Honest Update! These are always fun.

Luke and I got to go to Disneyland on Friday and it was magical! We had a great day with a group from First Baptist Tifton. SO great to hear some southern accents and be near people who share my love for Chick Fil A! Disneyland is a lot like Disney World, but smaller and not quite as dramatic. Which I loved because it did not take us long to get from one ride to the next and it was just easier to navigate! There were not a ton of people there so we made it through the lines pretty quickly which was nice. And do you want to know the best part about Disneyland? Well, it was the end of July and it was not HOT AND SWEATY like Orlando. I mean I wore capri jeans and a t shirt and was never hot or cold! It was perfect :) Welcome to CA... I love it. Also, the Space Mountain at Disneyland is waaaayyy better than Disney World. I believe we rode it 4 times! :) Don't get me wrong I have a huge amount of awesome memories in Orlando at Disney World, but I must say that I throughly enjoyed my experience at Disneyland.

Well, we have been getting settled in and seeing as Luke was here for 6 months prior he has fallen right back in the swing of things. Me on the other hand... I am definitely glad to be here and I am enjoying the adventure. However, I am having a hard time with the fact that I feel so disconnected. I have always had a tight group of core friends who I could always call if I needed something or just to hang out. People that "got" me. Here, I just don't feel like I have friends, not real friends. I know this takes time, but I am having a hard time with this because I have grown up with life long friends (Sarah Beth, Jessica, Shanna, Allison, etc.) And now I find myself feeling so overwhelmed as I walk in to rooms full of new people. They all seem to know each other or they just have that personality that is crazy fun and willing to just jump right into the conversation. So tonight, like many other nights in social situations lately I found myself sitting... it was almost like a dream. People were buzzing about, talking, laughing, and there I sat... watching it all happen. I wanted to cry, I wanted to cry hard. I miss my friends, I miss all things familiar, I miss knowing how to get places, I miss not feeling like I am constantly intruding or bothering people when I try to make plans with someone. Now I need to be clear that no one hear has done anything intentional to make me feel this way. This is 100% me and I am taking ownership of these emotions.

I realize that part of the issue is that when I build relationships with others I want to know you, really know you. Not just your name and your profession, I want to invest in you and build real relationship. People do that here, but not as often or intentionally as I do. Everything is so fast pace and I have not had much room for real friendships to form. I am pretty foreign to this feeling, because I have always made friends fairly easily. However, there are 2 girls that I do feel like I am building friendship with. Alisha and Christina. At this point I am so thankful for just the small amount of time I have spent getting to know them. And I can guarantee you they dont even know that I feel this way! Each of them have taken time to ask me questions and get to know me, this means a lot at this point in the journey. Because most days I feel lost and a little confused. I have gone from working full time and being surrounded by family and friends to no job and no family and friends. So I have concluded that it is not the place where I live that that made me confident and strong, but the people and the relationships. I will say that I do not know how Luke moved out here alone and stayed for 6 months. If I did not have him and our ever growing relationship I don't think I would be able to stay! I know that the friendship will come and I will feel more like I belong, but for now it is a struggle. A struggle I am willing to face.

On the bright side, I do love the weather and I am getting pretty good at navigating through Pasadena (still working on LA) :). I have a lead on a job, so I will keep you posted on that. Let's see what else?... hmm I can clean our apartment from top to bottom in like 30 minutes (great thing about a small place)... Oh I am doing okay with the cooking. Nothing too crazy but I have successfully prepared several meals. I am sure there are lots of other great things I am leaving out. So, see the good outweighs the bad for sure. But just wanted to share my heart. Remember back in January when I promised to be honest and open about this journey? Well there ya go! It has been an awesome journey so far, but not without struggle. I believe that as humans we sometimes put on a smile for each other and essentially lie to one another about the tough stuff in this life. I refuse to do this. Life is so much more fulfilling and meaningful when we are honest with one another! So the update is that we are doing great, I am adjusting, better in some ways than others but adjusting just the same, Luke has a part time job with a non profit (I will blog about that more later), and I am still job searching. Thanks for reading and I will update again soon!