Time Changes Everything...

Bob and I got to be home together today in the middle of the week...what a lovely treat.

We now have a lawn mower of our very own. We bought it ...it's ours. I know that probably doesn't seem like such a big deal to the homeowners out there but it's all about perspective. Bob has taken over the lawn care (and we will get a break on rent in the summer) so hence the purchase. Buying a lawnmower makes me feel like a grown up....they are something that your parents bought. The lawnmowers we have used at our previous residences were left by previous residents or provided by landlords. I swear the last one was held together by duct tape and rope. I couldn't start it unless I held the start thingy, stood on the lawnmower and jumped backwards really far and fast.

Bob mowed and I pulled out ivy. We have a nice patio out back with pretty trees and a spot that was landscaped at some point in time but the ivy has just overtaken all. Working in a garden is something that I am warming up to basically because I really don't like to get dirty. Didn't like it as a kid and still don't...but I'm learning.

Our last project of the day was going to be painting our new to us wicker furniture. We bought a set from one of the ladies that I work with and Bob wanted it to be Hunter Green. We washed the furniture, let it dry in the sun and took aim with the spray paint only to find we have six cans of defective paint. It sprayed for a minute and then dribbled down the side of the can. We'll be finishing the chairs another day.

Here is the real point...my nostalgia epiphany of the day. I went for a walk down our street and passed an apartment that was exactly the same as the one that Mario and I lived in when we first married many moons ago. (There are about three sets of these buildings scattered throughout Grandview on differant streets.) The apartment was empty so I looked in the window. I was amazed. It was SOOO TINY... yet at the time we lived in that apartment it seemed huge to me.

...but it was huge then. It held my world and the people I loved most at the time. My son began his life there...I had a best friend that I shared coffee with almost everyday while our kids took naps...my Mom wallpapered the kitchen for me when I GREAT with child (I can still remember the really pretty brown, cream and turquoise floral paper...sounds gross but it wasn't). So much life held in such a small space.

I haven't seen or talked to Mario in years...and after so many years, I really can't remember what went wrong with us. It just did and neither one of us had the energy...or the inclination...to fix it. We were just kids...

I see young couples in the grocery store with their children and it just gobsmacks me. They just look so young. I wonder if that's how Mario, Cory and I looked to people our age then....and yes, we did. We just didn't have all the tattoos and piercings but probably looked just as alien...and just as hopeful.

The hopefulness I felt all those years ago still continues...that was my epiphany. I have a man in my life who is challenging, compassionate, loving and so many things that I can't even pull the words forth...I have friends I love and who love me back and like me MOST of the time...I still have dreams...and hope that those dreams will come true.

Dream big. A space can't stop dreams...only an outlook.