I Figured This Much Out

I know that I am a person who hides behind humor. Maybe sarcasm is a better description than humor. Either way, I'm not always completely serious--being a ham is easier than crying all the time. Today, though, I want to be serious. I had time to think. My thoughts are random, jumbled, but I need to write them down. I need to remember. My first thought: I love music. I don't think that I feel anything in my heart like I feel music there. Music can lift my day, make me smile, make me laugh, make me angry, make me cry, make me remember, make me wish, make me believe. There's a burning in my chest when I imagine music surrounding me. I miss music. I miss singing. I miss making those emotions, making myself feel and making others feel. I want to listen to music so loud that I can't hear myself think. I want to lose myself in it. I want music to be a part of every day of my life. My second thought: I am young. I sort of started my 'adult' life differently than most people I know. I chose to have a family young instead of moving along with a career. I wondered for a long time whether or not I made the right decision. I now have no doubts that I chose the correct path for my life. While I struggled with "wasting" my education, I realized that I love being a mom, despite its challenges. I love Nate dearly and wouldn't change having him when I did for anything. I didn't waste my education--I graduated summa cum laude and learned that I love learning. I'll never lose my education and I'll have something to fall back on, heaven forbid, should I ever need it. I can always go back to school if I decide that that's something that would be good for me. I can always go back to work. Anyways, I'm young. Even though I'm 27 with a kindergartener, I am still only 27. I'm not middle-aged. I am in the prime of my life. I have plenty of years to have more babies or go back to school or work or ANYTHING. I have a lot of time left and lots left to do. My third thought: I love to read. This may not seem earth-shattering to anybody else, but for me it's a huge revelation. I remember that I used to love to read, but I don't remember why or when. Lately, I've fallen in love with books. I can't even count how many books I've read in the last few months. I devour them. I long to read when I'm taking Nate to school or cooking or doing anything else, really. I crave the characters and the story and the emotions. I fall into my books head first and don't come up for air until they're done. When I finish, I miss them--I miss the people I've gotten to know and the parts of their lives that I've been allowed to share. I think about them during the day, when I'm reminded of them by a song or person or experience. I find myself in a bad mood when my characters are struggling or sad. I am filled with their feelings, overcome by their emotions. How wonderful! How amazing. I am awe-struck by a book's ability to influence me. I am so happy to have found a way to escape, a way to lose myself somewhere other than my own life. Wow. My fourth thought: I believe in love. I believe in true love, soul-mates, meant-to-be, love. I believe in unrequited love. I believe that love is the strongest emotion I can feel. I believe that love trumps all. I believe that love can be enough, love is enough. There is a level of belonging, of feeling and connection, that only love reaches. That level descends beyond the deepest level of hell and reaches higher than the the farthest star, beyond death. Love can bring two people together when nothing else seems to. Love goes where nothing else will venture--Past hate, past age, past religion, past shoulds or should nots. I believe that love can be enough, always. That's it. Nothing crazy, just some thoughts that I need to know about, for, myself. I am continually surprised by how much I don't know about myself. I wonder if it takes everybody this long to figure things out. I think, though, for me, that I will live my life as a continual path of self-discovery. I hope so anyways.