What THREE lessons do you want your children to learn from you?
For the record… there are lots of lessons I hope to impart on my children. These were just the first three that came to mind.
Put your music on shuffle and post the first 10 songs.
Post about THREE celebrity crushes.
This will come as NO surprise to anyone who is an IRL Facebook friend…
My very first celebrity crush… began when I was 7 years old. Wil Wheaton as Wesley Crusher on Star Trek: TNG. He is the reason I started watching the show with my dad… and I’m thankful for that, because now it is a show I really love, for all the reasons.
My second celebrity crush ALSO stemmed from a show I watched with my dad… Jonathan Brandis as Lucas Wolenczak on SeaQuest. I was 10. He was in other movies (Lady Bugs and Never Ending Story 2) but Lucas was my favorite character he played. I was so sad when I heard he’d died.
And finally, Ryan Reynolds… I haven’t seen most of his movies, it’s a different style of humor than I enjoy. I liked him first on the 90’s tv series called ‘Fifteen’ on Nickelodeon. And he was great in “The Proposal”. But I really liked Green Lantern. (I don’t care what critics in the DC fandom say.) He’s just so pretty.
Make a list of your favorite things about summer.
Write about something that you miss.
Immediately, the first thing that pops into my mind is being a military dependent. There are so many things I miss about the places/things I had access to during my formative years. I miss my dependent ID card. I miss having the rank sticker on my car saluted as I drive through the base gate. I miss shopping at the Commissary and BX and eating in the food court in front of the BX. (All of those places had a smell specific to them… the way Kmart used to smell different than Walmart… and (to me) it was the same smell, no matter the time zone or zip code.) I miss going to the doctor/hospital/clinic on base. I miss brunches at the O-Club. I miss standing for the National Anthem before a movie… and experiencing an entire base stopping/saluting (pedestrians AND vehicles) as it plays through the base speakers at 5:30pm.
You don’t realize how special these routine and mundane things are, until you suddenly don’t have them. (Not that it’s ‘suddenly’ anymore. It’s been 16 years. But that means, even at 38 years old, I’ve still spent more than half of my life as a dependent (22 years).
You know that old adage “You can never go home again,” by Thomas Wolfe? It means… you can’t go back to the way things were. Cities change, people change/move, etc., etc. The way it was, won’t be how it is… ever again. And if you are a current civilian who was once a dependent… and you no longer have access to the bases you used to live on… this is literal.
Post your favorite movies or tv shows that you never get tired of watching.
There are many more that I could write about… and more that I’m sure will come to mind once I hit ‘publish’…
Write about a quote that gets you going.
“A ship in harbor is safe, but that is not what ships are built for.” John A. Shedd
I found this quote about a 11 years ago, during a time where I was feeling stuck and frozen. I wanted to do something about those feelings, but that was scary.
I ended up going on my first solo road trip that summer. I visited extended family with my sister (the first time without my parents), and also trekked through parts of the country I had never driven through before. I went through all 4 time zones and put my foot in all 3 large bodies of water that touch the US (Atlantic, Gulf of Mexico, and Pacific), within a month.
It was exhilarating, beautiful, and a tad bit scary.
The quote reminds me that, yes, staying home or staying in the familiar is safe. But I’m also capable of doing hard and scary things.
Write about something you’re excited about.
20 years ago I graduated from high school. My second high school.
I haven’t been back to my first high school (in Texas) in 20 years. The last time I visited the campus was summer after graduation, when my mom, sister, and I went on a massive road trip around the country. We visited as many of our old houses/schools/friends/family as we could, and even a few new places too.
I was able to go to my second high school’s 10 year reunion… but haven’t made it back to my first high school for anything official. (It was such a small school, ‘they’ usually just say “all classes are welcome” during homecoming weekend. Someone in the class of 2000 tried to get something organized for last fall… but Covid.)
All of that to say, I’m excited for a trip my sister and I are planning for this fall!! Our Texas high school may or may not do an official reunion… but we aren’t waiting for someone to coordinate that. So, in October, we are going to visit our old high school to see a non-homecoming football game, eat some Frito pie, watch the marching band perform at halftime, and maybe get lucky enough to walk around the grounds of the totally transformed campus. (They tore the old high school building down in 2016/2017.) Not only will it be wonderful to visit the school, wear the old school colors, and maybe even dig out the old class ring… it will be really wonderful to do those things with my sister, who I haven’t seen in far too long! #thankscovid
It’s exciting to be planning travel adventures again!
Write about FIVE blessings in your life.
What is something you sometimes wonder “What if…” about?
I know I talk about it often, but being an Air Force kid was (and still is) a large part of my identity. It shaped a lot of who I am, how I handle new environments and people, and (I’m sure) a fair share of my idiosyncrasies. The thing I often wonder is… what if my family had continued living in (insert one of the places we used to live) instead of moving? What would my life look like now? What kind of person would I be? Of course, that is impossible to know. Each move had its own profound impact on who I turned into as a person as well as this present life I’m currently living.
My parents thought they’d bought the home my dad would retire in… in New Mexico ( when I was in 2nd grade-5th grade). But a few years and a move later, I couldn’t imagine leaving my middle school friends I made in Virginia (6th-8th)… until I did. By the time we made it to San Antonio (9th- first half of 11th), I was beginning to understand how each move meant meeting new people… that I couldn’t imagine my life without. (My mom gave me great wisdom about that.) That made it a bit easier (but not less painful) to move to Colorado (second half of 11th-12th).
And yes… most of what I wonder is friend related, (but not all). How would my friendships have changed over a longer period of time? Would I have been in the same or completely different groups in high school? Would I have loved marching band as much without my ‘Friday Night Lights’ experience in Texas with my band director Mr. Wilson? Would I still like the Denver Broncos if I’d never lived in Colorado? (Honestly, probably not… I’m not a fair weather fan, but wearing orange was an ‘acquired taste’ I had to learn to love.)
If I go back, everything is a domino effect. There’s not one thing I would change about my now… so there isn’t a thing I could change about then. I’m very happy with where I’ve ended up. I don’t ever ‘wonder’ these things too seriously… but when I think about them, I consider myself blessed for the life I’ve had so far… how all the twists and turns landed me here… and I’m grateful.
Delighting In Each Moment 