Dear Heart....

How to feed a young family of 4 with $40....soup, soup, and more soup!!!!! I thank God for my Mom. Once you know the base of soup you can feed a whole army for about $6. I'm exaggerating, but you get me. She taught me how to make soup and she's taught me how to make a dollar work a few different ways. Now that I am a wife and a mother I think a lot about my own childhood. I never knew when money was tight in our house. That's just the way my mom works. We'd eat a roasted turkey one night, she'd turn it to turkey, rice, and gravy the next night, we'd eat turkey sandwiches, and then she'd scrape the whole turkey from the bone and make a bunch of soup. I just thought she liked turkey lol. She's taught me so much without appearing to do so.

On an unrelated note, but still kinda related...I recently lost one of closest friends. My cell phone has blacked out and no matter what I do I can't get it to turn back on. All of my messages and videos between me and my friend are in that phone. I've been relying on her to read me messages from her phone between her and him and that's been getting me through this time. I've been using her as a crutch. I haven't truly accepted that my friend is gone. I pretend like he's just travelling and isn't able to answer the phone. The other night I dreamt of my friend sitting at the foot of my bed. And we talked and laughed and picked just like we always have. After what seemed like a ridiculously long conversation I said to him our usual "don't crawl off somewhere. I love you" and like normal he responded, "I won't. I love you too" and then he disappeared and I woke up. I was crushed. I wanted to look at my phone. It felt so real. I wanted to tell him about my latest weird experience so he could make fun of me and carry on. I called my mom because I was desperate. I needed to hear some words from my friend, but she wasn't able to help me. Like I said I've been using her as a crutch, but when she couldn't help me I was crushed. I cried and cried and cried like I've never cried before. And then I was angry. I was angry that she wouldn't help me. And then I realized she was teaching me...whether she meant to or not...that I had to lean on myself. I have to say goodbye to my friend. As much as I believe in "see you laters" I have to let him go. I can't pretend that he's still here. I can't live in "text message world." I have to deal with reality. And I have to FEEL the grief. And I have to process it and then I have to move on, but the major point to this extremely long rant is that my Mom has taught me how to channel my energy in a better way. I'm not gonna sit around and cry everyday. I'm going to look into programs that raise money for cancer research and I'm going to actively and aggressively participate in them. THAT'S how I'm going to honor him. Cuz sitting around crying isn't anything close to how this beautiful soul lived his life....end of rant.