Anyone who has spent any amount of time around me in the morning
knows that I enjoy a good cup of coffee. Whether it be after a late night out
with friends, $1 coffee morning at Blue's Egg, or just
necessary to function, there's little I enjoy more in the morning (especially a
Saturday morning) than a hot cup of coffee and a tasty bakery treat. It's my
version of comfort food.
Today
I went to Rocket Baby Bakery for Anodyne Coffee and Cranky Al's for
a crueller. A two stop morning...fun night, but a rough morning.
It's
hard to know...how much do you put up on a blog? How much do you share with the
world? I read an article earlier this year that suggested that people are
oversharing online. I couldn't find the exact article, but a quick Google
search will produce plenty of articles supporting this statement. The article
that I read suggested that because of our constant desire to immediately share
information on social media, that the important events in our lives are
becoming desensitized. Every time you share an experience with someone, the
original feelings you had in that moment aren't quite as special and the memory
of the original event is desensitized. It encouraged people to hold onto some
of those experiences and cherish them personally before sharing them with the
rest of the world.
I'm
a person that is fairly open with my life. You have a question? Ask! If I don't
want to answer, I'll tell you. Otherwise, it's pretty much what you see it what
you get with me. But I'm also a person that is driven nuts by the overshares on
Facebook. I don't mean to offend anyone with this next statement, but the
amount of information about birthing and nursing and child raising shared on
Facebook by people my age is ghastly. Now the response I usually get is
"Well, if you don't like it, don't read it or block my status updates. This
is what's going on in my life and I want to talk about it." My response
is...doesn't that defeat the purpose of a social network? In my mind, I don't
need to see pictures of you or your child immediately after birth
(like...immediately. I don’t car once the baby is cleaned off, but if you want
to show me the icky pictures…do it in person) or hear about your milk
production or problems you're having with it, and I'm really happy that your
child is being potty trained because it is a skill that will serve him/her the
rest of their life, but I don't really need to see a picture of it while
enjoying my coffee and crueller. Is it important for people to have an
outlet to discuss these things and ask questions? Absolutely. But what happened
to people picking up the telephone and actually talking to someone? Where has
our sense of modesty and privacy gone? How much is too much?
So
now that I've ranted about all these other people and the oversharing of their
lives...am I about to commit the same crime? Is it ok to talk about
relationships but not pooping? I don't know. But here goes...
Yesterday
I wrote about things Lost and Found. I've been thinking a lot about losing
things in the last couple of weeks. Usually we're upset when we lose something
because it has some sort of value to it... functionality, monetary,
sentimental/emotional. Lost keys? Lost functionality. Lost wallet? Lost money.
But these are things. Things can be
replaced. It's not always easy and is often times very frustrating, but things in our life can be replaced.
However, when it comes to people it's not quite as simple.
I
read one of my friend's blogs yesterday about how her life was changing. She’s
in her fifth year of college so it’s that time where most of her close friends
have graduated and they are entering another chapter in their lives. Life is
changing. You don’t have all your friends around you all the time. It’s work to
maintain relationships as lives evolve and take different directions. Some
people you might not ever see again. Some people get married. Some people start
careers that become their lives. Some people have kids. Some people move far
away. And all of a sudden these people that you were once close with and shared
everything with become acquaintances whose lives you learn about on a Facebook
newsfeed or Twitter update. And there’s nothing wrong with that…and in fact it’s
perfectly normal. But that part of your life is over. It’s a feeling of loss
because that situation and those experiences won’t ever be able to be recreated.
I struggled with this after college too. Let’s be real, this is
still something I think about. I miss the days of going to the Bakerei
on Fridays after music class with Schlicht, Josh, and Jon…or sitting and
watching hours of Friends or Sex and the City with April…or going to Target and
not really needing anything…or middle of the night trips to Perkins in Mankato.
I still enjoy doing all of those things, but it’s different. And not a bad different…a good different. I have a
whole different set of wonderful people in my life (and some of the oldies but
goodies =) and a whole pile of new and different experiences. Brewers games, Badger
games, Packers games (in my living room) patio nights, St. Louis road trips, Civil
Wars concerts, babysitting, wine nights, Bachelor Mondays, triathlons and
races, breakfasts at Blue’s, late night scrambled eggs and singing marathons,
more laughter, more love, and more people who care about me and are concerned
about me than I could ever have imagined or deserved.
Sometime people come into our lives in the most unexpected ways. One
of my cousins and I have become so close over weekly watching trashy tv
together (and lots of other fun things too). I consider some of my coworkers my
good friends outside of work and their kids are my pseudo nieces and nephews. I’m
friends with someone that was my flight attendant on one of my business trips
from last March. A former student of mine has been there through almost
everything I’ve gone through the last five years and is my lovebucket. I went
to get a birthday drink last January and found someone who has become one of my
best friends and I can’t imagine my life without. There are so many amazing people
I’ve become friends with through other friends of mine. I’m more blessed by the
people in my life than I could ever deserve. It’s funny that when I started
writing this blog post, I was mentally going someplace different…but I ended up
here. Feeling so blessed. Kinda how life goes sometimes. So the I guess the
best way to sum this all up is this:
Thank you. Thank you for being my friend. And I mean this with my
whole heart…I love you.
Until tomorrow,
Andrea
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