Injustice Anywhere...

“I am cognizant of the interrelatedness of all communities and states. I cannot sit idly by in Atlanta and not be concerned about what happens in Birmingham. Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly affects all indirectly.”
–Martin Luther King Jr.

An Argument with my Mother

As I sat there, nails piercing my palms in the shape of little half-moons of rage, I struggled to maintain what composure I had left. She had done this before, seen the line lay out in front of her and crossed it anyways, but this was different. This was personal. Her words continued to repeat in my mind, stuck in perpetual repetition, as if somehow my anger was feeding the fire that was now pulsing through my veins. I could feel the heat of my blood as it rushed through my body, frozen in place, my body’s attempt to contain the fires within. I can hear my mother’s words as clearly now as I could when she first uttered them.

“What are you getting so worked up about? You don’t live in California and you probably never will. This has nothing to do with you.”

Her words began to mix with those of the much too peppy news reporter, swirling together, making me sick to my stomach. I no longer remember her exact words but I remember how my body felt as the reporter read the results of the California elections, as she sealed the fate of my community in a few simple words. Proposition 8, the Proposition that would take away the right of all gay and lesbian couples in California to marry, had passed. The people of California, in a 52 to 48% vote, had effectively looked every gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender person in the eyes and said “you are less than your neighbors, your rights are not your rights anymore”.
My mother and I had argued about this before. My mother is in no way homophobic- she loves me as much now as she did before I came out and truly believes that there is nothing wrong with being gay. She is, however, far from a social activist and my intensity and propensity for social justice issues is just a bit much for her. Naturally, the decision of Californians to take away the rights of people just like me brought up different reactions from the two of us. Being a firm believer of the King Jr. school of thought that “injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere”, I took the decision personally. I was scared. I cried. My stomach had that never-ending pit feeling to it and I felt like I had been attacked, like I was seen as a bad person, as less than, because I happened to love other women. My heart, that organ we all take for granted so often, felt as though someone had opened my chest and squeezed it tightly in a vice.

My mother, however, a firm believer of my grandparents school of thought that everyone should take care of themselves and that if it didn’t affect you directly it wasn’t of concern to you, had quite a different reaction. She had no reaction at all. The only reason she even crossed the line and said what she said was because I had done exactly what she would soon do to me. I pushed her to the edge. My sarcastic whispers throughout her news programs and heartfelt tirades about the injustice of it all had become too much for her and forced her to react. So like a dog whose ears had been pulled just one too many times by her own offspring, my mother bit back. And her comment, as it was intended to do, shut me up. It wasn’t that I didn’t know what to say that kept me silent, it was that I hadn’t considered that someone I had grown up with, someone I had learned so much from, would think so differently from me. I didn’t understand because I was so angry, so hurt that I couldn’t think clearly enough to bring her in, to help her understand why I was so moved to fight against this.

The way my mother had grown up and been raised was so far detached from what I was experiencing that I don’t know if she could have felt what I was feeling even if she tried her hardest. Her life, or at least her experience of it, simply did not include an understanding of what it feels like to be a lesbian or gay youth in my lifetime. And there I was trying to explain to her something that may as well have been said in Russian. I was explaining photography to the man who had never seen the light of day. It wasn’t by any means her fault that we didn’t have a common language to talk about this issue, but it frustrated me just the same.

I wanted nothing more than share with her what I was feeling because I knew it would change her mind, but the way I was going about it was wrong. Instead of trying to make her understand something that she couldn’t, like being a young lesbian in such an unsure time, I had to translate to a language that made sense in her life. And I realized that if I wanted her to relate to me, if I wanted anyone to relate to me and understand why this fight and so many like it were so vital, I had to relate my experiences to those of the people I was trying to convince. I had to help them realize what I knew to be true, that all of us are part of this world, that we all make up a “network of mutuality” where what affects one person has the potential to affect all other. In this way of thinking it is necessary for us all to be responsible for and with the rights and needs of others in our community, our state, our country, our network. If one group of people is being oppressed, if one child is growing up in fear because being who he or she is would put them at risk then the entire community is being oppressed and living in fear. And if they aren’t at that moment, then they could be at any other. When injustice exists in our world in any form it has the potential to exist in our world in any other. The injustice facing GLBT people today could very well be the injustice facing any other group tomorrow.

