Evolve or remain.

Yesterday morning I woke up with one of the worst migraines I've ever had in my entire life. One of those splitting headaches that made me want to just crawl back into bed, bury myself beneath my blankets again and sleep until the pain went away. But I knew, from the moment I woke up, that I wouldn't be able to do that. I knew I had errands to run, a job to get to, a messy room to clean up from the weekend before, packing to finish, homework assignments to do, emails to respond to, class to participate in, textbooks still to buy, bills to pay and people to catch up with- so I did what I could to ignore the pain in my head. I snuggled up with my dog for a few minutes, then forced myself out of bed and into business casual clothing for another busy shift at work. I took an Ibuprofen and chugged a bottle and a half of water. I ordered a coffee, got organized, washed my face with warm water and hoped with all of my being that things would go smoothly from there forward. Frank...

This isn't going to be anywhere near one of the happiest or most optimistic things I've written. This is probably going to be the closest I'll come to the polar opposite. This is also where I'd usually apologize for that, but I refuse to do that. I'm no longer apologizing for anything involving my writing or my art, because this is my space and this is my freedom. In a lot of ways, this is the only real home I've ever known. This is where I can breathe instead of feeling suffocated by people around me and deadlines and the disturbing things I deal with on a far more frequent basis than I hope you'll ever have to. This is not my job. This is not where I owe anything to you or to anyone else. This is not where you're supposed to have expectations of me and I'm supposed to push myself to my breaking point just to meet them. This is where I'm supposed to be able to be me. I'm supposed to be able to do that through all my art. Through my blogs,...

I know. I know what you're thinking. I know I said I was done. I know I said my last post would be my actual LAST post... but I can't do it. I can't not publish. I feel less than half alive when I'm not writing, and something about this process keeps me just in love enough to not be able to let it go. So here we are again. Welcome back. I've missed you. Thank you for being here. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ I've had a lot of people ask me if I made any resolutions for the new year, and to be honest with you I hadn't really thought about it until after I'd been asked several times. I answered several of you with an, "I don't know," and at the time that was honest. At the time, I really had no idea. But I know now. My resolutions for 2019 include: To be more emotionally vulnerable. To be open to new experiences. To be more human and less of a perfectionist. To devote more time to...