THE DAYLIGHT SAVINGS BLUES

i have nothing really to say except that we're not that far in to daylight savings time and already i'm ready for it to be gone. i hate that it gets dark at 4:30 and i hate that i have no choice but to just keep trudging on through until we make it to the other side. i'm not ready for cold or for snow or for scraping ice off my windshield. this time of year serves as an annoying reminder that i want so badly to move.

this time of year just kind of makes me feel crappy all over and i get grumpy and irritable and take it out on people who don't deserve it and then i'm the one that gets upset because i'm being so impossible and i frustrate myself.

it's super fun sounding, i know.

but in all seriousness, i need some routine and stability back into my life and that's starting with this new job i got going on. set hours are good for my brain. i'll get myself back soon, i just have to re-figure out who winter-time-natalie is because that girl is always a foreign being to my old summer self.

i want to watch a movie and cuddle with a boy and drink some hot apple cider. and that's what i have to say about that.

nathan and i climbed a mountain the other day. it's a long steep hike and it was so good for our bodies to be outside and moving. i often liken climbing a mountain unto living life, but it's also really similar to relationships. (mountain climbing is just maybe a metaphor for everything?)

except the more i think about it, the more i think it's true. life is hard and you have to work to get through the tough before you can appreciate the view and so it is with relationships.

people are complex individuals and as such we are always growing and stretching and changing. and climbing a mountain with nathan was a trip that we took together in order to work towards the same goal: reaching the top of the mountain.

real relationships are not always rainbows and butterflies, and nathan and i have had our setbacks, but there we were - at the top of our mountain, sore from the steepness of the end of the hike and celebrating with a beer and a coconut water - but together. we make compromises and we help each other on up the mountain.

this time last year nathan was still in school, living two hours away from me and trading off weekend visits. words can't describe to you how very glad i am that he is here now and i get to see him every day. but with that move it brought a new mountain and we have had to adjust to being together almost all the time. i know sometimes i get cranky and impossible and he loves me anyway. and i'm really glad that i'm climbing this mountain with him.

i think sometimes i don't tell him how i feel often enough. talking with real mouth words is just more difficult for me than i like to admit. my words get all caught up in my throat and i don't honestly know how to get them out. but you guys, i am straight in love with this guy. and even though this weather is cold and it gets dark way to early and i get more irritated with some things than i should, i'm always glad to see his face and to be in his arms or sitting next to him on the couch at the end of a long day.


//i know this all of a sudden just turned into a kind of sappy love post, but i reserve the right to do that since this is my blog and all. hashtag sorry not sorry ;)

climbing mountains

So this week TheBoy had a break from school between the end of his spring semester and the beginning of his summer session and he came up to visit me. On Wednesday we decided to hike Canfield Mountain. Well actually we went to Paul Bunyan's for burgers and debated whether we should hike the mountain or run by the lake downtown and TheBoy was all "you pick! I always pick!" So I drove to the mountain because, well, I'd never been there before so what the heck?

At first we wondered if we would really go all the way to the top. The higher we climbed the steeper it got and we both already had sore legs. (But Nathan's legs were way more sore than mine, let the record show. He wins the sore muscle award!)

We would look at how steep the trail went and say "we'll just get up this last peak" and then we'd get up there and the trail would go up even higher. Two hours into it and we were seriously debating turning back. But we'd come this far! We might as well keep going. It would be foolish to turn around now!

So onward and upward we put one foot in front of the other. TheBoy even had a makeshift walking stick for a while.

And then, just when I thought my little legs could take me no further, behold! The top of the mountain! And what a view, let me just tell you.

Check out that view! 

I know right? Gorgeous. 

From the top you could see the lake and the entire town. It was breathtakingly beautiful. We just sat and stared at the city for probably half an hour. We spotted the resort and then we were trying to make out other buildings, but that proved to be a little difficult since there are really no distinguishing markers. Oh well.

It was so worth it to get to the top of that mountain, you guys. Once I was there I couldn't believe that we had even considered turning around and going back to the car.

We daydreamed about climbing Mt. Everest or McKinley and then climbing Kilimanjaro and some of the Himalayas, because now that we had conquered Canfield we were experts. I mean, clearly.

And this whole thing got me thinking, guys. Like real deep stuff even.

This whole mountain climbing thing, it's tough work. The path is rocky and in some parts it goes up at a sharp angle. You work up a sweat taking step after step, feeling like the journey is lasting forever. Sore legs and sometimes labored breathing. There are moments where you want to give up, where you feel like walking back down the mountain would be so much easier - and you're right, it totally would be. But if you turn around and give up, then you never get to experience the euphoria of making it all the way to the top. You will never get to see the glorious view and rest in knowing that you conquered the mountain.

How similar that experience is to life.

We all go through bumpy patches, where you are climbing a mountain and circumstances are rough. There have been plenty of times where I have felt like running back down my mountains and clinging to things that I know instead of feeling courageous and plunging ahead no matter what. But that's what I am trying to do. Plunge ahead.

It would be so easy for me to go back to school. I know school. I can do that student thing like it's nobody's business. It's scary to move ahead with my life and take that big girl job and become a working class citizen. There are other areas also where I am climbing mountains too, not just with my career plan. If I just keep pushing ahead though, if I just keep pressing on then eventually I will reach the top of these mountains and the view will be spectacular.

And then I will look down from the top of my life mountain and wonder how I could have ever considered running back down. I am climbing and I am building myself and I am creating who I want to be. Life is all about discovering who you are and what purpose you serve. It is really the grandest of adventures. Sometimes I am so lost and I wonder what the crap I'm doing here, you know? Like what in the world is the reason behind my existence? Is there even one? But I know I have to be alive for a reason, or else what's the point?

So I keep climbing. And even though I'm not at the top yet, my path is still beautiful too. There is something to be said for the view of a mountain side. For wildflowers. And for good company.