An Encounter

‘What was the hardest thing you have ever done?’ 

“’Don't make permanent decisions on temporary feelings.’ I feel like that is such a huge lesson that I've been taught. I had a couple friends that have committed suicide. That turned my life upside down. Knowing what they did and how it affected everyone, I can relate it to so many things in my life. When I feel certain ways, even with little things like getting in fights with my boyfriend. It makes me angry and I feel like I want to break up with him, but that is an example of temporary feelings. When you're in that state of mind, whether you’re angry or sad, never make a decision. I always have to remind myself never to make a decision when I'm like that. Things can happen.”

“I'm trying to think back to all the gifts I've gotten as kid but nothing really sticks out to me. When you're a kid and you get physical gifts you think it's the coolest thing ever but then thinking back you can't really remember what it was. I don't know if I'd classify it as a gift but the best thing that I have ever received from people would be support. Support from all my friends and family whether it be through difficult times in my life or with things I tried to do. Encouragement, love, and support would be the greatest things that I have ever received.

“They aren’t born yet but the thought of my future children inspire me. They inspire me to want to change the planet for them. To make everything better for them. To better myself. To better relationships.”

“If I could change one thing about society it would be the standards on body image. All of it. Photoshop would be gone. Woman could walk around topless if they want. If you are fat, cool. If you are not fat, whatever. If you are a female and you have your boobs hanging out, that’s cool. I am tired of women and little girls being shunned of their body and being told to cover up. No matter if they start at four years old or two years old whereas little boys can walk around butt naked even if they are five. But as soon as girls are four, they are told to completely cover up. Put a t-shirt on. Put long shorts on.”

“The hardest thing I have experienced was seeing my dad cry. They went through a bankruptcy. It was such a horrible and terrible experience. They had no money. They were in debt. They almost got everything repossessed. My dad was really upset and I saw him cry. I was 6 years old and I didn’t understand. I always thought my dad was this rock. This person who was always serious. But I saw him cry and it killed me.”

“We met on PlentyOfFish. My sister and my family were bugging me to try out the internet dating but I thought it was a bunch of phooey. I went and I got a profile. Within a couple of weeks I saw Bekah’s picture. There are lots of pictures so I had to click on each one and thought ‘wow this girl is really cute!’ so I started talking to her. We said a couple of things to each other on PlentyOfFish and then I thought ‘you know what? Here’s my phone number, just text me.’ We texted every day since then. After about a month of texting, I drove a couple of hours to go meet her in person and that was it. Every two weeks we’d meet. Now we live together.”

“A story I remember was when I was in the lower grades of school. We’d have recess and noon hour to play ball and I never wanted to play. I would much rather watch because I never could catch a ball. Never! Every time I was out there trying, it would go straight through my hands. I could never get one. One day our team went to another school to play ball and it was a long distance ride so I went along. They were short one team member so they were yelling “come on Joe. Come on.” I said “I can't catch anything!” And they said “never mind just come on!”, so I went. The game was just about over and we needed one more home run or last catch anyway. Lo and behold that ball came straight for me and I caught it! I couldn't believe it but I caught it! Everyone was just roaring. They thought for sure Joe was going to drop it.”

“When I was 15 years old I first met her. I worked in the corner garage and used to sell candies and stuff from the front. She'd come over sometimes and buy candy. She was the most beautiful girl I've ever laid my eyes on but I never, ever dreamt that I would ever marry her or anything because I thought there was too big of an age difference at the time. But over the years she had struggles with her life and with her former husband. When things got real bad I started talking to her and that's how we met.”

“The hardest thing I had to experience I guess there's two things. One was having to tell my parents that after less than two years of marriage I was getting a divorce. Not by my choosing or doing but by my first husband husbands doing. ‘Death do us part, sickness and in health’. I truly believe that and truly thought of that when I got married the first time. To have it crumble and break so quickly and to tell them that in essence I had failed at life. At that point I thought I had failed with my life. 

“I would love to have a meaningful conversation with my son. He has special needs which limits what kind of conversations we can have. But I would really love to know what's going on in his head and to be able to really bring out and get what he has to say and what he thinks and to see life through his eyes.”

“When I was fairly young (around 6 or 7 because I was with my father), we were at a friend of his whose name (I think) was Bob. Bob was deaf. I don't know how they conversed but it was very cool. There was a parrot in the house too. For some reason I had gotten a hold of a broken digital watch. There was no band or anything but just the watch face. It worked and it had a stopwatch on it so I was fascinated by it, as many kids would be I guess. Bob somehow had motioned to me that I could keep it. He gave me this stupid little broken digital watch which meant nothing momentarily but after my dad died I remember finding it a couple years later and the memory of hanging out with my dad and this deaf guy with a parrot was a very fond one. The little free gift if you will, it wasn't for anything but the memories it brings back are really important.”