Going Ons

August 3, 2016 / legreene515 / Leave a comment

Hello Lovelies! I’ve been busy lately, and I’ve neglected my blog again. I’m sorry about that. Here’s a little bit of what’s been going on in my life.

I got a Fitbit HR Charge. It was a present to myself. I’ve been obsessively trying to beat a co-worker in steps each week. He’s short, so I think he must take about five or six strides to my one. At least that’s what I’m telling myself. The Fitbit has been motivating me to exercise more again, which is great because I had fallen off the wagon. Now, I’ve been doing Glide about three times during the week, and running about 2 times. I’m still running short distances and mostly running on the treadmill. I went out for a morning run the other day, and I had forgotten how much I liked the solitude and peace of the outdoors in the morning–not to mention the coolness, as opposed to 90+ degrees days.

My son found an Eastern Fence lizard in my parent’s yard, and he decided he had to have her as a pet. Her name’s Spikey.

I spent about $100 getting this lizard set up in a cage with a thermometer, sand, water, a fake tree and a rock hiding place. I do hope she lives for a bit. We bought crickets to feed her, and we put them in a little critter keeper. They are the loudest things in the world. As I’m sitting here they are chirping and driving me nuts. At first, I felt bad that we were feeding the crickets to Spikey. But this morning, I woke up and went to get my coffee. I noticed the crickets were low on food, so I put some in their critter creeper. One of the crickets was cannibalizing the other. I had no idea they did that. Plus, the poor victim was still alive even though half his body had been eaten. Gross. I found this article about them, so I’m guessing these guys are really katydids and the lack of food in their cage led them to eat each other.

I’ve been writing again. Putting my energy into a story that is flowing better than anything I’ve written in awhile. Plus, reading. I read Fates and Furies by Lauren Groff over the weekend. I highly recommend this book, and I’m going to write a review about it a little bit later this week.

And my oldest has middle school orientation this week. Where did the time go? I thought he was still just this little baby.

But no. Here he is, a tween, and looking more and more grown up every day.

Being a parent is so much about loving, teaching, and learning to let go. I hope I’m giving him the right tools to succeed in life. Parenting is the hardest, and every day I question myself. I used to have so much guilt in everything I did. I felt guilty for leaving him at daycare while I went to work. I felt guilty for disciplining him. I almost felt guilty for breathing. I was driving home from work the other day, and I realized that guilt is gone. Why? Because we, parents, are human and we’re doing the best we can. Because I know I am a good parent to him even on his hardest days. I know he’ll look back at his childhood and know he was loved. And that’s the most important thing, right? I also know, that he’ll blame me for a thousand wrongs. But that’s human nature. Boy–do I love this big kid more and more every day. It’s amazing to see him blossom into a young man, full of his own ideas, and to see him making his way in this amazing world of ours. Love you kiddo!

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Thinking Errors

July 14, 2016 / legreene515 / 2 Comments

Blame Game

Every once in a while I start to question my ability as a writer. When this happens, I usually take a break from writing. Or I procrastinate. I put my writing on the backburner as if this will solve the confidence problem I have when it comes to my writing instead of just making my confidence plummet more.

This week, my husband went out of town. He works from home. As such, he also does the majority of making dinner and cleaning the house, and he picks up the kids from camp, etc. He is basically Mr. Mom. I’m not sure what I would do without him, because he LOVES doing that sort of stuff and I don’t. I was lucky, because my niece and nephew were in town so we went over to my parent’s house most nights. Taking care of the kids and making dinner became a collaborative effort. Single parents: I have the utmost respect for you. I could not do it.

But my tween seemed to be having a hard time this week. And he was blaming everyone else besides himself. This is common among kids, tweens, and teens. I was upset by my tween’s behavior. I went to the internet to search why he always deflected blame, and why when I addressed it the whole thing blew up into a huge fight between us, ultimately ending with me feeling guilty. And then I read this great article and realized: It’s a classic thinking error. I found out from reading this article, how to challenge thinking errors when dealing with my tween. His classic thinking error is in thinking the whole world is against him. He has painted himself as the victim, instead of the aggressor. He has done this over and over again, because he has limited problem solving skills, probably because his parents (aka me and his dad) have not modeled correct problem solving skills when faced with certain issues, or we’ve been inconsistent in addressing issues when he’s in the wrong. In his way of thinking, when he hits a kid or gets into a fight it’s the other kid’s fault because that kid was “bothering” him. I challenged him yesterday. And I think it hit home. I’m trying to change the dialogue between us so he can start growing up and realizing that making himself the victim is a thinking error and won’t help him in the long run.

