I'm Not Who I Was

As you may know, I celebrated my 5 year blogaversary on the 7th of this month with very little fanfare and celebration at the time. Mainly because that exact day was the beginning of a rough couple of weeks that are just now starting to wind down. I wanted to make a big deal out of the whole shebang because FIVE YEARS seems like such a big deal, but I guess if I wanted to make that big a deal out of it I'd have started planning it far enough ahead that a bump in the road wouldn't have been an issue. However, I am not known for my mad planning-ahead skillz, so here we are 2 1/2 weeks later.

I am the first to admit it - I am a sentimental fool. I cry at sappy commercials, I sit at the airport and watch total strangers greet at the gate and tear up, I cannot not cry when Taps is played at a funeral or when the flag is unfurled and you can forget about me watching anything on Lifetime. That being said, I tend to also look back on my past and reflect. Often. It's not regret that causes me to do this, it's just something I do. I'm weird like that.

Just last night I had a conversation on Facebook with a wonderful friend from high school, both of us on the sentimental side, both of us very sensitive and both of us looking back at our teenage years with a mixture of horror, embarrassment and maybe a twinge of "Wow, wish that had played out differently." The evening's chat stemmed from a recently posted picture of me at age 21 on a girls' night out with the three girls I ran around with our Senior year. In that picture I had attrociously orange dyed hair and GIGANTIC glasses and oh wow, I wish someone had been kind enough to gently say to me, "Aw honey...your head looks like a giant carrot. Please fix that awful mess. Now. Because in 18 years they are going to have reality shows based on people like you." Alas, no one did and there is now photographic proof that I was apparently blind in my 20's.

The point? I'm getting there.

I look back at that picture kind of like how I look back on the blog posts from five years ago. My first posts are atrocious; at least to my critical eye, they are anyway. I see someone who was trying way too hard and trying to perform like a funny little monkey. Fortunately now I have found my groove. I hope. It's taken five years to get me here and it may take five or ten more to make me really, really good. Who knows. I may be as good as I'm gonna get.

... but now, the point.

I'm not who I was.

I find myself listening to a song by Brandon Heath often these days. The song is about how he found an old photograph of an old friend and how he wishes he could show them how he's changed. Coincidence? I think not. This song is kind of how I feel about my life. I am not the same person I was five years ago....or ten....or fifteen....thirty five.... And all the people in my life - in my past - aren't the same as they were. I'm trying to keep that in mind these days.

While there are certain things about me that are the same as they've always been and will probably never change, there are so, so many thing about me that have. And I am thankful for that. I'm not who I was.

If you browse around my blog long enough you are going to find entries written on

...days I was happy and days I was sad...

...days I was angry and days I was adventurous...

...days I was totally in the running for Mother of the Year and days I wasn't...

...times I was scared and days I laughed at my wonderful Oklahoma life...

...days I was sick and days I gave up...

...times I was close to God and days I felt alone and far away from Him...

The point is...if you search this site long enough you're liable to find anything. Kind of how if you're around me long enough you're probably going to see all the different facets that make up me; the good, the bad and the ugly, so to speak. The highs and lows, the ins and outs, the redneck and the diva.

A year ago I began the slow, painstaking process of cleaning all the cuss words out of here, a housecleaning, so to speak - something that made my mother utterly joyous, by the way. It was a personal decision, something laid on my heart by God and Him alone. During the process of seeking out the days my mouth was particularly filthy, I have found posts that make me kind of cringe. I have not, however, gone in and removed very many posts from then, though, because well, it's who I was at the time. It's not who I am now and who I am now isn't who I may be five years from now.

I started blogging five years ago to chronicle my life, my kids' life, my journey through divahood and redneckedness and I'll be danged if I change that. I am who I am. I am not perfect. I am a child of God who messes up and fails miserably, but I am saved by grace through faith in Jesus Christ. I am a wife, a mother, a daughter, a sister, an aunt, a blogger and oh boy, am I human. Do I always hit the mark? Do I always live up to expectations? Do I always do what's best? Goodness no. Do I try? You betcha. I aggrivate my husband, I continually cause my children to loathe my very existence for making them do such deplorable things as clean their rooms and mind their manners, I blog about things that make my mother shake her head, I fall short when it comes to serving God...

It's all a part of this grand process called life. My life.

Yeah.