starchild228

I hope everyone had a good Christmas and a fun and relatively hangover-free New Year. I went to Minneapolis (yes, I am aware of the idiocy of heading NORTH of all directions in December) with my Mom and brother to visit family and have an early Christmas there. Other than some interesting driving conditions where we witnessed the aftermaths of a few pretty spectacular crashes, and trying to stay out of the middle of the spitting, snarling scrap between my Mom and teen aged little bro on the trip up, things went pretty well. I actually set foot in a church to attend Christmas Eve services, but unfortunately I was reminded precisely why I don't go to church... namely to avoid the mind-numbing boredom. Although, if I ever do find a church at which I feel comfortable and accepted, I hope it is one like the one I went to. It was refreshing to actually see a woman >gasp!< at the pulpit, some cultural diversity, as well as some gay and lesbian couples in the congregation. Churches that are that open-minded are somewhat rare in my neck of the woods.
I also got a tarot reading from my Aunt for Christmas. I know it's a little too new-agey for some, but my Aunt really does have a gift for interpreting the cards, and what came through really touched me deeply. My entire life, I have loved art. As a child, I was continually sketching and doodling, and as I began tackling such tricky things as perspective and composition in grade school, I grew to be quite good in high school and college. I went to school to pursue art, then midway through my sophomore year in college, things took a very dark turn. I was diagnosed with Major Depressive Disorder, and the first thing that made me realize something was very wrong with me was that I lost my desire to create. I lost my art. After two years of battling the mental illness, I began to recover when my doctor and I finally found a prescription that worked for me. A prescription that I believe saved my life. However, my art remained lost. It's been nearly two years since then, and I have barely picked up a pencil to sketch in the last 4-5 years. And that breaks my heart. As my Aunt laid out the cards on her dining room table with my Mom and brother looking on, I was heartened to see that the strife card lay in the past. When she put down the card for the current challenge facing me, my heart stopped when she laid down the Art card from her deck. She told me that I would regain my ability to create if I was willing to work and do the soul-searching required. I nearly broke down in tears right then and there, because I had been terrified that my art was to be a permanent casualty of my battle with depression. The thought that I might be able to express myself in that way and love it once again filled me with joy. My Aunt finished my reading and asked if my mom and brother wanted a reading as well. My brother thought my reading was pretty neat, so he asked for one as well. Then, my Mother nearly shocked me into a dead faint when she asked for one as well. I never in a million years would have thought she would do that. She is very conservative and always proclaimed to me that tools of divination were evil. The fact that my Aunt prayed to Christ over the cards before each reading seemed to change her mind a bit, and the accuracy of both my reading and my brother's may have piqued her curiosity enough that she decided to give it a try.
Things with my boyfriends are still very good. We are going on three months now. He is a very shy individual, but like most shy people, he opened up quite a bit as he got to know me. He also has a dark, sardonic sense of humor rather like mine, and he makes me laugh a lot. He's very sweet and supportive, but has enough bad-boy in him to keep me intrigued. I also think he was shocked to come across a chick who not only had extensive knowledge of his beloved Metal scene, but who also loved the music almost as much as he. He tells me he can talk about music with me better than he can talk about it with his friends. We've shared a lot of our dark and painful times with each other, and I was relieved that I could tell him that I had struggled with depression and not have him immediately assume I was crazy- mostly because I cared for him a lot, but couldn't be with someone who wasn't open-minded about mental illnesses. So that was a test he passed with flying colors.
I'm happy with my love life, content with my job, and optimistic about my future. Things are almost too good right now. But after last November, I'm due for a little happiness.