My argument with my mother, though it ended in a blowout of epic proportions between the two of us, has helped both of us to see our world differently. My mother is beginning to understand that I fight because I know in my heart I have to and that I have a responsibility to do so, but she has also begun to see things as more interconnected. When she hears of young children committing suicide because they had been bullied and tormented for being thought to be gay, she calls me to say that something needs to be done. It’s no longer “it isn’t happening here, what do you care?” No, now it’s “this is happening and it needs to stop.” Like Harvey Milk argued during the fight for gay rights in the 1970’s, you’ve got to come out to everyone you know because it’s a lot harder to discriminate against someone you know. Though he was referring to sexuality when he said it, Harvey’s comments ring true for all walks of life. You have to “come out”, you have to be open and honest and talk with people about who you are and what you believe because if you don’t, you and your ideas become invisible and invisible ideas don’t spark change. In my argument with my mother I had become so blinded by my own outrage and pain that I didn’t think to let her in. In that moment I didn’t think of her as a part of my world community because I couldn’t make her understand, but what I needed to remember was that everyone is part of this community, even when they disagree, and it is not only our responsibility to fight for those being oppressed, but it is our duty to find ways to communicate and open discourse with those who, whether intentionally or not, perpetuate the existence of oppression.

The fight for justice is far from over, not just because of this one example of inequality in the GLBT community, but because while injustice exists anywhere we have to continue to fight for justice everywhere. My argument with my mother served as a reminder that when we try to exist outside of the “network of mutuality” we end up pushing away those who are our allies, who fight alongside us and for us. We have to continue to fight, there is no denying that, but we must do so in a way that invites people into the struggle or we run the risk of forcing them against us.

Name Your World.

Defining the Undefined: Youth & Youthwork

"Rather than standing or speaking for children, we need to stand with children speaking for themselves. We don't need a political movement for children... [we need to] build environments and policies for our collective future."

- Sandra Meucci

In order to give our lives purpose and meaning we must employ the Socratic method-asking ourselves question after question until we have something that resembles an answer, only then can we define who we are and what that means in our lives. I am a youth worker. What that means to the rest of the world is still up for discussion, especially because it is such a newly developed field, but what that means to me is quite clear. There are a few essential questions that every youth worker needs to consider before working with young people. It may seem as though these questions have obvious answers, but the act of discovering these answers is part of being a good youth worker. One question that is constantly redefined is “who are young people?” Yes, young people can be determined by a chronological age-for example, young people fall between the ages of 5-20. But really, what do these numbers tell you about who young people are? Nothing. They tell you what a young person is, someone who is not of adult age, but it tells you nothing of their abilities, their dreams, or their struggles.

So, who exactly are young people? In keeping with my own thoughts and philosophies regarding youth work, young people are a community within our larger society who are often marginalized and treated as second-class citizens due to misunderstandings, misrepresentations, and mainstream society’s unfounded fear of the unknown. This may seem like a very negative definition of youth but that’s because I’m not defining the word, rather I am providing you with a scope with which to see young people that will undoubtedly impact the work you do with and for them. If you see young people as a marginalized group of society then you’ll be more likely to work with them to promote understanding and to increase society’s awareness of what young people have to offer. But if you see young people as much of society does, troubled and in need of adult intervention, then you will most likely work to keep kids “off the streets” and try to impose upon them what you deem to be “good”.

Jane Addams warns us that “in utilizing it [the power of youth] ruthlessly we are not only in danger of quenching the divine fire of youth, but we are imperiling industry itself when we venture to ignore these very sources of beauty, of variety and of suggestion”. (Addams, 1995-2001) When we see youth as having the potential, the “divine spirit”, to do so much more than our society is allowing or giving them opportunities to do, then we are motivated to do whatever we can to right the injustices we see because otherwise we are responsible for quenching that divine fire Addams speaks of. This is why I see young people the way that I do. It’s because something in me drives me to fight for what is right and fair and when I see so much potential being ignored, and worse, deliberately shut down, I see a great injustice happening-not only for the young people but for our society, because without the fresh ideas and creativity of youth our society will fail to grow and change.

In order to do all of this, to provide young people with opportunities to use and explore their strengths and abilities, we need to have the help of youth workers. Again though, we come to the issue of definition. What exactly is a youth worker? Some people will tell you youth work is glorified babysitting, that all we do is watch kids in after-school programs while they create flowers out of pipe cleaners. Now while there certainly are programs that simply provide parents a place to have their child looked after while they are at work, this is not what I consider a youth worker to be. The people who do this may in fact be youth workers, but for the sake of defining what I attribute to be youth work, these people fall just short.

