A long season: JM

I just finished 'Someday I'll Fly'-- it's about John Mayer and if I told you that I watched it without crying, I would be lying. I still remember the first time I heard his music. I was 13, and I only knew Backstreet Boys before I heard 'Your Body is a Wonderland.'

I remember when I saw him for the first time -- in Atlanta. I was 14 and when he walked out, I cried. 

I loved his music and  sure I thought he was cute and still may or may not. I loved watching his interviews and I have seen him more than a handful of times. I use to play his music every single morning when I woke up, not just in my bedroom but I woke my house up by blaring John Mayer throughout the house. I burnt multiple cds for people who'd never heard of him and I watched every Thanksgiving episode of him on Letterman.  

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Now.

I am not writing this blog to express my love for John Mayer. I am writing this blog because the documentary took my back. It reminded me just how much life really does change, no matter how bad you want good moments to last forever and bad ones to leave quickly. It is still life and it still carries on. With that being said. I watched the screen with tears in my eyes while he explained what it felt like when he realeased his first cd. What he felt like when he lost himself completely and what it felt like when he got stopped because of his vocal cords giving out on him. I was a fan through all of it. It was the Continuum tour when I saw him for the first time. It was that cd that got me through a lot in 10th grade, so much in 10th grade. It was the Mayercraft cruise that I found out I really wanted to be a band manager (that had been a dream for a couple of years at that point). 'Stop This Train" was my graduation song, and the first time I saw him on the Battle Studies tour he was great, It was him -- then the second time I saw him later on the tour it wasn't him. He'd lost himself-- shortly after the terrible interviews were released and I just kept telling myself that it was all because he was lost. Then he walked away for a while. I was still a fan. 

I know this all sounds like a blog by a fan girl, but it's not. His music seemed to be there for me when nobody else could be. I didn't know Jesus then I just knew good music with powerful lyrics. As I watched the documentary, reminiscing on all of the things in my life that have happened since being 14 and all of the emotions that are so connected to those lyrics. I thanked Jesus for John Mayer and his music. I thanked Jesus that it was John Mayer that I liked and not some other crazy off the wall musician. It was a real musician, with a real life, with real lyrics, a creative soul who lived to write music and could play a guitar so well that I am sure Stevie Ray Vaughn would have been proud. 

I am now 22, and I still say John Mayer is my favorite artist. I say that 'Your Body is a Wonderland" is my favorite song. And the funny thing is I go weeks without listening to him, then he comes on shuffle on my iPod and I'm taken back. What I love even more is listening to his music and being able to hear my Pepaw say, 'he's gone country' or hear my mom say 'i sure do miss you listening to this in the house every morning' or listening to new friends ask 'who is your favorite musician?' and when I say John Mayer they seem a bit thrown off. My favorite thing to do now is find the lyrics in his songs that could be about Jesus-- simply because I could write a hymn off of 'Gravity.' I clearly don't come off as the girl who use to want to be a band manger, move to New York City and knew every John Mayer lyric by heart. but I was her for a long season. 

It is a season that I have hid very well at some points because I didn't want to seem like a fan girl, but you can make your own judgements on that one. I am a fan. I am a girl & I am thankful for his music.

"things will continue to change, but I will just be continuing the story" -J.M

His story has shown me that it is okay to change. I think that's how Jesus created us, He didn't place us on this earth in hopes of us staying the same. He gives us different seasons to help shape us to become the final product--  This was part of my story. It was the soundtrack to my life for awhile. I grew up knowing it. And I loved it. 

the real dream

Written Wednesday. 

Today I wish to stay in bed and write. It's 11:31am and I've been awake for a couple of hours just sitting in my bed. I've not done this in so long. But I've sat here, I looked at my phone. I read a couple of blogs, I read my assignment for class, congratulated my cousin on her engagement and now I am choosing to blog. 

I am choosing to blog because it's something I enjoy doing. It's something that I think about daily. I think about what I want to talk about on these post. I have ideas behind some and some I just throw out because I'm in need of a post. So today my blog post will be about this one question: 

If you could live a life where money isn't an issue. What would you choose to do? 

I recently read a blog about things nurses hear from people on their deathbeds, it's their top 5 regrets. 

Things like: 

I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.

I wish that I had let myself be happier.

I wish I’d had the courage to express my feelings.

With reading that blog and already pondering on the question I asked above.

I have not wanted to do anything other than sit and write. && for thirty more minutes I am going to let my dream come true. While I tell all of you viewers what I would do if money weren't an issue, only in hopes to make you ask yourself those same questions. 

I would travel everywhere with a notebook and camera in hand. I would go on so many mission trips that the airplane seat feels more like my bed than my own bed. I would sit and listen to people, just listen- not in hopes to change them or save them, but to just listen. I would blog about every experience I have. I would teach kids in other countries, I would teach them small words in English while they teach me how to love more. I would give everything I own (except my cat and camera) away. I would be a voice for the kiddos who don't get a voice. I would adopt so many children, that's it's like I have my own Orphange in America. I would get sweet Joseani & baby Grace and bring them home to me. These are all things I dream about doing when I'm driving or while I'm writing. I dream of seeing new places, meeting new people and loving everyone along the way. 

