Hello and welcome to the revamped website! 

And of course this is not the blog entry I wanted to start with but due to the weather this week I didn’t get the pictures taken for the blog entry I wanted to post and I had set this arbitrary deadline for the website relaunch as July 1st and if I missed the deadline I’d be the only one that knew, but I’m stubborn so here we are. I could have taken some crummy pics inside but that’s not what I wanted and I wasn’t willing to compromise on my “artistic vision” (LOL! Please don’t take me seriously when I say that) and as I was pouting and cruising Instagram I saw a writing prompt for July and thought why not? The prompt for today is “courage.” 

I’m not much for displaying inspirational quotes around my home and office, but I used to have this quote on a little sticky note on my computer monitor at work:

“Courage does not always roar. Sometimes courage is the quiet voice at the end of the day saying, 'I will try again tomorrow.” -Mary Anne Radmacher

There’s all sorts of quotes about courage, but this one in particular has always stood out to me. As someone that’s a little introverted, I’m not always the loudest person in the room. I’ve always watched a little more than I’ve spoken and just quietly went about the business of doing what I wanted to do. Most of my report cards always had some variation of this phrase, “Lana is a good student and very sweet, but she needs to speak up more and participate in class.” One of my teachers brought it up to my mom at a parent teacher conference and my mom just laughed and told her, “Lana, knows the answers, she just doesn’t care if you or anyone else knows she knows them.” One of my best friends was shorter than me and normally sat in front of me. She could always hear me say the answers to questions under my breath in class and would regularly ask me why I didn't raise my hand to answer when the teacher asked. I would just shrug and say I didn’t want to, but honestly that was only part of it. On one hand I was afraid of being wrong and on the other hand I was already enough of a nerd that I felt it would make me get made fun of that much more. So I sat back and quietly observed and listened and learned. 

Contrast that with the girl I was on the weekends that showed horses and rodeoed and ran thirty miles an hour around three barrels. It takes courage to send a sixteen hand, thousand pound animal into an arena running full speed, into the lights, music, and yelling whooping crowd. But that was where I was most comfortable. Go figure. Horses were my home and the arena was where I got to show what I could do. I didn’t feel self conscious. I didn’t feel judged. I didn’t feel the crushing weight of failing to fit in where I often felt I didn’t belong. Horses were security. 

To me walking down the short school hallway at Hebron took more courage than sending Yogi at his worst, snorty, gate sour self down the alleyway into an arena at two in the morning at the State Horse Show. There’s a certain security that riding a big bay horse gives, and at school it was just me. Every day you had to make the choice to “try again tomorrow.” I got made fun of a lot for being the horse girl, the nerd, the geek, the arty girl. It would have been easy to blow up, get in fights, have my parents come and meet with teachers, but at the end of the day I just decided to quitely, “try again tomorrow.” I tried my best to put off that quiet air of confidence that I didn’t care. That I was who I was, take it or leave it. Many days I succeeded.  Many days I failed, but always, always there was tomorrow.  Some of it of course I brought on myself because there eventually came a point in high school I sorta liked my quiet rebellion against the status quo. *wink* I just decided to be me. Whatever that was.

I’ve struggled many times with who I am, but who hasn’t? I’d love to be skinnier. I’d love to be a professional writer. I’d love to be a professional full time artist. But I’ve made the decisions I’ve made and honestly life isn’t that bad. I still get to be creative. I have food in my fridge, a roof over my head, and a darn cute family. What more could you ask for? There’s no such thing as perfect, but every day you get the chance to try again. 

And one of my ultimate acts of courage? Believe it or not writing these blog posts. 

I’m no professional writer. I wish I was, but I’m not. I love to write though and as a way to push myself I post my ameteur efforts online for the entire universe to read and judge. Why yes, I am a special sort of stupid. I’ve written so much over the years that’s never seen the light of day.  I’ve written pages and pages before and deleted the whole thing or just stashed it away on some harddrive somewhere and never showed it to anyone. But about 10 years ago now, right after I had Allie I decided to start posting my writing and photography online. It has been a trip and a half. I’ve gotten comments from all over the United States, made friends with people I’ve never met, and just for a moment sometimes I feel like this is all worthwhile. So please know every time you leave a comment or send an email it really does make my day. 

Sometimes courage is brash and bold, but many times courage is a simple quiet thing. I hope you find a moment of quiet courage this week, or maybe a moment of loud courage if that’s more your personality. Regardless I hope you reach for that thing that makes you who you are, that makes you feel alive, and makes you feel whole. And if you’re not having a very great day, please remember that you can always try again tomorrow. 

“The secret to happiness is freedom … and the secret to freedom is courage.” —Thucydides

That’s all my lovelies! I hope you have an absolutely wonderful holiday weekend! I also hope you like the slight facelift that I gave to the website.  I didn’t make any huge changes, but I think it’s a little more streamlined now and maybe just a little easier to navigate.  I hope so anyway.  I just wanted a little change as I don’t think I have really done much with the website layout since I moved over to Squarespace from Blogger several years ago.  Thanks so much again, as always, for reading and I’d love it if you'd leave me a comment and let me know what you think of the new site or my little rambling essay.  See you soon!