FADES IN THE BACKGROUND

So I was chatting it up on facebook with a friend of mine whom I haven't talked with in a long time. One of those friends that you always got along with but time and space just got in the way. Well there we were, she and I were gabbing on about our love for Scrabble and how we can't find anyone to play with us anymore as if no time had passed.

As time walked on in the conversation my grandmother's passing came up and my friend brought up her mother and how this past year was the year that marked my friend being alive longer than she knew her mother. I don't know why, but i teared up. I cried (and I am not a crier.) My friend talked about going to Italy because she realized that life is too short and you can't wait around to accomplish your goals. She talked about how her mother's death taught her that lesson. And as I was talking about my grandmother I started realizing how special that woman was cause of how she treated and loved everyone, despite her sharp wit and tongue.

However, this is not a "life-is-short" blog; we all know that lesson. However, as time marches on we talk less and less about our loved ones that have passed; or we stop discussing why the person we are with or why our family is important to us; or we stop mentioning the things that our loved ones did for us (no matter how small.) This is a very dangerous thing to stop talking about.

If we stop bringing these things up from time to time then they begin to fade into the background and just become the pieces of cloth that is on our skin, and they no longer are the threads that binds the cloths together. These are the things that make us whole. The way someone completes us, the lesson we learned when the person passed, or the little thing that someone did that made us go, "that is why i love them." Those are the threads.

For example, take it whenever in life you learned that important life lesson of "life is short" That time when we learned that lesson helped us put into perspective that hose dreams we have for ourselves or the goals of traveling or whatever are slowly losing time. Therefore that lesson is the thread that can sew the dream to the reality.

Or: maybe the person we love is getting on our deepest nerves one day, almost to the point of us just wanting to walk away. That memory of the time they let you sing in the car without asking you to shut up could be thread that holds the walking away to staying together.

We can't stop talking about these important things. These are the moments in life when we had realizations; when something that never made sense before became clear, and if we mention those moments but then begin to walk away from them and lose them out of our vocabulary, then we tend to go back to the way we were before the lesson was learned. What progress have we made when we do that?

So I say that if your grandmother made you realize that goals are to be accomplished or if your special someone put a note of gratitude in your car visor and you understood why you were with that person, or if your dog wanting you to love on him made you realize that simple things are important too, than don't stop talking about it. Mention it. Bring it up. And keep in mind that the friends that roll their eyes at the cheesiness of the conversation are the friends that haven't learned that you have to mention these things, cause these are the things that are the fabric of true happiness.

It's not achieving the goal that is the true joy, it is the moment when you realize you can do it.

Emotional Food Groups Pt. 1

I have a theory about emotions. I believe that all emotions that we can feel fall under four major categories: Happiness, Sadness, Fear, and Anger. Every other feeling live under varying degrees of these four. For example, jealousy (anger), depression (sadness), paranoia (fear), etc. However with all the emotions in the world I think that there is only one that doesn't belong to any one category: Love.

Though some emotions may cross lines with one of the four emotions above (I.E. Greed: fear and happiness or jealousy: fear and anger), no single emotion is able to cross all four categories such as love. Love is all of those things, sometimes at once. (But we'll save that for another blog)

Imagine this: happiness, sadness, fear and anger are the four food groups. You need every single one of those in your life in order to challenge, develop, or even relax yourself.

Just like the food groups, you cannot be truly healthy by seperating them. For example, how can you truly know how thrilling that soccor game win is if you have never lost those four in a row? How can you know how beautiful life can really be, until you have touched the edge of death? How thrilling can that lottery win be, if you have never had a single day of struggle?

Just like the four food groups, if you have too much of one food, then you are not giving your body the nutrients it needs in order to sustain a healthy daily life. Have you ever notice how annoyed we get when we are around a person who feels only one of those emotions all the time? It grates our nerves. Think about people you know who are alwasys sad, always angry, always scared, or always happy even (sometimes they seem to be the most frustrating.)

However, on the opposite side of the token if we don't have enough of one emotion it can be detremental to our well being. Think about those people who hold in that anger (I tend to be this person) and they never let it out until something very small and tiny has happened and then it is turns into World War III? Holding that anger inside of you and not letting it out in small ammounts creates this well of anger that we usually let out in one inappropriate gesture.