And in thinking about this, I started thinking about my own thinking errors. I have no time to write. I’m not a good writer. If only, I didn’t have a full time job, three kids, and 5,000 activities. I’m laying the blame for my failure to write everywhere else besides in myself. I’m not taking responsibility for the fact that I’m ceasing to create. I’m making excuses. I’m procrastinating, when in reality I have the ability to change the dialogue. I have the ability to tell myself I can write. And I know this, because I’ve done it before even when I was busy. I made the time. I stopped making excuses.

Overcoming thinking errors is hard, because thinking errors aren’t just mistakes. Thinking errors occur over and over again, because we’ve learned to use them as coping mechanism so we don’t have to face the reality of our actions or the intensity of our emotions. People use thinking errors to try to protect themselves from getting hurt. Thinking errors are justification to ourselves when we’re doing something wrong. They serve a purpose of trying to keep our self esteem intact when our self esteem is plummeting. When we don’t take the blame, we perceive an injustice to us that’s not there. When we procrastinate, we tell ourselves that everything else is more important than what we’re meant to be working on. These are all ways to protect our ego and to protect our identity as we see it. But the problem with thinking errors is that they’re destructive. Do we really want to go through life feeling like we’re a victim of our circumstances? Do we want to make excuses or procrastinate until the opportunity doesn’t exist or we feel so hopeless about our own destiny that we throw up our hands and we cease to create, cease to strive for better? I don’t want to be that person.

I’m rewiring my thinking error about writing today. I’m telling myself that I do have time to write. I have time to blog, even if it is 5 words a day. I’m going to stop using procrastination as an excuse not to face my fears where writing is concerned. I’m going to do what I’m called to do even if I suck at it (which I don’t think I do). When we overcome thinking errors, we become more emotionally aware. We also become more capable of being happy, self-confident, and achieving success.

Do you have a thinking error that’s holding you back from achieving success, establishing friendships, or facing your own demons?

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Seeking Understanding and Peace

July 8, 2016July 8, 2016 / legreene515 / 2 Comments

I haven’t blogged in three weeks. I’m sure you noticed my silence. At first, there was no blog because I was in Mexico. Then I wanted to write about Mexico and July 4^th, but I was getting back into the swing of things with work and simply didn’t have the time. Plus, I was using my mornings to read Bel Canto by Ann Patchett (must read!) and my lunches to workout. I gained some weight in Mexico. That story is for another time.

Then this week, two black men were killed at the hands of trigger-happy cops. Again. One man was approached because he was selling CDs illegally out of a parking lot. Another man was pulled over because his taillight was out. Both men were murdered.

I’ve thought a lot about this. I’ve listened to people say things like, “All life matters.” “This wouldn’t be news if it was a white man.” “If you do something illegal you deserve to be shot.” “If he hadn’t had a gun, he wouldn’t be shot.” (The gun one gets me, because these are some of the same people who said in Orlando, ‘If they’d only had guns…’” And the majority of these people are not for gun control). And I can tell you, that there are those that seek to blame the victim to deflect the real problem here which is racism. Those statements come from a place of white privilege. White privilege exists. Even if you’re poor and white you have white privilege, because of your history and because of the way our society caters to white people. Read Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack, and you will get it. I have white privilege and I know it. My children do too. I’m not in the position to understand how the black community feels about this happening. I have never been in their shoes, but I know that this type of careless regard for people of color (POC) is not right. Racism is taught and passed down generation by generation. Often people who are racist don’t see themselves as such.

Covert racism is still racism, even if it isn’t seen as such. Saying that Alton Sterling had a record, or he was selling CDs illegally is besides the point. If a white man was doing that, would he be held down, shot and killed or would he have a chance to be arrested and go to trial? And Philando Castile? He told the officer he had a gun in the car, reached for his license and was shot in the arm—for what? For being truthful? In front of his wife and child. If you have seen that video, or if you have seen the video of Sterling’s son sobbing and did not feel that what happened was wrong then something is very wrong with you.

Look at the numbers of the percentage of unarmed black people being killed in the US: http://mappingpoliceviolence.org/unarmed/. If you can look at these numbers and still tell me that this is not a problem then you don’t need to read any further, because nothing I write will make a difference to you.

I believe there are good cops. I know some. I believe there are cops who aren’t going to walk up to a man like Alton Sterling or a man like Philando Castile and shoot them. I believe the cops who did used their prejudices to harm people who they shouldn’t have. They let their racist views affect their judgment and that’s not okay. Those cops were ill prepared for the job that they signed up for.

