First assignment is due tomorrow and I completed it last week. So what’s the problem?…….the problem is it has to be between 150-300 words and I’m at 789. I need to some how take the blogger gal out of me and do some chopping!! ….so what goes and what stays……where are the judges from CHOPPED when you need them.
Before the chop and many many redo's:
Born and raised in the San Fernando Valley until I was 14, yes I was the typical valley girl until my parents uprooted my sister and I to this lovely Antelope Valley. Imagine the shock when I experienced my first 115 degree summer in the desert. It wasn’t pleasant and with enough protesting that we MUST go back to civilization my father put in a pool in the backyard to keep us entertained for the time being. Somehow I survived the desert through junior high and high school but vowed once I left the Antelope Valley I was never coming back. Well as you can see I’m back in Lancaster and the big man upstairs got the last laugh.
I had to grow up quite fast my senior year because my boyfriend, soon to be husband (now ex husband) and I had a daughter and right after graduation we married, he joined the navy and was stationed in San Diego which meant we were headed there as well. What a difference from living in desert and you better believe we spent most of our free time at the beach. A young mom of a one-year-old, one on the way and wife of a military man wasn’t easy; we learned quickly that married life was more difficult than we thought. I only had wished back in senior year I paid attention when the teacher was talking about sex and budgeting. Four years later, three different military stations, two children and one on the way we decided to get a divorce. He stayed in Twenty-nine Palms and my children and I moved to the Midwest to be closer to my family.
I would have to say my life really started when I left California and became a single mom of three little children. I quickly learned that no matter how hard I thought my life was I had to stop the self pity “it’s all about me” act because there were little ones depending on every action that I made. I don’t think I got a solid eight hours sleep for years and for some time I worked 2.5 jobs just to make ends meet. We spent close to five years in Wisconsin and the girl that first came to that little town with her three children wasn’t the same girl that left. I left as a women at the age of twenty eight who now knew what she wanted, knew how to fix a leaky sink, learned how to change a tire and taught myself how to shovel my car out of five feet of snow while enduring the wicked, bone chilling winters.
Fast forward nine years, my oldest is twenty and is a junior in college, my seventeen year old is a senior and my youngest is a freshman and I would have to say being a mother has had its rewards but it’s been challenging at best. I learned that being their friend isn’t always advised and being their dictator will only end in hurtful words being thrown between the both of you. I lived in multiple cities trying to find the “perfect” job or gain the “right” experience just to make the “right” amount of money to survive in these trying times. I’m not in the perfect job but my experience got me to the point of making decent money, but I have decided that to truly be where I want to be in my life I needed to go back to school, which leads me to writing this bio for you all too read. I tried my hand at love and like a game of poker I lost big until two years ago when love literally knocked at the front door, we will be celebrating our one year anniversary this October.
Our first year hasn’t been easy, it was certainly an eye opener living with someone other than my children because I had been on my own for fifteen years since the divorce and then throw in the fact that we became a blended family. 5 kids total, 3 dogs, 2 cats no wonder challenges started to build and chaos started to make itself known which only through counseling we were able to get a handle on. Honestly, there are times when I’m about to throw in the towel but what stops me is just thinking about that girl who was just 22, divorced, pregnant with 2 little girls heading to the Midwest and the struggles she faced and seriously nothing compares to the challenges I faced back then, but looking back I’ve come along way and it can only get better from here on out. Knock on wood.
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