All is fair in love and war.

She knew he was no good for me and in some sliver of redemption I did too. I was determined to "Laura-ize" him, ya know missionary date. The kind of thing a good Christian girl would do. I see the horror on your faces as you read this, but level with my 21 year old self. I hadn't fallen so hard for someone before and even though I was no stranger to being around boys or a boy I really liked. I clearly loved the "hooking" them part. I loved the chase, the intense wonder if I could get them to go crazy over me and then decide from there. I was winging it. I absolutely loved this time in my life. There is nothing greater than the decade of my 20's. I remember smells back then, first foods and wanting so badly to become something I was proud of. Each step I was taking was getting me closer to the Laura I am today and as I share my story remember that I am HUMAN, 100% HUMAN. That means I make mistakes, I have consequences, I've made bad decisions, I've learned lessons, I've taken risks that I've paid dearly for and I bleed just like the rest of you. I just don't think everything I've been through is a waste, no on the contrary it's Priceless. I was putting so much in front of my walk with God. I had been raised in a conservative home for so long reciting the "Christian" lines we God fearing people say and just taking every single backwards ridiculous behavior in. I was sick of it. I wanted to like my life, I wanted adventure, I wanted excitement. I was not going to spend my time being a martyr for the cause. Their cause sucked and I knew it. I was on my own. With my salvation intact of course, just put on the shelf for awhile. You can shake your head all you want. Most people won't be honest with themselves where they put Jesus most of the time. I never once denied him being in my life, I just told him aloud most of the time whether it was in my car or in my apartment or at work or the gym......I was going to do it my way. If I got struck by lightning than so be it. The reality check here is that we don't get struck by lighting. He allows us to make our own decisions because he wants us to choose him. Ask him to walk with us and to take over where we are not fairing. I told you I didn't want him to enter into this because I liked it. I wanted my chest to hurt and tighten up each time I thought about that night he saw me on the sidewalk. I played it over and over in my head. Everyday waking up in my fantastic apartment was just icing on the cake. It's what I thought about every hour of the day until the weekend came. I couldn't get to Friday night fast enough. I just had to get through a day of cutting hair on Saturday, take in a quick power nap (you'll learn this hairstylist loves naps), hit the gym so I'd be revved up to go out dancing. I would call my friend as I was heading back to my apartment, she'd meet me there and we'd finish getting ready to hit the club! We had a blast living life that way for months on end until this crazy saga began. It became a game to find this mystery man. For weeks I would dress up in something that I thought would catch his eye. Let's face it, I LOVE CLOTHING. I never wore the same outfit dancing twice for 5 years. I know what it takes to be a dedicated "Dancer Girl". I wanted so badly to find him that it began to consume my thoughts. She knew it too. I think she actually was a little jealous. I mean I had this driving purpose in me, while she was going through a nasty divorce. I wasn't even in love while she had experienced love and war. I wanted to be there for her but the reality was we were at different times in our journey's. I looked at her in the car as we pulled into the parking garage. I said "Look, we both want to write our own stories, you have yours, I have mine. Let's leave it at that and enjoy this night"! We are the kind of girls that are naturally perky and bubbly. We knew how to have a good time and didn't need to let drama ruin the night. Besides, it had been 6 weeks since I saw the mystery man and it didn't look like we were ever going to see each other again. I had to try to let him go. Or did I? If you've never been to dance clubs you are not aware of how smart and sophisticated they start out the night slowly pouring everyone's innocence down the drain with every alcoholic drink they make. It is always a little slower in the beginning of the evening because the introverts are winding it up with every sip. I, on the other hand, came out like the energizer bunny had just been let out on the dance floor. I didn't care that we were the only 2 dancing. She was always trying to find the local fool who would fall for batting lashes to get her a free drink. I've got to give her props, her curly hair and slutty top got exactly what she wanted. I knew her game the moment we got there was to take from people what we couldn't get from the ones who had already come along. It's true not everyone stays in your life for the whole time you're alive. But it would have been nice to have a posse of people who cared. We were that for one another. We had decided a long time ago in beauty school that nothing was going to split us up. We hadn't factored in my next move. It was a night like any other night. It was about 11:45 pm and the dance floor was poppin'. It was a lot harder to walk through the floor now because so many people were forming tightly knit groups like football huddles. It was a thing to see! Groups of people of all ages there for a number of celebrations. Not everyone was a single sleaze-bucket trying to find paradise. (wink) Given the chance to do it over again that night I don't think I would have. I was having a good time. She was having a good time. I looked up and there he was.......IT WAS MYSTERY MAN. My heart stopped and I grabbed her and pointed him out. I must have looked so desperate because she froze. Her next words were very powerful. "Be careful Laura" "You always seem to get what you want, be careful what you ask for" She was my friend and she loved me, I loved her, but she wasn't at the same place in my life as this mystery man was residing. I didn't want to not at least get his attention and not try to make some kind of contact. Now let's remember the floor is packed, people are drunk, I am NOT. I can see him across the floor with 2 Corona's one in each hand. I don't drink and it's clear he professionally does. I could see he wasn't into the dancing. He moved across the floor towards the back wall which is where I was but I was positioned behind one of the air conditioners so he couldn't see me or my friend. He kept walking when all of a sudden a girl backs up into him. I'm already on the move towards him....HAVE I LOST MY MIND? What the heck did I think I was going to do when I got to him?????? She turns to say she sorry for her broke drunk wickedness had knocked over his one beer and he caught it enough to let it drip on the floor. He turned. He saw me standing there out of the corner of his eye. TIME STOPPED! Only for a second because hussy here had seen first hand how gorgeous he was. She immediately begins to back her mama given booty into this perfect specimen of a man. I did what any crazy naive alpha female would do. I got in between them. Yep. I sandwiched myself like I was paid to stop this party. I laid my head back onto his chest and could hear him breathing against my ear, while the 2....yes 2 beers formed an