I also believe it’s time to change the mentality in the US that violence is okay. In the wake of the deaths of Sterling and Castile, more violence came in the shooting of innocent cops at what was supposed to be a peaceful protest for #BlackLivesMatter in Dallas. This is not okay! Seeing this violence over social media has desensitized us to what actually is happening. These are not movies. Real, innocent people are losing their lives: POC and cops. Real children, wives, girlfriends, husbands, mothers and fathers are mourning their fathers, husbands, sons, wives, daughters TODAY.

I have to ask you this question. Do you want your child growing up in a world where they see hate and violence every day? My children have good friends of color, and I feel for them and their parents. They live in fear that something will happen to them, their sons, their cousins, their brothers. As a white person, I speak from privilege and a place of not having to fear that for my sons. My boys won’t be looked at with a wary eye if they’re wearing a hoodie and walking down the road at night, but my friend’s son might, just because of the color of his skin.

I have friends who are cops, and I live in fear for them that now that these incidents have happened vigilantes will take it into their own hands to prove a point by killing more innocent people. It has got to stop. Gun violence doesn’t help. Hate doesn’t help. Protecting our brothers and sisters does. We can make a change when we start standing up for POC when we become vocal in saying what is happening is not okay; when we tell people we know and that we love that their racist comments are not helpful, but indeed they serve to drive a wedge between us and our brothers and sisters; when cops start turning in bad cops; when we find a way to control gun violence in this country. That change starts at home.

If you’re white, then talk to your children about the privilege they have in being white. Tell them that their friends who aren’t white don’t have that same privilege. Let them know that racism does still exist and that they will be taxed with fighting against it in the future. Tell them to stand up for their friends who are POC. Tell them not to accept overt or covert racism from people they know. Tell them that the solution to violence is never more violence. Ask the US to seek gun control. Provide mental health services for cops who have seen violence and tragedy in the field. I’m sure there’s a system in which cops can report other cops who they deem are misusing their power. Use those systems so that all Americans can feel safe when they’re pulled over for something as minor as a broken taillight. I don’t want to see anymore POC killed for being in the wrong place at the wrong time at the wrong side of a barrel. I don’t want to see any more cops senselessly killed for trying to do their duty and protect people. Let’s change America and bring back a sense of pride in the fact that we are different but that we are all US citizens who seek freedom and the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Let’s show our children that we can live peacefully together, love one another and they don’t need to fear someone just because their skin is a different color.

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Weekly Goals June 17-25

June 17, 2016 / legreene515 / Leave a comment

Today is June 17th. First of all, I’m going to report on how I did on last week’s goals. Then I’m going to assign new goals. And I’m going to let you know that I’m having a vacation week from June 25th-July 1st, so there won’t be goals that week.

Exercise

Run 4 miles on Friday, June 10 — I achieved this. I went to the Y and ran on the treadmill.
Run 6 miles on Saturday, June 11^th. Try to keep up with my running partner who has suddenly become a speed demon. I ran. But I also walked. I struggled with the heat.
Sunday is a day of rest (I think this was duly noted somewhere thousands of years ago) I rested! And swam.
Glide on Monday, Yoga Tuesday, Glide Wednesday, Thursday short run, start over Friday — I screwed up in this department. I did Glide Monday, 2 mile run Tuesday, and then Glide on Thursday. I had lots going on this week, so I didn’t get to the gym as much as I wanted, and the heat and the humidity outside was too much for me.

Food , Drink, Weight

No alcohol on weekdays.I was doing so well, until last night. I had wine with my childhood girlfriends. It was worth it.
Eat more fruits and veggies Done!
Less chocolate Done!
No chips from my chip-pusher James.James didn’t bring chips! I didn’t eat ANY this week.
Strive to lose 1 lb per week until I hit my goal weight (12 lbs to lose) I lost 2.8 lbs this week.

Write every day – I’m done with setting word limits, because sometimes I do less and sometimes I do more, but I find creativity flows better when I write at least a little bit every day. Blogs count too.– Achieved.

So here are my goals for this week:

Exercise

Yoga tomorrow at the lake with my friends! And I may run if I get up early enough. If not, oh well.
Sunday-rest and recovery.
Monday – Glide
Tuesday – run AM – 2-3 miles/Glide Lunch
Wednesday – rest
Thursday — Glide at lunch or run the treadmill (2-3 miles)
Friday – rest

My food, drink, weight goals are the same as last week:

Fruits and veggies
No alcohol on weekdays
Less chocolate
No chips on weekdays (I may eat some this weekend, but anything goes then!)

Writing

Come up with a plan
Finish editing Little Birdhouses or at least work on it SOME.
Finish 2nd girl in the Daniel series and start 3rd.

