Do What You Love.......Love What You Do

 Well,

this is my place......this is where I can speak my mind.  I have been back to work for the last six months and it is here I will declare I am so proud of myself.  In October of 2008 the store I worked at full time closed.  With twins graduating High School with plans of entering college, a dream home built by my husband with a huge backyard and pool along with the mortgage and property taxes to go along with it.  With obligations for race horses my husband decided to invest in.  Towards the end of that job my vacations were used going on scrapbooking retreats with friends, so my husband could take care of obligations at home and I could create and start to make books with the pictures of our family.  A lot started to change during this time.  The whole country went through an economic downturn and a lot of people were turning to the digital world.  I had some goals towards the end of my career with the department store I worked at.  Every year I would save money to use to buy a Mac laptop.  I would use the money on a vacation instead.  Not a bad decision.  But, when the store closed the liquidator said if I met certain goals I would get a bonus.  I also would be able to collect unemployment which actually meant no vacation could be taken.  My mom had other plans for me and gave my daughter and I a trip to Paris between Christmas and New Years knowing no one would schedule an interview during that time.  That trip really helped me focus of what I needed to do get a job.  I did exactly as I said I would.  I bought a Mac computer, taught myself how to use it.  Within two months I was writing a blog and opened an Etsy shop.  Glen and I went to Omaha Nebraska for Silver Bella and again I had fuel for the fire in me to get started living out the dream I had for myself.  And that was to find income in doing what I was passionate about.  I just didn't know what it was.  I had a love for Victorian die cuts, paper, trading cards, postcards and valentines.  I started making some things and putting them on Etsy.  Some loyal readers of my blog were my best customers and I was off and running.  I have to say having people in your corner cheering you on is my fuel.  Also, the support of my family and watching my children dive head first to any opportunity that came their way is what gave me a lot of drive!  So, why the picture?  Another life changer for me was going back to college in my late twenties before my children were born.  I majored in something I love Art.  Never knew how I could make an income doing this, but I knew I loved it and became aware of what a visual person I am.  I also included this because of the Pieta  being made out of wood and surviving all of this time.  And, I was in the Princeton Museum which is completely free.  How, do  you stay motivated in staying focused in doing what you love.....most things come with a price.  But, the most important lesson I have learned in those years is the choices you make in your day to day life is what makes all the difference in the life you lead and the legacy you leave behind.  What is it that you want to be known for?  There is a fear here also, will I look like an idiot, will I be broke, will I be homeless, am I crazy, am I good enough?????  See, how easy those questions come.  Because, those fears have been there for years.  What makes you finally decide enough!!!!!  What makes you take that leap of faith?  I am going to try and share my lessons learned so you too will feel ready to take your leap of faith!  So you too can learn how to Do What You Love and Love What You Do.  Even if you don't love it so much but, ultimately get you to where you meet your goals again financially.

Never chose my word for 2014.  Finally chose it.  It is KICK.  I am ready to kick this year's ass.  Yesterday I kicked the snow off my license plate and it felt good.  This year is not going to be easy.  I am in a slow gear, but to get this year going and make plans happen......I have to KICK it up a knotch.  I am ready!   London has been calling and I am ready to make it happen!

Bruce Springsteen - 2014-01-29 - Cape Town Bellville Velodrome - This Is...

I haven't written in awhile.....sick and getting over a cold.....working a lot....got through inventory.  So, 2013 my miracle was becoming employed.  By not calling out sick I now have a comp week.  I have a total of three weeks paid vacation....woot woot!!!!! My first vacation will be a cruise won in 2013....miracle!  My second will be to London, which will include seeing my son play with the Billy Walton Band (he started playing with them in 2013....miracle).  My third will be staying in the area to take advantage of all the shore has to offer during the summer.

2014 Light of Day was fantastic as always with a huge amount of local talent and talent and fans from all over the world coming to a birthday party for Bob Benjamin and all of the proceeds going to Parkinson's.  It is a let down when it is all over.

Sometimes all I need is a good song to get me out of a func.  I always say the same thing in January that I feel like a bear.  Just want to hybernate and go to sleep until it is Spring.  But, making plans for vacation can make that all better,  and a good song.  Sometimes songs can be a weapon and make your mood a lot better.  Thought I would share this video if you needed  a good song to sing too!  Especially love Steven and Bruce singing together and all the SMILES!!!!!

2014.....are you ready?

