My Good News Is

My good news is that I am alive. I am here, experiencing the smells, tastes, and sights of a wonderful and complex world. My good news is that I can laugh. I can cry. I can smile. I can dance. My good news us a joy that cannot be taken away. My good news is laughter on my lips, a smile in my heart, a song in my ear. My good news is sunshine and flowers, the ocean, puppies playing, a gentle breeze. My good news is family. friends. SLU. Learning.

My good news is being in love. Dancing carefree. Laying in the sunshine. My good news is nature. Walking along a babbling brook, hiking to the top of a mountain. My good news is the smell of spring, the touch of the sun on my skin, the water swirling its hello beside me. My good news is closing my eyes and liking who I am and where I am going. My good news is coming home, and also coming back to SLU. My good news is the ability to choose to love every moment. My good news letting go and letting God. Loving people. My good news is the desire to never stop learning. My good news is curiosity for life. My good news is that I am alive. I am alive! I am oh-so-alive.

Things SLU

SLU (Saint Louis University) is an old sweatshirt. SLU is my comfortable pair of sandals, the ones that have formed perfectly to every groove of my feet. SLU is the smell of my house after I've been gone for 3 months. SLU is a hug from an old friend, a tingle in the pit of your stomach when you share a smile with a stranger. SLU is your favorite pair of jeans that fit jst right, soft and slightly worn from hundreds of washes. SLU is family. SLU is friends. SLU is experience. SLU is comfort, like a homecooked meal. SLU is 74 and sunny, even when it's 10 degrees outside. SLU welcomes me with the fountains, flowers, smiling faces. SLU is home away from home. 

Hello, old friend

Wow, I haven't blogged in awhile. Not like I was so "committed" to this blog before. But that's all about to change. First, mainly because of James Canfield, my left half. He's wonderful, talented, funny, charming...the list goes on. Basically, we complete each other in the friendship realm. Anyway, he has started a blog (here's the link:) and it's fantastic and now I am inspired anew to come back to my own blog.

Another reason I am coming back to my old friend, this blog, is because I am taking the best class of my life, social justice, with Dr. Chmiel at SLU. It's my ultimate favorite class, hands down. I love it because we get to be real. The students all know each other's names (and many of us have never met before). We share life lessons, stories, reactions to things we read, and we write. We write in these lovely little composition books, and we can say whatever we want, because the comp books are for us. We look at important issues, like the war in Iraq, but we also share funny moments, times when we feel/see love. I would highly recommend it to anyone interested in social justice. Anyway, being in this class and writing in my notebook has re-awakened my love of writing. I'll probably post some things I write in that notebook. And I am okay if no one likes what I write, or cares about what I write, or thinks the things I write are trash. That's okay! Everyone is entitled to their own opinions. And I'm not writing for you (to be quite blunt). I'm writing for me. For the way it makes me feel to create.