This is a two part answer. Because I want to vacation at the beach, but live in the mountains.
The beach it’s warm and sunny. Beautiful! There is the hot sand, the blue oceans. It’s paradise. But honestly for me not where I want to put down roots.
I have some reasons. I’m not just stating a fact or anything. But for one, I’m afraid of the ocean. Yes it super pretty to look at; but only my knees will be dipping in. The husband and I went to Hawaii for our honeymoon, and I was having a panic attack swimming around in the ocean. I totally was a buzz kill for the husband.
Second reason…tsunamis. Not a fan…or hurricanes…nope nope. It’s all sunshine and rainbows until your house is washed away.
Third reason. I burn. No matter how much sunscreen I put on; I burn. Peeling is the pits.
But still, even with all those things; I would love to vacation at a beach again.
But putting down roots; I’m a mountain girl. The trees, the mountains, the Autumn’s breeze, the snow, the cold. All of it is beautiful.
But the extreme weather is not the greatest. The over 100mph winds or the -50°, terrible. But you learn, you adapt. My great fear in the mountains is grizzly bears and rattlesnakes; but there are things to do to handle those problems.
So I guess that’s what it is for me. The extreme weather issues of living in various places. You live up north you freeze. You live farther south you get whacked with baseball sized hail. The east you get humidity and tornadoes. And the west you get sky high population and expensive living with nice weather. Haha! But no matter where you decide to put down roots; you take the good with the bad. You learn to adapt. You live!
Is there an age or year of your life you would re-live?
I think I would choose age 15-17. When I was a competitive swimmer.
I stayed on my swim team because I didn’t want to lose my friends, start from scratch, and I didn’t want to let my coach down.
But if I had switched teams I would have probably gone farther in the sport. Not gotten hurt. And probably would have made it to the Olympics.
But instead I choose my friends. I thought they would be my friends always. But the older friends tolerated me because I was fast. The younger friends respected me because I was fair. But in the end I only have one good friend from my 17 years of swimming; living in a different state, and I only text her. It’s been almost 5 years now since I last saw her.
Another reason for not leaving, was I didn’t want to have to figure out my place on a new team. I knew there were faster swimmers than me. Surprisingly enough, more dedicated swimmers than me. But on my old swim team I was respected.
You can’t really leave one team, try out another, and then return. It would have not gone well.
The biggest reason of all: I didn’t want to disappoint my coach. My coach was my coach for 8 years, I think. She was the one that kickstarted my desire to become great. I always did anything she said. She was the one that was going to take me to the next level.
But like most things, many different events happened that began to unravel my hoped future.
She always wanted me to be the best, but I’ve come to realize it that she just expected the best without her 100% effort to help me there. She had a favorite on the team; and to her, that swimmer could do no wrong.
Another event was that when I was 16, I had finished 3 exhausting swim meets in a row. I had been invited to an invitation only swim meet, that I had to go to as well. But into the first day of the meet I had an excruciating pain in my stomach that I couldn’t even sleep through the night. My mom came to get me and we went to the hospital. Turned out I had a cyst the size of a large grapefruit in my lower abdomen. The doctors were amazed that I had continued through the pain, for this long, while being an athlete. I had to have surgery. So it was quite serious. The doctors said that if the cyst had ruptured I would have died.
But what do you think my Coach’s response to all this was… disappointment. She made me feels so awful for leaving that swim meet. She made me feel like I embarrassed her; and that I should have just sucked it up, and finished the meet.
After that day my Coach gave up on me. The swimmer that could do no wrong was now more than ever her favorite. And I continued to try and prove myself to my coach. I did more in my 16-17 years than I had already done for her from the age of 10 to this point.
And you might be wondering how it ended…
Without any help from my coach. I bettered myself all the way up to the nationals level. That’s one step lower than the Olympics trials. Two steps away from the Olympics. I thought, I would have at least one more year of her help. But instead she took her favorite to the Olympic trials. The swimmer chocked and didn’t perform well, and then my coach retired.
She gave up. She gave up on me. If she had given me some direction the year before she retired she might have taken two swimmers to the Olympic trials. I think I lost my spark after that.
She then sold the team to my teammate. He then made a rule that after the age of 18, if you are not swimming in college you couldn’t continue to swim on the team. So I lost my coach. I lost my drive. And I lost my team. All after I turned 18.
I swam at my community college. I did amazing. But it wasn’t the same. My spark was gone. I broke almost all the records. But then I got hurt. I think it was an old injury from when I tried to earn my coach’s respect back.
