Please still be my friend.

I read all the time.

I read everything.

I read The Hunger Games trilogy in less than 24 hours.

I read To Kill a Mockingbird multiple times each year.

I read reference books.

I read self-help books.

I read classics.

I read vampire fiction.

I read the books that make fun of vampire fiction.

I read the shampoo bottles when I’m in the shower.

In all sincerity, I read anything that falls into my hands.

I have loved to read since I was a kid, and it’s something that just never went away.

Generally, I am super thankful for the fact that I am so well-read.  My love for books is one of the huge reasons I chose to obtain a degree in English Education.  I absolutely love it when a kid who claims to “hate to read” gets super excited about a book and ridiculously invested in the characters. 

But it is kind of impossible for my love for all things literary to not have an effect (Daddy spent a long time this weekend teaching me the difference in affect and effect... I think I finally understand it.) on my everyday life. 

I went to a Halloween party on Saturday night, and a costume was required.  There were some awesome costumes there.  We had Mary Poppins and Bert.  Fred and Wilma Flinstone were in attendance, as were a honeybee with her own personal beekeeper. 

Me?

I went as The Tell-Tale Heart.  Yup.

I dressed up as a dismembered body part from an Edgar Allen Poe short story.

Thank God for my Daddy, who loves literature as much as I do, who took time out of his afternoon to help me build this costume.  Yes... power tools and linseed oil were involved. 

No, I wasn’t allowed anywhere near the power tools.

For this reason, I still have all of my fingers. 

I have decided it’s a good thing that I am a huge nerd.  It is.  Because if there wasn’t something to counteract my level of awesome, the world might explode.

My Exciting Friday Night

This is how wild and exciting my life is: my plans for tonight consist of sweatpants, FRIENDS reruns, Oreos, the couch, and Ellie Mae.

I like to live life on the edge.

If I start feeling REALLY crazy, I think I may finish the last book in The Maze Runner series.

Today was exhausting... both physically and emotionally. 

I didn’t get to bed until late last night due to my need to spend excessive amounts of time on the phone with certain out of state friends, so 7:00 AM came incredibly early this morning.  I mean, the conversations that took place are undoubtedly worth the lack of sleep, but dang. I’m pooped.

A surprise encounter with a certain he-who-shall-not-be-named did not go so well, and that sucked the life right out of me emotionally. 

Needless to say... not the best day.  I totally deserve my lazy night. 

But you know what?  Even though today has seriously sucked, it is impossible for me to ignore how fantastic my life is.  In the midst of confusion and pain, I have a ridiculously amazing support system, and they’re not going to let me down.

I don’t get “preachy” on here often.  I really don’t.

But the way that so many people find ways to daily show me how much they love me, it is impossible for me to not see God in their words and actions.  Because of the love and support that have been lavished upon me from the very start of this whole mess, I have never once felt as if I was walking alone.  Not once. 

I bet that there aren’t many people who have gone through what I am going through who can say that they’ve never felt alone. 

Gah, I’m blessed.  Even on days that get me down, I love my crazy, beautiful life. 

That’s all there is to it.

Now, it’s time to fall asleep on the couch, while eating Oreos and watching FRIENDS.  At 6:00 on a Friday night. 

(Who says divorced women don’t know how to live it up!?!)

35 Days.

In 35 days I will be hopping on a plane for a weekend trip to see two of my best friends in Virginia. 

I’m pretty excited about this. (I only do a countdown for something if it’s super important.)

Kind of like the whole moving to Florida thing… I haven’t started a real countdown yet, simply because it’s still a lot of days away.  However, I do know that it is less than seven months.  And that excites me beyond belief.

But back to the whole Virginia trip… I am flying out of Huntsville at 6:30 a.m.  I will then arrive in Washington, DC at 9:24.  I leave DC at 10:30 and arrive in Boston, MA at 11:56.  Finally, I leave Boston at 1:20 and arrive in Richmond, VA at 3:05 p.m.

Yes, the random, funny stuff that happens to me is what makes up the meat of this blog, but I’m praying that for this one day, my life is normal and uneventful.  I’m sure it would make for a wonderful post, but I would really prefer it if this trip goes perfectly and according to plan.  I’m shooting for no disasters and no missed flights.  I’m 27.  Surely I can travel unattended, right?

