Re Birthday

 My favorite day is here again, Yay!   Rebirth day as I call it, really is just a marker of a point in my life.   It is point in life to mark the growth that has come over the years.   Yet a few years back it was a goal that seemed so out of reach and unobtainable and now it is reality.  

I don’t always talk about this part of my life much because it really personal and close to my heart.   For the non transgender people though they seem to like to focus on this part of life and really ask the most pressing and personal questions they can think of.   Many articles as of late have been written about what NOT to as a transgender person.    

Yesterday a good friend of mine posted on Facebook  OK - for those who are Trans*, it's Write 1 Line of your Story Today. If you had to sum up in one line something you would want to say to the entire world - what would it be.

So today in my reflection of over the last few years I was trying to think of what my one line is to sum up my experience.   Being a person of not many word I thought this should be easy to do.   It is 10pm now and I just couldn't get it down to one line,   here is a few words that come to mind though.

Inter peace ,  Freedom,  overwhelming happiness,  Joy  calmness, gratitude,  quietness of the heart,  genuine , normal,   set fee,   Serenity, blessed   authentic.

I really have a hard time summing up how I feel in words but I can always do that in my photography.   This photo I took the other day says it all for me.

     

Missing Dog

Happy 4^th !

I had a interesting thing happen today, I was gardening and a gentlemen pulled up our long driveway.   He was looking for his dog Scooter.   The dog had jumped out of his car when he was buying some produce at a stand up the road.  Some people had seen the dog running in the woods behind our house. 

The name reminded me of our dog that we had growing up.  Kind of a funny thing was my brother and I named our dog before knowing the gender.   We thought Scooter was a cool name for a dog and later found out that she was a girl.  But Scooter stuck with her though.  

I really have fond memories of her though; she was a constant through my childhood that was such a great thing as I think back on it.   We moved several times growing up and she would always be there wagging her tail to give some love!   She was always there to be my friend to play with until I made some new friends in the neighborhoods we would move to.

We would go to trips to the Oregon coast and she would just love the coast.   When we would get 20 miles or so to the coast she would always perk up and get all excited.  Somehow she could smell the ocean, we would crack the window a bit and she would stick her nose out and just love the smell.    When we would take walk on the beach she would just run and run and run.   She love running in the water and chasing the birds.   She would be so wore out from the walks on the beach for sure.

I normally don’t think about my childhood and hardly ever talk about it either.

It is interesting how things can trigger happy memories from childhood.   It did make me smile as I finish working in my garden.  

Scooter at the beach 

Scooter in her older years

Relentless Reality of the past year

  

It is interesting how reality of life can be relentless it seems at times.   Over the last few months for me it seems like life has just been piling on problem after problem.   I find that a good way for me to sometimes unwind and get out of myself and reflect on life is to take a trip to New Hope Pa.   It is a special place for me and represents many beginning and ending parts of my life over the last few years. 

 

I got to into New Hope and had a late breakfast.   I’m not really a breakfast person but it really hit the spot.   I continued the day by talking a walk on the tow paths there in town.   I like to walk over on the NJ side of the river because there is this abandon old train car that I love to read the graffiti on.   I have written about this train car in the past in August 2012.   I find it so interesting to see the new things that people have written.    I also looked at the phrase that someone had written a while back that I found so meaningful to my life, it is fading pretty bad.  I suspect that it may not be there the next time that I get back to see it.    It is kind of how life is for me though, something that is meaningful and good seem to fade out as new things if life come in.   Just how this train car is people are always putting on new graffiti covering the old or filling in were things are fading out. 

After looking at the train car I continued on my walk pondering life and taking photos of the world.   I really find that I can just lose myself of all my problems when I’m out taking photos.   I don’t get to do this as much as I would like to, funny how work gets in the way of things.

I got to spend the last part of the day meeting up with Sara at my 2nd Home..   As usual we had a great time and great conversation.    It was a great way to end the day and a great way to start the new year out as well.

Bittersweet day

Today was a bittersweet day for me.   I went to pick up a few remaining things in my old car and get the license plate.   I really felt like I was saying goodbye to a great friend, Tina says that I'm just a sappy old lady and too sentimental.

About 2 weeks ago the insurance company totaled out my Jetta L   A little over a month ago while driving home from work in Baltimore I hit a deer about 125 miles from home at 2am.   This deer was pretty big (10 point) and it hit so hard that the airbag went off.  The car did all the safety things that Volkswagen say it will do.   It shut off the engine, unlocked the doors, turned on the 4 way flashers, turned on the dome lights and cracked open the windows.   It is one of those things you really don’t think about all the safety features until you need them.   I was lucky and didn’t get injured in the accident, the deer wasn’t so lucky though.  

I normally don’t get to attached to things but I had really grown fond of my Jetta,  it got great fuel economy and in the 107,000 miles I put on it in 3 years I only had to replace 2 tires and a battery.   The reliability has just been great!  It is funny too when I first got it I really didn’t care for the color, and solely got it for the fuel economy.  The sales person said that after driving it a while you will really come to love it and in the end I did.

I was talking with my youngest today and we were talking about some of the interesting things that the car has seen and done.    One of her cool memories was last year for the last day of school I picked her up from school and I had brought Pat (my chicken) for meet her.   Pat road to and from that day on the emergency brake handle happy as could be.  Christa thought that it was the coolest thing too.

