Know Your Place

The past few weeks at work have increasingly become less and less tolerable. Yeah kids can be jerks. They can act pretty entitled, expecting A's for C- work. But, they usually aren't the worst of it, I mean lets be honest, I had my ass moments in high school too. The worst ones are the so-called adults. Teachers constantly act like they know more than anyone on the face of the planet. Yes, please talk to me like I am 4 years old because I'm "just an aide" and you have a big fancy degree: which believe it or not I also have if you would actually take a minute to talk to me, instead of acting like you are placing an order at McDonald's drive-through. It blows my mind how incredibly self-centered, thoughtless, and rude people are. What is happening to being an adult, or better yet, simply having some manners? Look at me in my damn eyes when you talk. Please. Thank-you. You're welcome. Such simple words...rotting away in the dictionary. Maybe hold a door for someone with full hands instead of being so absorbed on whatever your pathetic little mind is focused on. Open your eyes to people around you. I get it. People have bad days. But having a bad day, doesn't ever entitle you to be rude to anyone, ever. Stop acting like your life is so hard, or more important than someone else's. 

You might ask: Why not give them what they deserve? Tell them exactly what's on your mind! Don't help them again, or simply be rude in return! The fact is, I can't do that. Why? Because I know my place. My parents raised me with some manners, which includes knowing my place. People might think it as being meek and mild or a push-over, and yes, it can seem that way, but more often than not its simply shutting your mouth and being an adult with manners.

Instead of rushing to cut that one person in line, flicking off that driver, or acting like the entitled big man (or woman) on campus that you think you are; Be thankful you are healthy enough to stand in line, be blessed enough to own a car, or be alive to breathe fresh air, see the sun shine, and give others hope that humanity still has some polite people left in the world. 

Insecure Elephants All in a Room

Listen, I'm going to get real honest real fast.

I'm really insecure.

I am absolutely terrified of failing. Do you ever remember having to show your parents an F that you got on a test, or worse, your report card? That feeling of terror, dread, and disappointment all seasoned with a pinch of cynicism...I'm constantly feeling as though I'm standing in the middle of The Arc of de Triomphe paralyzed. Any avenue could take me anywhere in Paris, but I'm too afraid to take the risk of crossing the street to get anywhere.

The funny thing is, I'm not really scared of letting Evan down, my family, or my friends; I'm lucky enough to have such amazing people in my life, that if I lit my farts on fire for a living, they probably would think I'm still pretty awesome. Letting myself down is another thing.

I love taking pictures. Especially meaningful pictures (duh).Yeah I've taken engagement pictures, kid's pictures, and some senior portraits, but my favorite pictures and the stolen moments. The kind where I'm floating around a party and no one seems to notice me. There isn't a demand for happy families, styled hair, or the perfect shot. I'm in love for every minute of it: until I feel the pressure. As soon as I feel that pressure of getting a perfect shot breathing on my neck: I panic. I overexpose, I underexpose, I cut off heads, and frankly act like I have no clue as to what I'm doing.

I'll get home and download my pictures and hate every single one of them. If the picture I had in mind didn't turn out right I get angry, my cheeks flush, and I feel like I never want to pick up my camera again. I'm frustrated not knowing how to work my camera to get a specific shot. I dread giving pictures to people. I'll spend hours trying to edit them to satisfaction only to fail in my eyes.
Eventually I decided that if I never actually committed to being a full time photographer, and just did it for "fun" and not as a professional, I could never fail. While this is ultimately true, it currently leaves me in a constant torturous and dissatisfied state of mind. One day I'm ready to break out, fulfill my dreams and do what I love. The next day I'm retreating back into a corner, beating myself up, thinking I'm out of my mind.

Then something happened. A few weeks ago I stumbled across Christina Greve, who is a photographer and life coach. I read this article  and felt like she wrote it just for me. It completely expressed, and shot down all the bad things I believed to be true about myself, especially when it came to taking pictures. I am not a crier, but I tear up every time I read it, because deep down I know its painfully true.

Right now I'm a little embarrassed to report that I'm still standing in  the middle of The Arc of de Triomphe. But, I can feel the roots of self-doubt and insecurities slowly disentangling themselves away from me. I'm accepting that its ok to not produce high quality, picture perfect pictures right off the bat. Its going to take time, motivation, and drive to accomplish skills that I want to possess. All of those things can't happen in a day, or even a year. I took pictures of spring around here, and I guess that's a good place as any to start.      

Dew eyes

My eyes are covered with dew.

My hair is a nest for birds.

I have been conquered with the love I have for all people.

I can't say I'm going to grow up and change the world.

I can't say I'm going to do great things.

But I can tell you I will love people, and I will be overwhelmingly humbled at the chance that I have to be apart of this radically simple thing called life. 