Youth workers are people who work on behalf of, or advocate for, young people in a way that promotes their positive development while simultaneously helping them to build bridges within their community that will help them to create positive relationships with adults and peers. Youth workers are people who are passionate about promoting positive youth development. They are people who understand that false models of power between young people and adults are harmful to fostering positive relationships. They are people who focus on the strengths of the young people they work with, rather than pointing out the weaknesses that we all, as human beings, possess. Youth workers are people who are able to communicate openly with members of two communities, that of the child and that of mainstream society, in order to advocate for and create a better understanding of one to the other. Youth workers are “people persons” who understand the benefits of social capital. They realize the value of conversation and find opportunities to engage people whenever possible. Youth workers are people who truly believe in the power of young people to impact change and inspire, and they work to help the rest of the world to become more aware of this as well.

Giving a meaning to youth and youth workers makes it much easier to begin to define the field of youth work more entirely. Youth work can be described in a multitude of ways but for me youth work is a way of interacting with and forming positive relationships with young people. It’s a way to open up communication between adults and young people and provides a safe environment in which to have honest, authentic dialogues. Not only does youth work help create relationships between youth and youth worker, but it also provides youth with opportunities to challenge themselves and in doing so promotes positive connections to self, others, and society.

As youth workers we have the task of creating safe spaces for youth to go where they can begin to form these positive relationships, and from these positive relationships we will be able to help them to create a positive relationship with themselves by using strengths based youth work. Strengths-based youth work builds off of the knowledge that youth have many talents, skills, behaviors, and attitudes that will contribute to their own success. So positive youth work would incorporate this way of thinking about and working with youth in order to teach young people how to be prepared to interpret their lives and the experiences they encounter. Youth work is not a miracle program designed to eliminate problems and adversity from the lives of young people, although there are programs that advocate for the rights of young people and in doing so attempt to ease some of the stresses in the lives of young people. But on a much grander scale, youth work is the kind of work that prepares young people and gives them the tools with which they can interpret and live in their world.

The purpose of youth work isn’t to create programming that aims to teach young people that there is only one acceptable way of living or being successful, but rather, its purpose is to teach young people how to decide for themselves how they view success and give them the tools necessary to achieve their version of success. Youth work is a way of opening doors to young people who have been told repeatedly by society that they are not good enough, that they are just trouble makers. Youth work is one of many mediums to reach out to young people and inspire them so that they can, in time, inspire their communities, their peers, even their opponents. The purpose of youth work is to encourage young hearts and minds to find what they love and be fierce about it.

One of the ways in which we can define our lives is through relationships we have with people from our community and our world. My world, in this sense, is the world of youth work.
The relationship between youth and youth workers is one of symbiosis, much like the sea anemone and the clown fish. Any other way of describing this very important relationship could leave out the vital aspect that makes this comparison so unique-the fact that both parties, youth and worker, benefit from one another. We all know that youth workers are there to teach young people, to guide them, and to provide support when necessary, but what many people often forget is that the young people we work with have just as much to share with us. The youth worker who forgets to continue to learn from the youth is the one who has forgotten what their job is.

We would be cheating ourselves as youth workers if we failed to learn from every encounter we have with young people, from every opportunity we have to interact with them, and from each of the many different experiences they bring to the table. We know that we have different gifts and talents as youth workers, unique lived experiences to share, so, we must remember, do the youth we work with. We are not in this field so that we can teach children what to think, to stand over them and impart our judgment or our beliefs, but rather we are there to help them learn how to learn. Our relationship with them cannot be one of superior and inferior, it must be one of equality, understanding and respect.

Being Connected....