Now as I look back over those years I can see that I should have left. I wasted 8 years trying to swim for someone who never seemed to care. But I wasted the best years especially; where if I had just switched I probably would have made it. I know I would have!
But with all things you must go on. I coached. Which I loved!! I will definitely do it in the future if I get the chance. Without the public speaking part. I’m terrified and terrible at that part. Another, I still like to do hard work. Any projects we have on the property I’m rearing to help complete them. My body feels sore and tired afterwards. Most importantly, I found someone who cares for me, who wants me to do my best, but will also accept me as I am.
So yes, I want to change those years. Because I wish I could give my 17 year old self a chance to succeed on the level she desired. But like all things. You learn. You move past it. And you then live your new life.
Digital Art By: emily2jane 11-04-2023 “Stilled Moments”
I know would is different than could. But trying things cost money…so I’ve been sticking to what I know, or make what I have work for what I want to try.
But if I could, I would try professional ballroom dancing. I love to dance. All types of styles! Ballroom, Latin, Swing….I like to watch hip hop, but I don’t know if I’m able to actually dance it well.
At one point in my life, I would go out dancing. I would be out swing dancing until almost 11pm every weekend. But I loved ballroom dancing the best. I felt so elegant and fancy.
To do it professionally would be fun. Not to do it to win! per say, but to do it because I love to dance.
But obviously I’m a full time mama, and I want more kiddos, so my figure is not what most professional dancers look like.
But it would be fun to try. I’ve even got the shoes already…they were my wedding shoes.
But still happy to be a mama. Never going to change that.
When was the first time you really felt like a grown up (if ever)?
I know they mean grown up as an adult but also remember the day I felt grown up as a kid.
I’ve already mentioned the day in detail on a previous blog post. But it was the day I stood between my dad and siblings. That day flared up my protective instincts. But felt like I grew up that day.
The day I felt like a grown up….not a very deep emotion day. But the day we bought our first couch. I don’t know why but that seemed to make me believe I had grown up.
But it’s strange. It wasn’t when we got married. It wasn’t when we bought our first house. Or moved away to a different state. Or had my daughter. But the couch came before our son. But I didn’t really feel like anything changed until the couch.
Normally when your young you buy fun things. I spoiled my husband….a lot. But I never had the desire to buy the grown up things.
But when the couch arrived I felt, “wow I’m old.” Haha! Blinds. Blinds are also something I feel like you have grown up if you want to change your blinds.
But I wonder when I’ll feel I’ve grown up to older adult life…
Finally back to our room, “Dude? Are you okay?” I asked Charlie; he had been grasping his rib cage.
“Yeah. The wind was just knocked out of me. And I think my back is bruised. But I should be fine by morning,” Charlie climbed into the bed across from Jeremy. “But what were you thinking? You know that what you did today will kickstart how the upperclassmen treat you, right?”
“Don’t worry about me. I have a knack at head butting bullies. Sometimes they change their personalities once they have met their match,” I smirked and looked over at Jermey.
“What?” Jeremy exploded, “You think I was as bad as Bryan?”
“Not as bad, but you were a bully that I tamed,” I laughed this time, because I never thought of it that way. A pillow hit me head on. ‘I knew it would, but I still continued to laugh.’
“You were a bully?” Charlie had slightly sat up in his bed.
Timothy propped up Charlie with pillows.
Jeremy groaned as he sat in his desk chair, “Yeah, I was. I was major jerk back in high school. Thankfully George was able to understand me through these last two years of high school. I don’t know if I would have changed so drasically unless George was my role model.”
‘Wow, didn’t know that’s how he felt.‘ “Wow. didn’t know you thought of me that way,” I walked over to give Jeremy a sarcastic hug.
“Don’t you dare,” Jeremy had held up hand to stop me in my tracks.
I chuckled and backed back to my own chair. I also remembered it was not us the pair of us in the room. I bursted out a laugh because of Timothy’s expression; it was pure horror. Jeremy looked their way and joined the laughter. “Sorry Timothy,” I tired to muffle my amusement, “being roommates with Jeremy so long has changed me.
Charlie sat confused as well, but maybe a bit more entertained.
Timothy turned towards Charlie, “Sorry you had to witness,” Timothy stopped and turned back towards Jeremy aand myself, “…that. I guess I’ve not spent a lot of time with these two.”
“Well that will have to change these next few months,” Charlie tried to laugh but instead just retreated into the pillows around him.
