Swimsuits, anxiety and blue trucks: a blog of this and that

Swimwsuits. I leave for my cruise in less than a month! In preparation for this, I am now the apprehensively proud owner of a Land's End tankini. The top, ehhn, well, it's okay, but it's the skirt that I'm crazy about. It's like a little trendy cheerleading/tennis skirt, and I kind of want to wear it everywhere I go, even to work. It's probably a blessing that my legs are as pale as they are; if they were browner, the temptation to wear my swimsuit skirt all over Nashville would be pretty tough to resist.

Anxiety. Well, as much as I love my swimsuit, I'm not sure how much I love seeing it on my body. I'm kind of nervous about other people seeing it on my body. Let's face it, I'm not a high school cheerleader anymore.

I know that the important thing is that I'm going to Mexico on a gigantic boat. I'm going to see Mayan ruins overlooking the Caribbean. I'm going to have a break from work drama. I'm going to see lots and lots of water. That's what I need to focus on. Compared to all that water, my thighs look pretty small!

Blue Trucks. Ok, this is weird. There's a guy in my apartment complex who drives a blue truck. He's cute, although I think he might be fresh out of college. The weird thing about this story? Well, we always leave at the same time every morning. Whether it's a work day or a church day, we seem to always get in our cars at the same time. Often, our cars (well, my car, his blue truck) are parked beside each other. Even weirder, our work places and churches are just blocks apart. I've followed this guy to church and work (not purposely; I'm not the stalking type). We always kind of look at each other every morning, make eye contact, get in our vehicles and follow each other to wherever we're headed that particular day. I call him Blue Truck Boy (creative, right?), and I think we might be destined for friendship. If I were a braver person, I'd say hey, and assure him that I am, in fact, not stalking him. It is only coincidence that I follow him everywhere he goes. I think this is all very funny and cute. It makes me happy to see him get in his car as I get in mine. It's like he's my little driving friend. Maybe one day we'll actually, gasp, speak, and I'll learn his name and no longer need to refer to him as Blue Truck Boy.

One final thought for this random blog: is there anything better than being a redhead?

Birthday Blog

Happy Birthday to me, Happy Birthday to me . . .

You get the idea.

Today is my 29th birthday. I'm happy to announce that everyone at work yesterday was shocked when I told them how old I would be. One of my co-workers (who is now my best friend) told me that she honestly and seriously thought I was turning 21. Really and truly.

God bless her.

I guess I have my parents to thank for my youthful genes. I can only hope and pray that when I turn 49 some wonderful person will declare that they were sure it was my 29th birthday.

If I had to title my 28th year, I would call it "Light at the End of the Tunnel." My 27th year was the hardest I've ever lived due to leaving England, encountering reverse culture shock, alternating between hiding my grief and allowing myself to grieve, and starting over in a big city with a job for which I really felt no love or attraction. I would call my 27th year "Trial By Fire." It was intense, consuming, painful, and I believe that God used it to melt me down and cleanse me of some of the junk in my heart. My 28th year has been a growing year and a year where the sun began to burn through the clouds. It's been kind of like coming up for a big breath of fresh air after being underwater for a scarily long time.

I feel like I've started to grow into myself this year, something I have prayed for fervently for as long as I can remember. I've never felt comfortable being me because, I've realized, I'm not sure who I really am. My whole life I've tried to be a person who I perceived everyone would love and adore. Over the past months, the longing to just be ME and to be that person well has slowly started to overtake the desire that everyone adore me. Of course I want everyone to like me, but realistically, that's just not going to happen. So, this past year, I think that I've started to explore who I really am as a person deep, deep down inside. This search has revealed some pleasant surprises and also, some not so pleasant ones. I'm horribly selfish, easily annoyed with people, frustratingly shy, scared to let people get close to me, prone to pity-parties, and inclined to use my painful past as an excuse for why I live with a victim's mentality all these years later. BUT, I've also realized that I am generous, considerate, longing to let people get close to me, tenderhearted, and I deeply love God and want Him to reign in my life even if it means giving up some bad habits and getting out of my comfort zone. I think, finally, praise God, I've learned that I am a good and worthy and loveable person, but that I will constantly fight this battle with Satan until the day I die and will need to rely on God AND the people He places in my life to be victorious.

Being the goal-setter that I am, I'm praying about a few dreams I'd like to see this year before I turn 30 (Thirty!!).
1. I'm starting my pre-requisities for nursing school this week! I'd like to have those completed so I can start nursing school full time when I'm 30. I'm excited, because I'm a nerd and I love school, and I've secretly missed it since graduating from college seven years ago. However, this time around, I'm working full-time and have other commitments at church, so it could get tricky. Also, this time around, I'm paying for it. Ouch!
2. I appreciate Hamish, my little ancient gold Saturn, but I really am praying for a new car this year.
3. Spiritually, I'd like to go deeper with God. I wholeheartedly believe (and enjoy the fact) that fellowship with other Christians is essential for spiritual health, but I think I've focused more on being popular with other people at church this past year instead of falling more in love with the Lord. Again, I've tried so hard to be the person everyone likes, instead of being who God created me to be. I'm praying that by the time next June 2 rolls around, I will have matured more in this area.
4. I want to be more brave. I'm a scaredy cat the majority of the time, and I'm tired of it.
5. I want to celebrate life more, to be more thankful for the little things that give life sparkle and shine. I want to enjoy living, even if my life isn't the picture I have in mind for my dream life. God is still good, so life still has goodness in it.
6. My big financial goal this year is to save up enough money to take a grand 30th birthday trip to England and to Greece next summer. This is not going to be easy because my money is very stretched right now. But I want this badly, and I know with some extra discipline, it's totally possible. So, maybe next birthday when I blog, I'll be doing it from the other side of the ocean!