Connecting to Space through its Capacity to Keep You Connected

When does a place become more than a geographic location, more than a series of coordinates on map? When does someone’s bedroom become more than the place they retreat to at bedtime? When does a place become a space? I am a firm believer in the idea that someone’s history and personal relationship to a place has the ability to change a location from simply somewhere we exist to somewhere we experience our lives and ourselves as more than what they appear to be. I believe that space has the ability to make people feel at home, welcome, and safe-something place can only give the illusion of. Space, in the way that I experience it, is something more than. More than me, more than you, more than the things that exist within said space. Space, in my world, is a way of seeing yourself in relation to where you are in the world and realizing that where you are is cosmically wrapped up in where you’ve been and where you’re going, in who you know and who you’ve yet to meet, in who are/were/will be.
I experience space in the various aspects of my life, but one place has become a space in which my past, my present, and my future have beautifully woven themselves together in a way that makes them inseparable, yes, but also rich in my own lived experience and that of the people who mean the most to me. My bedroom is much more than the room I go to when it’s time to go to sleep, it is much more than a bed and a desk and the occasional piece of forgotten laundry, my bedroom is where I am allowed the time and space to reflect upon my life and to dream about my future. My bedroom is more than just my bedroom; it is the space where all the different, seemingly unconnected parts of my life come together in perfect, harmonious bliss-regardless of, and in cooperation with, the chaos. This is not to say that my room doesn’t also serve as a simple retreat, because believe me I know how necessary solitude is to one’s sanity. It is to say, rather, that I understand how crucial the human need and desire for connection is and so my room, though a retreat at times, at least for the time being is primarily a space where I can stay connected to the world, to my world.
My bedroom is a window into my past, a constant reminder where I came from, what I came from, and how I got to where I am. Many people would argue, Emerson included, that history is not exactly a necessity in life- that one can live well, if not better, if they disregard history. I, however, know that history is vital to the present because it is what was, and is necessary if we intend to continue towards the future. As the song goes, and arguably more famously (depending on who you are), Seneca says, “every new beginning comes from some other beginnings end”. If I intend to continue moving forward, progressing towards what I dream to become, then I must never fail to acknowledge how my past-no matter how insignificant parts of it may seem-has impacted my life now and will continue to do so. My room is, in many aspects, like a museum. It contains artifacts in the form of ticket stubs, photos, play bills, books, journals, and countless other things that serve as connections to my past. It’s not rare for first time visitors to walk around my room, in the way museum patrons do, investigating each and every photo on the wall, every pin on the bulletin board and every flag or poster hanging from the walls and closet. Yet again showing how my history and my present intertwine, never separate, though time might lead you to believe they are. Next to a certificate that tells of a poem I got published is tacked a letter from the College of Education and Human Development accepting me into the Youth Studies major. Two opposite times in my life represented in my space within two inches of one another, connecting the past to the present, the present as often happens, a representation of the future.
The material things in my room account for only one of the many ways in which my room connects me to my past, present and future. My connections are so numerous in this space that many of them supersede the confines of this room even. The people who connect me to my past the most, my family, can be no further than a click away in this space. I simply log onto facebook and there, a few keystrokes away, my aunts, my cousins, and my dad-all of whom live in Florida. A few more strokes of the keys and the change of a web address and there, on myspace, I am instantly connected to my cousins, family, and friends in Wisconsin. Even for the family members and friends who haven’t embraced the technologic era there is a way to connect. A flip of the phone and a scroll through my phonebook and there I have my mother, my grandparents, and other family members. Yes, I could easily do all of these things in any other place-the library or a friend’s room perhaps. But these other places fail to provide me with something that only my room can-a sense of belonging. This is my room, this is my experience, and this is my space. To be connected in this age is simple enough, but to be connected in a way that is holistic, that involves your whole being and not just the tips of your fingers, is something incredible that no fiber-optic cyber-superhighway can provide.
Beyond the past connections that carry on now and will into my future, are the connections that started in this room. This space where my life makes sense, where everything I am meets everything I want to be, this is where so many of my happiest moments seem to take place. Sometimes this space provides me more than I could have ever imagined, more than I would have ever expected. It is in this room that I found love. It is in this room that, in an unexpected moment, my life got turned upside down in the best way possible. I met my girlfriend while I was connected to the world in this space. So not only does this space provide me the means and comfort to maintain connections with those who have impacted my life the most, but it also provides me with the ability to form new connections-ones that have changed my life in many ways and ones that continue to do so every day.
In a way, my room is a catalyst for change and growth. It inspires and nurtures me in a way that other places cannot. This space is where I make sense of my life, where I take my lived experience and turn it into something more than what happened. My life becomes more than a series of events because of spaces like this, spaces where time slows down for you to reflect and distance seems obsolete. And this isn’t even just a space that is unique to me. I can say this confidently because my experience tells me so. I’ve had many a deep, thought provoking conversation in this room. I’ve figured out life plans only to change them a week later. I’ve connected with life-long friends in this space only to realize that sometimes life-long friendships can be short lived. This is a space where my roommate, in a celebratory fit of joy, comes crashing through my doorway to share news of acceptance to grad schools. This is the space where I am awoken at 5am to my cats playing hockey with the food canister. This is the space where even the most distracting moments become something much more meaningful. This bedroom is a space where I belong-a space where I am connected to the world and the world has every opportunity to reach me…under my terms, of course, because another benefit to my space is the ability to shut the door, close out all windows, and turn off my phone. This is the place where I control how life reaches me and how I react to it.

