Wow... a whole quarter?!?!?! How did I manage to go an ENTIRE QUARTER without blogging even a sentence of it? The last blog left you off with, the quarter is wrapping up, I'm getting my wisdom teeth out, and yadda yadda... and then NOTHING. My deepest apologies to all of you who read my blogs. I love you, and appreciate your support, a special thank you to those of you that actually told me you miss my blogs ^_^ (Michael and Danny specifically). Okay, so now.... a whole quarter later it is summer break! My favorite time of the year! But wait, how did I get here? How did I jump from March 13th, 2011 to June 20th, 2011? .... Time Warp?
Okay no, seriously. Since March 13th, I have gotten my wisdom teeth out, survived the healing process without pain killers for the most part, caught back up with my best friends, and made TONS of new friends and acquaintances. Picked up long boarding (skateboarding), fallen twice total so far, borrowed boards from several VERY generous friends for the past few months (BIG THANKS & SHOUT OUT TO MAX & STEVEN), got my very own long board for free from a coworker of my dad's (thanks mysterious Jeff guy that gives me things XD), survived another quarter of college to complete my second year and find out that I will be able to finish all of my major requirements by next year if nothing goes wrong with scheduling, gotten amazing letters of recommendation from supervisors, bosses, and teachers for a scholarship I applied to (still waiting to see if I win the scholarship), met an awesome Christian man who builds custom skate boards and is going to help me fix up the board I just got, (shout out to Mike Allen! His website is: www.abksk8.com plug plug), watched my baby sister grow and learn new things with every passing day, watched my nine year old sister play basketball and my 15 year old sister as well, gone roller blading, met some of the neighbors, and most recently spent almost a week camping in a tent at the beach! OMG SO AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!
Lemme tell you! Okay so last week we packed up and drove down to Camp Pendleton, who in my family is in the military to let you onto base you might be wondering, well the better question is, who in my family is NOT in the military haha. So we drove down to Camp Pendleton for a family reunion with my deceased Poppy's side of the family. His three siblings and many of the children and grandchildren that came from them. So many adorable little tow headed cousins and endless smiles all around. We camped ON THE BEACH! The only thing that separated our campsite from the sandy shoreline was the little road we drove there on. Less than 100 feet between my tent, and the endless waves. The crashing sea and roaring ocean. The majestic beauty of God's creation staring back at me whenever I looked toward the horizon. The calming rhythm of an endless cycle caressing my ears day and night. The last sound before I fell to sleep and most mornings the first sound to greet me when I awoke (though on some days it was a whining dog or incessant bird instead). I spent several nights sitting on the shore just watching the waves in the darkness. Nothing making any visible movements other than the white water of waves already broken. The sky and the sea both vast expanses of darkness with just bits of white gleaming out of the black night. A faint line of gradient where the two met at the horizon, and no sounds other than those of nature (and the occasional dog walker). That last bit does no justice to the image I wish to convey to you... but alas, I lack the patience and quite possibly the ability to write a more eloquent description at this moment.
But yes, back and unevenly sunburned with infinitely more dense freckles on my face.
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Okay time lapse. It's now the next day. I got distracted last night and didn't finish haha sorry. Okay so where was I...? Oh right sunburns randomly splattered across my body like I got in a paint fight and someone sloshed the rest of the bucket across my back after smattering the front of me. My freckles have come out to play; perhaps a different color in that same paint fight, this time with a flicking method haha. I'm sore from using muscles (to bodyboard and such) that I no longer had as well as from sleeping on the ground for almost a week. & I am now determined to regain some semblance of the body I had back in high school. My first step toward this goal is to ask my old water polo coach if he minds me coming in when my brother has practice and swimming laps in the shallow end, out of the boys' way. Time to face the shame I feel over how much I let my body slide and face my coach and players who knew me as I was back then, despite how they'll perceive the change. I have to face it to get back what I had, that's the only pool I can access for free on a frequent and convenient basis. Time to remember what it was like to be sunburned for a month straight as a fish belly white, floundering little freshman who couldn't even swim one length of the pool without pulling myself along the wall 6 years ago. Okay so not quite that bad, I can still swim, but my stamina is gone as well as my base tan. Those of you who knew me in high school and haven't seen me since..... you thought I was white THEN? Oh my, you have no idea. One of my friends recently called me pigment challenged -__- trying to mitigate my self imposed sentence of pigment fail hahaha. I suppose it could be worse, there are plenty of people paler than I am, but still; I guess the worst part for me is knowing that it didn't used to be this way. Before water polo it never bothered me quite as much, I was a little white girl, what can you expect? But now knowing how I was makes this worse. I feel sickly sometimes looking at my pale skin; the lack of color representing to me a lack of health, a body drained of its vibrancy, oh the pallor. I make up for it in the vibrancy of my clothing and the exuberance of my spirit, but my skin never reflects the life in me...
