I had set P’s last entry to auto post. Largely because- 1. I’m in school and knew I wouldn’t have time to put something thoughtful together the night before I had something due and was about to board a plane and 2. I’m lazy.

I was all geared up to go this whole week. My mind was focused on nothing but P and cupcakes and lots of fun.

And then I got the call Tuesday’s morning.

Will’s grandpa had passed away.

It was a crazy day which included having to rearrange my travel plans. That turned out to be a fun event (ha!). Not only does American Airlines not give benevolence rates, but they also charged me a freaking kidney and first born to change my flight.

Insert expletive here --->

Anyway, I felt so terrible for letting P down, but I also knew I had to be there for Will and our family. I just couldn’t have a good time knowing what was going on back home. I had focused my mind on fun and craziness and had to switch gears to focus on loving Will and just being “there.” Definitely not one of those weeks you plan for.

The funeral was yesterday. I’ve mentioned Will’s Grandma Bea in the past. She died a few years ago and wanted her ashes scattered at a pond where she and Bill went fishing. It was an intimate and special place for both of them.

Grandpa Bill had been sick for several months now, and we all knew he’d be passing soon but it was still sad to hear the news. He had spoken with his daughter the day before he died and had a special message for each of us which she shared yesterday. It was emotional and really special to hear.

After the service we went to the lake and scattered his ashes the same place where they scattered Bea’s. I had never known anyone who had been cremated, so it was a different experience.

It was so weird to see Bill’s ashes in the lake. He had lived 87 years and had so many adventures and stories and at the end was nothing but ashes sinking and falling on the sand below. I know death is something we all know will happen to us, but it’s so visceral to be reminded of it and actually see a life go by and disappear in an instant. It definitely makes me so thankful for the life God has given me. He has blessed me beyond anything I could ever deserve and so often I fail to thankful and truly stop to give myself over to him to have His way in my life. Yesterday was a good reminder of how I need to live my life to please God and not to be so caught up in worries and stressors and the vapor that is life. At the end all we are is a lump of bones, and what we do today is what matters. Life is short.

It’s sad that it takes a funeral to be reminded of what a blessing life is, but I’m thankful for how God spoke to me. I challenge you to do something today to make tomorrow better. I know I will be doing the same.

So- we “take two” on the Chicago trip. I’m headed out later this week. I promise to provide lots of pictures and updates!

So today is the day.

The day all these silly posts have led up to.

The day P turns 21.

The day where I feel pretty darn old.

It’s finally here.

I remember the day in 1989 when we were living in Germany and I got home from school and heard the news that I was going to have a baby brother or sister.

I remember walking down the stairs to see the light on in the kitchen and finding my mom eating potato salad- which is what she craved throughout her pregnancy with P.

Hmm- P? What are your thoughts on potato salad? Mom craved Suzy Qs with me and to this day whenever I can find them (which is very rare) I have this unexplainable impulse to buy three and eat them before I even leave the parking lot. For some reason I can’t see you doing the same with potato salad.

…

Moving on…

I remember the day when P was born- “way” back in 1990. It’s weird to think that I can actually remember that, but I do. I was in school and one of my mom’s friends came to pick me up because “it was time!” She was born with a low white blood cell count and had to stay in the hospital an extra few days and I clearly remember going to see her in that tiny little incubator. She had these little foiled heart-shaped warmers on her back to keep her temperature regulated. I remember having to scrub, scrub, scrub my hands at the hospital before I was able to touch her tiny back- and I remember being amazed that I had a little baby sister. I remember thinking how much I was going to love her and play with her and take care of her and be her best friend forever. When I look back I liken it to Elvira on Tiny Toons. Do you remember that? The girl was always on the lookout for a pet and always telling potential animals- in a scary high pitch shrill, mind you- that she would love them and squeeze them and hold them forever and ever and ever! Yep, I was pretty excited to have a little sister. Poor thing. She never had a chance.

I was like her second mom, she was always on my hip and with me all the time and I was fine with that. Granted, as you know from previous posts she drove me crazy sometimes, and I’m sure I did the same to her. We’ve fought. We’ve cried. We’ve laughed. And we’ve been mad. But who hasn’t when you’ve cared for someone? I’ve watched her make friends and change friends and change schools and change boyfriends, and she’s watched me do the same. We went from superficial closeness to a deeper friendship as we’ve gotten older. We don’t hold back and share everything, our fears, our deepest secrets, our insecurities, and our worries. And it’s okay.  Because we’re safe to share those things with one another because we know it’s okay. It’s home. And it always will be.

So here’s to the first 21 years with P- I’m really thankful for them and so blessed to have a sister than I can be unbelievably close to. Friends are overrated, right P (haha)? And here’s to 21 more. And 21 more after that. And 21 more after that! I want us to be in some nice retirement village drinking mimosas and sneaking peanut butter patties past the nurses one day.