I hope everyone has a great weekend and that you set and achieve some awesome goals in the following week! Let me know your goals for the upcoming week/month/year are!

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Finished

June 16, 2016June 16, 2016 / legreene515 / 2 Comments

I wrote this for Terribleminds again. But I did have an agenda having to do with the Orlando shooting. Originally, I was just going to post this as a reconciliation story. In fact, I’d written something completely different. But in the light of what happened at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando over the weekend, I wanted to humanize the tragedy. I think so often, we aren’t able to see the human component of death and tragedy, because we are so desensitized by the media and the violence we see on television.

Finished – 836 words

Pounding. Like my head. I twist around in the sweaty sheets and stare at the numbers on the clock: 3:00 AM. The pounding continues. I try to grasp my bearings. I have no idea where I am. I switch on the light to see the impersonalization of a lonely hotel room.

Feet on soft carpet, but all I can think of is the grime of others feet before me. I realize when I’m almost to the door I’m completely naked. I turn around and walk over the sea of germs to the bed, pulling the sheet off and wrapping it around me like a toga.

When I get back to the door I look through the peep hole, but I can’t see anything. There’s something wrong with it—a little crack in the glass maybe—and so I open the door. And he’s standing there. I put my hands up to stop him from coming in but he stumbles forward, pushing back with both of his hands into my chest. I’m scared but it’s a silly feeling because I know he’s not going to hurt me.

He sinks on to the bed like it’s a sponge and puts his face into his hands. And he sobs. Giant ragged cries and inhuman noises escape his throat. They are noises no one should have to hear. And in a stunned moment I drop the sheet, standing naked in the middle of the hotel room with the door wide open. I slam it shut and gather the sheet bunching it up ineffectively under one of my arms so one breast is still visible, but I do not care.

As I cross the hotel room to him, I feel like I’m traveling a million miles and still unsure whether I’ll reach him. His sobs are becoming louder, and I feel a pit of sorrow lodge in my stomach even though I don’t know what’s wrong. I drop to my feet in front of him, placing my hands on the rough fabric of his jeans. His arms wrap around me and he leans his head down onto my shoulder. I can feel the ocean of his tears swimming down my back as his breaths become less jagged.

Finally he takes a deep breath and sits up straight. His hair falls in front of his eyes, and he pushes it back the way he always does with two fingers. I pull back and away from him and feel vulnerable and exposed, sitting naked in front of him.

“How’d you find me?” I ask. “And 3 in the morning?”

“One of your friends told me where you were,” he says.

“Lowell—”

“Shh.” His fingers are on my lips. Soft and inviting.

I hadn’t seen him in a month. Walked out. And as far as I knew he’d gone on with his life. The tears seemed too little too late. He wraps his arms around me again. I feel comfortable in his arms. Our bodies fit together as cliché as it sounds. I was never one of those people who believe in that hokey nonsense of we complete each other or soulmates.

When Lowell and I were together we laughed at each other’s jokes even when they weren’t funny. We didn’t resent each other. We argued and fought and found solutions. And I thought everything was as perfect as it could be for two tragically flawed human beings in love. But I’d been wrong. Because things fall apart. And our relationship began to unravel like an old quilt. One day, I left. I changed my number and walked out. I stayed with my friend for a few weeks. And about a week ago, I convinced my boss to put me up in temporary housing at an extended stay. After all, the reason I live in Orlando is for my job. I would have never moved here if it weren’t for Disney.

Lowell’s fingers slide into my hair. His lips are pressing against my forehead. And we kiss. He undresses and we make love with our bodies wrapped together and entwined like we have never been broken apart. Afterwards, we stare at each other. The soft pads of his fingertips trace the lines on my cheeks as if he is memorizing every part of my face. He starts crying too feeling lost and alone in his arms.

“The shooting last night,” Lowell begins. He seems to choke on the words. “Luis was there. Dad called me and told me today he couldn’t get a hold of him. He asked me to go by his apartment and check on him. He wasn’t there.”

My world sinks. It becomes dark. The hotel room looks concave. I want to faint. Lowell grabs my hands and pulls me closer to him. Skin on skin. Warmth. Love. We hold each other. The tears travel down my face.

“And he’s in the hospital?” I can hear the false lilt of hope in my voice.

“He’s not answering his phone.”

The world as I knew it crumbles into little pieces and breaks apart. I feel like I’m floating. Lowell pulls me closer and the ugly sobs of earlier return. We hold each other, and I try to comfort him. But I can’t.