Unfortunately, I can't unless I have money. That's the way this world works. I'm having to come to grips with that at the whopping age of 22. It's a messy world where money controls all things. But I refuse for it to control my dreams and goals. 

As I read the post I mentioned earlier,  I nearly cried. Simply because I say those things now. I wish I were other places, I wish I were married (only some days) I wish I were a mom, I wish I had a nonprofit. Instead of embracing where we are now-- where I am right this second, sitting in my bed, listening to Explosions In the Sky and writing. I get anxious about where I will be in 5 years, I dream of being this other person with a better body, healthier hair, who has it all together, who knows what she wants and when she wants it. 

No. 

I am tired of people being lied to by this world. I am tired of children comparing themselves to everyone else. I am tried of people turning their nose up the second they see someone who looks differently than they do. I am tired of a world where we as Christians debate with one another instead of going out and loving the ones who need love. Not preaching, but simply loving. Our actions speak louder than our words. 

I don't want myself or anyone elses lasts words to begin with, "I wish."

I want your our last words to be "it was a good time, but this is about to get even better" and we meet our creator and he grabs us up and says "good job."

That's the real dream. 

My family on a Saturday

I wrote this last Saturday. It was a busy day, it's been an even busier week. I now find myself behind a camera or computer doing something with pictures. It's been a good one.

Here is the post -- it was a special day and I regret not posting it that day. Here was the start of the day--

Nonna and aunt Susan are currently walking around the field, I'm pretty sure I've seen a couple of Jane Fonda moves. 

I smell meat of some sort cooking somewhere, maybe on the grill? But the cool breeze blows the smell over to where I am currently swinging and reading.

My dad cooks chili inside and walks back&forth between my house and his to look for missing utensils. 

My sister changes clothes 5 times. 

Her boyfriend sits on the couch watching football.

My uncle is helping my dad cook. 

My mom tries rushing everyone while they get dressed, because she wants to do something today. 

My Memaw and Pepaw come over for coffee.

I wake up grumpy only to have a discussion with my mother, which only lead to us play wrestling. 

My other sister and my cousin have gone to a ball game.

My best friend comes by to borrow a GPS because she has to get to Tampa today.

And I sit outside now watching it all. The weather takes me to a place my heart longs to be most days. The book I am reading makes me wish I were sitting in a coffee shops writing. Instead I'm sitting on my front porch while my cat plays with the blinds inside (like he's telling me to open the windows). Of course, I wish to be other places often. But if I weren't here today I would have missed play fighting match with my mother, my sisters boyfriend coming to sit on my couch to look up sports stuff on the computer, my dad running back and forth looking for cooking supplies, and my Nonna sitting next to me while she tells me and my aunt the story of her brother who passed away when she was 3. 

His name was Ugo -- 

He was 19. And would bring his mother, my Bis (twice-great) Nonna, coffee in bed each morning. Nonna says that she doesn't remember him much, but she has pictures of him. She tells me of how when she was younger, he would pick her up and she would stop crying immediately. He was a stand up kind of guy. One morning my Bis Nonna, begged Ugo not to leave because she had a bad dream. Side note: my Nonna grew up in Naples, Italy. Her house overlooked the ocean and off in the distance you could see an island. In my Bis Nonna's dream, Ugo was on a ship, holding a while flag and saying "bye mama, this is the last time we will see one another." 

With this fresh on her mind, she asked Ugo not to go receive his diploma that day but to please wait. Ugo, excited to receive it and knowing that he wouldn't get another chance hugged his mama bye and said he would be back. He left with his bike and the day carried on. About 15 minutes later, (at this point Nonna gets choked up- she explains that it's not because she lost him. She was too young to remember him. She says its because she knew how her mother must have felt)-- there was a knock on the door, only leading to my Bis Nonna shouting "Ugo, Ugo," because she knew something was wrong. The police explained, that he had been ran over by a large truck carrying stones. My bis Nonno, ran down the street to check on him.

Only for Ugo, at the age of 19 to be laying on the ground. His last words were "mama, mama." My Nonna said that over in Italy when someone passes, you wear black not just to the funeral, but for as long as your soul mourns. She said her mother wore all back for 10 years. 

So, as my heart longs to be on the other side of the world today because the weather and the smells remind me of it or maybe in Nashville on some new adventure. I am here with my family today because these stories shape me. 

Minutes after the story wrapped up. My best friend showed up to borrow the GPS. She has

to go to Tampa today to tell her aunt whom has cancer, maybe bye. I asked my Nonna to pray for her and she wrapped her in her arms and prayed such a powerful prayer over her. 

Throughout my Nonna's pain in life she is able to pray for other people and help them through their pain. 

So today, I wish to be here because Jesus has me here for a reason.