The night before last I got an earring stuck in my hair.  Not just kind of stuck, but so stuck that I had to wait for Joey to finish brushing her teeth and washing her face to help me get it untangled.

Two weeks ago, I had the same misfortune with a round hair brush.  After my attempts at freeing the brush, all you could see was the handle.  That situation required the assistance of friends as well.

A few months ago, I tried to throw my gum out of my car window as I was driving down 72.  Yup.  It came right back in the window and found a home in my hair.  That particular incident required a quick “fix it” job with scissors and then an emergency hair appointment to correct the damage.

My boarding passes can’t get tangled in my hair, right? 

Ode to Cowboy Boots

It’s the time of year

Where my outfit isn’t complete

Unless there are cowboy boots

Gracing my feet

My love for cowboy boots

It doesn’t really make sense

I didn’t grow up on a farm

I have never mended a fence

I have a degree in English

How redneck can I really be?

I say that as I’m wearing my boots

And a Mossy Oak hoodie

I’m terrified of horses

And cows, they really smell bad

My efforts at being a country girl

Are truthfully quite sad

But there is something about the first moment

When I first slide my feet into a pair of boots

That makes me wish I wasn’t such a poser

And that I really was just getting back to my roots.

E.E. Cummings, who???

Jessica the Wanderer

I really do feel like a nomad.  I just moved into my fourth place in three months… 

This spring, however, I will be moving a fifth time.  Now that I have talked to my parents about it, I am comfortable sharing the following news with the world: I really am moving to Jacksonville, Florida in May!  The details aren’t completely worked out yet, and there are still several decisions to be made, but I’m definitely going. 

I’m not sure that I have ever been more excited about anything in my entire life.

Two of my best friends are moving down there to work and establish residency for grad school, and I’m hopping on that train and going with them.  The Jacksonville area has the second largest school district in the state, so maybe I will be able to get a teaching job?  If not, it is such a big city that I’m sure I will be able to find a job doing something.  I just know that being out of Florence, Alabama will be the absolute best thing that can happen to me.

No one will look at me with pity.  No one will have to speak oh-so-carefully around me, in fear of bringing up what happened.  No one will know about everything that went down and how badly I was hurt and humiliated.   (I’m not saying that I don’t appreciate all the kind words that have come my way and all the concern people have shown.  I appreciate the support everyone has given me more than I can express.  It’s just hard to be constantly reminded of what happened.) 

No one there (aside from Brooke and Alyssa, of course) will know anything about me. 

Well, they’ll figure out that I’m awesome within a matter of seconds.  Duh.  But aside from that, I will be able to start from scratch. 

I think that I deserve a fresh start.

I think that I deserve to experience all the things that I never got to experience.

I think that I deserve to be happy.  And as much as I love this place, and as much as I love so many of the people that are in my life here, that isn’t going to happen in Florence, Alabama.

Those of you who really know me, you know I don’t say I’m going to do something and then not do it.  If I say I’m going to make it happen, I’m definitely going to act on it. 

So, yes.  This is really happening.

Feel free to start planning my surprise going away party.  I know that I’m not leaving for months, but the more time you spend planning, the more spectacular it will be!

On an unrelated note…Ellie Mae is now has a roommate of the feline variety.  The cat weighs almost 3 times as much as she does, and they have the funniest relationship ever.  They don’t fight.  I actually think that both of them have a strong desire to be friends, but don’t really know how to go about it.  Jack (the cat) can’t really figure out who or what Ellie Mae is. I’m pretty sure that he thinks she is some kind of toy. They follow one another around the house, in slow motion, for hours at a time.  I am going to do my best to capture it on video.

On another unrelated note, I had a crazy couch adventure on Saturday.  One of the biggest things that I had insisted on keeping in the whole divorce debacle was our living room couch.  It is quite possibly the kind of couch Jesus sits on in heaven.  It’s that amazing.  Well, it was no problem loading it into the U-Haul.  (And by no problem I really mean that I stood there and watched as two really big guys struggled to get it situated.) 

Yeah.  No way in hell was that couch going to fit in the door at Joey’s.  We turned it every direction you can imagine.  Nothing.

Finally, I gave up, hopped back in the U-Haul, and went and bought a new couch. 

That one wouldn’t fit in the door, either.

I’m totally kidding.

Amazing how much measuring actually helps.

My Bucket List.

 Kind of.

I want to do all of the following things before I turn 30.  I think normal bucket lists are generally things that people want to do before they die.  Right?