alcoholic cage around this in -over -her- head- white girl. I take it drunk diva figured out it wasn't him considering I have boobs and she was hoping she'd feel pecs. It's not the most decent night of my life, but it was empowering. She had no idea that while she was backing up into me, he whispered in my ear"I've been looking for you for weeks". I held my breath, before having to stand my ground. Ditsy turns and begins to yell at me because I stole her dancing partner. I have a certain power with my personality and one of them is letting other people know to tread carefully because I won't go down easily. I said "he's with me". (let me remind you we're in a loud dance club) WHAT THE HECK JUST CAME OUT OF MY MOUTH? She just turned and left. Huh? That was easier than I thought. I was so nervous to look him in the eye. I turned around and no sooner I did, He kissed me. He forced me up against his chest and he kissed me. I had never felt the surge of power or the salt of beer like that before. Not to mention Puerto Ricans I heard were saucy lover types. I was 21 what the heck did I know. I never kissed anyone at a dance club before or after that night. I will tell you we must have been putting off killer vibes because I looked up and we had managed to have a circle around us where people were watching. The music stops and my friend has someone she is dancing with and she makes eye contact with me. She can see I have mystery man with me and begins to walk towards me. She looks at me like what the heck am I doing, so I figured she saw me kiss him. I introduce them to each other. In all the dancing and making out I did manage to get his name. Luis. I told him my name and I fell hard. He had an accent that just devoured any sense of reality that I had left. I was going to have a Latin spice fest and no one was going to talk me out of it. His friend didn't look thrilled with me either. I asked him what was up with his friend? He said he had been driving him nuts trying to find me each weekend they were out. I knew she heard him and it clicked. Maybe we were meant to be together. I knew the blood boiling underneath my skin was a first and I surely wasn't going to give this up too easily. The walk of sleaze was different tonight. We both had someone tagging along by our sides laughing and telling us that our outfits looked amazing. What could be better on a Saturday night than to be open to the possibilities ahead. Let's keep an open mind as we move forward into one of the darkest most intoxicating 3 years of my life. PG-13(parental guidance unless 13 or older please)

I knew you were trouble when you walked in.............

I'd be lying if I didn't specify that the moment my eyes saw him I knew he was trouble. It didn't stop me. I can tell you what came over my body that night was straight from the Devil himself- hand delivered right to my lady parts. I don't want to sugar coat this one, for the lesson that it would teach me and the many facets of it would continue to this very day. Lust. I understand "Her" very well. I have over the years given in to it, but not so much as I did that day. It was the first time that anyone caught my eye from across a room without knowing them and without them seeing me back. Ya know the guy waaaaaay over there that seemed to be unreachable in all forms of the word. I turned and looked at my friend and caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror(there they are again), my reflection was disappointing and I began to doubt anything would come of this "shiver" I had flowing through my body. I liked the rush I had. I had never been so driven over a man in my whole entire life. (said dramatically for effect) I immediately got my friend's attention and pointed out the sin across the way. She glared at me and said "HE LOOKS NO GOOD, LET IT GO". I pulled away in that moment as if to let her know our journey was about to get very difficult. I knew she liked the independence she had with me and she wasn't going to let a man ruin that for her. Plus I don't drink so I end up everyone's designated driver. I didn't mind because I had just bought a brand spankin' new convertible. A Black on black Mitsubishi Spyder Eclipse. She was sexy. Sexier than me and she was going to help me get what I wanted. I was formulating a plan. Let's set the stage for this, because I want to be clear I knew ahead of time this road was going to lead me to places I didn't belong, so I know what our young people of today face. It didn't stop me and I am aware of why. I am not ashamed as much as I am understanding what I was missing and why it affected me so much- to trudge in waters I didn't need to be wading in. I spied him across the room from behind one of the pillars that broke up the dance floor. You could smell sweat, beer and cologne from every corner of the room. I could see the reflection in the sunglasses he was wearing, the clear kind that made you look like a MOVIE STAR. I could see he was with friends and one in particular looked like the main lackey. He seemed to be in charge which is what I figured considering his suavamente was hitting me from half a mile away. He gazed out over across the people shaking their rumps on people they didn't even know. I was standing still. Which is almost impossible for me to even comprehend. I hear music and something comes over me. Not that night. I couldn't resist. I tried to move closer to him like some celebrity coming to a big city to perform. I could tell he was not Caucasian. No, he was way spicier than that. I thought for sure he was Puerto Rican. It must have started to piss my friend off that I was preoccupied with this fine piece of flesh I didn't even know. She grabbed me and tried to bring me back to Earth but it wasn't working. I told her I had to try to get closer to him and she lost it. She began to shake me with both arms and told me to let it go. She even used the parents card and said they would kill me if I brought him home to meet them. Who said anything about taking him home. I didn't say it was pretty folks. My mind had wandered to a dangerous place, and I didn't even know if "I" could bring myself back. I didn't once pray and ask God to take this frenzy away. No, on the contrary, I decided to put him on a shelf for awhile because I had a challenge in front of me and it was to prove to myself I could have what I wanted. I took another long hard glare in the mirror and told myself" SELF........STOP EATING".....It went something like that. I knew I had to hit the gym hard. I didn't waste one minute of time. I started shaking my booty on the dance floor like nobody's business. I was gonna use this time wisely and dance floor aerobics were now in session. My friend knew I was somewhere all together different than the dance floor but by this time some weirdo had noticed her and she was dancing her heart out and didn't care about the plan I was devising. Time does fly by when your having fun and the night always seemed to slip away from us. The music stops abruptly and wakes you out of your day dreaming to send you out onto the cold sidewalk to do the "walk of sleeze". Ya know, the walk past all the people lined up outside wanting to take a piece of the action home. I never doddled in any of that. It didn't appeal to me or my friends. We didn't mind the occasional "wow" "damn" or "heeelllo" only because girls are ridiculous when it comes to affirming that