Well only a few more days left to the year.  I haven't written in awhile....not because of lack of time or inspiration, but because of disappointment.  When you write a blog, you can write privately or share.  I was so disappointed after sharing on facebook to see where traffic to my blog was coming from.  The surprise and again disappointment led me to stop writing.  Which in the end left me disappointed in myself because I didn't fulfill a goal and blamed someone other then myself.   Each year I set my goals, and see what happens.  I think 2013 was a miracle.  We as a family have had so much of our hard work come shining through.  My children graduated college....not a small feat!  My mother was so sick when she was treated her heart stopped beating and was put on a respirator.  After a month in the hospital, I think she is better then ever at 80!  Our store was able to open and Glen opened a second location called Covers and he received a patent for a design of a record tree.  Kaylyn went to China and taught kindergarten for a month and a half.  Ian has played with at least 6 different bands and ended up touring with a band  to England and Germany with Glen joining him for a week.  Glen and I really enjoyed this summer following Ian around and enjoying a great band at great locations we would never known about if it wasn't for them.  Like spending a Sunday in the pinelands of New Jersey is my new favorite way to spend a  day off.  I have started back at a job I am very comfortable in.  I am exhausted, but am ready for 2014 to start again and renew some goals and travel!!!!!  Looking forward to picking a word for 2014!!!  Truely grateful for the miracles of 2013!  Wishing you a Happy New Year and may all your dreams and wishes come true!

Talk about a dream........try to make it REAL

Lights out tonight, trouble in the heartland.
Got a head-on collision, smashin in my guts man.
Im caught in a crossfire that I don't understand.
But there's one thing I know for sure girl:
I don't give a damn for the same old played out scenes
I don't give a damn for just the in-betweens.
Honey I want the heart, I want the soul, I want control right now.
You better listen to me baby:
Talk about a dream; try to make it real.
You wake up in the night with a fear so real.
You spend your life waiting for a moment that just don't come.
Well don't waste your time waiting

Lyrics to songs.....listen to a song and have it have a whole new meaning when you hear it two days later.  On Friday night as I drove home from a full day at work.  It was my day off, but I went in anyway I went in extra early and still left late feeling defeated and drained in every sense of the words......felt very uninspired.  I listen to E Street radio and it is an escape.  Well, Jim Rotolo's show was on live this Friday night and they were talking about Bruce's live box sets.  One of my favorites to talk about in the store too....starting to get ironic.  But, then someone calls from Asbury Park and my heart is lifted.  So, happy to hear someone telling the world to visit Asbury in the off season.  Then Jim Rotolo actually mentions me and then the caller Frank mentions Glen.  JOY sets in.  I am elated.  What better song to celebrate then to sing along to Badlands.

Saturday I get in the car to work a late shift.  Echoes of Glen warning me to put the @#$@$%& insurance card in my car that has been sitting on the kitchen counter for weeks.  I put it in the car and start noticing how neglected my car is that has been so good getting me back and forth this sixth day of working this week.  I start driving.....I think I should make a quick stop on my way to get some supplies to make some things for Greetings from Geralyn.  I then decide I am doing the wrong thing that there will be lines.  I should call work in case I am late.  I look with one hand in my bag to make sure I have the number......I know I should just wait........I stop looking....now I am stopped at a traffic light....I should look again  I look down and decide it's a bad idea.  I take my foot off the brake and the next thing I know I have hit the car in front of me.....life changes in a second.  Racing thoughts and I have to make sure the person in front of me is ok.......I then see the dog cages in the back and have to be reassured they are ok.  The person I hit goes on to tell me what a horrible day she is having and is very sweet...I am repeating I am sorry over and over again.  I am not thinking right and am happy to just sit back in the car and just think.........think......think.   What if I didn't put the insurance card back in my car? ALL  the all ifs are running through my brain.  I instantly have an I give up attitude swimming through me......like a deflated balloon I wait and wait and wait for the police to arrive.  But, I sit and go from a shaking mess to calm.  I call Glen.....I call my manager and tell them what is up.  Long story short.......I am not hurt....the person in front of me is not hurt.....my car has damage to the plastic  bumper.....I still am not sure if I damaged her car...will have to see what the accident report says.  The officer gives me a ticket but tells me to go to the court date to fight it.  I write down what he tells me.  I surprisingly drive to work and arrive to work about a half and hour late which shocks me because I sat there for 40 minutes.     I work my shift and drive home.  Wake up this morning and tell Glen to listen at 8am for the repeat of the radio show.  I end up driving to Starbucks to refuel my tank (it is empty at this point).  I listen again to the songs that lifted my spirits so much on Friday.  Jersey Girl and those words of my job leaving me so uninspired......No Surrender is meaning don't give up Geralyn.....hang in there!!!  And finally they talk about Convention Hall again and I feel so GRATEFUL!  And then the words of every lyric in Badland has a different meaning for me, as always.  But, now I REALLY have a head on collision to deal with not just with my car, but my life!  Why do the lyrics from Bruce's song ring so true to me?  Why sometimes is it just not my feeling that, but something REAL happening?  Why did my husband stress the importance of putting the insurance card in my car?  All I feel to help me IS to  make sure I am on board......I am on the train......I am on that track and damn it......I am rising above these Badlands anyway I know how and that is by showing up!!!!!  I am on board!!!!  Get ready because this train is still a roller coaster for me, but I believe with all my heart that it may be a wild ride but, it is one that is worth it!!!!!!  It ain't no sin to be glad you are alive.