I’m giving myself a time limit, though.  I have a little over 2 years, and now, I have NOTHING stopping me from doing whatever the heck I want to do. 

1)      Get another tattoo.  I want a white ink tattoo on my collarbone that says “delete the adjectives.”   That is part of one of my favorite lines from To Kill a Mockingbird, and I think it would be a fabulous, fabulous tattoo.

2)      Skydive.  I know, I know.  With my horrid luck, that is a disaster waiting to happen.  But I want to do it so bad.

3)      Spend the night on the beach.  (Since I am currently working on moving to Florida, this one may be quite easy to accomplish.)

4)      Kiss a complete stranger in the rain, and then walk off without even glancing back.  

5)      Go an entire week without my cell phone or the internet.

6)      Have one of my pictures published in a magazine.

7)      Change the life of a kid.

8)      Go on a cruise.

9)      Hand out food and supplies to the homeless.

10)   Smoke a really good cigar while reading The Great Gatsby and drinking a glass of wine.  (Every time I have tried to smoke a cigar before, I have thrown up.  I am going to figure out how to do it correctly.  I am.)

11)   Crash a wedding.

12)   Graffiti the side of a railroad car.

13)   Take a Greyhound bus to a city to which I have never been, spend the day, and come back home.

14)   Participate in a flash mob.

15)   Write a rap song about the parts of speech.

16)   Visit my brother in Hawaii. 

17)   Learn how to change the oil in my car.

18)   Quit biting my nails… for good.

19)   Fall hopelessly and stupidly in love.

20)   Give $100 dollars to someone, hug them, and walk away.

21)   Join a random group of protestors and picket like I truly believe in their cause.

22)   Somehow, someway, I am going to manage to work the lyrics of “My Heart Will Go On” into a regular conversation without the other person realizing it. 

23)   Go to midnight mass on Christmas Eve at a Catholic church.

24)   Master when to use “affect” and when to use “effect.”  Yes, I have a degree in English.  Yes, this still confuses the mess out of me.

25)   Kill a deer.

26)   Pick a random person to follow for a whole day. 

27)   Go to a casino, and stop while I’m ahead.

28)   Memorize all the verses in the Bible that talk about God’s grace. He is good, even though I’m generally not.  I need to be able to back up that statement with scripture.

29)   Have adventures with my best friends that are so insane we will never be able to tell anyone else about them.

30)   Live well.  After all, that is the absolute revenge.

Not going to lie… I’m pretty pumped about this.  If there are any of these with which you want to help me or of which you want to take part, let me know. 

When I set my mind to it, I'm pretty good at making things happen.  Just ask the girls that were in Nashville with me this past weekend... ha.

Wanderlust?

There is a big, strong guy who lives in one of the apartments above my office.  His girlfriend has agreed to let me borrow him for the day on Saturday to help me move… and he has driven a U-Haul before.  So no worries boys and girls, you are safe to travel the roads of Florence this weekend. 

For the first time in my life, I think I have wanderlust.

I came to Florence when I was 18 to go to college, and I have never really considered living anywhere outside of this area since then.  I love this town and I love the people.  I love my friends and I love the familiarity of it all.

But when I woke up this morning, I was so angry that I was here and not somewhere else.

Maybe I am just weirded out by the fact that for the first time in 7 years, I have complete and uninhibited freedom?  Of course I have my job and a few other obligations, but I can do what I want to do pretty much whenever I want to do it.

I can’t help but wonder about what else is out there.

One of my brothers has been in Italy for four years and is moving to Hawaii at the beginning of next year.  My other brother recently moved from upstate New York to a beach front condo in Ft. Pierce, Florida.  They’re living these awesome lives and seeing and experiencing so many things.  I never thought that I would have the option to just pick up and move away and start completely fresh.  And I was okay with that.

But things changed. 

Even though I poured every ounce of my everything into keeping it from happening, things changed.

Last night one of my friends quoted an old school Foo Fighters song to me.

It’s times like these you learn to live again.

I’m not sure that any words have ever hit closer to home. 

It’s so, so scary.

But I think I’m ready to live again. 

Really live.

I’m not positive what my next step is going to be.  I am currently looking at which states accept an Alabama teaching license and which areas of those states are in the most desperate need for teachers.  I think that's a good start, right?

This is such a weird feeling.  But I know that I have to get away from here.  Somehow, someway.  I need to get away.