What about holding in sadness? If we hang on to sadness we tend to cover it up with happiness. But then that moment comes when the straw breaks the camels back (and usually it is something tiny) and we just let it all out in one fell swoop, and it takes us by storm, and we delve into a depression.

I think it's funny that of these four emotions sadness and anger are similar, and happiness and fear tend to be similar.

Why is that? Well, happiness and fear are emotions where if we live in them there is no way to grow. We don't become more complex or more intelligent people when we are feeling happy, if we are not careful we can become complacent. However, with fear, if all of you feel is fear then you never venture out into the world,and if you never venture you can't grow. The way you learn from fear is fighting to get out of it, after all that is how you begin to realize how strong you can actually be. On the same token, the way to overcome happiness is to not use it as a cover up for sadness and anger, you have to allow yourself to feel those two emotions.

With sadness and anger, they are similar because growth happens while you are in the midst of feeling those emotions. With sadness we learn as we are crying and feeling that pain in our heart. With anger, we are realize what we are willing to take while expressing ourselves through our voice, through our words, through our actions of dealing with that anger.

I think sometimes, the answer that seems the most practical isn't always the most obvious. We always want to cover the "bad" emotions with happiness. However, by not allowing ourselves to show that anger, sadness, or fear we are doing emotional damage to ourselves.

To go back to the four food groups: If we ignore fruit, we rob ourselves of the sugar our bodies need. If we ignore vegetables, we rob ourselves of the iron that our body needs. If we ignore meat, we rob ourselves of the protein that our body needs. If we ignore dairy, we rob ourselves of the calcium that our body needs.

When it comes to emotions we cannot deny ourselves a single one. They are vital to our emotional health. However, if those four emotions equal the four food groups then love is the chart that holds them all together.

I guess that must mean a Pt. II :)

ALL ABOUT ME

A while ago I wrote a poem to help people understand my way of thinking. Following my thoughts is not always an easy thing to do if I am not editing my thoughts. The poem tells you a lot about who I am as a person and the background I come from. I am not going to use this blog to post nothing but poems. However, I figured there would be nothing better as a first blog post then to tell a bit about me, and what you can expect from Thinking Sideways.

ALL ABOUT ME

So you want to know
All about me
Well, in brief
Here is a list of pointless facts about me:

I've got blue eyes
I've got ghetto lips
I've got a receding hairline.
I'm not small.
I'm not big.
In fact, I'm rather hot.

I've got a ten-and-a-half size shoe
I wear elevens because ingrown toenails run in my family
And I hear that bigger shoes prevent that.
I've had one ingrown toenail in my life.
I've had surgery on that toe so that it wouldn't grow back.
My brother watched as they performed the surgery,
He said it "was cool".
He's weird.

My cousin has had sixteen ingrown toenails.
His shoes fit perfectly.
I'll stick to the bigger shoes.

I have fifteen first cousins,
Fourteen boys and one girl.
She's a tomboy.
I have a brother.
I have a sister-in-law.
I like her, she's alright.
I tell her she made the wrong choice of brother,
And in her words she says, "I know, but you wouldn't do me much good."
I have a dad.
He's from Lubbock, Texas.
I have a mother.
She's from Cleveland, Ohio.
They've been married over thirty years.
They are old, but I love them.
My dad's family is Irish.
My mom's family is Canadian.
They all now live in Little Rock, Arkansas.
Don't ask, long story.

So that would make me part Irish and part Canadian.
Therefore, I was doomed to be a very, very, very pale person.
I also was doomed to be a very witty drunk.
I have my dad's Irish alcoholic love,
And my mother's Canadian alcoholic tolerance.
I begin floating at about two drinks.

My dad's family says words like, "ya'll" and "ain't"
My mother's family says words like "eh" and "aboot."
They make for very interesting conversations.

I have one Mexican uncle.
I have one ex-Mexican uncles.
And when I say Mexican I mean they are from Mexico...
And not Puerto Rico, Cuba, El Salvador, or Nicaragua
Or any other country south of Texas -
Except the country of Mexico.
I have on Asian uncle.
I had one black uncle ( may he rest in peace.)
I have one half-Mexican cousin.
One half-black cousin.
And three half-Asian cousins.
So needless to say at family reunions my family is like a package of Skittles.
Taste the rainbow.

