Every once in a while I just feel the need to tell you all thank you. Today is one of those days. Thank you. I thank you all for making me laugh. I thank you for making me cry at times. A few of you even shock me - - I love you for that. I thank you for sharing your lives with me - - for sharing experiences that comfort me, like a warm blanket on a winter's morning. All my life I have felt so different from everyone else. It's hard to explain. When I was a new mom I felt different from all the other moms. I don't know why. I just did. Reading the things you write, feeling the things you feel - - I feel included and I feel . . . "not different." For that I thank you the most!
I have more life experience now, and with that experience comes self-confidence. And I have come to realize that being different is not so bad! As a matter of fact, I embrace it.
And I embrace you all. Please keep shocking me, moving me, and teaching me!
This, right here, is why I write. It's why I chose to make my writing more public. This feeling of "otherness" has followed me all of my life. Like you, I have come to embrace it and also to see that I'm not as "other" as I might feel. I write to share those bits with people out there who might feel that spark of recognition, too.
ReplyDeleteI like "otherness" better than "different." I shall use that from now on :) Your writing inspires all of us. Thank you for sharing it us.
DeleteThere's a Morman ad with a daisy among a bouquet of red roses. It says "Be Your Own Kind of Beautiful." I think that goes for just being who you are in our own individual otherness.
ReplyDeleteI love that ad. It took me a long long long time to understand that it's okay to just be me :(
DeleteWell, I don't think I am one of the shocking teaching movers, but definitely three big cheers for otherness!
ReplyDeleteNo, Andrea, you are not shocking (which is probably good to hear), but you are a teacher mover!
DeleteAnd thank you for your great blog! :D
ReplyDelete:)
DeleteWell, with as much as we have in common, I'd say we're alike in our otherness.
ReplyDeleteAs for feeling different as a mom? I'm dreading the back to school night tomorrow where most of the kindergarten moms are in their 20's and I'm old enough to be THEIR mom.
Maybe that was a part of it, Jewels - - I was 35 when my first child was born! But, you're cool. I don't think I was ever cool - - that reminds me of a woman who bore her testimony when we first moved here - - She said she wanted to be the "cool" mom. I thought that was weird. I mean, to actually BE cool is fine, but to ASPIRE coolness is kind of creepy (as a mom, that is) - and especially to express that in a testimony!
DeleteThanks for all that you share, too!!
ReplyDelete:). Hope your school year is great!
DeleteRight back at you, kid!
ReplyDeletexoxo The Biggest Dork in the Room
I agree with Marianne: right back at ya!
ReplyDeleteThanks, Dana :)
DeleteKeep shocking you? Challenge accepted! :D
ReplyDeleteI knew I could count on you, Kellie :)
DeleteI remember always feeling different too. I think we all feel that way, b/c we're looking outward and thinking everyone else is sure and confident. I don't know why we always project that. We're just fragile I guess. I think it's God that ultimately give us assurance and peace that we are OK.
ReplyDeleteCouldn't agree more :)
DeleteNo no - thank YOU! :)
ReplyDeleteYou are so welcome and thank YOU for YOU!!! I embrace you right back and appreciate all your openness and sharing it is what makes our community here in blogosphere so unique and special we can bare our souls and not cringe at being otherness because we are all otherness together. Everytime we feel lonely and write about less then cheery things there is ALWAYS a blog friend or 2 or agzillion to jump in with a great pick me up ...it is PRICELESS...and I am so glad to call you friend!!
ReplyDeleteLikewise, for sure, friend! Otherness rocks!!
DeleteJudy - you always evoke a reaction in me and often your words encourage me to to give more thought to a belief of my own. That;s a good thing. I don't necessarily change my mind but at least I question my beliefs and opinions - a good thing, I think.
ReplyDeleteThanks --
I'm sure there's been a time or two when you AND Mark are screaming at me while you're reading! haha. But, it IS good to think and not be so "stepford" in the way we live, if that makes sense. You and your brother both do that for me. And I love reading about your work - - hint hint
DeleteGot it, Judy! ;)
Deleteokay, will do
ReplyDeleteYou're very dependable, you New Yorkers :)
DeleteExactly! Thank you Judy! I feel the same when I read your blog.
ReplyDeleteYour posts always make me smile, Michelle - - no shockers there!
Delete@Judy - You are the peace to my shocking world.. :)
ReplyDeleteMy blogging life would be so much less fun without you and your honesty and your "shocking" posts! haha
DeleteI haven't been visiting you so much lately and now I get the privilege of hearing you saying 'thank you :-)'
ReplyDeleteHaving said that --I am back and love reading your blogs!
Glad you are back :)
DeleteOh that thought of being a new mom that is different is so true for me too! I can see already that I am so much more confident with this second child then I was with the first. I hope your confidence builds and builds!
ReplyDeletethanks! nothing like a little life experience to give you self-confidence :)
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