And you know what?  I’m going to figure out a way to do just that.

(P.S.  I love you, Alyssa. So much.  And I’m so glad that you are amazing enough to be able to quote a Foo Fighters song that was released when you were 12… ha.)

Nashville loves me.

And I love Nashville.

The past three days were the absolute most amazing and wonderful three days of my life. 

I have been saying that a lot lately, I think.  It’s like my world keeps getting better and better by the minute, and each amazing thing that happens somehow tops something that I never thought could be topped.

I have always loved Nashville—everything about it.  There is something about that place that is like a drug to me.

I can’t get enough of it.

The combination of being in my favorite city with some of my favorite people was almost enough to make my poor heart explode.  

We ate awesome food.

We listened to amazing music.

We danced for hours on end with people that we will never see again.

A 32 year old Irish man commandeered my phone and announced to the world of twitter that “I could use a good poo.”  

Classy, I know.  

Speaking of the Irish guy, he was there with three of his Irish friends.  Upon initial conversation, I was completely convinced that all four of them were faking their accents in order to up their chances of gaining female attention.  I may or may not have demanded that each of them show me their identification. 

They were really Irish.  I begrudgingly apologized for my false accusations and returned their very real passports.

I wish I could say, “My favorite part of the weekend was when __________________.”   But I can’t.  I honestly can’t think of a single thing I wish had happened differently.

I will say this.  It absolutely broke me to drive back home toward Alabama knowing that the girls who are such a huge part of me were headed the opposite direction… back to Virginia. I ugly cried.  Like, people driving beside me on the interstate were staring at me. 

Cool.

My life is absolutely beautiful.  It’s crazy and wonderful and more than I ever imagined it could be.  How awesome is it that I have friends who are so amazing that I literally fall apart when I have to leave them?

My God is good. And He finds new ways each day to love me and show me His  grace. 

The summer of the school bus.

When I was 19 years old, I moved to Virginia for the summer to work at a small, Baptist affiliated camp.

Upon arrival, it was determined that of the five counselors (also college students) there, I was the only one who knew how to drive a stick shift. 

Looking back, I wish with my whole heart that I would have lied about my capabilities.

Turns out, being the only person capable of driving a stick shift meant that I was automatically selected to drive the camp’s school bus. 

Not just a van.  Not even a short bus.

Oh no.

It was a full sized late 60s/early 70s Blue Bird school bus. 

After less than 30 minutes of instruction, I was given the keys and told “She’s yours!”

I want all of you to paint a mental picture of this.  As I said yesterday, I struggle driving a Ford Focus without incident.  Please, for a few seconds, channel your energy into imagining me trying to maneuver a 37 foot school bus along narrow, winding, country back roads.

It wasn’t pretty. 

At the entrance to the camp, there was a gate.  Someone would open it each morning and lock it up each night.  As resident bus driver, I had maneuver the massive hunk of steel on wheels through these gate posts, and then make an almost immediate 70° turn. 

I hit one of the posts every single day.  No exaggeration. On a really good day, I would hit more than one post at once.  I’m not sure how that’s even possible, but I managed it.

I’m super glad that I wasn’t held responsible for damages to the bus.

If I can drive a school bus, maybe I can drive a U-Haul after all. 

As long as I don’t have to drive through any gates, I should be good.

Right?

(Side note… I’m actually going to be spending this whole weekend in Nashville with a couple of girls that I drove around on that blasted bus.  They’re driving down from Virginia for the weekend, and I’m beyond excited!  I’m sure that many stories will follow!)

Movin' on up...

I’m no longer searching for place to live.  God is good and He provides, and I get to live with one of my favorite people in a house that I have been in love with since the first time I saw it.

I think I am going to have to drive a U-Haul, though.

Nothing can go wrong with that, right?

My ex-husband has agreed to help me load up all of the furniture that he has been kind enough to allow me to keep at the house while this whole mess was getting sorted out and finalized.  He is a big dude, and his assistance will be a major, major blessing.  

I have a hard time driving my Ford Focus.  I can’t park between two lines, and I almost rear-end someone weekly. 

Okay.  I lied.  I almost rear-end someone daily.

I have lots of furniture… an entire living room suite, table, chairs, a bedroom suite, and tons of wall fixtures and decorations.  Therefore, I am going to have to rent one of the bigger U-Hauls. 