How do you comfort someone who loses a loved one to a hate crime? There are ways to fix this problem, but we as Americans have to take action. We have to say no to the people who won’t compromise. Does the American public really need access to AK-47s and other assault weapons? The answer is no. Having fair gun control is not banning all guns. It doesn’t even affect your 2^nd Amendment right. It simply makes it harder for people to gain access to guns they can use to exercise hate and small mindedness. These types of guns were created for the military, not for civilian use.

Unfortunately, the Orlando shooting has divided a lot of people instead of uniting us. But our brothers and sisters in the LBGTQ community have been affected. We need to use this as a reminder to teach our children that hate is wrong. We need to teach them love and acceptance. In the light of this shooting, it’s hard for me to understand how people are attacking Muslims. This spreads more hate against a minority group of people within our country. Not all Muslims are radicalized terrorists. In fact, the majority of them aren’t. When are we going to learn that judging others by the color of their skin, their race, their gender, and their religious beliefs is simply not productive? If you think that way then you might want to look in the mirror, because studies shows white extremists have killed more people in the U.S. than Jidhadists since 9/11. The only thing you’re doing by spreading that false information is creating more hate, which leads to more crime and violence. Don’t we want a world in which our children can grow up safe and accepted? It’s time to stop the blame and create a solution. Enough is enough.

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Love, Not Hate

June 13, 2016 / legreene515 / Leave a comment

Enough Gun Violence

I debated blogging about Orlando. More because I couldn’t face having to blog about another senseless tragedy yet again. My children are growing up in a world where anyone can purchase guns with the intent of committing mass murder. Nothing is stopping them from doing this. They’re able to get a hold of guns easily. They’re able to take innocent human lives. The brothers, sisters, sons, daughters of someone.

The news media is blaming ISIS. An American who had been twice-investigated by the FBI purchased two guns to commit this horrible hate crime. He pledged allegiance to ISIS. But if he hadn’t have been able to purchase those guns in the first place, because of a background check then the violence on this scale would never have happened. The US lacks a system that can stop the scale of gun-related violence and death. In 2015, 12,942 people were killed in gun homicide (*Statistic from The Trace). We need gun control reform, pure and simple. And while that’s a hot issue, it needs to be addressed. Innocent people will keep being killed if there aren’t reforms put into place to monitor who guns are sold to and what types of guns are sold. Why do assault weapons need to be sold to the general public when their whole intention is to kill other human beings? Americans throw up their hands and mourn, but we fail to do anything to fix the problem.

I can tell you that hate is never going to be eradicated. Terrorists are never going to cease to exist. They’ve existed from the beginning of time. It’s human nature to fight, be aggressive, and to hate. The way to get to the route of this problem is to institute a fair system for purchasing guns. I’m all for hunting rifles. And yes, there will still be accidents and killings with hunting rifles, but I can tell you if guns are harder to get the level of mass shootings that take place will drop dramatically.

I have a lot of friends who are part of the LGBTQ community. And I can tell you, their hearts are breaking. I’m not gay, but I can’t even imagine having to live with the level of discrimination they receive every day. Some people defend their discrimination as Christian, but do you think Jesus Christ would really be happy with you spreading hate instead of acceptance?

Religion Hate

I know this post is rambling and not cohesive, but I’m just so mad. The LGBTQ community has fought so hard for legislation to become accepted in this country. I’m hoping this coward’s action will solidify the love for the LGBTQ community instead of spur more hate. I’m hoping it will spur gun reform, but I know that’s not realistic because of all the money the NRA has in politicians’ hands.

As a regular citizen, we’re capable of doing a few things:

Show outrage that people were killed.
Vote in politicians who want gun control reform.
Write to your senators, or anyone in politics who might listen.
Throw Your Support Behind Gun Control
Teach your children to be accepting of people, even if they’re different from you.
Hate starts at home. Treat your children and others the way you’d want to be treated to eliminate hate.
Put yourself in another person’s shoes. Think about how you’d feel if you were always called derogatory names, targeted for hate crimes, and excluded from churches based on who you loved.

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Memories of Ed

June 11, 2016 / legreene515 / Leave a comment

This morning, I put in a Violent Femmes CD on the way to work. The only one I own. It is the self-titled album. I hadn’t listened to this album in years. It reminds me of Ed who I knew from church and then high school. Then he was simply gone.

When I was a kid I went to Holy Comforter, an Episcopal Church in Montgomery, Alabama. It’s still there. There were a ton of kids and one of those kids was a guy named Ed Pradot. He became my friend as we moved from children to the awkward pre-teen years and started participating in the youth program called EYC (Episcopal Young Churchpeople). We spent time at lock-ins together, playing BINGO in the church cafeteria, and stumbled through our developmental and adolescent years together.

