Gratitude.....

Sometimes in all the chaos of daily life, it's hard to remember to be grateful. Life gets heavy and hard and tiresome and too much- and it is also always beautiful.

Beautiful in a way that friends who haven't seen each other for years can pull together because a classmate has been in an accident. Beautiful that as a mother asks for the community to pray for her child, not a moment can pass before the prayers begin. Beautiful that it in my darkest hours Heavenly Father sent one angel after another to offer comfort, grace, and mercy, understanding and hope. Life is truly beautiful.

This doesn't mean that you or I have a set quota of hardships to be endured. Absolutely not. The harder you fight, the harder life gets.  The more you strive for greatness the further you may find yourself from gratitude, because we need to always remember. Remember that on our best days, someone may be experiencing their worse. Remember that just as angels came for me- I know they will come for you.  Remember to be grateful for the trials and when the joy comes, as it always comes, be quick to be grateful for that as well.  Remember that the very fact your heart beats and you have the opportunity to be someone's angel is reason enough to be grateful.

So I'm off to climb into bed. To lay next to another sweet fella that snores and be grateful for that. The first night I heard his heart beating in the quiet, I wept with gratitude for a sound I thought I would never hear again in my lifetime. Sure it's a different beat but it is in the act of motion- it is life and for that I am grateful.

All my love,

Kami

Sometimes Life is Messy......

Three years ago I never thought I'd find myself here.  In fact, never in my wildest dreams did I ever envision that I would be a widow at 35, remarried by 37 and attempting to figure out how life is supposed to work from this angle.
It is T-O-U-G-H.
It is a good tough at times.  You know, the kind that causes you to stretch, grow, become something....more.  Anytime you are attempting to change, it's going to be hard.  It has to be hard. Otherwise, everyone could do it.  I'm not everyone and neither are you.
I don't think that Eric or I had any idea just how difficult this would be.  The bottom line is that love cannot be forced and acceptance doesn't come easy.  Both of which I thought I had some control over- I'm learning more and more that I can only control myself and for a control freak that is hard to swallow.  Each day is it my prayer that I can be who all of our children need me to be, and love each of them as they need to be loved.  Each day I fall short.  Each day that is OK.
This causes my noggin' to drift back three years to when it all was so much smoother.  When you marry and have children with someone and have a good, somewhat healthy relationship; everything seems to find its rhythm.  When you walk side by side with someone for so long you learn to anticipate their reaction, their needs, their way of handling the outlandish.  In our home, now, we're all still learning the steps to this dance.
I think we've all figured out how to love each other, we just haven't figured out how to freely express it and that hesitancy tends to cause gaps.  Please don't misunderstand- I wake up each day happy to have the life I have, happy at a second chance at this life, happy that my kids are happy and at peace with the decisions I've made that have lead me here.
I wish I was better at embracing the moment.  One of the many regrets I had after losing Stevie was that I hadn't lived in the moment better.  I watched from the window, instead of dancing in the rain. Gaps, gaps, gaps.  Endless gaps.  If I allow myself, I think back to those moments and where there are gaps, I insert myself and the whole memory is cast in a golden hue.  It becomes whole.  When I find myself watching as gaps form in my life now, I can't for the life of me figure out why I'm still allowing this to happen.  I thought I had learned my lesson.
SO- this will be my goal for a while.  To stop the gaps from happening.  To embrace the now, and jump with my eyes closed into emotions, moments, love, myself.  I haven't been true to myself consistently since Stevie died and by neglecting this truth I haven't allowed others to know me as I truly am.  The fear of losing again, the fear of not being accepted fully as Stevie accepted me, has kept me from experiencing life in true color over the course of these years.
I will definitely keep you posted as to how this all turns out, because change is scary.  It's even scarier to embrace who you are and allow others to embrace you as well, but I'll try and hopefully it will help you to try as well.
Here's to a gapless life!
Kami