Again, nothing can go wrong with that… right?

I’m trying to think of a worst case scenario.  But with my luck, there are about a dozen.

The ex and I are at a point where we are actually getting along.  When we talk, it is friendly conversation and it is evident that we did, and to an extent always will, care about one another. 

For this reason, I think it will be wise for me to park the truck at the road and let him pull it into the driveway and down to the house.  I’m not totally sure he and I would be able to remain completely amicable if I accidentally ran a 17 foot truck through his home.  It might set us a few steps back in the process of healing, forgiving, and moving on.

No doubt, me driving a huge truck will be quite an adventure. 

Heck, with my combined lack of luck and grace, a walk to the kitchen turns into an adventure.

True Story: The very first wreck that I ever had happened when I was on my way home from driving school.  I swear on my life. I had just left Town Creek (dang cop gave me a ticket for running a red light AND following too close) and was headed back to the dorms at UNA.  I looked at my cell phone and not at the road… and boom went the Bronco. Yeah… that was not a fun phone call to make to my Daddy.  (Especially since he didn’t know until then that I had been forced to go to driving school in the first place.)

I’m so good at life.  Really. 

Sloss Furnace was awesome.

I screamed.  A lot.  I said some bad words (sometimes it just happens). 

And I fell. 

Like seriously.  My face made contact with the ground. 

It was a fall of such epic proportions that one of the actors (I think he was dressed as a horribly creepy clown type thing) completely broke character to help me up and ask me if I was okay. 

Story of my life. 

Katie fell a few minutes later, though.  I like to think that her fall canceled out my fall.  That’s how it works, right?

I think that’s why she and I are such good friends.  She makes me feel better about myself…

I know that my life is fabulous, because it seems like every few days there is a moment where I have to stop, take a deep breath, and remind myself that this is all real. I really am this blessed.

I had one of those moments last night on the car ride home from Birmingham.  Tears were streaming down my face from laughter, my throat was sore from singing pop hits from the 90s at the top of my lungs, and I realized that there was absolutely nowhere in the world that I would have rather been .

A few months ago, I was convinced that my life was over and that the world, as I knew it, was ending.

I am so, so glad that I was wrong.

A few months ago, I swallowed a staple.  (I mentioned that before, I think.)

Some of my friends in the medical field told me that the said staple could cause big problems and make me really sick. 

I am so, so glad that they were wrong.

Mercury Tea.

I woke up this morning feeling kind of icky and groggy. 

Sometimes I wish that I could just have my Momma write me a note excusing me from work the way that she could write me an excuse for school when I was younger. 

She was kind of a stickler about it, though.  If I wasn’t obviously on the brink of death, she would load me up with a dose of awful supplements and vitamins, make me drink some hot tea (she never let me put enough sugar in it, either), and send me on my way. 

One morning when I was in middle school, I woke up feeling gross.  I wasn’t really sick.  I knew this and Momma knew this. I just didn’t feel good and I didn’t want to go to school.  I tried to sound super congested and miserable, but she didn’t buy it for a minute. 

It was winter, so I locked myself in my room and put my head over the vent, making sure that the heated air was blowing directly in my face.  About five minutes later I moped out of my room with my head hung low and told Momma I thought I had a fever.  After (not so gently) feeling my forehead, she begrudgingly admitted that I, indeed, was very warm and that there was a possibility that I was actually sick.   

When I heard her digging around for the thermometer in the medicine cabinet, I knew that I had a shot of winning the battle at hand. 

See, Momma refused to invest in one of those new-fangled digital thermometers.  She only trusted the old-school models that were made of glass, had a metal tip, and were filled with mercury. 

She put the thermometer under my tongue, instructed me to not leave the kitchen until she came back, and went to start a load of laundry.

For once in my life, I was thankful that Momma thought hot tea could solve the problems of the world.  Because right before she jammed the thermometer (again, not so gently) under my tongue, she had placed a cup of steaming hot tea in front of me. 

Laughing on the inside, I held the thermometer in the cup of tea until I heard Momma’s footsteps heading my way.  I quickly put it back under my tongue and did everything in my power to look absolutely pitiful. 

I thought that the thermometer felt kind of funny, but I didn’t really have time to process that.  I just wanted Momma to hurry up and look at it and see that I actually was running a high fever. 

