The Meek Shall Inherit The Earth

I was going to take a Day Off today, but when The Lightning and The Lightning Bug picked me for their writer of the week, of course I had to join in with their Dare to Share link up! In case you don't know about it, each Saturday, Katie picks a topic for the weekend. You write on the topic, post it and link up HERE. It's one of my favorite link ups, since I frequently blog in "laundry list" form. It gets me out of my laziness comfort zone and encourages me to write about topics I may not explore otherwise.

This week's topic is: Fight For Your Right: write about something that involves standing up for something you believe in. You can stand up for a cause, support your opinion, or just rant about something that makes you mad.

I have a lot of opinions about a lot of things, but generally I do not voice them. I do not fight for as many rights as I should be fighting for. I would rather seethe with anger under my skin than say anything. Actually, I wouldn’t rather seethe, not really. I would like to know how to effectively stand up for what I want, to voice my opinion without getting unnecessarily angry. 

My boyfriend and his family are very vocal. If they have something to say, they say it, and in my mind, sometimes it’s a little much. To them, this is the way they are, honest, sometimes brutally so. To me, it is scary. This is not to say that he or his family are wrong in the way they express their anger and opinions, they just do it differently from my family, which probably has a lot of un-spoken issues, just waiting to explode. 

This makes for an interesting relationship. There are many instances where he is yelling at me to, “tell him what I want” and I am silently staring him down with the evil eye and my mouth drawn tight in a line and my hands clenched in my lap. He thinks I am thinking what an A-hole he is, while really I am thinking of all the things I could have said or should be saying. I am crafting a discussion in my head, as if it were an essay. First I will say X and then, he will say Y. If he says Z, I will say W. But he will probably say V instead. 

So when I finally squeak out my answer from my clenched lips, which of course NEVER comes out the way that it was playing in my head, I never really feel as satisfied as I thought I would. It usually comes out gruffer, more hurt or angrier than I really am. Why can’t I just say what I mean, and say what I want, and say it nicely? Why can’t I stand up for myself without making it a big deal? I don’t know. Maybe it would work better if my relationship were letter based, like in the olden days. 

“My love, I have missed you so much. Perhaps when we finally see each other, we can go to that brunch place I have wanted to try. Love, your sweetheart forever. “

Did those people fight over nothing when they finally met up for brunch?

I am learning, however. Learning that it is better to just say what you want, what YOU need. This may not avoid an argument, but at least all bets will be on the table and you can go from there. You have to SAY what you want to even come close to working to get it. It’s like winning the lottery; you are never going to win if you don’t play. 

As Mick Jagger said, “You can’t always get what you want. But if you try sometimes, you just might find, you get what you need.” 

______

Also on a totally unrelated note, I have a race tomorrow and here is the weather forecast. Bummer. So please everyone, cross your fingers for clarity (and lower humidity) between 7:30 and 9:30 tomorrow morning! Thanks! 

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Back to The Basics

I grew up in a small town. When I say small, I don’t mean thousands, or even hundreds of people. I mean tens. Barely. My elementary school was a tiny school with only two classrooms and was the same one my dad went to. I believe that when I started going there, there were approximately 50 kids total, split into K-3 and 4-6.

I remember my first day of school, standing there with my best friend and her strawberry shortcake lunch box, waiting for the car that would come and pick us up. Yup, we had a car, because there were only three kindergarteners and we went to school later than the older kids.

Me and My Bestie - First Day of School

My first teacher was a hippy. Well, it was 1983 and there was some carryover from the 70s, I suppose. She played the acoustical guitar for music hour. We sang Joni Mitchell, The Beatles and Anne Murray songs. I still know all the words to the Yellow Submarine. She ate something that at the time I thought was the strangest thing ever – seaweed! I now know this as sushi.  Our “Christmas” play was “The Giving Tree” by Shel Silverstein. I played a key role; I was a branch.

The cook was named Bobbi. I will never forget her – she used to check to make sure we ate all of our lunch. We would try to trick her by spreading things out, mixing them around or flattening them down, but she was never fooled. We also used to dare each other to mix whatever was left over all together and eat it. Gross. I think this is where I developed my strong dislike of milk. Have you ever eaten mashed-potato-pizza-green bean-milk?

I looked forward to school. My best friend was there; I liked learning. I enjoyed the social interaction and the games. We built forts out of pine needles and played with our care bears. We played kick ball and steal the bacon and tag. The older kids chased the younger ones around, either trying to beat them up or kiss them. I know it sounds weird and I actually don’t remember being kissed, only being chased around with the threat of being kissed.

We used to play on the flipping bar! Remember the flipping bar? I could swing around with one leg and no hands. I think about that now and it makes my tummy hurt. I can’t believe I did that. It’s so dangerous! Do they still have the flipping bar in schools?

I have many good memories of my school days. I always looked forward to going back to school. I think back on that time and wonder: are things inherently the same now? We have so much more technology and kids are being crammed into public schools. Will kids have good memories of their school days when they are my age?

Do you have good memories of your school days? What kind of lunchbox did you have? (I had a care-bears lunchbox.) Do you have kids now? Are they excited to go back to school or do they dread it? 

This post is linked up with:

This weeks theme: Back To School

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Why I Blog

I used to send emails.

Wait, let me back up a minute. Before that, I used to make phone calls. I would arrive in a new country and I would ask in bad French where I could find a phone card (un carte telephonique! telephonique!!?) and then I would take my 5 dollar phone card and find a telephone booth where I could spend 7.8 minutes yelling into the phone to my mother (YES! I am fine! No! I don't need any money!) 

That was how people knew I was alright. Then email got more popular and THAT was how I let people know I was okay while I was traveling. At first I was a good daughter/friend/sister. I would send each person a nice little note about what I was doing in New Zealand or wherever and how fun the skydiving/hiking/people watching/sheep was/were there. I would tailor it depending on the other person's interests.

Then it got to be too much. There were too many people to write to. There was not enough time to travel! So I started this blog. If people wanted to know what I was doing, they could read it. If they didn't care, they didn't have to get my periodic emails. And I could talk about what I wanted to talk about and what I was doing. Most importantly, I would have an online journal of my trip. It was a win-win situation.

But Me, and Who I Am, is not just about travel. I am a passionate hater of bad drivers; I am a money saver;  I am a lover of cooking and eating food; I am a reader of books and a taker of photos and I run (or try to run). I realize as a person who would love to have blogging or writing be my job and be able to make money from it that this is usually more easily done if you have a niche. But I don't have a niche. I am all over the place.

I like it that way. I can say what I want and be who I really am, in life and in the internet world. There is always someone on the other side of a computer who understands what I am going through, be it a travel situation or a life crisis. I love that there is such a community out there, of runners, of readers, of bloggers...of PEOPLE.

So...why I blog? I blog to let off steam, to write, to share, to meet, to understand and to learn.

Why do you blog?

This is a Dare to Share post with the subject of: Blogger Identity. The task was to write a post that reveals, discusses, or explores who you are as a blogger.

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