Just smile and say thank you

After my child bearing years were over it seemed like I lost all confidence in how I looked. My body felt like it had been run through a ringer with my last child and I felt like that's exactly what I looked like. Then after I turned 40 it seemed like losing weight has been an uphill battle. I found it much easy to jokingly put myself down than to ever find anything positive about me to say.
When you are no longer have the body that you had when you were 20 (something) you start to feel a little less of a woman. But this week a friend of mine pointed out in no uncertain terms that a woman is not measured by her weight or how she fits into her jeans; because beauty is not measured in the numbers 36-26-36.
When I was in my younger days I dressed to the hilt and in a manner that I was screaming for a compliment. But as I have gotten older I'm more conservative in how I dress and a lot more modest about my body. When I have received a compliment in the past I didn't really it serious - I took it more in the context of someone just trying to make me feel better. It's not really a pity party that I have; but more so a reality check that I am not in my 20's anymore and I shouldn't expect to look like I am.
My family has been blessed with great genetics. My Mom looks 20 years younger than what she is and I have cousins that I swear stopped the aging process at 30. So I am spending a lot of time doing some wishful thinking that the gene has been passed on to me and that by the time I am 50 that I won't look like the running gears of destruction.
Regardless though of how we fit into our clothes, how many times we cover up the gray or how many new signs of age that we develop - the beauty that we have should project from the inside of us. Now I am more guilty than most women of standing in front of the mirror praying for a miracle in the form of Oil of Olay. Sometimes that miracle comes and sometimes it doesn't - but regardless of how gracefully we try to age - it's going to happen and we just have to make the best of it.
After I stopped having the body that I had when I was in my 20's and part of my 30's my dad would remind me each time I took a cookie that I didn't need that if I wasn't careful my hind end would end up 3 axe handles and a butcher knife wide. I didn't listen to him and so it came to pass. The only thing that is good about that though is that apparently in the eyes of most of the younger generation I tend to have the right equipment for something referred to as twerking. But by all definitions of that I'm quite certain that activity would require a hip replacement in the near future.
I have brought myself down to earth and realized that I will never be 20 again. I may never have the physique of Jennifer Aniston BUT I don't have to settle for achieving the goal of having the physique of Rosanne Barr. I can still be beautiful in my own way - just like every woman can. We should never put ourselves in the mindset that in order to be considered gorgeous that we have wear a size 2 jean. Sometimes
a woman in a size 12 can be just as appealing.
The other day I got brave enough to post a picture of myself on Facebook because I had gotten a new haircut. If you know me then you know I'm not one to pose in the bathroom mirror and take pictures every day. Several people commented and everyone had something to say complimenting the new look. I felt like I was on cloud 9 with all these sweet things that were said. The difference in that and someone trying to pay me a compliment before that? This time I chose to accept the compliments and it felt pretty darn good.
As women we are expected to look good. To fix our hair, put on our make-up, wear high heels and doll up in prissy outfits. I don't think we always have to go that extreme - heck there are days I go to Wal-Mart without make-up. But we should always put forth an effort.
Putting forth that effort is just part of the battle though. You have to accept the fact that you have your own beauty. In doing that it means that when someone compliments you then accept the compliment and simply smile and say thank you. That's what I did this week and I have to be honest it felt pretty good!

It's okay - have a cupcake for breakfast

Some times there are things in life that happen solely for the purpose of us gaining a new perspective on life or for us to learn a valuable lesson. This week I have had the opportunity for both of those things to happen to me at the same time.

For the last two weeks I have undergone the worries and stress of waiting on some test results to come back. Normally I wouldn’t worry myself too much, but this was with an Oncologist so my human nature kicked in and to be honest, I have let the fear of the worst case scenario play havoc on my mind and my emotions for the last 14 days.

In the midst of all my worries a good friend of mine made me some cupcakes. Now first of all, let me emphasize on the fact that when Cori makes you cupcakes she is not JUST making you cupcakes. These are not the standard run of the mill cupcakes – these are ones that could compete on cupcake wars! Second of all, my friend had no idea what these past two weeks have consisted of, so therefore the cupcakes were just an added blessing; because she didn’t make them under the pretense that she thought I was dying.

Since I began my journey “over the hill” a couple birthdays ago I have to admit I’ve packed on a few (that’s being modest) unwelcome pounds. So bringing cupcakes to a woman who swears everyday she’s going to diet is just opening the door to temptation.

Well I am weak – I admit it – I’m not proud of it – but I am weak. So needless to say I have had a balanced diet of cupcakes for breakfast, lunch and dinner a couple days this week.  After I would eat the cupcakes I would beat myself up for having no willpower, give myself mean looks in the mirror and engage in battle with my jeans to get them zipped (more so than usual).