I am ridiculous! I read these lines and I am ridiculous, I am uncomfortable with my own skin. Why? My God given skin! My skin is healthy. I am not sick and yet I lament my flesh as if I were. Why am I disloyal to my skin tone? Perhaps because I am mocked for it.... or teased.Weta, Basura Blanca, Cracker, "Hey White Gurl", comments about how I'm gonna blind someone with my stomach, why is it shameful to be white? I suppose a psychologist would say it's revenge for all the racism directed toward minorities, but that's crap! I don't discriminate, I don't take color as a defining feature, to say I don't notice someone's color is ridiculous, but I don't avoid people or make decisions based on color and I am NOT a racist.
There's only been once when I truly didn't see the color of someone I encountered and it was a bizarre experience let me tell you. I was practicing a hip hop routine and trying to get the choreo down, and the instructors were telling us we needed to have more swag with it, and get into, hit each move harder, and the like. I was pumped up, and super excited about learning the routine, and someone was walking behind our group alone on his way somewhere, and I turned around and asked (or rather shouted at... I'm loud) him if he wanted to come be a gangster with us in an overexcited voice about a foot from his face. He continued walking and perhaps said no or something... and then people around me freaked out. I didn't know why, and everyone was saying things like "Oh my gosh I can't believe you asked him that!!!" & I replied, "What? I just wanted to invite him to dance with us, it's fun, and he looked lonely." It was then that one of them said to me: "You just asked a black man if he wanted to be a gangster with you; that's so racist." I didn't even know he was black! I had to turn around again and look at him a second time, he was indeed black, but that hadn't registered before. The body language and facial expressions, I got, but the color, I had missed completely. I hadn't meant to be "racist," and I wasn't. If someone perceived it that way, that's their own personal issue. I am not a racist, and I shouldn't have to be ashamed of my whiteness or afraid to speak to people and ask certain questions because of our respective colors. The world we live in is absurd. We are all humans, all hand crafted beautifully by God, we are not mass produced, we are not stamped out with intentional differences to pit us against each other. We are all different, but we should all be able to recognize the similarities as well, we have so many more similarities than differences. & color needs to stop being a tool for division, do we separate people based on eye color? People have different eye colors as well as skin colors, why is the skin so important? Why do so many white girls try so hard to get a tan, and why do so many minority girls try so hard to look more "white." Why do people try to force their hair straight, and dye it blonde and other lighter colors? Why don't we just truly embrace who we are as we are?
I admire the natural beauty of all people, and it pains me when anyone tries so hard to cover it up or alter it. That's why I don't wear makeup, if you need makeup to like me, then I don't need your superficiality, but why can't I apply this so easily to the the color of my skin or the straight(boring)ness of my hair? Why did I try SO hard to get more tan this past week that I ended up burnt and hurting? In pain and risking deadly cancer in the future, just for a more acceptable shade of me? Why? ... I notice the problem in my perspective more now, with the addition of my two new sisters we're adopting. They are both far paler than I am, and with rosy red little cheeks. They are both BEAUTIFUL little girls, but already my nine year old sister is trying to lay out in the sun and talking about how pale she is too. It sickens me that this is something on her mind already. And my fixation on my color in front of her sickens me too, I'm indirectly helping put some of those negative perceptions in her head by not accepting my own body as it is. She sees me complain that I am so pale and looks at her own skin which is even lighter, so light that she has to put sunscreen on EVERY DAY before recess to keep from being burnt for goodness sake. I am ungrateful for all that God has given me, and a bad influence on my sisters. I WILL be confident and comfortable in my skin, I will find the beauty in myself even if it kills me. It's so easy to see in others, but so hard to find in me. God made me.
I am ridiculous! I read these lines and I am ridiculous, I am uncomfortable with my own skin. Why? My God given skin! My skin is healthy. I am not sick and yet I lament my flesh as if I were. Why am I disloyal to my skin tone? Perhaps because I am mocked for it.... or teased.Weta, Basura Blanca, Cracker, "Hey White Gurl", comments about how I'm gonna blind someone with my stomach, why is it shameful to be white? I suppose a psychologist would say it's revenge for all the racism directed toward minorities, but that's crap! I don't discriminate, I don't take color as a defining feature, to say I don't notice someone's color is ridiculous, but I don't avoid people or make decisions based on color and I am NOT a racist.
