(this is a work in progress)

On who I am [highlights, as I could go on and on about this and it is always changing!]  – well, first and foremost, I am a child of God. I committed my life to following Christ in my late teens, after a lifetime of Him wooing my heart.  I’m [still] happily married to my highschool sweetheart and we have 3 great kids.  (Have to make that “still” distinction as so many people assume marrying that young doesn’t work out – it’s not been easy, but what marriage is?)  I’m a newly-created SAHM, by choice, after years of working out of the home with my first two kids.  This, despite being a chosen thing, is a difficult task for me and is part of me dying to my self and striving to become the woman God desires me to be.  I’m pretty much a nerd – which serves my stubborn, always have to be right side, because usually?  Usually I am right. (This means at times I have to hear Dr. Phil in the back of my mind saying, “Do you want to be right and alone or let it go and be in relationship?”).   I like to cook yet I hate the mess of cooking great meals.  I’m a survivor, of many, many difficult things.  I’m a proponent for social justice and particularly have a heart for the homeless.  I’m a newly re-committed runner and am training for a 10k in May, 2010 as a way to demonstrate God’s healing in my life (see the link on “things” above) and well, just that I CAN.  I have struggled with depression my entire adult life, sometimes with the aid of medication.  I secretly really enjoy fashion, style and design despite it being a “shallow” thing and in contrast to my religious/humanitarian convictions.  I sometimes swear when really empassioned about something, but rarely do so in casual conversing/writing.

On my hair – when I was a kid, red hair merited teasing (is it still this way?) and I endured plenty of it.  Over the years, my shade has deepened, darkened some, and over all mellowed – but it is still red!  I love my hair now, and will unleash fury upon those who question if it is really red.  I have two boys with red hair and I HATE it when people ask, “Why, where did they get their red hair from?”

On embracing the “red-headed step-child” persona – well, there’s the whole thing about “if a shoe fits…”, but beyond that quite literal relevance, I have always been kind of an odd [wo]man out in life, hence my tagline of being a “square peg trying to fit into life’s round holes.”   A couple of examples:

  • While not a complete social outcast, I was always too smart for the “cool” crowd and yet had enough social skills to avoid being relegated to the caste of untouchables in school: the freaks and geeks.  This hasn’t changed much in my adult life.  Oh, I have friends, a life in which I have found community, but sometimes I still feel as if I’m on the outside looking in.
  • I make my spiritual home in a church that is fairly conservative by Colorado standards, yet I am pretty liberal in my thinking – such that I often feel too leftist for my pew neighbors but too evangelical for my non-Christian friends.
  • I worked my butt off in school and afterward to attain a middle-class lifestyle, yet I came from a family borne of generational poverty.  Sometimes it seems as if I can never quite fit in with the middle-classers, yet I’ve not a lot of desire to return to my roots, nor can you really ever go back home again, KWIM?  Maybe Maya Angelou was right afterall?

(To be cont’d)….