I knew Ed pretty much my whole life. He had fluffy blonde hair, and a huge magnanimous personality. He was a grade below me in school, but that didn’t affect our friendship. One summer, our EYC group went down to Orange Beach for the weekend. Ed and I were in the back of a car with a girl named Deidra, and he put in the Violent Femmes CD. We sang the songs all the way down to Orange Beach (church appropriateness = questionable). That night, we decided we’d stay up all night: Ed, Deidra, and I. And we made it too. Only, we were too tired to go to the beach and slept through all of the next day. I think we made it down to the beach for about thirty minutes before sundown the following night. But we didn’t think the time had been wasted. We were young, and we’d stayed up through the whole night so we could talk, bond, and learn how to grow up and become adults.

Later, when I was in 11^th grade, I transferred to the Catholic school in town. Ed went there, and we ended up in some classes together. Then we started carpooling. I picked him up every morning and we talked all the way to school.We often stopped at a Spectrum gas station on the Eastern Boulevard to get candy and junk for our day. We were such good friends, but nothing more. I never had thoughts of him as more than a friend, but I’ll never know whether he wanted more. It wasn’t something we discussed, but it wasn’t something I questioned either.

On one of these morning trips, Ed did not seem himself. I asked him about his history test, and he told me he didn’t have one. He stated he had a science test, but I knew that wasn’t true because we had discussed it the night before on our way home. I had also told him how in Health class we learned that when someone has a seizure you don’t put anything in their mouth. Instead you wait it out, and then sweep out their mouth afterwards to make sure they have a clear airway.

That morning, I had made it to the intersection of McGehee Rd and Troy Hwy and was about to turn onto Eastern Blvd, when he started having a seizure. I thought he was messing with me.

“Oh, c’mon Ed. I know you’re faking it, trying to see what I’m going to do.” I patted him, trying to get him to stop, but he continued seizing. His head hit up against the window of my Supra Celica. I learned at this particular moment in my life that I’m horrible in emergencies. I was at a stop light, and I beeped my horn trying to get people to move. I rolled down my windows and yelled that my friend was having a seizure. No one moved. And finally, after what seemed like an eternity the light changed. Ed was seizing still—I think. I drove like a bat out of hell to the Spectrum station. I left the car running, made sure that Ed was okay, and ran into the store.

Inside, I said, “My friend is having a seizure in the car. Call 911.” Six shocked faces turned to look at me, and six shocked people dropped their morning snacks and ran out to help me. Ed had stopped seizing by then, and the attendant called 911. A nice man straightened him up in the seat and swept his mouth. He was bleeding, because he’d bit his tongue. A nice woman held me, comforted me and told me Ed was going to be alright. I called Ed’s mom, but she didn’t arrive until after the ambulance had already loaded Ed into the back and taken off. The ambulance driver told me where they were taking him, and I relayed the information to his mother.

She said, “He’s never had a seizure before.”

I just shook, barely able to speak. Then I got in my car and drove to school. I attempted to take my Religion test, but Mrs. Toner my religion teacher walked me to the office, called my mom and sent me home. I was so shaken up.

Ed recovered. He told me the last thing he remembered was getting in the car, and then it was a blank, like he didn’t even exist until he woke up in the hospital feeling so tired with his tongue completely bitten through. He didn’t even remember the conversation we had that morning in the car.

Unfortunately, when I went to college Ed and I lost touch. And the summer before I went back for my sophomore year I thought about him. I called his house, but his little brother told me he was staying with his dad that summer. When I asked for the number, the little brother told me he didn’t have it.

A few months later, sitting in my dorm room at American University, I received a call from my childhood friend Hillary. She was sobbing. “Ed got hit by a car, Lauren. He was crossing the road. He’s dead.”

I was shocked. Because he had such a big personality that it didn’t seem possible his life could be snuffed out just like that. And I didn’t get to say goodbye. I wanted to see him that summer before my sophomore year and talk to him, pal around, and just be Lauren and Ed, but it never happened. My parents were in London when I received the call, and so I didn’t have the money to fly home from Washington D.C. to Alabama. I called my brother and sobbed on the phone to him. I felt life was unfair. I’d lost two friends at young ages by this time, and I just didn’t understand how that could happen. It took me a long time to wrap my head around losing Ed. More than anything, I wish I had insisted on getting his phone number from his brother and having one last conversation with him before he left this world.

Today in the car, listening to the Violent Femmes all the memories of Ed popped up making him feel alive again. I could see his kind eyes, his funny, fluffy hair, and the smile he always wore. I remembered all the nights we’d hung out together at EYC. I remember how loving and caring he was, and I’ll always treasure those moments I had with him, even though they were too few.