Until Next Time,
I hope you find your space...
Emily

A Call for Change

The struggle for equal rights is one that has been driving our society for decades; it is in human nature to want to be accepted and respected by the society in which you live. Whether it is the civil rights movement that fought for equal rights between African Americans and white people, the struggle for equality between men and women, the question of a woman’s right to choose versus a child’s right to live, or the most recent struggle for same-sex couples to have equal marriage rights comparable to opposite-sex couples, there is one thing these struggles all have in common: they are all based on the ideal that all men and women are created equal and so should be treated that way by the law. We learn from history that people can be cruel and that there is always room for change, especially when the change is in regards to human rights. For example, when we look back on the civil rights movement of the sixties, most of us cannot even begin to imagine living in a world that is so overtly segregated and racist. Many of us are left feeling embarrassed by the actions of our ancestors. In the fight for equal rights among all people, changes must be made in order to progress towards a more unified community; ideals, morals, traditions, and personal views change and, in order to keep up with the times, so must the laws that govern our people.

Imagine, if you will, coming home one day to a phone call saying that your partner of 10 years is ill and in the hospital. You are frantic, and the only thing you can think about is how scared he or she must be. Quickly, you call a close family friend and ask him/her to watch you and your partner’s 11-year-old daughter. You rush to the hospital, and your partner’s parents are already there. They never accepted your relationship and so they tell you of your partner’s status, but nothing more. She is very sick, and all you want to do is go see her for what could be the last time-your last chance to say goodbye. When you get to the door of her room you are stopped by a nurse who says, “Only immediate family is allowed to enter this room, are you related to the patient?” No matter how many times you tell her that you have been together for ten years and have raised a daughter together, the nurse says you cannot enter. Since her parents never approved of your relationship, they do nothing to help you, and you are forced to wait outside. Later in the night your partner dies, you never had the chance to say “goodbye.” You leave the hospital; they won’t listen to you, anyway. You go to pick up your child, but her grandparents have already been there. When you try to contact them in order to pick her up and take her home, her grandparents refuse your requests and tell you to talk to their lawyer. Since the child was from your partner’s first marriage you are not her “legal” guardian. You have no legal right to visit or take care of the child that you and your partner have raised together since she was only a year old. Your world has stopped, and there is nothing you can do about it; you are forced to sit back helplessly and watch your child being taken away. All of this because you were not allowed to be married, because you were never allowed those basic rights that heterosexual couples take for granted, because same-sex marriages and adoptions have been banned. Although this particular story is fictional the events it mentions are actual situations that same-sex couples face every day in America.

The recent passing of Proposition 8 in California, where same-sex marriages had previously been legal, and the passing of Propositions and laws in other states that ban not only same sex marriage but also same-sex adoptions are a step backwards in the fight for equality and justice for all citizens of our country. This is a prime example of religious beliefs and values being projected on mainstream, secular society. Just look at California’s battle over Proposition 8 if you need a concrete example. The Mormon Church contributed hundreds of thousands of dollars to advertisements and lobbyist fighting to ban same-sex couples from being allowed to marry and it’s believed that the measures of the Mormon Church were one of the main driving factors in many Californians’ decisions. Which, when you think about it, makes perfect sense because their ads knowingly lied to Californians and told them that allowing same-sex marriage would directly affect school curriculum regarding sexual education-and when you bring people’s children into the equation logic often goes out the window. You don’t mess with our nation’s children. Regardless of the fact that these ads were blatant lies created by Prop 8 supporters, we live in a nation where church and state are said to be two entirely separate entities but it seems as though somewhere along the line the rules of the game have changed, and not for the better. People’s lives are being affected by this grave injustice all over our nation and its time that we changed the rules in a way that benefits all members of our society, not just those with the loudest voices and biggest bank accounts.