our outfits are just as cute as we thought they were. With no intentions of lending it out for the evening. No we were old school white girls who literally just went out for the dancing and looking cute. I had no idea how that would change once I had seen him in the crowd on the 3rd floor. I could't shake him. I kept a keen lookout for him on the long trek down the steps that led out to the sidewalk. I did the usual good bye , hello, see you at the gym verbiage I gave to all the bouncers I knew from working out at the local hangout gym. I bebopped out onto the sidewalk like usual, but didn't tell her I was looking around to see if I could see him. No luck. She knew. She kept tugging at my arm trying to get my attention and she could tell I was up to something since I had never acted like this before. I must have looked like I had lost my first puppy, because I think she actually started to feel bad for me. I hung my head and just let the guys call out to me without the usual "thank you" I gave to be polite about smashing their dreams so early in the morning when we kept on walking. We got to my car and since I loved that new shiny black metal I put a smile on my face and just tried to put him out of my mind. It wasn't working. Parking garage's aren't the greatest but it worked for us. We were classy girls that needed a place to park their sweet ride so we didn't have to park in the ghetto down the street. I knew there was a chance when we got out on the main road in front of the club we might, I said might, see him. I was trying to time it just right when everyone finally gets put out on the sidewalk and the whole yellin, tire screeching hollering happens. I came around the corner and made a left turn onto the road. We were always super hot after dancing and would put our windows down to see all the ruckus. THERE HE WAS. I slowed down as much as I could. I forgot to mention I also had sunglasses like he did, the clear ones that made you look like a movie star. His friend spied me first, most likely it was the car. I had the top down. Ha! Revealing the 2 cute girls inside it. On purpose.......yes. He turned and pulled his sunglasses down off his face to look me directly in the eye. I almost came to a complete stop, like my heart had when I realized he saw me. As the guy behind me HONKS!!! Scaring both me and her half to death. I did it. He at least saw me. I didn't know how I was going to ever see him again, but I was going to try. I wouldn't give up until we saw each other again. She laughed and said "feel better now"? I giggled and said "DID YOU SEE THAT"?!!! He made sure to take his sunglasses off to see me!!!!!!!!!!!!! I didn't let her alone the whole ride home. I kept telling her I knew something was different about this guy. I walk by a million guys a a day whether it be at work, the mall, the gym, church. Nothing ever catches my eye. I had to figure out what was so different about this one. Her last words to me that night were "You know he is no good".

Let's not forget........What led me there in the first place.

I can get wrapped up in how much my life has changed over the years, but it is only because it is so hard to contain the excitement that I have about sharing the lessons I have learned! I desire to relate to anyone I come in contact with because I have seen what can happen when we share what has led to the decisions we have made. I feel like Mario Bro.'s 2 in the game I love! Collecting mushrooms and coins to beat the bad boss at the end of world 8.....Ah the good ol' days.....um not so much but ya get my drift. I've collected all of my mistakes to show you how I've filed them back in my brain after accepting the responsibility for everything I did and said. I take it you're wondering how such a cute thing like me could only have one boyfriend before marrying the wrong guy?! You would be wise in asking yourself if we skipped a few parts in the story. This is the story that goes on and on and it gets ever more exciting as we go along. Remember I told you that when I was just barely out of the womb I was kicked out of the house for the "Jezebel Juggle" I was accused of at the ripe age of 17. I had begun a dark spiral right after my high school graduation. I had some how managed to find some guy to fancy the feet even I couldn't see due to the belly I had been growing since birth. Sarcasm? No. Only the part about the guy, that was made up. My parents were convinced since I wasn't running home like an episode of Little House on the Prairie, then my only options were sexual deviance. I have shared with you that even though that wasn't the case I have since learned a valuable lesson on what was really going on in the house hold. Moving forward I knew nothing was going to please my parents since they were hiding their own secrets- it was easier to place blame on me than to own up. It didn't matter, let's be honest, my journey was mine and even though I was making a mess of it by dating a Muslim man while making it to church at leassst 4 times a month, It was my mess and I liked it that way. I don't know that I would have changed it much, since I was the one making all the choices back than as well. I did have great times with my boyfriend, playing relationship games on the weekends. Ya know the ones where you make time to watch movies, talk, or to make out on the couch. Ha! I was 20 going on 21 when I knew things weren't going to workout. He wasn't into meeting my family and my family wasn't into getting a new photo for above the fireplace. Come to think of it, they never like photos where we have new people in them. Keep that in mind as we go through this mess one blip at a time. I could see the independence coming around in me. I felt like I could pull away more and still keep a boyfriend. No we didn't have sex. Just get that out of your heads. I'm not saying we didn't do things that I would like to stand up in front of church and announce but (I am proud to say) I never did crude things with my mouth and he never asked me to. I take it many of you are not up on the Koran. If he had kept my virginity(which I did) he deserved a long life in a 7th level of some form of heaven that he believed in. Although Christians do not believe in this level heaven stuff, I did like it he never tried to have sex with me. I was afraid of sex, shamed of sex, confused of sex, afraid of sex, scared of sex, and did I mention afraid of sex? Yes, this sexy thing at one time was mortified to ever think of having to be sexual and NAKED.....I WAS HOOKED ON THE "HAVE TO BE NAKED" PART FOR A LONG TIME. You eventually get over that if you get counseling, or drink. I don't drink. Lord have mercy no. This extrovert has never had alcohol, for good reason. I don't need it. Anyhow I needed to move on and he was trying to settle down, now was a good time to collect my altered ego and scat. He was starting to talk marriage and I thought for sure I was going to end up in someone's basement making burkas for people I didn't even know so I started to make him mad to put distance between us. It was hard to let go of someone you didn't fight with. What was there to fight about? He worked ridiculous hours and I worked ridiculous hours, by the time I finally saw him either to eat dinner together after 9 or to see him on the weekend after my workouts, what's to fight about? We both loved our jobs and loved our independence, but something changed