It's amazing . . .

. . . how brave you get the older you get. Here, I am. No make-up, badly in need of waxing and plucking, and jars of wrinkle cream, hair product to make my hair look spiky and edgy as it is supposed to, and a little focus from the camera-15-yr-old-daughter-girl-picture-taker-person. (maybe the soft focus is a good thing) Notice I didn't say hair color. I have learned to embrace my gray hair. I once had naturally very dark and very long curly thick hair and it was just too hard to keep the gray covered. And, I got a headache from pulling my heavy hair out of my face. I started going gray in my early thirties. I cut my hair the first time my daughter had lice in 2nd grade - 8 years ago - because we cut her hair and I didn't want her to "go it alone". I'll be 43 on Sunday. I have earned every one of those gray hairs and wrinkles - mostly in the last week. I never wear sunscreen due to pure laziness and the idea since I don't burn I don't get damaged. Now that the wrinkles and crepe paper skin have set in, I beg to differ with myself.

So, here I am with my smile on a stick. The coolest thing in the world about this is . . . that no matter how ugly I think I am, I know I am the most beautiful person in the world to my kids and hubby and I know how that feels to think that. I remember feeling my mom was the most beautiful person in the world. I am smiling under my smile on a stick, too, (didn't have to fake it really) because my daughter was cracking me up. I'm doing okay. Trying to catch up with myself. I am worried about my dad and the strike. Mostly my dad. I still need him and I don't like the spot we're in.

I am a planner. I always have plan A, B, C and usually D. When I can't plan for A, B, C and D, I get a bit off. Planning for the worst, when I think I know what it is, that's how I cope with the worry trait that has been handed down to me from generations of women on my mom's side. I think, I worry the best of any of them and I think my dad would agree. Not that I worry the most, but try to be the most logical about it. It really is quite an art to understand, which my husband is an expert at, hands down. He could lead seminars and motivational speaking engagements on "how to handle the worried wife". He, and my kids, get me. I don't LIKE to worry. I don't LIKE drama. I LIKE to be happy and carefree, I just don't feel worthy most of the time. I feel guilty when I am happy and carefree, like I'm slacking and not thinking of everything that needs attention . . . and fretting over. Someday I will share more of my story with you, because as much as this blog is about my art, it is about my life finding my art. It's about figuring out what I want to tell the world AND what I want myself to know about myself, if that makes sense.

I am making backgrounds this weekend and trying to get some ideas going in my empty head. Hope to be back to normal and making stuff next week. Thank you for putting up with my sobby, worried, drama lately. It's just life, now and then but not often, with mamafish.