‘It won’t be that long for me. Soon I’ll be entering into the lions den that I have already pissed off.’
The simplistic part of writing. That I can have a thought and just jot it down. That it could be for me personally. It could be for my blog. For my journals. An art idea. A poem. A story from a dream.
But that it doesn’t have to be some eloquent masterpiece. For some reason I have random dreams. And occasionally I will have a vibrant dream that I must wake up and jot it down for possible future stories.
Like my story I’m writing on my blog: Life of Two Best Friends, started off as a dream. and it’s just morphed into a story that I enjoy to write.
And I have maybe 5 other stories that I have saved in my computer, all different types. Christian Romance, Fantasy, Sci-fi, etc. I just wake up inspired and I get it down.
My brain likes to store things. And if I get them down on paper that’s one less thing so my brain to store.
But writing is a great way to express one of my creative sides. I’m not good at expressing myself through speaking, but through writing people can hear my points of view easily.
If you were going to open up a shop, what would you sell?
Everything!! But seriously, I have so many ideas and why not put them all in one shop.
I want to sell artwork. Paintings, drawings, photos, etc. I would also like to have some sort of art classes in my shop.
I would like to have a cooking section. Where I have a cookbook of my tweaked recipes. Also maybe a small cooking corner; where I could teach an easy recipe. Plus a baking area.
I’d like to have an area for other crafters to maybe teach their craft. Maybe not sell items, but sell their time.
My husband wants to make and sell tables. So I’ll have an area for him. And I might steal some of his wood and paint different things. Or insist he makes different small furniture that I can help with.
Then maybe to finish off the space I would have a kid Art corner. Somewhere little kids could just go crazy and paint.
So…I would have a collection in my store.
I’m an everything type of a person. Not a one hit wonder.
What is the most important thing to carry with you all the time?
People might roll their eyes or laugh at my answer, but it’s my children. They are my precious cargo. I even call them that on public.
“Mister! Got the precious cargo!?!”
If my husband is with me, I tend to prefer to be the pack mule and have the mister keep tabs on the babies. Usually when Daddy is around my daughter behaves a little more crazy. As if her body language is shouting, “ Daddy’s Home, Daddy’s Home!!”
But when it’s just me, I again looked like a pack mule. I carry only what I need (phone & wallet) and then load up with my babies. Son in left arm, daughter in right hand.
Some people might say their item is there phone. Which is true. I use my phone for almost everything as well. And the panic you get when you think you left your phone at home, does not leave a good feeling behind. Like you know something is missing and your gut drops because you think it was your phone.
Well for me and my kiddos, I can get a similar feeling if I can’t see them. But mine is more severe; I get a gut reaching fear that I messed up, and they are gone forever…scary thought.
I do occasionally go places without my daughter, and I’m constantly feeling like something is missing. So, for me my kiddos are my precious cargo that I cannot leave the house without.
5min Digital Art “Precious Cargo” By: emily2jane 08-12-23
I’ll be honest. I have typed several different things for this post and they don’t seem like me. I know it’s supposed to be my opposite self but I think some thing’s would transfer over into an alternate universe. Like I am sure I would want to be a mom no matter what. Currently i knew this was for sure so I started young; young enough to enjoy my kiddos life. So opposite…start kids later in life; only one or two.
Let’s say maybe I wasn’t a swimmer…but I’m sure I would have been some sort of athlete. So let’s say opposite of swimming. Track. I would have been a track athlete. Land sports…blah! Unless it’s ultimate frisbee, I am not a land sport person in this current universe.
So….would it be my upbringing that would have been different? My dad bringing me up….then I wouldn’t have been myself. I can’t even imagine that life, nor would I want to. I probably would have run away back to my mom’s house with my siblings.
Maybe my husband is different. No. He is my match. I went on so many first dates for two years that there is no way he wouldn’t be my other half in an alternate universe. But let’s say he is older than me. That’s different.
Maybe… I’m well off…Yes money would be helpful. But I’m so well off now with so many different skills that would be sad if I wasn’t an artist, cook, organizer, etc. I would take skills over money any day. Because with skills I could make money if I needed to. Money will run out at some point. But sure, wealthy with money.
And I don’t know what’s to come in my future, so I don’t know my alternate idea. So….I guess….
Alternate universe me: Brought up by my dad. Track athlete. Older husband. Married late, late kids. Wealthy.
I don’t know about you, but I will take my current life 100%. My alternate self has such a sad sounding life.
emily2jane 