Per my friend Melissa's request I was preparing to write my little positive blog for the day. After finding my 2-year-old painting the bathroom with green nail polish I thought for sure I would write about the challenges of parenthood. I went down to my office to find my Mr. Roger's book for the quote I knew would fit, when I came across my journal from my sophomore year in college (which needs to be thrown into a bonfire VERY soon).
Wow. I think that about sums it all up. I can't believe how grown up I thought I was at the time, and reading it now I can see how much growing I had yet to do. Let me just thank and apologize to everybody who put up with me back then. Seriously. Just reading all the boys' names I was crushing on at one time is enough to make a person's head spin.
Twelve years have come and gone since my last entry in that journal and Hans and Paul and Jake are the names from the past. It is Mom, Dad, Karen, Rachel, Josh, Noah, Micah and Erin...the friends and family in that journal that are still beside me in my life that make it hard to throw that book away. Most of my journal entries from that time about my family involve me being mad or fights that we had. It isn't that they are happy, shiny memories. In fact, a lot of my entries about my best friend Erin at that time are during a rough patch in our friendship.
It is a great reminder that relationships don't have to be perfect to be perfect for us. This is true of all relationships in our lives. I love my husband and think we have a great marriage, but I'll be the first to admit our relationship is not without its tough times. We get mad...we fight...but we always find a way to work through it. I love my children unconditionally and whole heartedly, but even those relationships have room to grow and improve. Gosh, even my relationship with myself has a long way to go, and I've been working on that for 31 years!!!!
Looking back now, I know all those fights with my parents and siblings and best friend were just blocks leading us down the road to the relationships we have now. I talk to my parents every day, I talk to at least one of my siblings every day and Erin and I are as close now as we ever were. I am so grateful that I had the chance to day to look back at those relationships as they were then, because it make me even more grateful for the amazing people in my life today.
I also found the book I wrote quotes that I like in, so it is only appropriate that the perfect one is right there on the first page.
"We like someone because. We love someone although." Henry DeMontherlant
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