So friends- today we tip our hats (ahem- and glasses. Big, big glasses) to miss P. She’s a big girl now. Cheers to her and cheers to what might possibly be one of the more fun weekends in our 21 years together.

Happy birthday P Dub. I love you.

Chicago here I come!!

As you may recall, Will and I made the move to Kuwait during the late spring of 2005. When we got there, we lived with my parents and sister in an apartment. Defintiely not ideal living situations for 5 people! Not to mention the fact that when we moved there, I was still unemployed. The summer of 2005 was interesting. At the time, it was a mix of fun and pain, but now that I’ve been removed from the situation for several years, I look back and think it was such a great time in my life. Something I needed and learned from and appreciated. Something I wouldn’t trade.

The summer of 2005 was full of a lot of navigating. Learning the ropes of living in Kuwait. Getting familiarized with the culture, the area, all the different cool things that existed in this new world…I learned about the dust storms and kitchen fans (check out this post), running out of water, and all sorts of other things. Seriously, if you get bored, you ought to check out the summer of 05 archives. Good times.

I learned a lot, and it was nice to get to learn it with my sister. Because I was unemployed and had no Kuwait license yet, P and I were homebound during the day. All day. For months. Literally- the only time we would get out of our apartment complex would be on the weekends with our family, and then at the bottom of our building to get bread from the bakery. So- it’s not like I need to tell you this, but- we didn’t get out much. I would shower and that’s about it. Poor Will. Literally days of no makeup or doing my hair. Sexy.

P and I became pretty good at staying home all day, everyday. We even had a system. Will would get up at like 4 in the morning to be able to leave for work, so I would get up with him, go back to sleep, we’d wake up, have breakfast and watch Home And Away- this incredibly porpular Austrailain show. I would clean the apartment. We’d have lunch- which often consisted of thin crust cheese pizza from Pizza Hut. Then we’d freak out over how much we were eating and go work out. Sometimes we would swim, but that ended quickly because the building owner would watch us and it would creep us out. We’d spend time on the patio outside too, looking at life go on while we were stuck inside. Then we’d make dinner. We tried to actually take time to make real meals for our family since we were home all day and they were at work for 11 hours straight.

I remember one time in particular we were having a bad day. I don’t remember why, but I remember being pretty bummed, mainly because I wasn’t able to find a job. I was on edge. I was irritable. I was not ready for anything to go remotely wrong. Plus I had just cleaned the house. We had decided to make homemade baked chicken strips with our own breading. So- we put the chicken in a big gallon size bag that had lots and lots of breadcrumbs in it. P was in charge of coating the chicken. She began coating the chicken, and then ended up just shaking the bag to try to coat it evenly. Only the bag wasn’t sealed. And chicken and breadcrumbs when every where. And I seriously freaked out. In fact, I think there was a time in which P and I actually named that day, “The Chicken Finger Freak Out.” Because I remember literally screaming. I don’t think I screamed a word- I just screamed and I think I totally terrified P.

It was one of those moments where I had just reached my limit and the breadcrumbs flying everywhere was more than I could handle. And P was there. She was there to help clean up the mess and she was there to laugh about it with me. She was there to make me realize it was going ot be okay. She was just always there when I needed her most. Somewhere around that same time, during the height of my frustration of living with my parents in a matchbox and being uneomployed me and P did something silly. I remember we had gone out with my family that night and it was sweltering outside. We were hangingout downstairs by the pool for some reason. P and I got restless and bored and were already in a goofy mood. Plus we were hot, so we ended up both getting a running start and jumping into the pool together, clothes and all! What a sight. That just helped keep things in perspective for me. Things don’t always go as planned, but you just hav eto dive in and go with the flow. And I was lucky enough to have my sister right there with me.

In the summer of 2002, the summer before I met Will, I broke up with my boyfriend of 2 ½ years.

It was a pretty rough time. I remember P was so great and was my best friend and we got so close that summer. All my friends had already gone off to college and so that summer aside from my church friends- who were also friends with this guy- it was really me and P.

We had a lot of fun that summer. We’d hang out at the pool, make late night Dunkin Donuts runs, I even recall eating ice cream out of the container and picking all the delicious toppings out with or hands (classy). Just a lot of silly fun.

There’s even a video floating around there somewhere which would most definitely seal my fate for never being able to run for public office. Nothing risqué, but pretty freaking hilarious.

We are just a lot of fun when we’re together and she will never know how much she helped me through that breakup. I know it seems silly to say that my 12 year old sister helped me- a 19 year old- get through that time, but she did. I think the glaring giant age difference between us made a lot people scratch their heads as to how we could be so very close. I mean, it’s practically a decade. When I was driving she was learning to write cursive. When I was going to college she had just started junior high. We were on entirely different planes, but it didn’t matter. We would still laugh and joke and kid and drive others around us crazy with all our inside jokes.