Meredith Currently...

Do I look crazy?

Because I feel like the past several days have been crazy!

Obsessing over...getting all my Halloween decorations put up! I pulled all my stuff out of the attic, but I haven't had a chance this week to get them out of the bins. I'm determined to get it done this weekend!

Wishing for...goodness. I've been awfully contemplative lately about wanting to simply make the world a better place. I just got done reading A Million Miles in a Thousand Years by Donald Miller, and this whole week I haven't been able to stop rolling it around in my mind. People set out with grand dreams of changing the world, falling in love, doing something amazing. But the drift toward the merely acceptable happens almost without notice. Every life has a story. I want to make sure that my story is worth telling. How many people do you know truly live life? Not many. I know life can feel just plain hopeless...and hard! The economy isn't the greatest, the world is at odds, leaders are secretly scumbags, and frankly living the dream is intimidating, overwhelming, and risky. Watch out guys, because I'm going to make sure I have a good story. Mark my words. Big things are happening, I can feel it in my bones.

Thinking about...Grad School. Going back now, might be my prime opportunity. My job isn't overly stressful, so it would be really easy to work and go to school at the same time, plus the military spouse discount isn't anything to complain about...but I feel so overwhelmed just at the thought of going back to school. I use to hate school, simply because I didn't know how to study, or how to take a test. Now that I know how to do that confidently, I just need to buck up and take the plunge. I'm so afraid at making a choice, especially one that I have to be pretty committed too, that I'm stuck in the limbo of I don't know. Its not a great place to be, but I'm starting to think I should throw caution to wind and go for it. 

Anticipating...our future. (Do you feel a common theme here? haha) Now I know that's pretty general, but I'm so excited/terrified for the future. Evan and I have talking about so many different possibilities about what we want to do next. Really, we can go in any direction our hearts desire; we literately have the world at our feet and its a terrifying rush of adrenaline. At night when a crawl into bed and think about our lives, it feels like Christmas eve as a 5 year old child...I CAN'T WAIT UNTIL SANTA COMES! I get so giddy I can't sleep! Too many ideas are coming to me all at once. Stick with me, I promise my inspirational/potentially unrealistic rant is coming to an end. Conclusion: I'm so glad I have this place to write about all the things that are spilling out of my brain; if I didn't I might explode. Get ready the journey is just beginning! 

Love Me Like My Dog Does Baby

I'm sure if you listen to country music on a semi-regular basis, you will have heard this song.

I myself am a dog lover. When I was about 9, my neighbors had an outdoor dog named Zoe. Unbeknownst to them, she was my dog. I took her on walks, gave her treats, played fetch with her, and begged my parents to let me have her. The begging and groveling process for a horse, dog, hamster or anything that had furr was probably a monthly occurrence for my parents, poor souls.

After finally being married for a few months, I shipped Evan off to Afghanistan with only one rule from him: I better not have a dog when he got home. Me? Want a dog? Nooooo.

But for real.
What's up with everyone trying to ruin my life dream of owning a furry companion here?

A few weeks before Christmas my soon-to-be brother-in-law found a little puppy, half frozen, tossed in a snow bank. I immediately schemed a plan. I was all alone, poor little Army wife needing something to fill my time. Ok, really there was no plan except the old stand-by of my 9 year old self: beg and grovel. PLEASE EVAN, PLLLEEAAASSSEEE!!!! Its my life dream!!! I won't ask for anything else! I won't even buy another pair of shoes for a year! (Ha. I know, we both knew that was a lie) PLLLEEEEAAASSSSEEEE!

Like the good man my husband is, he gave in to his crazy wife's pleas.
And then laughed in my face ear, when I had to stand outside in the sub-zero winter tundra that is Pennsylvania, to potty train the piss head.

Although there have been many, many moments of (impatient) me wanting to throw Scout out the door, hoping he would run away to another family, I really don't know what I would do without the massive beast. Even when I've yelled at him when I shouldn't have, he still loves me like it never happened. He might be huge, but he has the biggest heart to match. He gets stressed out easily, but will rip any box apart at the possibility of finding a "biscuit" inside. When you talk to him, he'll cock his head and listens with careful content. Most of the time he will answer back with his two, dog-talking cents. During the week I have to practically drag him out of bed, but I can promise you, Saturday morning (on my only day to sleep in) he will be nose to nose with me, giving me his best pitiful, chocolate brown-eyed stare to please get up so he...can go back to sleep in the living room.