and it wasn't going to be the same ever again. I made sure of that. I don't like being told what to do. Maybe you have figured that out by reading my blogs. That's not what it sounds like. I don't like being barked at like a dog, I love conversation and a strong leader type, but no barking orders. I had that crap at home, I wasn't going to take it from a man (said in the most urgent of female viking voices to declare my independence). The pivotal moment came on a Saturday afternoon in the late summer. I could never forget this day no matter how long ago it was. He wanted to talk to me about going to the gym and out dancing with my friends when I turned 21. I was getting so excited to go to dance clubs because ASIDE FROM BEING A FABULOUS DANCER, I LOVE TO DANCE!!!!!!!!!! He was forewarning me that I wasn't going to be able to go out and shake my body around other men. I was immediately appalled at his accusation that I would even do such a thing (which I would later do 6 nights a week to be exact). I told him as we were sitting on the couch that he was going to have to trust me because I've been waiting my wwwwhhhhoooolllleeee life to be able to do this and I was going to do it. Period. He turned and slapped me across the face. In that moment so many things rush through your head. Is it going to escalate? Is he going to hurt me? Is he going to yell? Is he going to kill me? I didn't say all of those things were rational, but remember I was 20 years old with childhood baggage and dating a Muslim man while I was sober. The whole big picture wasn't pretty. I'll never forget how intense I got after that. I stood up and he told me to watch my next move very carefully. My stomach was in knots, I wasn't sure if he knew exactly who he was messing with. He was lucky that day, because I let him live while I planned my revenge. Once the line is crossed there's no going back to before hand. He had slapped me so hard I remember seeing the lines across my cheek when I used the bathroom. I knew then we needed to break up and I needed a killer plan to do so. I've always tried to be one step ahead of the toxic behavior in my life and then was no different than now. So I had a lot of long nights ahead of me and I hadn't seen my boyfriend for a few days after the wretched slapping he gave me. He asked me to come over for a picnic on the following Saturday and I agreed to go. I was patiently awaiting my birthday which was just a few short months away and I decided to make my move slowly away. I wanted to get him back in such a way that didn't make it a bad breakup but more of a way to help him since I clearly was weighing him down and wasn't the right fit for him. So I have always loved to cook and to this day love casserole's. He worked in food service so he loved it when I cooked. I knew part of his stringent religion was to NEVER EAT PORK. Look it up, it's a thing. Pork's always been a favorite of mine in any form (even at the farm show the baby piggies are my all time favorite)!!! I made sure to incorporate okra which was one of his faves, along with everything PORK. He had no idea that down to the broth, was from the pork roast I made and told him it was turkey. Ha Ha! "Slap me again and get roasted with that pork" was what was going through my mind. I put tons of cheese and veggies in to mask the pork and of course he ate it up. Every bite he looked up at me with glee that I had really hit something here. I just smiled and said to myself "Laura......you're good honey, you're real good". He asked me at one point what the delectable flavor was and I told him it was my claim to fame cooking skills. I just played it off like he didn't get out much! That there is a whole big world out there full of flavor he doesn't get to see because he's always around the Subway subs. I then sat him down and looked him in the eye, and let him know I had been thinking. It was clear to me that he needed someone worthy of him and his "ways'...yes, yes, yes. I used reverse babble on him, but it worked. I told him that the journey of being his girlfriend had come to an end and it was time to part as friendly as we could so he could find the perfect person to compliment his life. I told him our religions didn't match and my independence would get in the way of someone taking care of him. Blah blah blah! He bought it hook, line, and sinker. He went to hell in a hand basket from eating my casserole but the breakup went easy peezy. No hard feelings, I think we both knew it wasn't going anywhere and we were fine to let go of what was. Could it have been worse? Sure, I was a lucky one who didn't get wrapped up in some weird cargo ship back to Egypt. I am not belittling anything I have been through but not everyone who has come to this country wants that kind of ending to their story either. I have run into my ex from time to time over the years and there is still no hard feelings and I feel we both won in the end. It didn't destroy us, which is pretty cool considering the circumstances. It didn't take long for me to get into a new kind of groove on the weekends as I prepared for my time to be 21! I was never so excited for an age as I was then. I never wanted to be older than 20, other than to go dancing with all the other people like me who wanted to be out there feeling the music on the dance floor. (Not to mention feelski's, you gotta watch out for the grabbers) I was so naive. I was also so strong of a woman that if someone did try to touch me on the dance floor I put it to a stop with just a look. Ohhhhhhhh, the day I could hear the music on the outside of the building I remember I would get chills just to get on the floor and dance my heart out. I would get there early when all the guys were still getting all the alcohol out and stocked at 9 pm. How was I supposed to know that the party didn't start until around 11:45 pm. I would guzzle coffee right before I went out at 8:45 so I could stay awake until the music became one with my bones to keep me up. There was nothing like the rush of the cold dance floor with the music pumping through my veins until more people arrived. I did this for months just loving the intense rush I got every time I was able to dress up and walk into the club every weekend. I must say if I had to do this now, I wouldn't love it at all. I've wised up over the years to just how lucky I was to not get hurt by some scum bag trying to ruin my night. I made a lot of friends over the years, well, more like acquaintances. I had a name for myself. "Dancer Girl". I take it I got that name because I was ALWAYS there at 9 pm to dance and NEVER DRANK anything but bottled water. Some of the best years of my life were dancing it out in my 20's. Whether it was me all by myself or with a friend, I didn't care. I had a pleasant surprise a few short weeks into being 21 when my girlfriend from Beauty school was going through a divorce and wanted to tag along and find her groove that she so clearly lost during her odd marriage. I knew we would have a fantastic time dancing it out together. We always got along perfect. No drama with us. We didn't like the same guys and we both loved to dance so it was a no-brainer that hanging out together was a great gig for us. She didn't care if we went early to dance at 9 either. She was a keeper. Those few short months where we danced our hearts out are still some of our best memories. THEN I SAW HIM.............

