A Pause, Not A Stop

I've been considering getting a tattoo for quite some time, however, I've hesitated because of the cost  and also because a tattoo is so permanent.  I didn't want to get something in a spur of the moment decision that I would regret later.  If I was to get a tattoo, it would be something that had a lot of meaning to me.  There was also the issue of where I would get it since I didn't want it to affect my ability to get or retain a job in the future.  I also knew that I wanted something small.  While I admire the incredible artistry and skill involved in some of the massive tattoos that cover a person's entire back or chest or arm, I personally prefer something much smaller.

I hadn't given it much thought in a good while until today when a young lady I know shared a link on her Facebook page about the 3rd Annual Semicolon Tattoo Project.  I'd heard of the growing popularity of the semicolon tattoos but hadn't really looked into it all that much.  Curious, I finally decided to check it out.  Suffice it to say that I am about 99% sure I have found my first and possibly only tattoo.

For those of you who don't know, the point of Project Semicolon is to "start a conversation that can't be stopped about mental illness, suicide, depression, addiction and self-injury."  A semicolon is a pause, not a stop, a sentence the author could have ended, but chose not to.  As the founder of Project Semicolon stated, "The idea behind the tattoo is to say that your story isn't over yet.  That you are the author of your story and you are choosing to continue."  As someone who has had and still does have major struggles with depression, suicidal thoughts, self-injury, and addiction (to food, not drugs or anything like that!), I can't imagine another tattoo that would so perfectly fit me or have so much meaning and depth.

My first thought was to have the tattoo behind my ear where it would be fairly unnoticeable and easy to hide.  But the more I thought about it and saw pictures other people had posted, I decided that if I do it, I'll get it on my wrist.  My thought was that, 1) I'll actually be able to see it to remind me what it stands for, and 2) weird as it might sound, it just seems an appropriate place considering the scars on my wrists.  So while I haven't decided 100%, I have decided that even if I don't get the permanent tattoo, I will get a temporary tattoo.  I think the movement behind this tattoo is amazing and absolutely awesome.  Creating awareness for certain things can be really difficult, but I hope this one continues to gain more followers and reach even more people.  I don't think I'll ever look at a semicolon the same way again!

Never Take Friendship Personal

So I realize it's been quite some time since I've gotten on here.  My life has simply not been interesting enough to write about (I work at a dry cleaners.  Can you say boring?) and I haven't had any profound thoughts to talk about either.  So I ended up just letting things slide.  As I have often said in the past, we'll see if I can't do better.  Don't hold your breath though, you might be holding it a very long time!

So life really has been fairly boring.  I work mornings, go home, and stay home.  I go out with a select group of friends once or twice a week, but that is literally the extent of my social life.  I'm actually going to see a Christian romance film that's showing for one night only on Monday night and I'm actually kinda terrified because 1) I won't really know anyone there and I don't know the people I do know who are going very well, and 2) it's a romance which is the kind of movie I always avoid because they depress me.  Aaaaah!  Freaking out in 4...3...2...1...days. We'll see how it goes.

In any case, I find my lack of a social life to be rather ironically amusing because I was so much more social when I was younger and I always figured I would have even more of a social life as I got older.  Nope!  How things change.  I think that point has really hit home recently with checking out my Timehop the last couple of weeks and seeing all the friends I used to have and all the people who liked and commented on my various social media posts in years past.  It's just made me realize how much, as I've gotten older, I've fallen out of touch with those people and failed to really make any other lasting friendships.