i haven't blogged. in forever.

you know that old saying,

"when life hands you lemons, make lemonade."

and you know that other saying,

"when life hands you lemons, grab the salt and tequila and make a margarita."

yeah, i've taken up "margaritas" as a hobby lately.


so, where am i going with this?

i've been going through a divorce. the majority of my marriage has been one big lemonade stand, and the divorce was a lot like taking those earnings from that proverbial, and lucrative, lemonade stand and taking it to a patio to wallow in my own margarita sorrow. it's been 4 months and 20 days since i found out that my husband was not at all who i thought he was. it's been about 2 months and 20 days since i realized that maybe i did know and chose to sugar that lemonade instead of adding salt to the rim.

i was looking through this blog and came across this post in the "love" section, written just one month exactly before my husband walked out of my house and never came home. he'll tell you i asked him to leave, i'll tell you i had a reason. a damn good reason. but now, looking back at our relationship as a whole, we both had our reasons.

am i still thankful? of course i am. i have so much to be thankful for. when i read the words now that i wrote then, are they still true? of course they are, because that was me in that moment, regardless of what was going on that maybe we were both denying. marriage and love and family and life are hard. real hard. real, real hard sometimes. but there are other times when life is simple, and lovely, and full of love and life.

four months and twenty days seems like a pretty short amount of time to decide to divorce your husband, even for me, and i'm living it. did i want my marriage to end? no, i wanted it to last forever and a day, til we were old and moldy and changing each others diapers while our great grandkids ran around like the wild banshees we were. do i feel like i failed? absolutely not. i put in a tremendous amount of effort to make both of us happy and provide a happy life for our children. and yes, marriage is work, but should it be a "tremendous amount of effort?" probably not. no, definitely not.

definitely not. not when there are easy breezy days on the patio with your kiddos and the wind in your hair and a smile on your face and happiness and contentment to be had.

do i miss him? i sure do. every day. i married him. i planned my future with and for and around him. he was supposed to be my partner and support and my shoulder to lean on and my hand to hold forever. but you know what... even though i may look pretty awkward trying to rest my own head on my own shoulder, i've found my own two feet again. and those were made for standing on my own. and i am grateful that through it all, i can do that... stand on my own. with a smile.

so, when life hands you lemons, i guess you can make lemonade... but one of the main things i've learned about myself through this entire ordeal, is i don't have to wait around for life to hand me anything. i can get up and go get what i want out of life.

and i prefer lime and coconut in my margaritas.

cheers.