I’m grateful for the bruises, cuts, scrapes and sore muscles that are the evidence of a weekend in the woods well spent with good friends. There’s a certain satisfaction in coming home, showering off the sweat, bug spray, sun block and mud of a good time.
I’m grateful that I’ve almost made it through my first year of teaching
I’m grateful for the beauty of nature
It’s called Inferno and it is the current color on my nails. For most women this is far from noteworthy, so why mention it? Because I did them myself… just because I wanted to, and it made me feel pretty.
Wait.
Again, this probably doesn’t sound like a big deal to anybody but me. And in the grand scheme it isn’t. But it’s an outward manifestation of something that’s slowly been evolving for the last few years.
I never liked being girly. I used to make fun of the so-called “girly girls” for being prissy, helpless little things. Then I realized what it was: it wasn’t that I didn’t want to be a girly girl… I didn’t know how. I’ve always felt awkward and unrefined in that way. Like a perpetual 12-year-old fat girl that doesn’t know how to put on makeup, can’t put an outfit together and cringes at skirts because it means she has to sit like a lady.
Then somewhere in all of this things started shifting. And now I feel like that 12-year-old who’s trying to figure it out, except I feel exceedingly stupid, because how did I get to 35 and not know how to do these things? So it’s easier to play it off as not caring than it is to admit to a defeciency.
Then there’s dealing with the shock from people when I DO actually make an attempt. I’m never sure if it’s because they percieve it as being out of character for me, or if I look foolish because I’ve done it badly. Cue my inner awkward adolescent.
Seriously, can I get a fairy godmother to give me a crash course so I can stop feeling dumb?
Silver Tides 