She removed the thermometer from my mouth and held it up at a certain angle so that she could get an accurate reading.  It seemed to be taking forever, so I continued to sip on my hot tea as I waited for her to see that I, in fact, was quite sick. 

In my head canon, I knew that she would beg for forgiveness for doubting me and cater to my every need for the rest of the day.    

Instead, her features were taken over by a look of confusion.  There was a little bit of fear mixed in there, too.

(Please use a thick German accent while reading the italicized words in order to experience the full effect.)

Momma:  Jessie!  What the hell did you do? 

Me (still sipping my tea): What are you talking about Momma?  I told you I don’t feel good.  Is my temperature really, really high or something?  Maybe I’m just really sick.

Momma:  Surely not even you're this idiotic.  Surely not.

She then grabbed my face and forced me to open my mouth, screaming at me to lift up my tongue.  I’m not sure I had ever been so befuddled in my life. 

Then I saw the thermometer… with its tip completely broken off.

Turns out that it isn’t a good idea to a stick a cold glass thermometer in a cup of really, really hot tea. 

Turns out that the thermometer will break, and the contents inside of it will slide right on out of that joker.

Turns out that I drank about half a cup of tea that had a pea-sized ball of mercury in the bottom of it.

Momma (after hitting the speed-dial for poison control): Yes, this is Christine Grady again.  No, this time it’s Jessie… What are the signs of mercury poisoning?

Don’t try to fool a thermometer.  It isn’t worth it.

Good day, all.  Good day.

Yup. You're welcome.

I was unable to compose a normal blog for today.

Why, you might ask?

Because “Hold On” by Wilson Phillips is stuck in my head.  Again. 

Seriously. 

It is consuming my mind. 

I love this song.  It takes me back to 1990 and cassette tapes and my Sony Walkman.  But I don’t love that it is keeping me from having any type of coherent thought process. 

Happy Wednesday from Wendy, Carnie, and Chynna. 

(PS... The lyrics are posted after the video in case you want to sing along and can't remember all the words!)

"Hold On"

I know this pain
Why do lock yourself up in these chains?
No one can change your life except for you
Don't ever let anyone step all over you
Just open your heart and your mind
Is it really fair to feel this way inside?

[Chorus:]
Some day somebody's gonna make you want to
Turn around and say goodbye
Until then baby are you going to let them
Hold you down and make you cry
Don't you know?
Don't you know things can change
Things'll go your way
If you hold on for one more day
Can you hold on for one more day
Things'll go your way
Hold on for one more day

You could sustain
Or are you comfortable with the pain?
You've got no one to blame for your unhappiness
You got yourself into your own mess
Lettin' your worries pass you by
Don't you think it's worth your time
To change your mind?

[Chorus]

I know that there is pain
But you hold on for one more day and
Break free the chains
Yeah I know that there is pain
But you hold on for one more day and you
Break free, break from the chains

Some day somebody's gonna make you want to
Turn around and say goodbye
Until then baby are you going to let them
Hold you down and make you cry
Don't you know?
Don't you know things can change
Things'll go your way
If you hold on for one more day yeah
If you hold on

Don't you know things can change
Things'll go your way
If you hold on for one more day,
If you hold on
Can you hold on
Hold on baby
Won't you tell me now
Hold on for one more day 'Cause
It's gonna go your way

Don't you know things can change
Things'll go your way
If you hold on for one more day
Can't you change it this time

Make up your mind
Hold on
Hold on
Baby hold on

stop collaborate and listen…

Yesterday it was “Hold On” by Wilson Phillips.  Today it’s Ice-Ice Baby.  I wonder what pop hit from 1990 will be in my head tomorrow…

The scab from my butter knife injury has finally fallen off.  And yes, I am more than likely going to have a nice little scar.  It will serve as a forever reminder that though they are often overlooked, butter knives are definitely a dangerous form of cutlery.  

Be careful, friends.  It’s a dangerous world out there.

As I mentioned previously, I am going to Sloss Fright Furnace next weekend.  I have never been, and I am SO stinking excited.  I am really 15 years old on the inside (Jonathan Taylor Thomas pictures from the late 90s still make me more than a little bit giddy), and I think haunted houses/attractions are fantastic. 

By fantastic I really mean terrifying.                                                

I scream.  I shake.  I panic. I hyperventilate.  I say bad words. 

Then I leave and tell everyone how awesome it was and try to convince the people with me that I was just pretending to be scared the whole time.

