things I've started. That's a pretty good, all encompassing resolution. I am probably going to hate myself for it later, but the year is new and I have a lot of time :)

I am still reading a lot. I have finished Lauran Myracle's Bliss... eh it was ok, and Jen Lancaster's Such a Pretty Fat. I am not used to reading Humor, and it took me a while to get into it, but I found it inspiring. I started the year reading Harry, A History. I am a Harry Potter fangirl, but I got kind of bored and had to move on to something else (shhhhhhhhh). I should post a list of all the books I read last year, and you can easily see why my posts were few and far between.

What's new with you? Working on any projects? Make any New Year's Resolutions?
~2