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Weekly Goals June 10-17

June 10, 2016June 9, 2016 / legreene515 / 5 Comments

Today is June 9^th. Well, you’re reading this on Friday, June 10^th, because I wrote this post yesterday. I’m literally speaking to you from the past. This week I have been making excuses. Back a long time ago, on this blog I checked in once a week with goals. I felt this helped me make changes in my life. I know this might be boring for some of you dear readers, but it might also inspire you to make your own goals and live by them.

Back at the end of April, I ran a half-marathon. I think some of you might remember that. And then I lost my exercise mojo. I hated running after that dang half. I didn’t want to take another step. I didn’t want to run another mile or two, but definitely not LONG runs. Thinking about running 8, 9, or 10 miles gave me anxiety. I threw myself back into yoga and Glide, and I went to a few other classes at the Y. Then I started cleaning out my closets. And eating…a lot. And I gained weight. Imagine that. But at first, I lost weight which was weird and confusing. Then I gained 5 lbs this week. In one week. Hopefully that’s water weight, but gees. It takes me so long to get it off that standing on the scale and looking at that number made me want to vomit in my mouth ~~a little~~ a lot.

So I decided today was the day to make goals. And I will do this every Friday for the upcoming week. Friday seems like a good day, because it’s the day I weigh myself and actually believe the scale (I weigh myself almost daily, because it helps with maintenance but Friday is the day of truth). Also, it allows me to set my goals for the week ahead and not fall off the wagon if I play around a little bit on the weekends. I was originally taking part in a weekly blog post on Fridays, but I lost that motivation too. Ugh—motivation can be a hard thing to grasp.

Here are my goals this week (and they are weight loss, lifestyle, and writing goals by the way).

Exercise

Run 4 miles on Friday, June 10^th
Run 6 miles on Saturday, June 11^th. Try to keep up with my running partner who has suddenly become a speed demon.
Sunday is a day of rest (I think this was duly noted somewhere thousands of years ago)
Glide on Monday, Yoga Tuesday, Glide Wednesday, Thursday short run, start over Friday

Food , Drink, Weight

No alcohol on weekdays.
Eat more fruits and veggies
Less chocolate
No chips from my chip-pusher James.
Strive to lose 1 lb per week until I hit my goal weight (12 lbs to lose)

Writing

Write every day – I’m done with setting word limits, because sometimes I do less and sometimes I do more, but I find creativity flows better when I write at least a little bit every day. Blogs count too.

Those are my goals for the upcoming week. What are yours?

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Lost and Found

June 9, 2016June 8, 2016 / legreene515 / 1 Comment

I wrote this story for Terrible Minds, yet again! The assignment only had one requirement: must contain a map.

Lost and found

(873 words)

Harlan didn’t trust GPS. The first time he used it he had ended up somewhere in bum-fuck-Egypt. At that point, he had been infinitely grateful for the stacks of fold up maps stuck in his glove compartment. Back then, everyone had maps. Most people used them. People understood geography and how routes connected to state highways, interstates, connecting all the states to make us somehow unified even from thousands of miles away. Now they summoned Siri and asked her to take them to a location. How did they know she’d comply? That’s what Harlan wanted to ask them.

Cheree thought he was ridiculous. A few years after GPS came out she’d bought him a TomTom. It sat in the box under the wilting tree for a few days. Then one day it magically appeared in the front seat of Harlan’s car, still in its box. It sat there too, until Cheree had to borrow Harlan’s car because hers needed an oil change. When she came back from work that evening the TomTom had been installed. Harlan had never so much as pushed the power button.

Which is why at this point, he was ticked off. The map open in front of him did not show the road he had been driving down. He knew he had made a wrong turn somewhere, but he couldn’t figure out where. And he sat, air conditioner blaring, needle precariously close to Empty, on the side of the road with his finger on an empty space in the middle of nowhere where clearly, in real life, there was an actual road. The TomTom glared at him, willing him to push the little power button. But he felt in this predicament the TomTom would have no idea the road existed either. Plus, it might drain his gas reserves even further. And it was the principle of the matter after all. All these years, the maps had always been right. This was not the time to change his firmly held beliefs, damn-it.

He turned off the engine and stepped out of the car. The heat beat down on him with its blaring desert-force. He kicked the tire to his 2009 BMW, because that was helpful. He stood in the breakdown lane with his arms over head and sweat stains spreading out on the new Oxford shirt Cheree bought for him. The heat played in dancing waves over the desert surrounding him.

