A New Year

Amazingly enough, December was a good month.  Did my entire office get laid off in which we all simultaneously panicked?  Yes.  But after a few days of trying to figure out just what in the FUCK we were going to do now it all seemed to calm down.  We all took a breath and looked for other employment.  We all found it...eventually.  I was the first, of course.  Like there was any doubt in anyones mind about that.  I can't handle NOT working.  It's not me.  It's not how I operate.  I did take the entire month to finally make my decision and chose to start the beginning of the new year.  A new year, a new job.  Funny enough it's the exact same job I had before.  Same company even.  Just a different environment.  It's taken some getting used to but it seems to have smoothed itself out nicely.  

I miss my friends though.  My boys.  The ones I've spent the last nine years with.  I've been there for marriages, new homes, births of their children.  They made me laugh.  I don't laugh as much now.

We spent Christmas in Missouri.  Moving my grandmother was challenging, but it kept us from remembering.  At least for the majority of the time.  I teetered between ambivalence and anger.  There wasn't sadness.  The goal was to get my grandmother moved, get her comfortable, and then get the hell out of town.  We accomplished it nicely.  I spent Christmas Eve with my father's side of the family.  That sentence still blows my mind.  Many years I did not even think about those people, and now they're in our lives.  Life is strange.

New Year's was spent at home.  Just Thomas and I.  It was better than any fancy dinner or drunken party.  It was just us.  I wanted the year to finally end and it did.  The year that I couldn't imagine getting any worse.  The year that kicked me square in the ass and then had the nerve to laugh at me.  But it's all over now and now we move on.

I turned another year older this week.  I didn't want to think about it but for a brief moment I was sad when I remembered that she wouldn't be calling me.  There would be no birthday card from her.  The moment passed when I remembered that one year that she forgot my birthday.  She was too busy being a drunk.

Her loose ends are, for the most part, tied up.  The burdens that were hanging over my head for so long are practically gone now.  I know it changed me though.  Permanently changed me.  It's not bitterness, it's reality.  I'm okay with my reality.  I look forward to putting last year behind me and moving forward.  Take all the bad I was given and turn it in to good this year.  Learn from my mistakes and grow from it.  Prove to anything and anyone that I am better for it all in the end.  We all are. 

I turned 30 on Sunday.

30.

I have yet to completely wrap my head around it. I don't know what it means. If it means anything at all. It's a number, a number indicating how many years I have lived. 30 of them. 30 wonderful, heart breaking, exciting, terrifying years. And all I can think about is that I want them to stop increasing. Not because I want to be young and stay that way. But because the older I get the older my grandmother gets. My mother gets. My husband gets. My friends get. My sister gets. I do not fear my mortality, but the mortality of those that I love more than myself.

I am 30 and I can honestly say I have no regrets. I wouldn't go back and change an action or a thought because they have caused me to be where I am in this exact moment. I wouldn't change that for any amount of money.

I am 30 and I am so fucking blessed to have people in my life who sacrifice for me. Who scheme and lie just to put a smile on my face. I spent my birthday weekend with the three people in this world who I feel nothing but love from. No disappointments or strings, just love and thinking about it brings tears to my eyes.

I am 30 and I may not have a career in some high rise building bringing in mad baller cash, but I am loved dammit. I feel it every single day. I am loved for who I am, not a front that I put up. I am loved and I love in return.

I am 30 and I wouldn't want to be anywhere else than where I am right now.

Things I Learned While on Vacation

1. Never ever take a cruise in the dead of winter. My luck is such that an unusual cold snap will take over most of the country and our counterparts to the South. This makes for cold road trips, cold ocean water, and choppy water conditions.

Also, I am apparently prone to sea-sickness when on a boat that rocks back and forth like me on a drunken binge.


Note the jackets on and red tipped noses. We may be on a boat but we're freezing our asses off.


2. There's always a reason why something is just a tad too cheap. I swear to the sweet baby Jesus himself being on that ship was like being in a floating Walmart for five days. Babies screaming, kids running, horribly ugly women walking around in their housecoats and slippers. It was like all the trailer parks in Texas got together on one ship to ravage the all-you-can-gorge buffet and take part in the embarrassing karaoke version of "My Humps". The food on the ship was incredibly "meh" and it was more about quantity rather than quality. Then again after seeing how some of my fellow cruisers were wolfing down the food like it was their last day on earth I wouldn't be surprised if there was an emergency case of Wolf Brand chili and hotdogs somewhere hidden just in case we ran out of food and the hungry hillbilly natives got restless.


Thomas enjoying one of the more finer foods on board the ship - soft serve ice cream FTW!


3. After a full and sickening day at sea getting off the ship and getting drunk with strangers is glorious. Also, duty free shopping is one of my new favorite past-times. Buying Mexican Camel Lights for $15.00 a carton made me shed a tear of happiness.


At this particular beach break the Coronas were "all-you-can-drink", so I did.


4. We may be a bunch of white people but we can sure as shit shake a tail feather when we're three sheets to the wind.












5. Towel creatures are fucking creepy.











6. Cruise booze is expensive. A bucket of four beers will cost you a whopping $22.00. $22.00! For FOUR BEERS! A MaiTai will run you about $8.75 and a double Jack and Coke will require you to give up your first born. However, taking photos of yourself with those little umbrellas behind your ears is priceless and extremely hilarious, when you're drunk.










7. After spending hundreds upon hundreds of dollars in booze on the ship when they offer you free drinks for an hour TAKE ADVANTAGE OF IT.








8. I am the motherfucking QUEEN of the self-portrait.












9. The more the merrier. I love my husband, I love my in-laws, and I love my friends. This vacation was just what the doctor ordered for all of us. Were there some rough times on the trip? Sure, if you count the sea sickness and the horrible food and the cold and the cabin fever. But in the end we all made each other laugh. We all had a fabulous time. In fact, we were having such a fabulous time that we ended up adopting more people into our group who saw how much fun WE were having and just had to join us. What can I say? We're likable people.














10. No matter what, sunny beach breaks with unlimited drinks makes everything a-okay in my book.










11. Turning 29 isn't so bad when you get to spend it with the ones that you heart the most. A pot of melted chocolate REALLY helps as well and then maybe a beer or 20.

Birthday Re-Cap...Finally

Nothing bad happened on my birthday. Not a single thing.

I woke up next to the man that I love. I received numerous phone calls, emails, and text messages from the people who I hold near and dear. I had lunch with friends and Thomas. I did a little shopping for myself. I napped, and it was spectacular. Thomas and I had a wonderful dinner and then spent the rest of the night out on the town.

If there is one day of the year you should feel special it should be on your birthday, the day you were brought into this world. I felt special that day.

In the end, it was perfect. A perfect birthday. I couldn't have asked for more.

NBHHY* UPDATED!

Less than 12 hours until my birthday.

Had a damn good lunch courtesy of my boss. Received giftcard and card that made me chuckle because it all referred to us as "inmates".

Outlook for the rest of the evening: Positive. Involves chicken and chocolate pudding. Don't ask.



*Nothing Bad Has Happened Yet

*UPDATED*

Here's the birfday loot so far!



Sweet and funny birfday cards from my co-workers, my wonderful Gramma, and my homegirl Princess!!! As well as some sweet smellin' lotions and soaps (I think she's trying to tell me something) and pink Crocs from Thomas!!! PINK! CROCS! With butterfly button thingies on them!! OMG! I used to hate/loathe Crocs with a passion but after wearing Thomas' on occasion and realizing how gawdawful comfortable they are, I wanted a pair for myself and now I gots them!! Lovelovelovelovelovelove!