You know when you’re just made to be close with someone? That’s how it’s always been for me and P. We are like kindred spirits, two bodies linked by our one connection together, our “sisterhood.” It just can’t be explained sometimes, and anyone that is close to their sibling or a longtime friend definitely gets that. 

In the fall of 1999 I got my learner’s permit- and the whole world seemed to begin to open for me.

It was just me, my purple mini van, and the open road… oh- and the responsible adult (AKA my mom or dad) in the front seat with me.

Learning to drive was… fun.

Of course- I say that now with rose colored glasses. The truth is that it was awful and painful, I’m sure. I remember on more than one (um read: ever freaking time) occasion I would yell to my mom or dad- “Do YOU want to drive!? Then stop telling me how to do it!?” I also remember hating to turn. Like turn the car to the left or right. Especially when semis were nearby. I would totally freak out. It was fun for everyone in the car, I’m sure.

My little sister, being the comic relief that she is, would further perpetuate the matter by bringing her pink Barbie bicycle helmet along and wearing it while I drove.  Yes. She actually did. Just to stir the pot and annoy me. Kid sisters are the BEST!

Anyway- what P forgot was that a day was coming in which she would turn 16 and have to learn how to drive too. What’s interesting about that is that P turned 16 while in Kuwait, and couldn’t get her license there so she never really drove much. She decided, however, the summer before last that it was time for her to get her license. So- Will took on the brave job of teaching P how to drive- parallel parking and all. He was pretty great about the whole thing. Will has a touch with that sort of stuff. Unfortunately, most of this training took place during the day while I was at work so I had to miss out on all the parking fun. I didn’t even get to wear a bicycle helmet to pay her back! Bummer. I really would have enjoyed that. So- after only about a week of crash course driving lessons Will took P to get her license- and she succeeded! There’s actually a whole long drawn out story involving a cracked windshield, grumpy cop, and my sister bawling (which she never EVER does)- but we’ll glaze over all that to simply say- she got her license. Good times. 

When P and I were younger we had an above ground pool in our back yard. We spent every single day out at the pool during the summer. We would play all sorts of games, from Marco Polo, to “guess what color I’m thinking of, and I’m going to dunk you until you say the right one,” to giving each other tours of the pool while riding on a float, and finally- we would occasionally get all self righteous and baptize one another. Very nice. We had a lot of fun summer days together in the pool. 

I posted this ages ago. It was about how P and my mom came all the way to Camp Arifjan, where I worked in Kuwait, and surprised me with a Johnny Carinos canolli and a crown for being “Employee of the Month.” It seems sort of silly when I look back on it now, but at the same time, when I look back on it now, it touches me even more.

For one, I hated my job experience in Kuwait for a long time. If any of you have read my blog from those days you know I had a hard time. It was so sweet when they came up to my work and surprised me with such a thoughtful gift just to show they loved me. Also, getting onto Camp Arifjan is a giant pain in the ass. Yes. I said it. Ass. Because it is. It really is, and there’s no way around not cussing because it’s THAT much of a pain. Anyway- it took a lot of time driving there, waiting to get to the gate, having your car searched, getting fondled in the 100 plus degree heat, and then getting to my office. That alone shows the thought behind the gift. What a nice gesture. I’m a really lucky girl. 

P eats with me.

Like eats.

Girls are annoying. We really are. We don’t eat in front of other girls ever! Because that would mean that we had no mastery over our hunger and that we really don’t survive solely on coffee and Orbit Sweet Ming gum (ha- see yesterday)!!

That’s what I love about me and P. We have lots of healthy moments, but we also have a lot of ravenous manly beast-like moments- especially during special occasion weekends like P’s upcoming birthday weekend! Do you know that this past May when we went to Beavers Bend we literally had smores for every.single.meal. the entire weekend? It was amazing. We are also known for killing an entire medium Lou Malnati’s deep dish pizza in one night. And then there’s… well… I think you get the point. Let’s not lose sight of the fact that we DO eat healthy. Haha. Oh- and if you’re wondering- yes, we already have our entire gastronomy planned for the entire birthday weekend. But you probably already figured that. 

The girl goes through Orbit Sweet Mint gum like I’ve never seen.

She’s got a real problem and a bad habit on her hands- she’s up to four packs a day!

I’ve considered an intervention, but, well- have you had Orbit Sweet Mint gum? 

P and I have the best emails and text messages back and forth. We hardly ever write more than a paragraph at any given time and continually exchange short little blurbs back and forth throughout the entire day.

It’s like a Christmas present that I keep getting over and over.

It always makes me so happy to see an email from her. We can literally talk back and forth like this for 10 hours a day via email or text message and never get bored and still have tons of pithy and hilarious things to talk about. Oh guys- do I have some hilarious doozies I could share, but the truth is that if I did share them it would be pretty embarrassing so it’s probably best I do not. Maybe one day I’ll clean some of them up and post a thread or two. Fun times.