Aftershock

There is a reason I am this me.

Many will describe me based on what they see. Medium height, not light but not dark skinned. Medium weight, not fat and not skinny. Big eyes. Very expressive eyes. Smallish feet and long fingers. Pretty toes.  Ordinary looking behind. Very black hair. Big ears...the list of physical attributes endless and not particularly memorable except for the eyes. No the eyes seem to be a big deal.

Very few people will tell you that I am clumsy or that I bite my nails when I am nervous and strain my eyes continuously because I am short sighted but absolutely hate that I have to squint. Very few people will tell you that I place one foot on top of the other when I cook or that I have two left feet and never dance. Very few people will tell you that I have different acents for different intonations and have a very wide vocabulary that I very rarely use. Except in my poems.

Very few people will tell you that I am a really bad liar and a huge crier and O have an extremely short fuse. Only one person will tell you that when I cry my bottom lip gets the shakes and a little dimple appears that nobody else knows is there.

Even fewer people can accurately describe who I really AM. And that's okay.

In the search for inner peace, serenity, clarity and balance I have learnt a few things about life. For one thing, nothing is ever what it seems. The truth is always just that. And sometimes it hides in plain sight. And who I really am is MY truth and nobody else's business.

Trust is a fragile thing. And it doesn't take much to break it. Sometimes even in doing good one finds they have crossed lines they never should have and trust is left broken.

Loyalty cannot be bought. You choose who you are loyal to. And that choice doesn't always have to be logical. Loyalty is a heart thing. Because when your back is against the wall the choice to be loyal will depend on how hard your heart beats as you stare down the barrel of that gun.

In love it is best to take everything one moment at a time. What you see right now will not be the same tomorrow. Emotions change overnight. Cherish the good moments, collect the memories and don't exaggerate the bad ones...magnify the good and accept and forgive the bad...it will save you time and trouble and even if it ends, the hurt will be different. The good will remain intact. Its only what you CHOOSE to make important that IS important.

Family is everything. Through the ups and downs your family will keep you going. And its not only blood that determines who family is. Half the time when the chips are down the blood will be watered down.

Plans are just plans. Your life and your destiny are already mapped out. The end result depends on your choices. Not on your plans. Sometimes those choices work for those plans and those plans are mapped out on the right path so they work. But other times it happens that plans go awry and you have to stop, drop and roll or regroup and rebuild. When that happens, don't give up. Keep going and keep believing. The difference between the man who gave up and the man that made it was the courage and the faith to believe in just 'one more try'...

Wisdom has nothing to do with age. Folly is the same. A woman should be discreet. The woman who shouts about her husband's long johns in the town square forgets that she is the one who is meant to wash them. Your secrets only reflect badly on YOU in the end.

I have seen and heard a lot of things in the past 24 hours that have made me rethink the people in my life and who they really are and the weirdness of life. But at the end of the day one thing is for sure, the only one who can decide who I am, what I do and what I believe in is me. And that's all that really matters in the end.

(This post is for Ashley Gibbs and for my one.)

#TitaniumSolid #Kilimanjaro #LoveOverEverything

J. Bird.