Kicking and Screaming - - 2008 in Review

I've been wanting to write a little something about this past year...all I have learned, all we have experienced, what we've done, what we haven't done, etc.

It's a couple weeks into January and I'm finally getting to it.

And...well...I'm drained. 

So, as is perhaps better anyway, I will make this short.

This year held a lot of learning. It held a lot of fun too, which is the majority of what is documented on this blog. You can't always get to the lessons learned when there is just too much darn fun stuff to share!  But, beyond all of that, in the background, we were learning. We were growing. It feels like we've done a lot of that in the last FEW years. Or...maybe everyone does a lot of that EVERY year...in grown-up land. :) I guess we're just experiencing adult life! Haha...but, anyway, it's good.  

I learned a lot about other people and a lot about myself.  We didn't actually have a lot of change or big events in our little family (no babies born for this whole year! First time in three years!) but we experienced a lot of external events and change...not the kind that hit you from the inside, more the kind that blow past you, ruffle you up a bit and you have to figure out how not to let it knock you over.  

We tried, tried, tried. Fought, fought, fought to keep our heads on straight and our feet on the ground.  

I discovered that kindness doesn't always exist where you wish it would.

I discovered that honesty isn't always something that people have to offer.

I also discovered that you can't always know why.

You can't always understand.

You can't always protect yourself or the people you love, no matter how hard you fight. No matter how big of a fit you throw.

So, you just draw the best boundaries you can and then...you just accept.  Even when it's scary.

You can't always control your world. You can't always be prepared...

"in case..."

Because, when "in case" comes, preparation doesn't necessarily change anything.

And sometimes, maybe...it doesn't come at all.

I discovered that just because we know what's right and what's good for us doesn't necessarily mean that's what we choose (a concept that had brought me intense frustration and yet I didn't realize this applied to me until I found myself eating cookie dough by the spoonful at the end of a particularly stressful day...as lightening struck my brain with understanding, the spoon dangling from the corner of my mouth, it was a strange moment of clarity...)

I discovered that no matter how little any given person's opinion of me and my life matters to me, I will still beat my head against a wall with frustration that I am misunderstood.

I discovered I long to be understood.

And that I really...really...need to give that up.

Before I break my head. Or a wall.

I learned to think of people like that as "the tabloids." (It's a little easier to deal when you're pretending to be rich and famous...instead of a Misunderstood Mandy, I am Jennifer Lopez who, with a flip of her hand, casually dismisses the ridiculous notion sitting on the front page of a meaningless magazine that Marc Anthony has abandoned my twins and I to run off with the nanny's brother...)

I found that, at my heart of hearts, I really am a fighter. I wouldn't have guessed it.  I fight for what I believe to be true, good and important, without even thinking about it.  

But, sometimes I fight a little too forcefully. And sometimes that fighting energy could be turned inside out and used to strengthen those good and important things...my home and family.  

So, I tried to stop kicking and screaming.

And just learn.

And hopefully, in learning, teach my children that you don't always have to fight when you feel threatened. (though, I suppose they are allowed a certain amount of kicking and screaming as a right of passage through toddler-hood) 

Instead, you can strengthen from the inside out so that even the most threatening winds will blow past you, leaving you unmoved.  Even the most cruel of life's realities can approach you and you can stare them down. And you will never have to do it alone...but, always, with a family built for the eternities surrounding you. 

So, we move into 2009...not kicking and screaming, but building a strong foundation on all fronts. And, darn it, enjoying ourselves as we do so!

Because, as a very special lady said, 

"The only way to get through life is to laugh your way through it.  You have to either laugh or cry. I prefer to laugh. Crying gives me a headache."

 - Marjorie Pay Hinckley

Amen, sister.