Superstorm Sandy a year later......

This picture was taken in 1986.  Notice the tape on the windows above.  Glen ended up building a beautiful deck with a firepit, corner gardens and benches all around.  We celebrated the firemen winning the County Bowling championship and had many summer evenings spent back there.  We sold this house.  We survived many storms living there, before selling it about ten years ago.  The house is just an empty lot now.  Sandy knocked the house right off it's foundation.  It was torn down and not even a piece of wood is left there.  The same goes for the house Glen grew up in and later renovated by putting in a brand new kitchen.
     Now, that Glen and I are in our fifties we have made a lot of decisions.  For me, I was tired of watching Glen work so hard.  He worked physically hard as a union carpenter.  Financially a very tough way of living.  Building in this country has had it's highs and lows.  So, during the lows Glen would work on our houses.  Once, the children were born we had two houses for him to spend endless hours not only renovating but, making larger.  Always having the big picture in mind.
     Circumstances and finances started to change when our house values became better.  But, on our income it became harder and harder to afford our property taxes.  It was time to sell.  When, we sell our first home we invested in finishing our home we lived in.  We changed the liner in the pool.  The utility bills were huge and way beyond our means.  When my dad died, we still weren't completely finished with the house.  But, we had family come up from Texas and a week to get ready.  So, Glen put wallpaper on the walls and we were proud to show our house as finished for the first time.  We had savings and investments and the stock market tanked along with what we had put aside for the children for their education.
     So, long story short we ended up selling that beautiful home that you could call our dream house.  Glen had changed every wall.  Built a second floor with a master bedroom and bath and a room of their own for Ian and Kaylyn.  Built me a kitchen that I designed.  Put in a  bathroom where you would walk in the back from the pool.  We had many celebrations in that back yard.  Prom pictures were taken by our fireplace and we felt proud to have this be our home while the children were in their teenage years.
      Senior year the department store I worked at closed.  But, I was able to see every activity my children were in.  We had the time to throw the cast party for a play Kaylyn starred in.  We went to every Jazz band concert and marching band activity Ian was in.  But, as the decision came for college they both decided on the same.  University of the Arts.....googled it.....oh my god.....$30,000 a year......times 2 !!!!!!!
        So, the real estate market is bad.......really bad!!!!!   I get a full time job in Princeton for a year.  Glen wants to retire and he should there is no building going on.  But, their education is going to cost $240.000!!!!!!  Yes, scholarships and grants helped.  But, here we are and they did have to take out student loans that become due this month.
    So, when Sandy hit we are in our new home.....five miles from the beach.  No big trees,  utilities are all underground.  Glen is still a fireman, but he stays home for the first time.  Ian is a fireman and sleeps at the firehouse for three nights. We have a store in Convention Hall on the boardwalk in Asbury Park.  We food shop and watch the storm unfold on tv and on the computer.  The wind and rain starts early and there is a constant worry.  When I am watching tv I see Anderson Cooper on the boardwalk and what I see is devastating and realize it was filmed earlier.......the tv goes off and total darkness sets in.  I still have the battery on the  computer and then my son starts posting pictures and I ask him to stop I can't take it.  I see the medallion in the Casino building in Asbury Park is blown in......I see trees falling around us. I see pictures of trees on houses.  I close the computer and vow not to open it again.   I hear the wind howling for hours......candles our blown out and we go to bed and end up sleeping until daylight.

This Hard Land (Kilkenny 07/28/13)