Oops I did it again...

                                                    BLANK SCREEN!!! 

That's what I'm currently looking at. It's a little intimidating. I have to fill all this space so that you might not get too bored while reading along, which could result in you coming back and reading this ol thing yet again on another day, now that is a lot of pressure!! 

Lets start with this:

"This blog was inspired by a true story, all the facts are real but the names have been altered to protect the identity of all parties involved."-- Did you read that in your Morgan Freeman narrator voice? You were supposed to, so go back and start all over. . . . . Ok, now that you've caught up with the rest of us, let's begin.

Picture it, Sicily, 1912. A beautiful young peasant girl with clear olive skin meets an exciting but penniless Spanish artist. There's an instant attraction. They laugh, they sing...That peasant girl was me, and the artist--we will just call him JJ. Now of course this was not in 1912 nor did it take place in Sicily, but I like to think I was beautiful and I was young. As for the penniless artist? He was actually a truck driver with money in the bank. I just couldn't resist bringing a little of the Golden Girls into the mix. (You can tell me now, I watched too much TV as a kid). Fast forward, summer of 2010. I think life is great, I'm just living the dream. Decent job, great friends, no bills, and a boy who is planning a future with me. Well, if only I could see my life 9 months later. You think I'm talking about a kid now, don't you? Well dear reader, I'm not.. but only because the grace of God was in that particular situation. I won't go into details just in case my daddy ever decides to read this, but you can put 2 and 2 together. Anyway, I don't have special "look into the future" glasses, and even if I did, I imagine that I would have still chosen to live my life and date the boy and have the friends I did. I loved them all more than anything in the world.That should have been clue number one.

Fast Forward again, spring 2011.

For one reason or another; no friends, no job, no boyfriend. 

Gosh this just got all kinds of depressing, no? Sometimes when that happens I just start singing, out loud. You should try it. Start with "pocket full of sunshine", and if your really down, go back to the scene in Easy A with the cute little card and the repetitive singing of said song. "I've got a pocket, I've got a pocket, I've got, I've got, I've got a pocket full of sunshine". Ok, now that we all have had a little pick me up, lets continue on with the story.

So I'm quiet literally flat on the floor. Life decisions placed me there. When things started heading south with the boy, I started heading east--to the bar. Then when all things went crazy with the friends, I lost myself in a sea of drunken men, [I found most of them at said bar]. As for the job, the only real thing I had holding me together, somewhere along the way my boss decided they were "going a different direction". Their new direction left me looking in the classifieds. So it's the beginning of summer by now and I have no idea how I will be spending it. Some how (I know how, but I don't want to spoil the surprise) I ended up hanging with this group of "church people". I mean if you're desperate and that's all there is, you just have to go with the flow. Anyway, I'm with all these people that praise Jesus all the time and I know that when I was a kid I was into all that, but I have grown up now and my life is so much better off without all that crap. Oh wait, it's not so great now, is it? I have nothing. Like I literally have nothing left but the car I'm driving. Oh, I forgot to mention that all 4 of my brand new tires got slashed at the bar. So I almost don't even have a car. Well hows that for CRAP.

Yea, maybe I should give this church thing a real try. So I did. I ended up at some summer retreat for high school and college age kids. As I was walking in the door on the first night, I received a phone call saying one of those old friends (people I hadn't talked to in 5 months) wanted to contact me. Wow was I livid. Almost ruined my mood for the whole night. ALMOST. Oh, here is the part where I start telling you how great God is and how amazing it was to walk into that building and be completely surrounded by His presence. And here is the part where half of you roll your eyes (the other half of you that are saying Amen, keep it down a little--don't want to scare off all my not so sure readers). Yes, I walked into that building a beat down frazzled person without a plan for the future, without any desire to really carry on in any way of living. I had absolutely nothing. The small amount of family I had was very distant, and my rock-My grandmother, her health was in a place that I was sure she would never recover from. So I had nothing. 

The band starts playing and the girl singing says "Now this is a new song, so yall just sing along and take it all in". And boy did I. From the moment the keys started and the singer opened her mouth all I heard was the words. As I'm telling you all about this now, its like I can see myself back there, in that place. The broken girl that I was. It is so wonderful to know that I am no longer that girl.

Today I am a woman of God. A person with a purpose. I am a daughter of the King. I was beautifully broken. God healed and forgave me. I am His Orphan Saint.

 Maybe some of you reading this are a little tired of the religion talk now.. and I get that, trust me I get that. I was that person. And honestly I can still be that person at times. You know when you hear people talking about how great God is and how amazing church is, then they turn around and treat you worse than anyone ever has. Yea, those people really irk my nerves. I vow here and today to never be one of those people. And with the power of God, I can keep that vow. I promise you, I'm not going to be all preachy all the time, and for those of you that are my friends and do not live this faith filled life, you know that I won't force anything upon you. But I also promise you I will not water down the greatness of my God. He does love each and every one of you.

As for the rest of the story; I'm not sure where to begin. It all started that day, July 12th 2011. Since then so much in my life has changed. I still face every day challenges. While I have made a commitment to serve God, I still fight the flesh daily, and sometimes the devil does get the best of me. I can assure you though, I'm much happier now than I ever was before. 

Oh, and just in case you were wondering about those friends and that boy-- The friends are no longer enemies of mine. God healed that situation too. Maybe I will share all those details with you one day. As for the boy, he's married now... which just proves he was never the man God intended for me, because if he was he wouldn't be married to someone else. 

WOW. things got a little deep today, huh? Yea.. well you just jumped into the kiddie pool, wait till you hit the diving board. There's a lot of crazy up in this head. Still to come on days ahead: reasons you don't wait until the last minute to start homework; how you manage to keep friends that live different lifestyles than you; why it was not nor ever will be acceptable to wear a fanny pack; oh... and you know, just all the other random things that pop into my wee little mind. 

I've gotta tell you all about how I have to come up with 2600 bucks in just a few months too... but that's a story for another day (just another cliff hanger to make you want to come back for more)

Take the rest of this journey with me, wont you?