In conclusion, I love my family.
And in a poem about me
They need mentioning.
They made me.
They are me.
They're everything to me.
But this isn't their poem
So let's get back to me.

I like writing.
Duh! Why would I be writing this?
I love words.
My favorite words are
Kumquat
And
Toilet.
I think they're funny.
I do not like the words
Duty
Or
Masticate.
I think they're dirty.

I love rhyming words
This poem, however, doesn't rhyme.
Don't ask!
I don't know why it doesn't!
If I could explain me I would.
I can't so I won't.
I'm inexplainable
Or unexplainable
I don't know which - I'll look it up later!

Or I'll probably just say I will
And won't.

I can procrastinate sometimes
"Why put off till tomorrow what you can do today?"
Because I can do it - tomorrow.

I love board games.
I love Scatagories, Taboo, Monopoly
But my favorite,
My tip-top, number one
Favorite game of all time is:
SCRABBLE!
That's right - Scrabble!
And I'm still in my 20's.

I'm competitive!
I want to win!
I won't spell the word "seize"
When I can wait for the word "seizure."
I spelled that word once
On a triple word score;
While using the "s" to spell another word across.
That's right1
I'm good!
I'm damn good!

I'm a gracious loser!
I'm a sore winner!

I adore crossword puzzles!
I also like prunes!

I really don't know why those two words remind me of each other.
I got problems.
You know what!?!
Sometimes I eat prunes WHILE i do crossword puzzles.
I think prunes taste good!
As do brussel sprouts
And rice cakes
And tofu
And sunflower seeds.

Sometimes I can be lazy
I eat the sunflower shell because I don't want to have to separate
The shell from the seed.
I don't eat crabs, lobster, or crawfish:
It's just too much work for the meat I get.
It's a waste of my time.

Kind of like T.V.
Good TV doesn't exist anymore.
And if it does they take it off the air.
My favorite show is ALL IN THE FAMILY.
No, I wasn't alive when it was on.
I love ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT, 30 ROCK, THE OFFICE
And LOST!
I LOVE LOST!
Although I admit I've been lost sometimes while watching it.

I love good writing.
I love bad writing.
So then I guess I just love writing.
My favorite books are "Catcher in the Rye"
"The Giving Tree" and
"Oh, the Places You'll Go!"
I love Dr. Seuss!

My favorite movies are
Forest Gump
Almost Famous
Adventures in Babysitting
Clue and
Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory
(The old one - the new one just creeped me out)

And then there is music.
Music is everything to me.
It is what I listen to no matter my mood.
Stevie Wonder is my favorite.
Billy Joel is my favorite.
I also like Elton John, Sheryl Crow,
Alanis Morisette, Tina Turner, Santana,
Diana Ross, Marvin Gaye, Cyndi Lauper
Madonna, Meatloaf
And the Spice Girls.
It's true!
I really, really, really wanna Zig-a-zia-ah!

I love Harry Potter.
But then again, so does everyone else.

I love the theater.
I love plays!
I love musicals!
I love Shakespeare!
You get the point1

I'm intelligent!
I know how to express myself!
I have soap boxes!
Some are really, really, really, really, really high!
I'll try not to step on any of those in this poem.

I think in very odd ways.
My dad says that I THINK SIDEWAYS.
He says some people think towards the future.
Some people dwell on the past.
And then there is me,
I see an object and morph it into a million different things.
Therefore, I think sideways.

I love the teaching part of my job!
I put smiles on a face that didn't want to!
I put hope in kids that felt they had none!
I put fun in learning about writing!
I make kids come out of shells made of steel!

I learn from them more then they learn from me!
I go home tired,
But I go home happy:
Extremely happy!
As I read through this poem I realize
That there is no way to sum me up completely:
But I can do my best summation of me by saying this:

I am intelligent!
I am fun!
I am funny!
I am loveable!
I am adorable!
I am crazy!
I am random!
I am unique!
I am me!
And I like me!