There's only been once when I truly didn't see the color of someone I encountered and it was a bizarre experience let me tell you. I was practicing a hip hop routine and trying to get the choreo down, and the instructors were telling us we needed to have more swag with it, and get into, hit each move harder, and the like. I was pumped up, and super excited about learning the routine, and someone was walking behind our group alone on his way somewhere, and I turned around and asked (or rather shouted at... I'm loud) him if he wanted to come be a gangster with us in an overexcited voice about a foot from his face. He continued walking and perhaps said no or something... and then people around me freaked out. I didn't know why, and everyone was saying things like "Oh my gosh I can't believe you asked him that!!!" & I replied, "What? I just wanted to invite him to dance with us, it's fun, and he looked lonely." It was then that one of them said to me: "You just asked a black man if he wanted to be a gangster with you; that's so racist." I didn't even know he was black! I had to turn around again and look at him a second time, he was indeed black, but that hadn't registered before. The body language and facial expressions, I got, but the color, I had missed completely. I hadn't meant to be "racist," and I wasn't. If someone perceived it that way, that's their own personal issue. I am not a racist, and I shouldn't have to be ashamed of my whiteness or afraid to speak to people and ask certain questions because of our respective colors. The world we live in is absurd. We are all humans, all hand crafted beautifully by God, we are not mass produced, we are not stamped out with intentional differences to pit us against each other. We are all different, but we should all be able to recognize the similarities as well, we have so many more similarities than differences. & color needs to stop being a tool for division, do we separate people based on eye color? People have different eye colors as well as skin colors, why is the skin so important? Why do so many white girls try so hard to get a tan, and why do so many minority girls try so hard to look more "white." Why do people try to force their hair straight, and dye it blonde and other lighter colors? Why don't we just truly embrace who we are as we are?
I admire the natural beauty of all people, and it pains me when anyone tries so hard to cover it up or alter it. That's why I don't wear makeup, if you need makeup to like me, then I don't need your superficiality, but why can't I apply this so easily to the the color of my skin or the straight(boring)ness of my hair? Why did I try SO hard to get more tan this past week that I ended up burnt and hurting? In pain and risking deadly cancer in the future, just for a more acceptable shade of me? Why? ... I notice the problem in my perspective more now, with the addition of my two new sisters we're adopting. They are both far paler than I am, and with rosy red little cheeks. They are both BEAUTIFUL little girls, but already my nine year old sister is trying to lay out in the sun and talking about how pale she is too. It sickens me that this is something on her mind already. And my fixation on my color in front of her sickens me too, I'm indirectly helping put some of those negative perceptions in her head by not accepting my own body as it is. She sees me complain that I am so pale and looks at her own skin which is even lighter, so light that she has to put sunscreen on EVERY DAY before recess to keep from being burnt for goodness sake. I am ungrateful for all that God has given me, and a bad influence on my sisters. I WILL be confident and comfortable in my skin, I will find the beauty in myself even if it kills me. It's so easy to see in others, but so hard to find in me. God made me.
Psalm 139:13-14
New International Version (NIV)
13 For you created my inmost being;
you knit me together in my mother’s womb.14 I praise you becauseI am fearfully and wonderfully made;your works are wonderful,I know that full well.
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These verses are important and true. God painstakingly made each of us the way we are and we are wonderfully made! Endeavor to find the beauty within yourself today. And if you can't find it, ask me and I'll tell you where it is :)
Love to all my readers. Thanks for your continuing support.
<3
These verses are important and true. God painstakingly made each of us the way we are and we are wonderfully made! Endeavor to find the beauty within yourself today. And if you can't find it, ask me and I'll tell you where it is :)
Love to all my readers. Thanks for your continuing support.
<3
Wow, you said a lot, not in quantity (well yeah, that too) but in quality mostly. I guess that the best I can say right now is that I'm gonna have to carry some of this stuff with me for a little bit because I get the feeling that I have a deep need for some of it. Thank you for this.
ReplyDeleteYou're welcome and thank you! ^_^
ReplyDeleteI'm really glad you found it beneficial. Also, I miss you!
It started off casual enough, but as I wrote I just started thinking about more serious things and got off on a wild tangent. That's how I always write; I start simple with a summary of events or a story I had on my mind, and then just see where the thoughts flow. Some thought flows are more productive than others.