So needless to say when I went to the doctor this week my favorite part of the visit was not stepping up on the scales! I knew that once I took that step and the end result flashed before me that I would try every way possible to kick myself in the hind end. It was bad enough that I was a nervous wreck awaiting my test results, but the added depression of going up on that dreaded slide instead of down made it worse.

But as I stepped off the scales and proceeded back to my room I overheard the conversation of a lady that had apparently been going through a battle much worse than mine. She had been diagnosed with cancer, had continued to lose weight and by all indications her prognosis wasn’t a positive one. I started to think about what awaited me on the other side of the door. Was what lay in store for me the same thing that this poor lady was going through? Was my life about to change completely?

Without making the story any longer than it needs to be and not going into the lengthy details – for now the results were far better than what I had worried myself into anticipating.

During my drive home I couldn’t get the lady in the other room off my mind. I thought about how much she would probably love to be able to eat a cupcake for breakfast, actually have a choice about wanting to and being able to exercise or how she dreads stepping on the scale for the exact opposite reason that I do.

I realized that life is so short and so much more precious than we give it credit for. It shouldn’t matter if we want to have a cupcake for any meal of the day. We shouldn’t put so much emphasis on the importance of how we fit into the society designed image that we should have. I think that life should be enjoyed – every minute of it. I think we should wake up every morning with a new goal, a new embrace on life a step closer to our dreams.
I still have a few tests to do - but whatever the outcome is - I hope I never lose sight of the fact that it's okay to eat a cupcake instead of a pancake some times and when I do I'm going all out and licking the icing off my fingers too!

Finding a treasure in an old cardboard box

I must make a confession. I am a pack rat in a bad way - not in a way that could land me a starring role on the show Hoarder’s kind of way – but still pretty bad. I have mementos of every decade I believe and on occasion find one tucked away here and there. Not too long ago I was looking for something in the family community storage building and I found a box that had been battered and beaten through time. It was marked in teenage handwriting “APRIL’S – PERSONAL – DO NOT OPEN!” Well first of all – apparently I thought I must have been under some ridiculous misconception that just because I wrote it in capital letters that would emphasize that I meant business and it wouldn’t be opened. (Yeah right – with two brothers who would have loved to have gotten something on me to embarrass me with and a mother and father who cared too much about what I did – I’m sure it wasn’t opened). I looked at the box a few and of course over the span of (X) amount of years I had completely forgotten about the box and its contents. I shuddered for a moment at the thoughts that it could contain something that could leak out to the press should I ever run for office. So I dusted it off and opened up. Inside of it must have been every note that I wrote and received in school. There were old love letters and notes to and from my friends that we had evidently passed to each other in class while the teacher had their back turned. I must have stood there and read notes for half an hour. There I was by myself grinning like a Cheshire cat at some of the memories. What a pleasant surprise that flashback of memories was!

I got to thinking about my kids and wondering if 30 years from what they will have to look back on. With the world of technology being much more advanced than it was back then the only communication that they have is text messaging and social media. It made me kind of sad to think that one day when they stumble across a box from the past that it won’t hold precious possessions like the one that I had found.

One of my favorite things to come across is something that represents a memory. It brings to mind things that otherwise I had just forgotten about. That secret cardboard treasure chest that I had discovered held in it pinkie-promise secret crushes that us girls talked about and from the heart emotions that we only confided in one another with. Today all the secrets are in found on the kid’s smart phones and deleted when the memory starts to get too full. And when they do delete it – it’s gone – buried in a cyber graveyard never to been seen again and certainly not to be reflected back on a few decades down the road from now.

I love to find little notes that my kids used to write me when they were in elementary school and would leave on my pillow or stick on the fridge. Now they just send me text messages that I have to lock to make sure I don’t delete them and if I get a new phone then they are gone for good.

Some times technology is a good thing. I love being able to catch up on Facebook, post a new picture on Instagram and Google what I need to know. But sometimes I just like to have a crumpled up old piece of paper handwritten by someone special. It just seems to have more of an impact.

The other day I was putting away some clothes in the kid’s bedrooms. I opened one of my daughter Kailee’s drawers and in moving some stuff around to make room I can across a sheet of paper all folded up. Thinking it was an old assignment or a test she thought I didn’t need to see I opened it up. Low and behold it was a note that she had passed back and forth in class with one of her girlfriends obviously quite a few years ago (judging by the writing). I couldn’t believe my eyes! I just giggled to myself, folded it back up and stuck it back where I found it and smiled at the thought of what that little piece of paper will mean to her when she finds it one day. I hope that she will smile and consider it a treasure too.