Looking Our Age

So I've had this problem most of my life. I don't really look my age. I've had people think my two sons were my little brothers. And when I was pregnant with my first son (in the spring) I mentioned to a nurse that I was going back to school in the fall. She kept telling me I could talk to my teachers and they'd most likely let me go to the nurses office every few hours to pump milk if I wanted to continue breastfeeding after I started school again. I was so confused... did most buildings on a college campus have nurse's offices?

Nope. But all High Schools have nurse's offices. Yup... she thought I was pregnant and a junior in High School.

I was 20 at the time. Sigh.

After painting our downstairs bedroom 'Chocolate Mocha Froth', a little got in my hair. It made me look like I was going grey. My husband mentioned he was excited to grow old with me and have both of us change and see what we will look like with gray hair. And I have to admit. I really don't think I will be one of those women who gets upset over gray hairs or a few wrinkles. After looking (at least to strangers) like a teenager for who knows how many more years... I think I will gladly welcome the appearance of various stages of adulthood. I'm in no rush for the years to pass by, but when they do, I want to enjoy how I've changed physically, emotionally, and spiritually. Every stage of life is beautiful, and I want to enjoy looking the part during each of those stages.

What do you think? Do you look your age? Do you want to look a certain age forever, or are you okay with where you are at and what the years may bring?

Here's a Random Thought: Nice People = World Peace

Four words, and I believe it's absolutely the secret answer to the world's problems. It would not make them all completely go away, but they would certainly be solved much easier, and there would be a lot less problems. Let me first define "nice people" as: individuals who always strive to be the very best kind of person they can be, who are unselfish, who realize that there is more to life than personal gain, who recognize the worth of each person, animal, and the natural environment we live in.

Let's think about it:
1. Nice people don't steal
2. Nice people don't break the law (on purpose, anyway)
3. Nice people don't sue others for ridiculous reasons
4. Nice people don't care about taking over the world for selfish reasons
5. Nice people as leaders would truly want the best for the people and wouldn't care about fame or fortune
6. Nice people as leaders would want to be serving the people, not being served.
7. Nice people would help their neighbors when in need.
8. Nice people would be people you could trust.
9. Nice people would work together to help everyone in need rather than spend huge amounts of money on their own selfish desires.
10. Nice people would be honest in their work.
11. Nice people would be kind to their spouses and their children and animals.
12. Nice people would want the best for the environment and would strive to do their best to support it.
13. Nice people would never try and hurt others.
14. Nice people would give of their time and resources to a good cause.
15. Nice people would do their best to be educated and self-sufficient so that they could be in a position to help others.

Think what a wonderful place we would live in if all people were 'nice people'... While I realize that getting people to this state of being is much more complicated, I really believe that if each person could get themselves to this point, it would be the answer to many of the world's problems, no matter how simple of an answer it seems.

This was my random thought while laying in bed this morning.

Let me correct myself...

I'm sorry if the last post made it seem like the reason I was upset over the gender role thing was because I believed it was the cause of homosexuality. That is not what I believe. What I believe is that being confused about who you are and about who you are meant to be can lead to making a choice of homosexuality. And I believe there is a lot in our society that confuses people about their gender roles, their biologically determined sex, and their sexuality.

Gender Roles

We have been collecting the Fisher Price Little People playsets for the boys (and any future children we may have). So far, all the sets have been your basic multicolored, nuetral-gender toys. Girl people and Boy people come in almost every set. However, while at the store yesterday (my mom came and took us shopping and wanted to buy a new one for the boys), the new camping set and the pet care set are completely pink and purple. I was so disappointed that they all of sudden started making them gender specific. And of all the sets to make "girly" why in the world would one of the first choices be camping? (It's complete with a pink fishing pole...) Why did they feel the need to go all crazy with the pink? Did they not think girls could play with the regular mulitcolored toys? Well, guess what? We bought it anyways. Yup, we bought it for our two boys. Pink and purple are just another color of the rainbow in my opinion and Kadan loves camping and it really is a cute little set. He didn't care about the color, so I don't either. Maybe I should explain my reason for being upset with this subject.

Here's the first half: I don't mind my boys playing with toys that are meant for girls. We have a little kitchen set and more than one doll in this house. My husband doesn't mind either, even though most dad's would. What's the big deal? What's girly about cooking and eating food? And maybe if more little boys played with dolls they'd feel more comfortable in the 'father' role once they got older. Maybe we'd end up with husbands that cooked dinner with their wives and spent more time with their children. Why can't toys be toys and children play with whatever they want? I know plenty of girls who would love playing with cars and little basketballs and dinosaurs, but I doubt many parents buy these things for their little girls (unless they were pink or purple I suppose). We stereotype what being a "boy" or being a "girl" is so much that as children grow older, if they don't fit into this perfect little mold of being a "tough manly man" or being a "pink and purple princess" they think there is something wrong with them. And that's when you start getting into the whole confusion about whether a boy should have been a girl or a girl should have been a boy or even into the feelings of homosexuality. Two men who are very dear to me decided that they were gay. They did not fit into the typical "manly man" role and were always treated differently because of it. So they finally decided they must be gay. While I don't deny that people can have homosexual feelings, I do believe that the world and it's stereotypes are screwing people up.