What if we all tried to love other people the way dogs love us? I think we can all agree Hitler wasn't the nicest kid on the playground, and was...How do you say it?...one of the worst tyrants of the 20th Century.You have to be pretty consistently awful, even before you decided to wipe out an entire race, to win that title. 
Adolf had been given a German Shepherd named "Prinz." Right after World War I, during his years of poverty, he had been forced to give the dog up. However, she managed to escape and return to him. 
If that isn't an example of a dogs wavering devotion without judgement, I don't know what is.

 Dogs don't judge us if we're overweight, gay, straight, obsessive, depressed, religious, ignorant, old, dirty, anorexic, annoying, black, white, crippled, have a third nipple, or act downright rude. So the next time you scrunch up your nose at someone, or are quick to snap back to a nasty comment, don't. Take a minute to see them through a dogs eyes. "Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle." - John Watson

Obligatory montage of Scout

^
I bubble wrapped him and told him I was mailing him to Grandma's. He didn't think it was an awful idea.

New Halloween Costume

Napping: Exhibit A

Napping: Exhibit B

He really let me do this to him...and liked it. 

Where were you?

Where was I? 

I was sitting in the pew of my school's sanctuary. 

The only thing I remember being confused about is the Twin Towers. What were they? Oil towers? Should I know what they are? Why was it such a big deal if someone ran a plane into an oil tower? Then our teacher turned on the television. I was in 7th grade. Contrary to what most adults may think, I fully understood what was going on. I can remember, just like it was yesterday driving in the car with my family that evening. My mom said to look at the sky, because it would be the only day in my entire life where I wouldn't be able to find an airplane in the sky. 

Today at work was odd. Most of the day I was livid that all the school did in remembrance of this day was flying the flag at half-staff, just like it was just another government holiday. Many of the kids weren't old enough to associate any kind of sadness or feelings to this day. I guess I'm one of the few who were just old enough to remember everything about that day. The adults didn't mention it, like they are already trying to forget. Maybe it still hurts too much. I even had a teacher ask me what today's date was. It almost made me cry, and then snap with anger. How can you not know what today is? Maybe its because this day change my entire childhood, what was left of it, and shaped my whole future. A friend from college wrote this piece, which sums up a lot of people my age are probably feeling. 

The Monster

by: Josh Kinney

I kind of remember the night before, but it’s hard to say.

That morning came like a tidal wave, sweeping away everything we once knew and thought as safe.

I remember being glued to the television for hours, watching everything on repeat, listening to my mother crying in the other room and holding a newspaper, her eyes red and tired.

We saved all of the newspapers.

From then on The Monster had entered our lives: my life.

He would be there for years to come, causing me to look over my shoulder, judge people I shouldn’t have judged, and imagine things I would’ve never before imagined.

Every time I heard that roaring sound of a low-flying aircraft or saw some kind of embellished or paranoid behavior on a subway train, The Monster reminded me of his nasty presence, his lingering effects.

The Monster was always there.

Every now and then we would hear of one of The Monster’s plans, barely thwarted, but somehow foiled.

New laws and paranoia as well as a new wave of political propaganda swept the land.

As I grew up from a boy to a man, I’d never forget The Monster.

I lived with him, we all did.

The Monster and what he did to us was ingrained in our psyches forever.

The Monster was often a topic of conversation, his lasting mark stretching into and out of our college years.

And then one night we were warned of a great announcement.

Our elected leader had awoken us from an early night and the Internet buzzed with activity.

Immediately we were reminded of The Monster, our stomachs choked in fear, but then – relief!

An ease I only remembered from childhood and had thought I’d forgotten.

Brave men had tracked down and slaughtered The Monster responsible for our fear.

Although The Monster’s minions still lurked about the globe, for the first time in the longest time, I slept with a peace I had only known as a boy.

Today is the perfect day for us.

Its the first day that summer gave in. The air is undemanding, not oppressing. The sun is like the perfect temperature between the covers; just like the ones we would have rolled out of  this morning. The coffee pot would be on like it always is when you are here. We would have taken the top off the Jeep and hurled ourselves into to the countryside. My hair would be flying a thousand different directions, but I know you love it, so I would resist pulling it up. Every now and then I could have caught your smell as the air swirled around the open car. Your smell would brings a smile to my lips, cause lighting to flood through veins, and a weakness to knock at my knees. The baseball cap you would wear hides your eyes, but I already know they are a clear blue, as fresh as the sky we are chasing. Today we would have sung to the radio together, and picked out our farm house along the way. Or maybe today we would've just held hands, balanced on the center console, in the serenity of  us.

We would have gone to the range.

We would have been competitive. 

Our fingers would have brushed as we counted the holes in the paper circles.

We would of had fun.

We would have been together.

We wouldn't have done anything in particular.

We would have done everything.

Today would have been the perfect day for us. 

But you aren't here.

You are an impossible number of miles away from me. 

So I guess today its the perfect day for me to wish you were home.