The Joys of a Spring Vacation

Amber "surfing" at CWS last year while moving our luggage about.

Yes, it's that time of year again folks!

It's time for Christian Workers Seminar!  Once again in Pigeon Forge, TN, we will be having a ridiculous and rollicking time.  Of course, I can't speak for the people actually attending the event, but I do know that the little ones who will be in my group will.  I am in charge of child care again this year with Amber, and this year we're adding Shelby Upton to the mix.  Should be a hilarious good time.  Our kids will be learning about God, eating snacks, doing a lot of coloring, watching great movies, and generally just having a great time as kids should at things like this.  Parents won't have to worry about where their munchkins are, and I won't have to worry about being bored or about how long I will be busy or anything else.  It will be a lovely little vacation.

I leave on Sunday.  I cannot wait.

I miss Amber and Kimmie and Garble and everyone, so CWS will be a good way to spend some time catching up as well as getting some sight seeing or just general running around it.  Plus, I get to celebrate both Jake and Amber's 21st birthdays with them while we're there.  That will be hilarious and great.  Kimmie and I are taking them out to dinner on their birthdays.  Plus, Jake is bringing Munchkin, so we'll have games to play.  I seriously can't wait.

After CWS, I am going down to Atlanta for a few days to move the rest of my stuff out of the apartment.  That makes me a little sad actually, but at this point, I'm not seeing me heading back to ABC to finish.  Not any time soon anyway.  On the plus side, I will get to spend time with Regina, Marcus, Jack, Mitch, The Cheat and the rest of the family and the ABC crew.  I'll be making a Felini's run as well.  I miss that place.

Conor.  :)  What a stud.

Then, the last leg of my trip will be spent in Ohio where I will be staying with Amber.  Hopefully I'll get to help with some wedding stuff while I am there, and, what I'm most excited about: I'll get to meet my nephew, Conor!  I haven't seen Nikky since she and Yan's wedding last August, so it feels like forever since I've seen her.  I can't wait to see her and meet the little man.  The pictures of him are great, but I want to get to hold the real deal, and have actual face to face conversations with his lovely mother.  It's hard to live so far away from them.

This trip will be such amazing things.  Exactly what I need to shake up my bizarre sense of complacency and start something new.

Lucky

I miss that boy.  Well, I miss all three of those boys, but mostly I miss the one on the left.  He was closer to my heart than anyone had been in such a long time.  I loved high laughter and the crazy faces he made.  I loved talking about poetry and art and God and relationships and family with him.  I loved that he would with me luck and he was my own personal lucky cricket.  I loved that we use to talk late into the night about everything and anything.  He had my heart in his hand, and I don't think he ever knew it.

Now...it has been a long time since we've had a real talk.  Probably not since he was with me at FUEL this past summer.  That was maybe the best week I ever had.  Even better than CWS last spring or my first FUEL.  I miss my friend.  

What I hate though is that I still feel a little undone when I see pictures of him or here news of him.  It gets less painful and less noticeable with time, but it still aches.  I sometimes wish things could have stayed the same, but it's not my place or my path.  He's not meant to be one of the main characters of my story.  Maybe he's just someone who was a key element of my back story or something that pushed me in the right direction.  

He did teach me some things about myself that maybe I wouldn't have realized otherwise.  He taught me that you have to be willing to fight things out till the end and that just because someone touches your soul doesn't mean that they'll ever let you see their's.  Just because someone tells you that you're important doesn't mean anything if they can't back it up with their actions.  And I learned that I need to be needed, and I need someone to see me as beautiful.  I should not be doing all the work or be giving all the compliments and kindnesses.  You can only be in love alone for so long before it starts destroying who you really are.  Sometimes you really do just have to let go and run.  You gotta see if someone's gonna follow you, and you have to accept it when it becomes apparent that they don't even notice that you're gone.

Sometimes the hardest thing to take is the truth: they never loved you.  You weren't important...not to them.

And that's when I realized something else, just because he never saw me, it doesn't mean that I'm not important.  

I am important.  I am loved.

This last picture is from last Christmas.  Just before break we had a Christmas part at the college.  I have loved this picture every single time I have looked at it because it reminds me of the general hilarity and awesomeness of the people who truly do love and miss me.  You've got Amber in the middle there who was about a second and a half from cracking up entirely because of a. Garble's hilarious reaction to Mitch's present and b. to the general silliness of the fart noises being made the the putty Mitch had been given as a gift.  I am reminded of Mitch sitting next to me on the couch making us all laugh, and I remember all the sing-a-longs and the fact we got Kristen involved super quickly with everything and that even though I'd never really met her, I loved her almost instantly because she's just an awesome girl.  I remember Regina and I making faces while Mitch took pictures and I remember Cynthia being hilarious and insane while playing ERS with us.  I remember that I am loved and missed by more people than many can ever hope to know, and I am reminded of how lucky I am.  

I may not be married or have kids yet.  I may not have traveled to Prague or France or China or Rome or any of the places I have always wanted to go to.  I may not have an important job out in the public eye or having my Bachelor's in theology from ABC or anything really beyond my Associates in Arts in English from a local community college painted gray.  I may not speak a foreign language or have published a book (or even finished one yet).  I may not live in my own home or even have a guy who thinks I'm what he wants in life.

I may not be a lot of things or have accomplished the things I expected to by 25, but...

I am loved.  And I love many people.  I am truly living up to my beautiful name: Jaymin.  I am "lucky" and I am a "special helper" to many people and I am "good luck" for many.  May that never change.

We're going to make it.  And this Christmas is going to be beautiful.  It already is.

I Am Loved

Beautiful letter care package sent to me by Kim, Amber, Hilary, Regina,  Garble & Jeff

 I am so loved.  The picture above is the care package that came for me last week.  It came with instructions on when I could read each my beautiful letters and gave me a full week of love from some of the crew down at ABC who I dearly love and miss.  I have been writing letters back the rest of the week.  Every time I look at those letters or that envelope or write a letter back...it is impossible not to feel like I could explode because of how incredibly loved and filled with love I really am.  It blows me away, and it's a joy to know that I am as loved and missed by these amazing people as I love and miss them.

Amy holding Mara with Colton & I

Mara & Colton holding hands...how cute is that?

 The two previous pictures are of my wonderful friend Amy holding her niece Mara (my psuedo niece) and me holding our friends Carrie & Jerry's little boy, Colton.  I include these pictures because I am missing Amy like crazy today.  I got a letter and a mix cd from her in the mail today.  It is hands down the best mix I have received in ages.  It reminded me just how very much I am completely and totally loved.  I needed this love today because I have been home feeling a little like death.  But Amy's mix and the note that I am so very loved...it blew me away and reminded me of all the awesome times we had this summer.  I am so loved.

Adios for now.  Remember...YOU ARE LOVED!  By me and by God.  <3