Doom's Day.......Thursday Dec 7th 2007

Not so funny to compare my first marriage to the day Pearl Harbor was attacked. If you think about how silently the attack came and the air was clear and the sun was shining, all the while there was an attack under way. My first marriage was exactly like that. The silence was there and all the while the doom was right around the corner. You would not have been able to convince us of it then in that moment, but I am sure if you had checked in with us just a few short weeks down the road we would have weighed in on just how big of a mess we had gotten ourselves into. Is there any way around it, I mean it's just so humbling to hear the words aloud in my head. I was only 24 years old and thought the whole world around me was caving in. Everyone was miserable (still is) and I WASN'T GOING TO BE LIKE THEM. I thought if I just found someone who could see the good in me and we could work and make a life, everything would fall into place. I couldn't have been more wrong. I didn't have the tools in my head to deal with the stress that life dishes out. That's not to say that all of us have that issue, but once again you don't always have the same luck when picking out spouses!! I was so angry in a silent but deadly way back then that my life wasn't what I wanted and I wasn't going to let anymore time go by without trying to make it what I wanted. I never saw the "Doom" until it was too late. If you would have told me I was going to keep an engagement for 2 months before I secretly got married on a random Thursday at what time in the afternoon? 2ish? I mean you've got to be kidding me. I've always appeared high maintenance while really being laid back. I didn't ever think it added up to getting married in secret on a Thursday. I have nothing against the oddest day of the week. I just never expected that at a poignant point in my career, I'd be marrying someone literally twice my age only to find out that I was against all odds from the very start because I didn't have the relationship with myself that is required to be in a "marriage". I NEEDED A STRONGER WALK WITH THE LORD. A lot of people remember that very odd time in my life. Thank goodness I didn't go through the weird eyeliner phase! It's definitely weird to hear this girl is engaged and before you know it I'm married before Christmas of the same year. I should have known things weren't going to work out the way I had planned them because you drag the whole family through something like that. We don't all go through in a healthy understanding way. Oh no, that would be too easy! Let's go back to late September when my then husband was asking for my hand in marriage from my father at the Warwick Hotel (a well known town restaurant), my mother wasn't there (she was on a trip). I knew that, and told my husband that my mother was a totally different woman when she is with my father then when she is alone. If we involved her in the process of asking for permission, we would end up bringing things up from the 3rd grade unresolved and totally pointless. So I told him we should just talk to my father and get this over with because even though we weren't going to get the blessing from him, we weren't going to hide either. Or so I thought. That was a night to remember. Not in a good way, of course. You always want to believe the best in your parents. I really believe until you realize your parents aren't perfect or know everything, you're left thinking they are. I don't think I was ever fully convinced of how horrible my parent's relationship was until the night my father told me all of the secrets he'd been hiding for so many years. Try to picture me sitting at the table with my soon to be husband (who's my fathers age) and listening to how my father is not happy in his marriage and all of the secrets he's been hiding come out to scare us both away from getting married. GEESH.....it sounds just like what it was.....the biggest surreal nightmare of my life. How is it the words I was hearing come out of my father's mouth were so much harsher than the same words I had heard inside my own head for decades?! Well, THAT'S EXACTLY MY POINT. It does change things when we speak the words out loud rather than just inside our own heads. The truth takes on a totally different feeling when it's out in the open for everyone to chew on. I knew the tactic to scare me out of marriage wasn't going to work. He hadn't thought through what he was really revealing. My father's marriage had and still doesn't have accountability to get help when needed. I wanted more out of life and thought I had covered my bases by finding someone who had gone through it before. On many levels divorce can truly heal old wounds in people. My soon to be husband seemed less bitter than my father so my assumption was that he had worked out all the kinks from his past to lead him straight to me where the rest was going to be history! Ummmm...no, not so much. Instead I realized that both men were lying about who they really were. They got away with it for so long because so many marriages (and people in marriages) are lying about who they are. They easily blended into society along with everyone else by displaying only the outward appearance of having it all together. Before you jump to the conclusion that I believe people actually reach the level of "having it all together", I don't. I do believe we can always be aware to be better tomorrow than we were today. It's just a mindset to be involved with ourselves in a goal oriented mentality. Too often we find people are only allowing you to see the person they think you want them to be or a more acceptable version of themselves. RIDICULOUS. It doesn't help any of us to put ourselves on the back burner out of what we are to afraid to face in ourselves. I learned very quickly that my soon to be husband and father had been hiding how they truly felt about themselves for a long time and it was beginning to catch up with them. It isn't easy when your daughter and soon to be wife is much younger than you but continually asking questions as to why things are not being dealt with. Often the answer is that you can't do anything about it. I disagree. I think the hardest part about confrontation is that it is done out of anger instead of love for all people- to empower humans all over the planet to see community. If we had been a unified family and a team, things may never have gotten out of hand that lone Thursday......who's to say it wasn't the most amazing day of my life. I couldn't go back. I had begun a journey so grueling and wretched to reveal my true self and to smooth out the rough edges I had acquired along the way. After 3 verrry long years, this very same day would be the day I invited Joshua to meet my friends for much needed encouragement and conversation. The man God brought to me to see me through the rest....Two days later on a Thursday he took me on our first date!!! You never know what can happen on a Thursday, the oddest day out of the week.

