(no longer a nanny)Kate

That damn shoe.

I've started a couple of posts to continue, but I'm not sure what to say that doesn't sound whiny and fussy. And lately, I've been a lot of both at home and that makes me not want to be that way anymore. As if I want to say 'Enough of this, get on with your life'. But I feel like I need to continue in order to get it out of my system. So. Here it goes.

In high school I lucked out. I went to Happening and found friends all around NYS that were fun and funny and we loved being together- not just at those overnight weekends, but we would drive hours to hang out at someone's house, go to someone's high school play, watch someone play lacrosse, and be at each other's graduations. Happening became my family outside of my family, and I was incredibly lucky not just in the friends I had, but in the 'parents' I acquired. Mom Sandy and Dad Mark, Mom Julie and Father Tom, Mom Suzie and Dad Dean, Mom Marti and Dad Jim, and another Mom Marti and Dad Charlie. I saw what a love filled, God-centered, deliberately decided upon marriages were. I saw that in parts of my life prior to and since then, but something about all my 'other parents' relationships was different. All of those people ...made the very well thought out, planned, deliberate choice to spend their life with their spouse. There was no part of their marriages that were haphazzard, thrown together, ....chaos that I felt within my parent's marriage.

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To make it more clear- My mother has (I think when I was in high school or maybe early college) told me that she had been very in love and involved in a long term (like almost 2 year) relationship with someone she went to college with. My dad had gone on a couple of dates with one of my mom's best friends from high school and they had decided it wouldn't work but this friend of my mom's thought that they would get along well and set them up, since my mom was no longer involved with previously mentioned gentleman. In one sentance- My mom was on a rebound. And my dad was convenient and fell for my mom. And that is what I mean by the haphazzard, thrown together, chaotic... and non-deliberate relationship. I'm not saying this was part of the shoe dropping/worrying that is me, but its part of how I view my parent's relationship.
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In addition to my Happening/CNY family and parents, I had the theater/music/tech club/drama club/crew in my high school that became my other family. I spent more time in the auditorium than anywhere else- playing cards, talking, hanging lights, painting sets, rehearsing, feeding lines to people, and generally hanging out. That one room- that huge enormous room that could be peaceful and awe-inspiring, and full of laughter -that was the place I was most at home (except for Thornfield). And I feel incredibly grateful for the life I had there, the friends I made there, and the way I felt there.

I was lucky in my parents that they allowed me freedoms- to drive to Syracuse, Skaneateles, Ithaca, Cazanovia, ...all over CNY and also to be out with my friends in the area we lived at all hours- to stay late at school because of rehearsal and go out to fork someone's yard at midnight. There was never a curfew because I always told them where I was and with who and when I'd be home. Before cell phones and I was out till 2 am often on the weekends.

I know that during this time, I wanted to be loved. And while I had lots of friends- good friends and many of those people from one part of my life became part of the other part (high school friends who attended Happening too, or Happening friends who were part of the rest of my life because they came to visit and be there for the plays and Talent Fest that I spent so many hours on in that auditorium). But I was always looking for 'the one'. Whoever he was, to love me, for me. To accept me and want me and love me for always.