I do this to myself every year.

But Sloss Fright Furnace?  This place is supposed to be the real deal.  Like super, super scary.  In order to prepare for the experience, I have been looking up some information online about what exactly it is that I will be facing.  Apparently, in the tour of the actual furnace (there is also a haunted trail… more on that later), there is a “furnace catwalk.” 

That sounds promising. 

Walking on a narrow and elevated path? 

I will be totally fine.  It isn’t like I struggle walking on regular surfaces or anything.  

…

Honestly, though, I’m more worried about the outdoor trail than anything. 

This is how the website introduces the trail:

Are you ready to face your deepest, darkest, fears armed with nothing but a flickering light?

I’m interested to see how they are going to pull this one off. 

Is inadequacy going to follow me around as failure grabs at my ankles?  

I kid, I kid. 

I’m excited.

I am.  I’m not just trying to pump myself up because I am truly nervous and scared to death.

Really.  I promise.

…

Hold on for one more day.

The title of this particular blog has nothing to do with the following post.  I just happen to have “Hold On”  by Wilson Phillips stuck in my head.

I, without a doubt, am completely and ridiculously blessed. 

I’m not even kidding. 

This divorce, it is the hardest thing that I have ever gone through in my life.  No question about it. 

But you know what?

I still laugh way more than I cry.  And that says so, so much about the amazing people who I am lucky enough to have in my life. 

This weekend has been nothing but a phenomenal blur of awesome.  I don’t think I sat still for more than 10 minutes at a time (unless I was sleeping or editing pictures), but it was so worth it.  When I say that my stomach and cheeks hurt from laughing and smiling so much, it isn’t an exaggeration. 

I almost made it through the entire weekend without any type of injury or mishap. 

Almost.

Friday night consisted of pizza, movies, and awesome conversation. 

Saturday involved a photo shoot with a pretty amazing 16 year-old and then a night out with a few of my absolute  favorite people. Some old-school country music was thrown into the mix, and that made for a pretty dang near perfect day.   

Sunday, Joey (Katie’s big sister) and I decided to sit down and actually attempt to do some real wedding planning.  She is getting married in April and I am the photographer, but I told her from the beginning that I would do absolutely anything that I could in order to help her get everything ready.  We spent five hours focused on nothing but wedding planning and ideas.  And she made exactly three decisions. 

But hey, that is three decisions that she won’t have to make later.  

After watching Bridesmaids and laughing uncontrollably at Katie’s indescribable level of inappropriateness (she showed up right as we were wrapping up the wedding planning…), I decided that it was time to hit the road and make the 8 minute trek back to my house.   I said my goodbyes and grabbed my laptop and keys and headed for the door.

I’m trying to figure out a way to explain the series of events that then occurred.

I was carrying my laptop and its charger in one arm and I had my key ring draped over my pinky finger, ring finger, and middle finger. 

I was almost at my car when the cord from my laptop charger (which was still attached to the laptop) somehow got hung on my keys.  I calmly set down the laptop and untangled the cord.

Right.

In reality, I began to wildly flail my hand in an ill-fated attempt to free the keys.  Yeah.  I ended up with the above pictured key ring jammed all the way down to the base of my three fingers.  It was completely pulled over my knuckles and 100% stuck.  I’m still not completely sure how it even happened. 

I tried for about two minutes to pull the key ring back over my knuckles, but by this point my fingers were swollen and angry and an absolutely marvelous shade of deep purple. 

Hanging my head in shame, I went back up to the door and knocked.  I wish I could say that Katie and Joey didn’t laugh at my predicament.  I wish I could say that since they are such amazing friends they expressed great concern for the unfortunate turn of events that had fallen upon me during the 20 foot walk from the front door to my car.

I wish.

My fingers were so twisted and swollen  that Joey couldn’t even look at them.  She told me, “That just looks like it hurts really bad,” and then wasted no time in leaving the room.  I then interrupted Katie’s hysterical laughter and reminded her that as an EMT, it was her civil duty to help me in my time of medical distress. 

Half a bottle of Dawn dish-detergent later, my fingers were finally free.  Bruised and mangled, but free.

This story doesn’t really have a moral. I’m just kind of bad at life sometimes. 

My weekend, however, was truly amazing. 

Next weekend I am going to Sloss Furnace in Birmingham. 

That’s a good idea, right? I’m sure nothing unfortunate can happen to me there…