This leads me to concern #2: I believe very strongly that God created man to be man and woman to be woman. Although I believe in gender neutal toys for children, I would never dress my son in girl clothes and I would never let him grow his hair long and put it in pigtails. I want him to know that he is a boy and there is a reason he is a boy. It wasn't some accidental biological feature. There is divine purpose behind it all. He should be proud that he is a boy and grow up to be a man and a husband and a father.

I do believe that men and women are different, and we're different for very good reasons. I don't think we should ignore those differences, we should respect them. But I don't think we need to go so far as to insist that boys fall into the mold of blue-green-sports-dinosaurs-and-monster-trucks and girls fall into the mold of pink-purple-dolly-princesses. How do you find a happy medium without going into one extreme or the other? How do we let our children know that their inherited gender is sacred and important, but that it's also okay for our sons to play with dolls and our daughters to play sports?

Finding Some Favorites (Music)

For a long time, I never really had any 'favorite' artists or 'favorite' songs. There were my old favorites and I liked some of the new stuff that was coming out, but nothing really stuck out to me. Well, recently I have found a lot of favorites! So I thought I'd share some with you.

I think I'm fairly picky about music. I started out as a music major and I changed it when I realized that I'm already very picky about music and if I was to study in depth about what quality music really is... I think I'd be so critical and picky that I wouldn't enjoy hardly any music. (I know it sounds crazy, but that truly was my reasoning for changing my major.)

Here are some of the things I look for before I choose my 'favorite' artist/song:

Lyrics: I do not care for profanity or foul language in a song. I think it shows a lack of talent if you can't think of appropriate words and have to resort to putting junk into a song. I also like the lyrics to be something I can relate to, something that has meaning.

Music: I enjoy a lot of different genres of music. Some things that might make it a favorite of mine is being 'singable' (I don't really care for that extra heavy stuff) and somewhat 'danceable'. Fast or slow, calm or upbeat, I enjoy singing along and moving to the music. I need to enjoy the way the music makes me feel.

Artist: Although some people will probably disagree with me on this, the life and personality of the artist does affect how I feel about their songs. I know that their can be a great song that is sung by a horrible person, but if I respect the individual, I am much more likely to enjoy their music.

Artist's Voice: I enjoy music most when the artist has a unique sounding voice or has a voice similar to my own (it makes it so much more fun to sing along if you can blend with artist's voice).

So with that all said, here are a few of my favorite artists and a few of the songs they sing that I like (there are several I like from each artist, but unfortunately it's late and I'm not going to try and remember all the older songs they sing, so you just get a list of their newer stuff) So here they are, in alphabetical order, because I can't decide how to order them by rank of 'favoritism':

Natasha Bedingfield: Love Like This, These Words, all songs from "Pocket Full of Sunshine" http://natashabedingfieldusa.com
Colbie Caillat: Bubbly, Realize http://colbiecaillatmusic.com
Alicia Keys: No One, Teenage Love Affair http://aliciakeys.com
Taylor Swift: Our Song, Tim McGraw, Picture to Burn http://www.cmt.com/artists/az/swift_taylor/artist/jhtml (I couldn't find an official site for her)
Carrie Underwood: American Girl, Don't Forget to Remember Me http://carrieunderwoodofficial.com

Listing these probably doesn't make me sound too picky... since they are all pretty famous artists at this time and there are lots of people who like them. However, being a 'popular' artist is certainly not a criteria for being my favorite. I like to think of it as the world has good taste (on this issue) if my favorites happen to be their favorites as well.Also, if you're thinking I'm sexist because the only favorites listed are women, that's not true. It's just that in the last couple years, when I haven't had any favorites, my husband has had favorites. And he mostly likes male singers because he enjoys singing along with a voice similar to his own. So we've mostly been listening to male singers for the last couple years and I've finally found some good female singers that I enjoy, so now we get a good mix of both. Sometime I'll list my favorites from the opposite sex. For now, you get these.

What are your favorites and why? How do you choose a 'favorite'? Comments on mine?

Politics

Unfortunately, I don't know too much about politics. I was late 95% of the time to my US government class in high school (it was my senior year and the teacher was dull). However, I'm regretting that fact these days. I really would like to understand the system enough to determine for myself if the government is corrupted or not. I have no idea who to vote for. I hate watching the news because it's so tainted with the media's own opinions. They edit and show it to make it the most interesting possible. Happy good people don't sell. Scandals and lies do.