Honesty.....it's the best policy! (someone find that guy and shoot em) ;)

It's true that most of us will never understand how to use honesty as our best policy. That is an unfortunate thought, considering I'd love to change the world's thinking on talking. Period. I love how honesty over the years has become such a double edged sword for me. How? I'M A HAIRSTYLIST! We're not known for telling the whole truth nothing but the truth so help me God. That doesn't mean over the years I went out of my way to lie to my clients. Surely not. It does mean I walked out of high school into a career path that doesn't make it's money on truth. We continually blur the lines of what's real and what's not with clients spending more money monthly that goes towards our mortgages. Some would say it's a necessary evil to spend such money and time on yourself so you look professional. After 17 years, I (on the other hand) am much wiser about who should and shouldn't be in the chair. I never realized how much my home life would parallel my job. I had a mother who would appear to be something she wasn't and a father who did the disappearing act most of the time just to stay away from her (and most likely us). We weren't the fam on the block who got involved in sports, or after school activities. How odd that most of the women or men who sat in the chair mirrored the same behavior to me while I was looking in the mirror back at them. It is scary how many years I have literally been staring in the mirror and everything I use it for is to tell me the truth. Not what I see most people doing. I know they are looking into the the glass, but what do they see back??? I mean most of the time it is asking them "why did you walk out of the house like that"? "oh damn did you brush your teeth? tooth"? Harsh? I dare you to shadow me for a month and look at how most Americans leave their house. It is a tragedy to me to see how they hide themselves as they sit in the chair due to being so overweight they are disgusted that they have lost sight of their own genitals even when eye level with them. No joke folks. This society has been binge eating for decades now to deal with the pain and hollowness of their lack of faith. How can God help in this situation? UM HE IS THE KEY TO EVERYTHING. END OF DISCUSSION. Let me explain why I believe everything I am describing to you can truly be healed by accepting him and learning to draw closer to him through a real intimate and total disclosure to him. I don't know many people like myself that describe their relationship with God as like other relationships. Some of you might balk at that comment, let me go into detail. I truly, genuinely believe everything he gave us in his word the Holy Bible is to relate to any form of pain, loneliness, confusion, temptation, fury, sadness, loss, happiness, joy, understanding, blessing, team work, support, family, friendships, money, success, disobedience, consequence, accountability, responsibility there is in the human life. If I missed anything in that long line of items just add it to your mental list!!! It isn't to shame as it is to reveal honesty. We as homo-sapiens need honesty, believe me over the years I should have stood tall brush in hand and yelled "NO MORE! THIS HORRIBLENESS ENDS NOW". But it has to be in the context of love. Ah...the shoe falls on everyone's head. I'm sure the critics will yell and scoff some more once they read that poignant line. I have been known to call out the most dignified of idiots, whether they are in my family tree or in your family tree. Have I always done it in love? NO. Have I always done it gracefully? NO. Have I enjoyed myself when I'd rather be doing anything else than staring a bat shit crazy person in the face who is lying through their teeth while no one stops the madness. NO. So I've had to learn myself what that lesson means as well. It a lot of times means we are to have an entire team of support so the many can conquer the shit storm. Put your boots on, that was a lot of crap. To help honesty along the way we all have to have the chance to be vested in it. It requires us to be totally and utterly open to ourselves and what we are thinking and feeling. It means that while God is the source of love we can not see, we choose to plug into him whether through talking, prayer, reading, speaking with a friend til we build that foundation of him inside us through the Holy Spirit. I see so many people's relationships being a weird one hour reading time on Sunday mornings at church while running away from the rest of our human duties just to make sure we are good tithing Christians. Here's a dose of real honesty. That's messed up in soooooo many ways from here to there. Someone needed to say it. How is our relationship supposed to be relatable to anyone including ourselves? Did you catch that? He made us, He gave us everything we needed to relate, we haven't caught on yet that the Bible relates to so many things people do when being totally human and yet we still make our relationship look something like a whisper talker at the local coffee shop open mike night. GET A CLUE PEOPLE. He want's a real relationship with us. One where we rely on him spiritually and live fully in our human bodies using our entire brain to connect fully to ourselves and everyone around us. Now honesty starts with ourselves. Then goes beyond ourselves to disperse into society to bless all those around us. How could that work in my profession?? Why I love that you asked that! It goes a little something like this. Client walks in and sits in the chair. She looks slumped in the chair and is not making the greatest eye contact with the mirror. I have learned to read the signs like someone is feeding me my lines. It is clear she isn't happy with her life and for the next 1 hour and 45 min is going to contract me to change her into the heir of Godiva chocolates. I had a huge problem biting off more than even I could chew for about half of my career but now I'm on to bigger challenges. Now I'm about teaching her to like herself and sweet cheeks that takes more than 2 hours. But I get the ball rolling with helping her see the good in the mirror and what is applicable when she gets home, work week, home life, kids, expectations vs. WAKE THE HELL UP! YOUR HAIR WON'T DO THAT AND JESUS ISN'T HERE TO CREATE MIRACLES TODAY! A little stylist humor! I always love to cut and color someone's hair so the real women or man can be revealed to them. To see the changes in people over the last 17 years when I've dusted off their do's to begin to create a new person, it's like a little piece of Heaven. We never need to let things fester to have honesty be our total policy. IF we were the proprietor of our own walk with honesty it wouldn't be so hard to take any form of criticism. Even if it was just in the stylist's chair. I've worked continually over the years to reveal and revamp who I was or wanted to become. Not always liking the situations I was in was what pushed me to be better. If I had been comfortable with everything I did I wouldn't have pushed to become a better version of myself. Honey, I'm better than Apple products around here, ask hubby, I change on the hour to upgrade to a higher level of intellect. Those phones got nothing on me baby, maybe grammar but who wants to talk so weird anyway. It would be a lovely place to be where each child born into a lovely home would pursue the honesty policy right down to "does this make me look fat"? Seriously, how did we as humans let the fat demon rule our lives? Exactly, we had nothing else to rely on for honesty. We couldn't deal with the reality of things, so when food entered in we didn't have honesty on that either. It's not so much calories as it is substance. That is meant both literal and metaphorical. We have very little substance to us anymore and don't want to be bothered when it comes to loving ourselves through the right kind of foods. We need to start something because people are dying all across America because we won't stop the self torture that is obesity because we have lost honesty. No you don't call out to the herd of people waddling towards sweet frog fat asses! You might have a sudden urge to say such snarky things, but that is NOT the honesty I am talking about. It starts with relationship. There I go again. How would you want someone to approach your tubby butt? I know it works when you actually care. When you desire to see the best in the person come out. It is going to take a community approach for everyone in the world to feel loved and be spoken to about their weight issue. It takes time and support first to allow the person who is over weight to feel whole and special no matter what. They have to begin to trust you and want to be better for themselves because we or you treat them that way. It's over all hard to do when we live in a society that doesn't all plug into the things of the Lord. So our common approach is to make comments or shy away from them because they aren't sexy or desirable. Remember I come from the side of the tracks where on a Friday night my date was the couch and cake. Not proud of it, but it was our form of self deprecation in our house. It is our meth. COME ON! Get real. It's most families' drug of choice now a days. Once again because we will not be honest as a society that all people deserve a right to feel great, be great, strive for greatness. How the heck do you get parent's serving up that at breakfast???? You fall in love with the fact that you were created with the ability to be your best. It would come from a childhood which fed into the thoughts that followed and began to build in you the ability to be honest to a fault with yourself about ABSOLUTELY EVERYTHING YOU TOUCH. The moment you leave the house you're on a journey to fulfill that with everyone you meet. Including those who may not know Jesus. We will introduce him through being real, honest, happy, joyful, silly, engaging. It's a compelling thought. To believe honesty comes from a child on up to the adulthood. One can not enter adulthood without being a child. If we had been groomed in a household of lies, it will be almost impossible to remove the viruses in the brain without trauma. I said almost. I did it, we can do it, together we flourish. Or I say die trying to find that guy......

