August 17, 2011

Hanging by a moment....

Today..on my mindless run to get groceries, I saw the end result of a car wreck. Right in front of me were three paramedics kneeling on the ground preforming CPR on the person in the middle of them. It wasn't a very pretty site..

I've been thinking about it ever since for some reason. One instant. That's all it took for that person to go from going about life normally to lying on the ground...fighting for life. One moment. A moment that the family will get the call saying their son, daughter, husband or wife has been in an accident. Thinking about it in that perspective, you would think the world would be placed on pause, that everyone would tune in for that second to somehow help the outcome...

I watched as the line of cars began to form behind the flashing cop cars stopping traffic. People who were just going about their daily lives, getting slightly annoyed at this new delay that would throw their routine off. When in just a mere few hundred feet in front of them, someone was seriously injured. It just put into perspective for me, how all too often we get consumed by our own lives, caught up in our current moment, school, work or even silly errands...and we don't give thought to what the person next to us is facing or going through. We just simply void our emotions.

The point is, that everything can all change in a split second. I don't know if the person today lived or died. I don't know who they were, or any part of their life story.. But I know that today has probably been an incredibly hard day for their loved ones. We don't know when our "instant" will come...but odds are, that we won't be expecting it. Don't let that moment pass you up to let someone close to you know how you feel...don't waste all of your words by never sharing them.

You never know when that moment, instant or second could be changed forever..



August 12, 2011

The In-Between

Packing...unpacking...packing...unpacking...packing again?? At this rate, I'm almost becoming professional. This will be my third time in under a year! My problem is the whole starting to pack part...I'm pretty great a putting it off as long as I can. Which may be why I'm writing this...

A little while back, I was home visiting my family. I was talking to my grandma when she said something that, made me laugh at first, but thinking about it now, it is rather true.. She said, "You know Manda, you're at the point in your life where you don't really belong anywhere. I mean, you don't really belong at home anymore because you've moved away. It's more of a place to come visit. But you don't really belong at college either because it's not your permanent stop, you'll be done there in a few years. You're just stuck in the in-between. In between childhood and being all grown up."

She's right. I'm stuck in the in-between. But I'm happily stuck there. I'm going to enjoy it...the up's, down's, packing, unpacking, meeting new people, finding new adventures, learning, laughing, and finding happiness in the journey of it all.

So here's to the in-between! And to all of you others out there stuck in it also! Enjoy it! Be spontaneous, do things that scare you, try things you've never done...before you know it, you'll be "all grown up."