So, please, feel free to share your sources for political information. And even your own political views are welcome. This is one subject I do not yet have an opinion on. I'm trying to stay open.

Judgements

Oh, boy. Here we go. This is one that has been driving me crazy. One of my all time biggest pet peeves is judgemental people (right up next to that is negetive people). I know that I have been both before, but I do make a concious effort not to be either.

Note: I do not know who will read this blog and I do not want to offend anyone, so I am never going to list the real names of the people I 'vent' about. However, if you are reading this and realize a story sounds extremely familiar... I truly apologize if it's about you! : )

There is a person in my life, we'll call her Becky, who I love, but cannot stand to be around for very long. I cannot think of one person (on tv or in real life) that she has not said something negetive about. I feel like I'm defending the whole world when I am around her! I'm constantly saying, "Well, there's probably more to that story," or "Maybe she was thinking this..." etc, etc, etc. No one in the world is allowed to make a mistake or be less than perfect in her eyes. I have to contain myself from pointing out every single little mistake she made in her life (though she would readily deny most of them).

There is another person in my life, we'll call her Wanda, who I've known for such a long time, and I used to be extremely close to her. But it's so hard to have a conversation with her these days. I want to laugh and talk about the wonderful things in life, but she can't get past the negetive about everything. I know that sometimes we need to talk about what's been bothering us, but EVERYTHING bothers her. Every time I mention we got a babysitter and went to the movies or that we took the kids to a movie or even how we celebrated Christmas, she is completely apalled and lists the reasons why she would never do what we did.

These people are not individuals that I could ever let out of my life. However, spending less time around them is essential to my sanity! I love them both, they will both always be very dear to me. But I do not know how to have a conversation with them, anymore. Here are two very important parts of my own personal philosophy:

1. There is always more to a situation then I know. There is nothing and no one in life that I know everything about (not even myself). Thus, I have absolutely no right to make a full judgement about a situation. I can have my opinions, but it's important to remember that we don't know the whole story.

2. I know that there are horrible things that go on in the world. And I'm certainly one of the more paranoid parents I know when it comes to the safety of my children. However, I refuse to go throughout my life looking at the negetive side to every situation. There is good in (almost) all things and I choose to find that good.

A First Entry... Finally!

The day I made this blog I had so much on my mind! I had so many things I just wanted to pour out of my heart and mind. By the time I finished the blog, put a couple little things on the sidebar, I was tired and decided to just go to bed. Well... that was a couple months ago. I have had things on my mind, but I was always so busy! And now that I'm making time to sit down, I'm not sure where to start.

After 5 years of being in college, I wish I was more educated. The more I've learned, the more I realize I don't know hardly anything. There is so much going on the world... and I spend my days thinking about laundry, dishes, and diapers? Don't get me wrong; I absolutely love that I am able to stay at home with my boys. There is no place I'd rather be than with my family. But I wish I had more knowledge so that I could at least contemplate something meaningful while doing the laundry, dishes, and diapers.

I took a social problems class last semester thinking this would open my eyes to the world. What it actually did was open my eyes to all the pessimists in the world. I did NOT care for the author of my textbook and since it was an online class and my instructor did not assign anything other than the textbook, that was my only information. (I'm sorry to say that I did not go the extra mile and research other sources on my own time, because... well... I bearly know what "my own time" means. In other words... I'm busy.) The first few chapters I really believed the author in all that he wrote. I thought that really was how the world was. However, then he started getting into other chapters that I DID have a bit of knowledge base in. One of the topics was C-sections. The author went on and on about how doctors are pushing and pushing for c-sections because it's easier on the doctors and it gives them more money. It had statistics about how there are so many more c-sections today than 50 or 100 years ago. Well, you know what? If I didn't have a c-section, I wouldn't be alive and neither would my children. I am GRATEFUL the doctor had the sense enough to perform a c-section. Are there horrible doctors that do it just to get extra money? Probably. Have I met one? No. My doctors were amazing. I absolutely believed they had my and my child's best interest in mind.

The author of this book made a similar argument about all the teachers and various other professionals. That they didn't care about the health/education/welfare of their clients/people they worked with. I'm sure that there are people who go about life doing everything selfishly and only for the money, but not EVERYONE like the textbook was implying. I am a teacher and I know that I'm not like that. My husband is a CNA (an occupation that was also discussed very negetively in the text) and I know he cares a lot about the people he works with. Surely we are not the only people in this country who care about others.

Well, this post is getting very long, but like I said, this blog is for me to vent. Bottom line, I know the world has more problems than I can imagine. However, I also know that the world has so much good in it that the media (and authors of textbooks) frequently overlook. Good news doesn't sell. Scandals and disaster do. I want to go through life with hope, not fear. I want to make a difference in this world because I have hope for it. According to the text, their is no hope for the world; everyone is selfish and corrupted; and we need to just make laws to allow it all because it will inevitably happen anyways.

I hated studying for that class. I got a C.