Get Home Strong

As soft and light as that floral scene.

Most of the time I don't know how to be thankful for something because I'm used to having it. And most of the time I only bother to be obviously thankful when a day on the calendar tells me to be. This year we stayed with my Nana and Papa in Nashville to have Thanksgiving with all the Tennessee Turners.

I like to see them but sometimes I get weary about staying with/spending time with family for a few days after having not seen them in a year or two. I feel obligated to play catch up with their lives, which I want to do, but hope to do without being awkward. Isn't it weird that you can feel awkward even around your own family? I think it's because your family loves you and knows you the best, and that's a raw knowledge. A stranger just gets the surface, so there's no need to feel pressure about being exposed, because you never will be. Family doesn't go anywhere, if you're lucky.

I realized what a difference there is between youth and old age. I think I learned this week that someone who is pushing 80 is probably going to tend to reminisce a whole lot more than the middle agers and young adults. They have already had their time of waiting for the future. But they have a whole life behind them, that's why. We're just starting everything. This is something that causes a strange tension in our family. The youth of this generation can never really relate fully to someone who lived generations before them, and vice-versa. It's supposed to be that way. This year I'm thankful for everything in the present. And that there's always something to learn from my elders.

My patience in my youth exists on a very thin string. But look at the life that could be left for me. What a waste to fast forward and plan and wait and rush when everything that's happening today is

SO BEAUTIFUL.