I wish...

that crying would make me feel better. That it would fix this hole inside of me but it doesn't.

Russell says he dreams of Dad every night. I envy him that. I had one dream where I was looking for Dad, but all I could find was the wooden carving we bought at the craft fair because it looked like him.

It hurts to even look at pictures of him at my wedding, knowing that the reason he looked like he'd aged 20 years in the last 5 is because most likely he was being devoured from the inside by this cancer. To see him like that is better than those memories from the last week though. Those plea's he'd made trying to hold on to his last shreds of dignity.

Mom and I are closer than we were. Russell and I too. It doesn't seem worth it to bicker about the small stuff. It's too precious... time, that is. We've all changed though, we're... quieter now... subdued... I feel like all the extra stuff has been trimmed away. This is me, this is who I am, I'm not afraid to be that person and for everyone to see me as what I am.

You want to think I'm a nerd? Fine, I'm a nerd. I feel no shame in being labeled a nerd. I've always been decently smart, I read fast, but I ALSO STUDY my BUTT OFF. I PAY ATTENTION. I'm a book-reading good-girl who will stay home and study over drinking at the bar. I'll answer questions in class and feel embarrassed when I'm wrong. I'm respectful of my teachers but I don't treat them like authority figures or gods or expect them to know everything. The only thing that differs them from me is knowledge and experience... I can get there someday.

I do my job. I take pride in doing my job WELL. I get angered when people are negligent at work or take for granted all the opportunities we are given. Don't be spiteful or mean if I'm taking the steps you never tried to take for yourself. I'm only risking failure. I'm willing to work hard and dedicate the time and effort to doing this. And if I fall, I will keep fighting, would you?

I'm geeky. I wear a backpack even though I've been told it makes me look like a grade schooler. I have the fashion sense God gave a snail (I have patchwork multi-colored denim FRAYED EDGE jeans from highschool to prove it!)

I love Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter AND Twilight. There are merits to all three series. I like Star Trek, and have never seen the Star Wars movies. I HATE Battlestar Galactica, I get seasick just watching the commercials.

I take more pride in the fact that my father was able to give up drinking for the last 16 years than I do in the fact that I graduated from college...

I miss starry nights in the Catskills more than I care to think about, the stars look different from Connecticut.

I sing in the car. Badly. And loudly. I also dance, and wave at truck drivers.

I feel like people never expected me to get married. I dated one guy for five days before meeting Jim, that was it. It never really felt right with anyone until I met him. Maybe somewhere deep inside I just knew.

I would rather spend hours sitting a parked car in front of a Staples with a good friend just talking than go out to a fancy restaurant or catch a movie. I still consider wandering Walmart as an afternoon of fun, but that's Monticello upbringing for you.

I hate when people see my house for the first time and judge that my family is rich and therefore I must have been spoiled. My parents lived in a trailer with no running water and no electricity for five years... then we spent the next seven years in that trailer while my Dad built our house from the ground up. Almost all our furniture is hand me downs from various relatives and my parent's version of a family vacation was driving to my grandparents house in Florida. I've been to ONE movie with my parent's in my whole life. We didn't eat out and never shopped for anything but necessities. New clothes were something for Christmas or maybe one outfit for the new school year. I bought my own first car with money from jobs I started working as soon as I turned 14.

I'm overly generous. I'll offer to pay for dinners with friends, even if it means I put it on my credit card and know I wont be able to pay it off this month. Because of this, I feel like I get taken advantage of and I think people also assume I just... have money. I don't, but it feels good being generous anyway.

I regret not learning how to weld. It's a 'mans trade' but I always had a strange urge to sculpt metal. I'll probably never have the chance now.

I love interior design. I got that from my Mom. I reorganize SOMETHING at least once a week: rooms, cabinets, bookshelves, closets. It used to drive Dad nuts when we would reshuffle the living room every few months. Jim can tell when I'm upset or stressed because I'll go into reorganize overdrive and rip apart a whole room. I intentionally left the den a disaster after I found out Dad was dying. I knew I'd need the project.

I'm getting used to Connecticut but I still miss the quiet of New York. I miss the pride of being a New Yorker, the attitude, the arrogance. Connecticut is just... here... almost a New York City suburb... like a richer Long Island. And there are so many people. Ugh, the traffic. I could never be a city girl, I miss the solitude, the peace, the serenity of nature.