The Look on their faces.......

It's no secret there's some bittersweet memories associated with my childhood and young adult life....but none too great for me to sift through, re-file in my brain and move on. I'll never forget the look on my boss's face when I told her I quit. I believe in that moment she might have wanted to beg me to stay, but on some greater level she knew if she kept me I'd end up like her, and in some deeper desire to respect me more than herself she let me spread my wings. Not to mention she wasn't going to eat crow...it wasn't a particular dish she liked served. Knowing what I know now it was some of the greatest growing pains of my life. I didn't like the burning in my chest that I got when I walked into my room to pack up my stuff, but I wasn't going to eat crow either....I didn't have ketchup. ;) I knew I wasn't coming back, in my heart of hearts it wasn't the life I was looking for, my dreams were greater than the team. I still have that same feeling that the ceiling of my life isn't here yet and I refuse to give up on myself. It was like a bad 80's movie driving off into the sun as I approached my parent's house. I mean where else do you go to share your wounds other than the household who you have nothing in common with? You laugh but as I pulled into the driveway I asked myself how do you think this is going to go? These are the same people who threw you out because they "THOUGHT" you were being quote: Promiscuous unquote:. Yeah, Yeah, Yeah.....I didn't have anyone else lined up to listen to what new hell I had managed to conjure up on a Friday. Did I get help on the matter? No....I got looks like I did most of the time. Like I had farted in church during prayer. I got the 20 questions act of do you know what you got yourself into? Do you have another job lined up? How are you going to survive? I DON'T KNOW MAYBE GO INTO FULL TIME PROSTITUTION??!! IT'S WHAT YOU PEOPLE THINK I DO ANYWAY! I know my husband and I have talked about this so many times. Who has children to dream of the day when life has them down and you kick em? We can't wait to help our little guy become the best young man he can possibly be. We don't think that is easy of course, but because we are so sound of mind working out loud together at all times on any subject. Nothing is too great for us to handle. WOULD IT HAVE KILLED MY PARENTS TO FOCUS ON MY STRENGTHS BACK THEN? No. I think I would have fallen over actually! Once again just pointing out we didn't have the tools to leverage the team, to support each other, because we understood what we could do if we learned to see the best point of the situation and put our heads together to get the rest of it taken care of. I know it sounds easier than done because I've yet to see it mastered in my family. Sad really....because we all can be better than that. NOT WITHOUT ACCOUNTABILITY TO CHANGE. I looked at the face of my mother who til this day hasn't held a career path long enough to collect a dental plan. The stay at home mom thing didn't work out, she didn't like kids. The surreal dream of having a family came along with it's own baggage. It never really worked the way she wanted it to. I was too loud and opinionated and my brother was just as passive aggressive as she was, but wanted dinner and was sure to kiss up unlike my father so that worked for her. My other 2 sisters on deck really gave her a run for her money. My middle sister hasn't learned to see her own value yet and the youngest one requires a full time lawyer in the pocket just in case. Good times at family functions I know. Not such a big deal if you learn to see the irony in it that this is the mess we created. We could choose to clean it up at any time if we really wanted to. Don't go wasting valuable time feeling bad for us if you're not going to see the lesson involved. NOTHING IS TOO BIG FOR THE LORD. For humans that's another story. I left defending myself that I wasn't going to sit around and wait for my life to just happen but rather stand up for what I believe in and go get another job. Reluctantly I had involved them and now needed some sort of salve for my wound. I got salt water in return for spreading my new found hope around the table that currently served mediocrity Monday through Saturday. Sunday we served straight up "Pretend". Imagine our weekends like a lame Broadway show. It could have been so different in so many ways ten years ago. I was looking to my future to find that girl, the amazing hairstylist, the friend, the show-stopper, that girl. I thought after my mother used her skills to create a resume consisting of my babysitting to snack bar girl to retail barbie to small town beautician my life was going places. Until I took the first new job working for the "DEVIL'S NEW DO" right down the street from my last job. Let me preface with saying I am grateful for all of the wrong places to be because it taught me so much more about what is really out there, but don't get it twisted I didn't like the journey one bit. I needed a wake up call and I got it. Right before I had started working at "SATAN'S DAY SPA" I had started to spend a lot of time with an older man that I had met at the gym. I know you're thinking how much older? Older okay.....we'll get to details about that later. Let's just get this new beginning under way since it is my new job and I am going to change my life I can just feel it! I didn't like it very much, but wasn't going to tell anyone that because I had no one to bitch about it to anyway. I'm might be painting a very pale picture to some of you, but remember we are talking about me here and one thing you need to remember about my personality is I am independent so I wasn't focused on that so much as trying to learn what I could to stand out around here and move up the corporate volcano. The higher you go the hotter it gets. Ain't that the truth?! Ha! I laugh at myself back then. I went from being so comfortable at my last place that I was bored out of my mind to so scared to even blink for a minute that I might do something wrong or not make it. I snapped out of that real quick. I can read people like the "Everybody poops" book. It isn't pretty when I go all analytical on you. I began to really fight for my own style and space and I wanted to learn as much as I could from other people so I watched everything they did. I ate it up like a sweet new bag of cool ranch Dorito's. I learned so many new and exciting things in the midst of the most uninviting locations on the planet. Go me! I knew I should have been wrapped in bubble wrap for awhile because my brain was so fragile back then from not having a pastor hold me in a toddler chair, I wasn't sure how life would pan out since I had been winging it up until this point. Why the heck did I not have ANYONE telling or sharing with me how to find more joy, understanding and peace?????? Because in my small circle, and I mean small, they didn't have any to give. I only went more intensely towards the wrong things, including marrying the old guy as fast as I could. GASPS...GASPS...AND MORE GASPS...I know. I didn't say I was using the best part of my brain back then. Although the silver lining in this one is that I got him to marry me. Or is that not the silver lining? Ha! We both made a huge mistake jumping into such an awesome team created for us by God called marriage. We paid dearly for not having a support system of respect for ourselves and then those around us didn't