He walked around to the other side of the car, opened the passenger side and took out the stack of maps. Nevada. He had two other maps for Nevada. They looked older than the one he had been using. He opened one up and laid it out on the hood of the car, then planted his hands on the black paint before realizing this was a mistake. The sun-heated metal burned the palms of his hand.

“Shit,” he said, shaking his hands in the dusty air.

He stared at the map, placing his finger at the location that looked like an undeveloped piece of land in the middle of the desert. He looked around, and sure enough that’s what it was, with a goddamn no-name, no-route road running through it that he’d been lucky enough to turn onto somehow.

Cheree would be worried by now. He knew she was sitting at the bar at the Bellagio having a gin and tonic and checking her iPhone for the time. God, he wished he had one of those too. Then he could call her if he could get reception out here. They had tickets for Cirque du Soleil at 7 PM. He knew he’d never make it if he didn’t find his way out of this place. He just couldn’t remember if he’d taken a right or left, then another right or left, and it was a horrible time for his memory to fail him. Or his sense of direction.

Cheree always joked that for someone who loved maps he got lost an awful lot. He always smiled and nodded when she said it in front of other people, but in reality the statement pissed him off. But now he knew she was right and that if he didn’t find his way out of this nowhere road he’d die of thirst and hunger in the middle of the desert.

“Stupid no-good maps,” he said.

He folded them up, stuck them in the glove department, slammed the passenger’s side door then walked around to the driver’s side. He started the car then powered on the TomTom. His first thought would be that it would need updating, and he’d still be lost, but to his surprise it had been updated and there were even addresses loaded into the machine. God love, Cheree. Always there for him. He pulled out his notepad with the address scrawled on it—3600 Las Vegas Boulevard South—and plugged it into the machine.

The little dots swirled around in a circle: Calculating.

And sure enough the road appeared. Continue for 35 miles, take a left. Clear cut directions on a road that did exist even though every single map he owned said it shouldn’t be there.

Maybe Cheree was right after all. GPS had its benefits.

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Letting Go

June 8, 2016 / legreene515 / 5 Comments

DIGITAL CAMERA

By Camdiluv ♥ from Concepción, CHILE – Colours, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=19871961

A few years ago, a movie came out. If you have little girls, you certainly saw it. My own little girl was still really little, and we didn’t go to the movies. Instead, we waited patiently for Santa Claus to deliver the little case with Frozen inside. And we sang and listened to the song a million times: Let It Go. It’s good advice, and if you listen to the song it’s about letting go of fears, expectations, and the past.

As I said in my blog last week, I’m reading The Life-changing Magic of Tidying Up by Marie Kondo. Kondo writes about how purging and cleaning out allows you to let go of the past and live in the present. Being someone who has suffered from depression for most of my adult life, I have problems with living in the past. I go through times where my past seems to haunt me, almost a present-being within my life, absorbing and sucking all the joys from today. I think we have a lot to learn from the past, but I also think some people, including me get stuck trying to relive the moments that made us happy.

I cleaned out clothes this past week. And I must have had 8 or 9 bags full. I threw out American University t-shirts I hadn’t worn in years. When I held them in my hands, I felt the memories sitting in them taking up space in my life where new memories could be made. I hesitated, and then tossed them. This was a milestone because for me, I have a hard time letting go. When people leave me or move on, and as life moves on, I mourn the past joys, excessively. Recently, I read that happiness is a moment. Those glimmers of sunshine where you know a memory will stick. Humans have a want to hold onto those moments and try to make them permanent when really the beauty in them is their impermanence.

I look at happiness as an action. Happiness has to be created. One has to stop living in the past or the future and focus on finding happiness every day. This can be done by influencing your happiness. Surround yourself by people you love, exercise, smile, laugh, find a sense of humor, be accepting and loving and giving. These are all ways to make yourself happy through action.

I haven’t gotten to the hard part of cleaning out: mementos. Last time I went through all of my writing and letters from the past, I ended up severely depressed. I’m thinking of scanning the letters this time and throwing out the originals. I have letters from my grandparents at camp when I was a kid. I have letters from ex-boyfriends and ex-wannabe-boyfriends. I have letters from friends who are no longer friends. Perhaps the funniest thing I kept was a fax from my mother when I ran out of funds in Spain asking me if I had drank all of my money away (I had). Boy, she knew me!

Since I started purging, my creativity has blossomed again. I don’t think it’s coincidental. I think the act of purging is redefining my desire to be a full time writer. I know writing makes me happy and defines who I am, and in purging I’ve realized the more I run away from that thought the unhappier I am.

How do you focus on the present? What are some tricks you have for letting go? What’s your dream in life?

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