Aside from the far-reaching ramifications that blurring the line between church and state is guaranteed to create, think for a moment of the real life families who are being affected by these church influenced laws right now. In your own country, the country you should be proud to be a part of, a young man is beaten because he identifies as female and there are no laws to prosecute hate crimes against GLBT people, a young lesbian couple is forced to pay outrageous lawyer fees in order to write up countless legal documents that afford them the same rights their heterosexual friends could easily attain via civil marriage, a young boy is shot and killed after asking his male classmate to be his Valentine and because heterosexuality is the norm, and the young boy doesn’t fit into that, we see media outlets somehow attempting to blame the young man for his own untimely death. Is this the kind of society that we want to be a part of? One that is willing to take the rights and protections away from an entire group in order to appease religious zealots? One that deems an entire population of people to be “second-class” simply because of who they love? I’ll tell you right now- this is NOT the kind of country I want to be a part of. I mean, how can I be proud of my country if my country is not proud of me? My country has given me, and everyone in the GLBT community, an ultimatum-We can either be a proud gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgendered people and in turn surrender our rights to have our relationships recognized and protected or we can conform to societal norms, marry a person we don’t and could never truly love and then, and only then, can we share the same rights as the rest of our fellow Americans.

We live in a country that was founded “by the people, for the people” and I truly believe in that idea. And so, in return for the ultimatum my country has presented to me, I present to my fellow Americans, not an ultimatum, but a simple request. I won’t ask you to approve of who I choose to marry, I won’t ask you to sacrifice your personal beliefs for my own, and I won’t ask you to do anything that would put you or your family in harm’s way. All I ask is that you take a second out of your day to put yourselves in the shoes of your gay friend, your lesbian sister, your transgendered coworker and imagine, for a moment, what it’s like to fight for your basic human rights, to be the person in the hospital who can’t visit their partner minutes before he or she dies, to really think about how your life would be different if someone decided one day that your marriage was no longer valid, that your child was not your own and that your rights were not nearly as important as those of your neighbor. And then, after you’ve done that, after you’ve imagined what it would be like to be on the other end of hateful legislation like Prop 8, try and honestly say that you don’t believe we are all created equal and that we don’t all deserve to be treated as such.

I don’t think all the people who voted against same-sex marriages and adoptions are intrinsically bad people whose goal is to take away the rights of GLBT people, rather, I think they are people who got caught up in the political debates and the media spin and went into self-protect mode. And I get that. We all want to protect our families and groups like the Mormon Church made it seem as though protecting the rights of GLBT people would somehow negatively impact everyone’s families, which is simply not true. So I don’t write this to berate people for the way they voted, what’s done is done, but instead I write this because the battle isn’t over and it’s people like you and me, American people, who will determine who wins. So please, think about all of this and remember the words of Martin Luther King Jr. “injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” Though these current laws may only directly impact the rights of GLBT people right now, in the long run they impact every one of us because they set a precedent that allows for the rights of one group of human beings to be placed above those of the rest of humanity.

Reasons to Love You.

To my baby:

You are the most amazing thing to happen to my life in so long. You make me feel like I am the only girl in the whole world, like I am perfect even though I know I'm not. You are truly the most beautiful girl in my eyes.

I love everything about you-your eyes, your smile, your voice, your laugh, your beautiful randomness, the non-existent pudgie you claim to have, the fact that you can be such a boy sometimes, how you are so addicted to your Nintendo DS, how you have an uncanny ability to make me smile when no one else can, how you are ALWAYS hungry even if you just ate, how you make the most adorable 'dorkface' ever, the way you struggle to stay on the phone to the point that you fall asleep mid-sentence, the little noises you make in your sleep, how your voice changes depending on your sleepiness level, and how you're a total bad-ass with a heart of solid gold.

There are even some things I don't know if I'll ever fully understand- like how you could possibly enjoy corned beef hash as much as you do, or how you knew I was blogging while we were on the phone (literally right now), how your thought process/brain works, why of all the girls I know you could have had-you chose me, or how two people so completely different can have so much in common and be so in love with each other. Everyday I discover something about you I don't quite understand...and I absolutely love that about you. I love that we are so different. We balance each other in the most amazing way.

If I could dream up the perfect girl, she wouldn't even come close to you, baby. You're so much more than anything I could have imagined and you make me feel like no one else ever has or ever could. I am so in love with everything about you and the thought of one day being able to wake up to your beautiful face right next to mine makes my heart beat so fast...

I can't seem to put into words the way you make me feel and this is by no means even close to expressing just how much you mean to me, but I had to try. My life is closer to perfect because you are in it. You've given me everything I could have ever wanted and you continue to do so every single day...I cannot wait 'til the day I can hold you close and kiss you and never let you go. Until then, my heart is with you. Wherever you are. Forever and for always.

Happy Valentine's Day, baby. I love you. <33


p.s. There is a little something in the mail on it's way to you...it's not much at all, I wish I could give you so much more, but I wanted you to know that you're on my mind (all day, every day). I love you, baby. *kissies*