"Without you here, don't know what to do, I'd give anything just to talk to you, Oh, it breaks my heart" --Caitlin and Will

Warning: This will likely be a sad post.

Have you ever lost someone? I'm sure that answer is yes for most. There's days that I'm okay, and then there's days that the heartbreak is so fresh it feels like it just happened. I think of the simple fact that I won't see him again. For a really, really, really long time. It's indescribable, the pain that comes over me. The immediate jab of realization. There's so much going on in my life and I always got to talk to him about it. I always got to hear how proud of me he was when things were going well and his encouragement when things weren't. With everything happening with my potential internship in Vail.. I want to tell him everything so bad. He would be so excited for me. He'd talk about visiting me with Grandma.

Why did all of this spring up today? I called my Grandma to talk. Her phone was off and her voicemail came on right away. Silly reason, right? Except that Grandma cancelled her phone and uses Grandpa's old one. So the voicemail that greeted me was, "Hi, this is Bill Emhoff." Ever since he's been gone I hang up the phone before it gets to voicemail. There hasn't been once that I've called and not had time to prepare for his voice coming over the phone. It caught me off guard and took my breath away.

Today is a hard day. Sometimes it just happens. I think, in a way, it gets harder as time goes on. I'm sure there will be a point when it's not hard to see his picture and I'll want to call and hear his voice, but it's hard getting to that point. It makes it hard to breathe and hard to think.

There is absolutely no words to describe heartbreak. It eats at you and leaves you speechless. You want to scream how bad it hurts, but it leaves you with no words or breath in your system. There is so much inside of me that I wish I could express about how I feel right now, but nothing will ever compare.

Absolutely no words.

However, this song does a great job of capturing it. As I warned, this post is sad and this song is no different, but the lyrics are amazing and capture feelings that are so hard to describe in such a meaningful way. Check it out.

"No address in the stars" --Caitlin and Will


This one is also one of the most intense songs I've ever heard. Ace Enders is one of the best musicians (in my humble opinion) that has come around and I don't think he gets enough credit.

"So treasure every moment you have and remember that time waits for no one. Happiness is a journey, NOT a destination" --Alfred D'Souza

There's a reason this is tattooed on my foot. Sometimes I need a gentle reminder that I am on a journey, not on a one way, smooth, straight road towards my inevitable passing. I'm on a road that runs through the mountains with rock slides, highs and lows, dangerous curves, and roads so narrow you feel you could fall right off the edge. But the scenery among it all, is worth it. Because there's times you can see the thick snow flakes fall gently and quietly onto the ground around you in the winter and catch a glimpse of the glimmering lake below you that's formed from the melting snow in the summer. Yes, I'll refer my life's journey to a road in the Rockies.

Lately I've had a little more of the overcast days with a little glimmer of sun that makes you think it will be an okay day, but only for a little while, and then the sun goes away. That's how I'll describe it. Nothing major. No health problems, except for the occasional ankle annoyance. I have a place to live. (ish... working on the fall.) And I'm able to feed myself. I have an abundance of the things that I need to survive. It's just small little things. Like someone you haven't talked to in years who randomly comes back into your life. A weird moment with someone who has been in your life for a long time. And money that seems to disappear as soon as it comes. So yes, an overcast day with occasional breaks in the clouds.

I decided to not be really personal in this blog. To not "out" my personal instances to the general public. So most of this will be vague. Mostly just a background story to get my point across.

People from my past have been sprouting up like red roses on Valentine's Day. Seriously. And out of nowhere. And it's like nothing has changed. But it has. Grown up and definitely in it for different things, but I'm still amazed at how random and how it has actually been nice to catch up. And not just one person, but many. It's always so strange talking to someone(s) that you thought were out of your life for good, don't you agree?

And weird moments. Have you ever had that moment with someone you've known for a long time of the opposite sex and think "whoa..." Weird, right? That's all I can describe it as. And my reaction was "uh..." Fitting, I think.

And money. Ugh. My shifts have been cut (and by cut I mean I went from working nearly every day to barely getting 3). What this means is my bills are piling up and the money to pay them isn't doing the same. Why does it seem that everything needs to be paid all at once? Sticker registration for my car, security deposit for my apartment in the fall, cell phone payment, credit card payment, parking tickets, books for school, school in general. How, exactly, is a student supposed to pay for all of that? Obama, you better be doing WORK in the White House to help out future students, because Lord knows we need it and apparently society hasn't gotten the memo.

It all comes down to looking at my foot, as weird as that sounds, and remembering the entire phrase that inspired a permanent ink blotch on my foot. Because in the grand scheme of things, this is just another bump in my Rocky Mountain road of happiness.

For a long time it seemed to me that life was about to begin -- real life. But there was always some obstacle in the way, something to be gotten through first, some unfinished business, time still to be served, a debt to be paid. At last it dawned on me that these obstacles were my life. This perspective has helped me to see there is no way to happiness. Happiness is the way. So treasure every moment you have and remember that time waits for no one. HAPPINESS IS A JOURNEY, not a destination
--Alfred D'Souza