[Soft*Silver]

today I was out in my yard doing ..well..yard work.

I was covered from head to toe in soil, mulch, sweat and blood. (rose bushes)

My buddy Jean came over to cut the grass for me. She walked up to say hello and smiled as she looked at me. I felt like I looked a sight. The weekend was so hard on me...I created a massive disaster in my kitchen last night by forgetting to turn off the bathroom sink. In 10 minutes, I destroyed my kitchen ceiling. This was on my mind as well..and well, I felt like I looked anything but pretty. I felt I looked frazzled, worried, scared, ashamed, (memory loss caused the mistake that destroyed the ceiling) and messy.

she said to me " you look really happy..your yard agrees with you. You look good..."

wow. Talk about a suprise pick me up! I felt pretty. Not just pretty beautiful but pretty damn good about myself in general. She was right. Destruction comes and goes in my life. If not my ceiling, then my hopes and dreams are always on the line up to be shot at and destroyed. But destruction isnt the only thing that comes and goes in my life. I am stubborn. I am relentless. And I am in denial. I refuse to let my back injury destroy a single moment that I have left in me to STILL DO. Someday I wont be able to STILL DO but right now, in my mulch/soil/sweat/ and blood moment, I was able to STILL DO and my buddy Jean recognized the beauty in my stubborn willfulness.

and other ways I feel pretty...

refresh my nail polish. My nails are always painted. Its the one thing I love to do and makes me feel good about myself

avon. Can you believe it? I am shocked myself. But no one makes a better face moisturizer for the price. (look at consumer reports) and I can afford a $2 lip gloss every once in awhile

walk my dog. Getting out and moving can make me feel alot better about myself and walking my dog helps her feel good too

condition my hair. Ever since I went silver I have such volume and curl. I rarely need to "treat" it anymore because its not burnt by dyes, curling irons, chemicals, etc. But sometime I just do it to feel pretty

Tattoo. If I had the cash, i would get a tat to feel pretty. Or a piercing.

one of the best ways to get me out of a myopic funk, is to see myself the way my honey sees me. I pick well. I pick people who can see me as beautiful and appreciate my inner and outer beauty. So when I see myself the way they see me, its a real pick me up.

I look at my daughter and because I know where she got the genes to be so beautiful, I can get a pick me up that way too.

looking at my sister as we age, and seeing how incredibly beautiful I think she is as she matures, I acknowledge we come from the same gene stock too

remembering my mother, who in her simplicity of looks, was an incredibly beautiful woman. I know my father fell in love with her the minute he saw her and I never saw him not look at her without total adoration. He is who I model my expectations of a partner from. If they cant look at me like he looked at her, I dont want to get involved...

there is more but I am tired...