have those gifts of the spirit either. Needless to say the roller coaster ride of a lifetime became my life for 2 years. We didn't make it because he tried to push me out of the cart and I wasn't having it. I had learned to be smarter along the way with what I shared with my family. I realized anything real, honest, bad, uncomfortable was left for trying shoes on in the mall and not so much my life and where it was headed. Plus who wants to jinx themselves for the 2nd time around when telling the mother who is so earnestly awaiting your mistakes. My life began to mirror image Cher's final final tour. No joke I adore her but someone had to tell her 7 final tours was a bit much. Spoiler alert there's more drama to follow but this kind of reality check is enough for one day. Don't ever forget that I know what it is like to have a failure chart a mile long. The only thing I stress is get it out as often as you can to consider how much you have been blessed, all the lessons to be learned and shared. Don't run from who you are and where you come from. Make sure to laminate that, you don't want to tear it while pulling it out of your pocket. ;)

TAKE THE ELEVATOR TO THE SECOND FLOOR.......(INTELLECTUALS PLEASE APPLY)

It seems the higher the floor the more the pay or power....it's no different inside our heads. I've said it before in an earlier post that "Emotions" are the first right of refusal to the brain. Unless otherwise taught or wired to ask or communicate to your Creator or guardian, the emotions block intellectual thought process of right and wrong based on logic. Right and wrong coming from a standpoint to murder your best friend because she said something nasty about you on twitter should strike you as odd.....one might want to verbally kill her but not physically. It's a little harder to decipher things that the emotions are hiding such as politics in our nation. Most people can't pick up on when the congressmen or the political leader are lying because they are no longer in touch with the Intel in their own brain to know how or why those things we are saying are INCAPABLE of making a safer America. If you are not able to stay in touch with the side that is right, how would you ever see the other side of that coin, which is "wrong"? You wouldn't. Bottom line is I think I speak from a direct standpoint to say we are not using everything that God has given us in our brains when we will not try to see both sides to an issue by asking questions then putting forth our own feeling or desire whether it be right or wrong. We forget to admit that when the feeling is selfish or neglects others feelings in the matter, whether you take everyone's feeling into account or not....YOU WILL LEARN MORE ABOUT YOURSELF, IF YOU ALLOW THE MIND TO TRAVEL THERE. Americans now a days are taking the easy way out on most things because we do not wake up first thing in the morning, look into the mirror and like what we see. It's a shame really that the undertone in our society is that God has made us, but the belief in ourselves to be our best is just a line we throw out when we see others we want to appear in control with. Don't get me wrong, I do believe that there are a lot of people out there who want to be productive during the day but what else is there?? I've stated at the top that I believe in the intellectual outlook on the second floor of our brain to be by far one of the most overlooked tools we have as humans to walk with so much more joy and control. There's more to acquire than just stopping at that, because we can not lean onto our own understanding as God has clearly stated in the good book, the Bible!! The third floor of our brains is that of the connection we have to our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. We need his HOLY SPIRIT to reside in us to give us power over the spiritual realm so we are not consumed by darkness or ignorance. I have not run into a whole lot of people on this planet who like to be honest about how they are feeling when you come up on them...............well....anywhere. They hesitate, look away, put a fake azz smile on, mutter their words, lie about how they are doing, lol (as if I can't tell)!! Right then and there I know they are emotionally blocked, and do not think like an "Intellectual" human being. Here's why. We all go through rough times during a day, week, month, calendar year. We don't all seek counsel on how to get out of a mess or how to avoid further messes, furthermore what most people are unaware of is that if they could accept themselves at where they are in those most awkward and unusual moments that they feel are not a good indicator of their best self, they would already be half way over the "Emotional Battle". The second part of the battle is to tell one more person, out loud, so their own ears can hear it, and so they can be held accountable to not holding it in to allow it to fester or make them feel like they are alone or the only poor soul going through it. Some people would argue with me that you can not be held accountable if the other person is not willing to hold you accountable. Once again, not the point or an intellectual thought. You don't need them to call you in 2 weeks to have a one on one talk on the phone about what you happened to share with them the other day in the grocery store. Reason being you are held accountable by God to set up time with him to ask how to go about helping yourself. Half of all the arguments over Christians not being good friends is because they are not accountable to reading God's word to understand how he made sure stories where in the Bible to lay a foundation for hearing, saying, telling, sharing, accountability, responsibility, questions....I could go on and on about how many ways he left for us to identify the same situation in our own lives but we didn't read the book to see ourselves being better, we tend to identify with the "Victim" in the story and not the "Criminal". The healing that is right around the corner for us as God's creation is so splendid and so necessary for a healthy life. Once you've allowed your brain to understand the pain it feels because of a bad decision, you can heal and be ready for the next thing life throws at you, your mental capabilities will take a turn for the good. My desire to see everyone believe they are due the right to believe in seeking out truth through asking specific questions pertaining to any situation that allows for all people to be safe and sound. It sounds easier than it really is considering how passive aggressive we have become as a society to allow little white lies to be the staple in our communication skills. Once again why would it matter if everyone did tell all the details associated with the situation?? Why could we not then find a suitable solution to the problem or re-occurring issue? My point exactly.....it is such a huge issue in our culture because this type of accountability only comes from being linked to the HOLY SPIRIT and using your brain to keep your accountability high. The Christians were supposed to be leading the pack on how to behave and we have lost that in our own selves, our families, our communities. I believe we can change, we can be better, we can forgive ourselves and ask for others to forgive, we can seek out counsel on how to change long term until it becomes the new norm and we can tell others about it so we can help the change the world around us for the Glory of the Lord. AMEN!