In my former job my Jetta was a working office.   I had a inverter wired up on the back trunk and had a laser printer in the trunk where I would print up paperwork for the aircraft that I would be handling that day.   I used to drive her out on the ramp next to the airplane on many different air force bases.   With the big trunk I carried everything I needed to be able to do my job and still have room.   I can't count how many hours I sat in it awaiting the plane to depart.  She transported many crew as well to and from the aircraft.

She was there through 2 major surgeries that I had; I still to this day remember each trip back from the hospital and home.   At that time we were living in Summerville and both trips were 12 hour rides and they were the 2 most painful drives home I have done. 

Over the last 5 months I have been traveling back and forth between Rock Hill and Baltimore and she has kept me safe when I have taken naps in rest areas in my travels as well.

So today I said goodbye to my old Jetta as the tears of sadness came out.   I wanted s something to remember her by and all the good time I had with her.   As I was leaving the wrecking yard I pried off the VW emblem off the trunk.  I hung it from the rear view mirror today of  her replacement.  I got a 2011 red Jetta with the exact same package as the last one and it too has the same diesel engine.   I am looking forward to all the new memories that this car and I will get to share.   If she is anything like the last one I am not going to be disappointed at all!

   

The passing of Henrietta

We had a sad day yesterday.   Tina got off work and came home and was tending to the babies, feeding and watering them.   They do the usual when she opens the door the all jump out and graze in the yard.   They just love it and the dogs love to play with them too.   When Tina went to put the back in their pen she noticed that she didn't see one of hers Henrietta.   The searched all over and didn’t find her, she finally looked in their roost and found her in the corner dead.  It just broke Tina's heart!   She was such a nice chicken and very affectionate.   She will be missed!   Here is a few photos of her over her fairly short life.

traveling experiences over the last few months.

Today I made it back home for my weekend around 6am this morning.   Currently this has been my crazy schedule,  I drive up on Monday morning to work and stay up there for the week and then leave to come home on Friday night after work and get home early in the am on Saturdays.   I have been doing this for a little over 2 months now, I am finally getting used to it I think.  

I have had a few interesting situation over these last few months at some hotels and though I would share a few with you.   

To try to keep cost down I started to stay at a Super 8 motel.   I started to stay there mostly because of the cost.  The rooms were sure not anything to be excited about by any means but for the most part it was quiet.   However one night I was coming back to the room on night and stand just outside next to my room was this guy with his shirt off smoking.    I went into my room and latter on that night he was outside smoking and talking on the phone and with a person that was with him and he was for sure part of the KKK.   Oh my gosh, I was freaking scared!   I was sure happy to know that they left the next day. 

My next experience was even scarier.   I saw the cute hotel that had pretty reasonable weekly rates and it looked nice from the outside so I thought I would book it for a week and try it out.  I drove up Sunday night and got in at around 2am on Monday morning and checked in.   I unpacked the car and got into the room that was marginal at best.   However the price was right though.   As I was unloading the car 2 guys walked by and I didn't think too much of it.   This room was on the bottom floor and had a window in the bathroom area with privacy glass to you couldn't see through it.   I happen to look up and I saw someone peering through the window.  That freaked me out and I turned the light out and shut the door to the bathroom.    Next thing I know someone was banging on the door and blocking the peephole.  Told them to go way, but they persistent and kept banging on the door.  I started to calling the front desk and while I was talking to the front desk clerk they started to pushed the window in trying to get in.   The front desk clerk scared them away!   I keep some tools in the car so I grabbed a hammer and knife that I slept with all week.    That night is one of the few times in my life that I can truly say I was scared.  I will never go back to that hotel for sure.

Those two bad experiences prompted me to continue to find better places to stay.  This brings me to trying Airbnb.com   My 1^st experience I really didn't know what to expect in the booking process and how things work but it was really an easy site to use.   The first home I stayed at was so cool experience.  They welcomed me in and I was made to feel so welcome there.   The first night we talked and shared life’s experiences and it was such a cool experience.  In the morning I love to have coffee and conversation before work was such a great way to start the day.   I really enjoyed that week.

The next 2 weeks I tried a different place and again I was taken aback at how welcoming my hosts were.   They made me feel so at home and like a part of the family.   This last week they made me dinner every day.  It was such a cool experience.   I will be staying a few weeks next month with them again and am so looking forward to it.   They are cool people and I am hoping that I will be able to cook them some dinners.  

What I have really learned from these experiences is that I really am more of a people person than I ever thought and that having a good conversation and learning about someone’s experiences in life is very important to me.   

Unrealistic Expectations

I was talking to a friend yesterday and he was asking me how I was doing in my new job.   I said that I was pretty discouraged in that there was so much that need to be done to make it a proper running facility.   He looked at me and asked how long have you been at this job, I was like well right around 7 weeks.   He smiled at me and said don't you think it unrealistic to think you can change it around in that time.    He was so right and I needed those few words of wisdom!  

I have to admit I also had expectations that things would just fall into place as well for our family.   They have but not in the ways I thought though.   Brenna is doing very well with her school and very happy.  Christa is doing very well in her school too.  Her school is very wonderful and she is fitting in well this year.  Tina is doing very well in her job as well.   So for the family things are fitting in to place so much better than the last few years.    My expectations of moving the family up to a new state just for my job is very realistic.   So it looks like it’s going to be commuting for a while longer for me.  

I do feel blessed that I have a job.   It’s in the aviation field, challenging and pays ok, so I can't ask for much more at this point.