THREE THINGS

I'm afraid I've been kind of irritating on Twitter lately.

I don't know why I think it's irritating, exactly, except that I know some people tend to think any kind of (I'm having trouble thinking of the term I'm looking for, but when you go out of your way to be cheerful or whatever) is cheesy.  Maybe I'm projecting.  Hehe.

Anyways, I happened to be reading an article that linked to a Reddit thread asking about what things made people glad to be alive. I like things like that, because you can learn a lot about people and what they enjoy that way. There were a lot of answers, some sweet, some kind of...ick...but then again, it's Reddit, so you have to expect that. I decided to add my own two cents into the mix and instead of Reddit, I put them on Twitter.  Off the top of my head, I thought of these:

1) Walking the beach and finding cool seashells. 2) Slow, hot, deep kisses that set every cell in your body on fire. 3) Dogs. Sometimes cats. Mostly dogs.

Now, obviously, to me those are some pretty damn good things; things that aren't common.

As an exercise, that was kind of fun, but it also made me think about my everyday life.

I don't talk about it much, and that's for a reason, but I've been struggling a bit these days. When you're a kid, and you think about being a grown-up, you always think you'll have everything together.  Most people think they'll have a great job, lots of friends, family, money...whatever. If we're lucky, we might have some or all of those things, in one degree or another.

But no one ever really prepares you for how hard it can be sometimes, even for the most privileged of us. Don't misunderstand, I know that I have it better than 99% of the rest of the world (I think, I didn't check that statistic) but I'm not talking about material things. I'm talking about, just, life.

No one tells you how hard it is to go to work everyday (if you have a job) and do stuff that you aren't passionate about. My jobs are great and I'm beyond grateful I have them, but working reception and in office admin isn't what my heart wants to do everyday. The fact that I still don't know what I want to be when I grow up scares the shit out of me sometimes. I should have some idea, shouldn't I?

No one tells you how lonely it can be when your friends are all over the place and how bitter it can make you. Not bitter at your friends, obviously, because it isn't their fault, but bitter at the universe for taking them away. Of course, you can always go out and make new friends, they say, but it's not the same as having the people you love the most, the people that are a part of your heart, out of arms reach.  Sometimes it feels like you're holding a bunch of balloon strings as tight as you can, but every once in a while one slips out of your hand and it breaks your heart because you can't catch it no matter how hard you try. I'm so glad for social media, and texting, and other things like that, because I've been able to keep my friends virtually nearby, if not physically.

No one tells you that sometimes you'll just be so freaking BORED. That you'll try to find a million things to do to fill your time, but sometimes you don't want to do any of it. You'll wind up sitting on your couch, looking at the internet, or staring at the TV and not really paying attention. If anyone had ever told me that one day I'd rather stay in bed with my iPad all day rather than making something, or going someplace, I'd have thought it was a lie, but it happens sometimes. Also, I never knew that there would be times when the only thing to look forward to would be eating, and how that has wreaked havoc on my physical self. I mean, dude...

But all that being said, it doesn't mean my life is bad. I have a pretty good life on the whole, actually, and I'm glad for that. I also know I'm not the only one who feels that way sometimes. There are days, though, that feel so heavy and gray and as flavorless as old gum. I struggle with depression sometimes, and I know myself well enough that if I can't shake my brain loose from it, I'll sink way down and stick there for weeks, only really living in fits and starts. During this time of year (and for some reason during the month of June) it's easier to fall into that than other times, and recently I've been feeling that way more than usual. Is it a mid life crisis?  Maybe. Who knows?

So, I've said all of that to explain why I've begun trying to find at least three things every day that make me glad to be alive. Some of those things are big, but most of them are tiny, seemingly insignificant, things that no one else might ever notice, but they add just a little light into my day. Sometimes it's a message from one of my far away friends, sometimes it's ice cream, and sometimes it's talking to the nice lady at my gym that makes my workout feel faster. I put them on Twitter because I hope that someone else who might be struggling, can be reminded that little things in their own lives can be really great things too!

I also hope that, if you're reading this and you're feeling down, that you can find three, or even just one, thing every day that makes you glad to still be here. They're out there, I promise.