a repeat picture, since it makes me happy

katie and i are back in the creek tomorrow.

come visit us. :)

or am i part of the disease?

i actually have a lot on my mind today for some reason. so much that i can't even begin to write it all, but there are just a few things i wanted to put on here.

on friday when i was at the beach, i decided to start writing in a journal each day at least one thing that i learned, in hopes of publishing it (as long as i actually learn some cool things)...haha.

this was inspired because on the way back from myrtle beach to ocean isle, i was in the car doing my elbow exercises and trying to bend it, all while feeling pretty sorry for myself since i was the only one in the car who had an ailment that i had to tend to & because i still can't even pull my own hair back and simple things like that which are driving me insane. a few minutes later, we pulled into a gas station to buy lottery tickets and while we were waiting in the car, i saw a little girl get out of the car next to me and throw something out in the trash. when she turned around, i saw that she had no arm past her elbow...she had lost it somehow or another and looked like she had it amputated. i began to feel very lucky about having an arm to rehabilitate and was thankful to be reminded in the parking lot of a gas station. i don't even think anyone else in the car saw her.

the other thing i wanted to put on here are a few excerpts from a video we saw at a church my bro and i went to this morning. it was interesting...called "the paradox of our time"...here are a few lines from it:

we spend more, but have less; we buy more, but enjoy it less
We have bigger houses and smaller families; more conveniences, but less time; we have more degrees, but less sense; more knowledge, but less judgment; more experts, but more problems; more medicine, but less wellness.
We write more, but learn less; we plan more, but accomplish less. We've learned to rush, but not to wait; we have higher incomes, but lower morals; we have more food, but less appeasement; we build more computers to hold more information to produce more copies than ever, but have less communication; we've become long on quantity, but short on quality.

this video could definitely be considered a cliche churchy thing to show, but i do think it's interesting. definitely something for me to think about when i'm feeling unsatisfied. nothing here will ever satisfy me, so i'm obviously looking to the wrong places when i feel that way.

guess who's back

yeah, so i had my elbow replaced.

i'm doing pretty well. it's semi-hard to type still and my arm becomes pretty much deadweight after about 15 minutes on the computer, but i'm getting stronger and stronger everyday. haha.

that is pretty much my summer thus far. i was in the hospital from friday-monday, then proceeded to sit in my house all day for the next 5 days where basically all i could do was watch tv. i went to my post-op yesterday and they told me i could drive, so i've been on the road since then and i'm feeling better already. :) they said my arm looks really good, but i'm not pleased because i still cannot even reach to put my own hair up and until then, i will continue to push myself...

i'm going up to va to see my roommate this weekend and go to the lifehouse show up there, so i'm pretty excited about that. oh, how i miss my roommate!

and i will be moving back to campbell soon...probably on memorial day and i cannot WAIT! it will be wonderful. :)

so, that's the update on the new bionic joint. thank you SO much to everyone for your prayers, cards, messages, phone calls, visits, etc. i love you, i love you, i love you!

gimme whatcha got

let's try this comments thing again.

be nice or i'll have to take them off again. kids these days.

it's like ten thousand spoons when all you need is a knife

once again i am reminded that i am not in control of my life.

all semester i have been trying to figure out whether or not to have my elbow replaced, and if so, when and how, etc, etc. we finally decided to have it this friday and found out recovery would be about a month, so i secured a job in buies creek starting june 1 to stay there for the rest of the summer to do marketing work and to work on sga stuff for the fall.

i got home last night because my pre-op appointment was this morning. on the way downtown, my mom turned on her phone only to receive a message from my UNC doctor saying that she did not think i should have surgery on friday. she says my last remacaid treatment was 4 weeks ago, and that i should allow at least 8 weeks before surgery b/c it increases the risk of infection in the joint.

i've tried to call the woman at least 3-4 times a week since my last treatment and have never received a call back. my mom called last week and found out she was on vacation for the week. so, on our way to pre-op today, we were told that i might not have surgery on friday.

basically, that leaves me a standstill. my doctor and the surgeon are now going to talk and decide what they think is best and let me know. if they decide i have to wait at least another month, i honestly don't think i can do it this summer. i have a job to start and i can't afford to sit around all summer. so, that pushes the left elbow to Christmas and the right one to....well, when i graduate and don't have my parents insurance anymore.

it's just interesting to me, because i finally thought i had everything worked out. surprise, surprise.

even if they decide to go through with it this week, at least i'm learning to sit back and laugh at my ironic life. i am trying to learn something from everything that happens to me, and so far, it hasn't been too hard.

"well life has a funny way of sneaking up on you when you think everything's okay and everything's going right.
and life has a funny way of helping you out when you think everything's gone wrong and everything blows up in your face"



(shout-out to katherine ruth tibbitts, who sang a "katie version" of ironic when she opened shannon's silverware drawer the other night)