Why I Document Life

 

Hi friends,

Happy weekend! 

Cleaning my art porch I discovered I had two swimming pool 

baskets full of journals I've finished.  

Needing the room I sat on the floor to go through them and try to figure out how

and where to store them.  

Then I began thumbing through and reading awhile.  Doing so; 

I realized ... again... why 

I write... art journal, memory keep,

and just document life.  

 ... the memories that came back

got me to cryin.  lol  

Then  onto just thanking  God for so many blessings and seeing 

us all through so much.  

Thought I'd share a few things I learned as 

I read.  

Alot of my books are full of cuddling Blakelea. 

Here the kids had stopped by after getting a different vehicle 

and I got to hold her in my arms and  love on her... 

In this photo I was growing my hair out to it's natural color...

which was pretty much all gray and white.  It felt right 

as I'd just became a new Grandmother. 

 

In many of these books are three little words 

You are loved.

One day maybe this girl will pick these books up 

long after I'm gone and 

read 

how loved she was and will always be.  

I hope so.   

Often my pages turn into simple prayers... 

This one just gets me every time I look into this photo. 

Blake had learned to crawl and crawled right up 

to her little friend.   

Yall the free and easy  nature of children is amazing. 

Like how come it's so hard for us to make friends?

Why can't it be this easy????????   

So many pages are penned about this very subject that still

often escapes me.  

For me it seems the older I get the harder this whole thing is.  

I think it may have been the very first time we took Blake to a park..

While we were there another couple came and had a little girl exactly Blake's  size... 

Blakelea ran right up to her and took her by the hand... they were instant bff's. 

They walked all over just holding hands and beholding eachother's faces.  

I cried watching.

  Brought tears I think to all our eyes it was the most beautiful

and REAL.... interaction of:

 "wanna be my friend??????" 

Anyways... it's things like this I want to remember and it's things like this 

that keep me thinking about real life and friendships. 

On this day I got prettier or so he told me. 

I got to watch my first grand daughter be born...

then... the day after Myguy goes... "You know what happened yesterday?"

me:  what?

He said, "You got prettier."

gulp. 

What a sweet  thing for a new Papa  to say to a new Grammy. 

happysigh 

Here we were gettin ready for bed one night and Myguy just  up and leaves. 

He came back with these ... um... beautiful... wilted.. blackeyed susies.  He'd picked them for me earlier when mowing and put 

them in his hot truck to keep but  forgot about them. 

They are still so beautiful to me.  

One day our grown kids will read this stuff and  know

their folks really loved eachother alot.  

Journaling has also helped me get in the practice of doing the daily examen.

I don't do it every night... but I try to.. and 

it is a good way to end the day for this soul.  

These pages are something that I'm still learning to do.  

Getting older is hard for women I think.  We aren't taught 

how to do it well especially when the media tells us  you gotta be skinny, tall, 

have great proportions, 

and have no wrinkles or gray hair and all the beauty products are for anti aging. 

By the medias standards... if that is what beauty is... I'm screwed.   

I have days I still struggle alot.

Stuff hurts.. this hip makes me limp when I get up, ... 

Getting old  is .. not easy.  

Just in the past three months I've gained more weight... and 

while I know that  has went  up and down alot in my life... 

learning to love myself the way I am .. 

at whatever size 

it's hard. 

When these  muffin tops are spilling out of their waistband?

When the rolls seem to multiply by just  bending over?

When these upper arms  wave more than this hand does.? 

When the thighs swoosh when walking and I'm not even wearing corduroys? 

Yeah... it's hard. 

But the leaf on the left side of this spread... tells the story and it's true. 

Life is a cycle. 

We aren't meant to look like we did in our younger days. 

We don't need to fight that. 

It's better to accept the changes and  go with the flow.. 

Just  be your true self.  

  

Then I stumbled on this page.  

-No makeup... wild hair... 

and pissed off cat.... 

It took guts I think for this gal to document her truth.  

While the embellishment to "be your beautiful self" feels like a reallllll stretch..

This heart wants very badly to wear strength and dignity and 

beable to laugh at the days to come.  

Whatever that looks like?  

Just be your  true self 

and  smile anyway. 

So many lessons to learn...

And maybe we keep doing that 

all the way to the end.  

These pages spell more love.  

And the cool thing is ... this guy has taught me alot about love. 

He has seen me at my very worst.  

My lowest. My saddest. My ugliest.  

And he's cupped my chin and pulled it up.  

And now these days we're like an old pair of leather boots.  

Worn in... badly used...some weather rot, 

but most loved... and very comfortable 

with eachother.  

That's love.

These pages took me back to favorite things I did when I was 

a child... 

Funny how I'm still that kid. 

hiker, explorer,

nature lover,

always looking for cool rocks,

loved singing along with guitar music 

at the Catholic church.  

Baker, 

.... bike rider... 

It's amazing really how so much of who we were when were young,

is exactly who we 

are free to be "now." 

Because' that's our true. 

Thumbing through pages I also found bits of art that 

came easy for me and I can see that this is something 

I need to explore more of... 

So journaling... really has alot of life.

Just this morning a very good friend told me that she 

looked through her journal to pages that were about a year ago?

She was very sick... very sick.  She wrote her raw feelings and didn't 

have much hope.  But re reading it today... she sees how God brought her through 

it all.  Today she has hope and is living each day as gift.  

That's what I want I told her.  

To live grateful.  

For whatever is real and beautiful 

and true... today.  

Sometimes I lose real sight of that.  

Maybe things and people get taken for granted? 

I'm sorry for that.  

May these eyes see differently... 

the love... the beauty the goodness and truth

of  these moments.  

Until we meet again,

<*)))><