Boys Boys Boys

So senior year was a beautiful hot mess of a shit show (sorry for the language). To top it all off at the end of second semester I was getting really unhappy. You know the typical "I don't want to leave college and my friends" unhappy but there was a little something else on top of that. As many of you know if you've kind of followed R and I had been dating since the middle of high school. When I finished senior year we would have hit the 6 year mark together! Crazy long time. 

Up until then R was my world. I loved him with my whole heart and thought that he was "the one". One and done. I thought he would be the one I would traverse the world with, marry, and have a family with. Everything was going well but somewhere in February I felt a shift on my end.

He was still the amazing gentleman I still know and he treated me like a queen at every turn. At that point in the year the sorority, my friends, and real life started taking a major front seat. So much so our relationship fell to the way side. He noticed and I'm not sure if he was doing this intentionally or not but I started to feel smothered. There were constant questions of where I was, who I was hanging out with, and what I was doing. He wasn't a fan of drinking and I had found social drinking a fun thing to partake in.

To me I started to feel like he was very controlling and didn't really appreciate what I was doing or wanted to do. He held me on this pedestal of ideals he wanted me to be and thought I was. In reality I was realizing who I really was and wanted to be. I was growing up and changing which didn't seem to settle well with him.

We had the most awful breakup one could imagine.

It sucked.

I called him one night and told him I wanted to end us. Get out of the relationship. I needed to find out who I was. I had not been single for 6 years and he was my first serious boyfriend. He was not happy about this, I mean who would be. This was about mid-April.

He didn't take it well and kept hanging around. I tried my best to be civil and be the good friend to him that I knew he needed. I really didn't want to loose him as a friend but looking back at that time it was necessary to completely break ties and come back at a later time to build that friendship back up. He hung around, showed up unannounced, and just wouldn't let go. He kept bringing up the same conversations and getting really upset. 

It wasn't until almost mid-May or the end of May that he finally got the message and gave up. I was livid with him. The fact that he was keeping tabs on me and who I was seeing and what I was doing still was frustrating. I was so mad at him. I was hurting so bad but just couldn't sweep this under the rug. I kept my ground and held fast to the decision I made.

Through the summer he would pop up occasionally and it felt like we were moving toward friendship and it made me so happy. Then out of nowhere he decided to start avoiding me, well at least that's what it seems like right now. I understand. He has a new girlfriend and probably does not want to mix past with present.

I'm sad. I miss my best friend. He seems so happy though and that makes things so much better. I know it will take a long time but I hope we can be the best friends again that we once were. 

It's hard to let go. I never really understood it before but now it makes complete sense.

Since then I have popped in and out of the dating world. I've had a lot of flops. Some promising starts that just fell through. Dating sucks. It's fun at the beginning but I'm over it. I have completely pushed dating out of my world and have been focusing on me. I figure if it's meant to be it will happen and I will know. For now my world revolves around my friends and what makes me happy.

It's weird not having someone there to share everything with and go out with but it's kind of refreshing.

Love is a weird thing. I love love but man it fucking sucks. To everyone out there, don't force love or a relationship. Let it do it's thing and enjoy the ride. It may not always end nicely but we have to learn somehow and what better way then to make some mistakes and move on.

If for some reason R finds this heres a little note to you.

I know you are happy now and I couldn't be more thrilled for you. I hope things continue to work out for you and that you are beyond successful. Hopefully one day you will talk to me again and we can grab some brunch. You'll always be in my thoughts and there will always be good wishes for you from me. Keep pushing, have fun, be happy, and don't let anyone tell you you can't do something.

Until next time darlings

XOXO

ZMH

Oh Hey, I Didn't See You There

My goodness has it been a long time. Sorry about just dropping off the face of the earth but that seems to be the theme with this blog. I try really hard for a short time to post regularly and then something comes up and everything stops. 

I've never aspired to be a super successful blogger but I have always found writing and publishing very therapeutic. Through my writings I try to be as transparent as possible and hope that maybe my posts help someone through something they are going through.

Geeze I don't even know where to begin from the last time I left off. A lot has happened in my life and a lot has changed. So let's see, I went to camp again and it was one of my favorite summers back. I had such a wonderful staff in my unit and my co-unit directors slayed this summer. 

I left camp with a boyfriend (GASP! What wait what happened to R? I'll get to that). Camp boyfriend was a long time friend that we decided to date, long story short not my smartest move but we are still friends because we were that close. Anyway we moved together down to Chicago to start adult-ing and it went well for a while and then things went down hill quickly. 

I had a big girl job but was starting to feel lonely, stressed, and get sick. I was not healthy physically or mentally so I made the hard decision to move back to Michigan with my dad. I'm back in the mitten state for a few months while I collect myself and get a better game plan to move down to Chicago. 

Dear lord, a lot has happened. The next couple posts I'll delve more into what happened, how I'm doing, and what my plans are. For now this blog will be a way for me to sort through my feelings and thoughts. It may not be very exciting but maybe this will help someone out there? Really this is more for me and if people want to read and support along the way that would make me so happy. There will be photos when I have them and maybe some other goodies.

So this post has a lot of loose ends hanging and I apologize but you will just have to wait for more posts to come to get the blanks filled in on how my life has progressed. 

Until next time darlings

XOXO

ZMH

A Friend Is A Friend No Matter How Far Away They Go

Yesterday I had such a wonderful day with a few old friends.

Hannah, Caitlin, and I have been friends since about 1st grade. We grew up together going to dance classes, school trips, and many many after school play dates.

As we all grew up each of us came in and out of each others lives depending on where we all were. Hannah was always committed to ballet to the point we thought she was going to go professional. She was hard to stay in touch with because she was always at the studio but she always was around when we needed her. Caitlin was in the grade below Hannah and I so when we got out of multi-age classes that left Caitlin to start finding new friends that were her age. She was also always around but had different sets of friend groups she would bounce to and from.

Both Hannah and I are currently at Hope College. We have been able to still talk and do things together since the campus is pretty small. When Caitlin went to college she became distant and soon found out she wasn't where she wanted to be. From there Caitlin took a huge leap and moved out to Arizona with her boyfriend. Hannah and I talked with her through text and Facebook but it wasn't the same.

Caitlin surprised us by coming home for Christmas! All three of us got together and went ice skating and just hung around chatting. It felt like no time had passed between us.

We love ice skating so much. As children our home town would make an ice rink out of the local baseball field. All three of us would beg our parents to take us there almost every single night to spend hours and hours skating. We would create games, drink lots of cocoa, and try to be figure skaters. We had so many great memories from those years that ice skating yesterday seemed like the best thing to do.

Overall I am so happy I got to see my friends. I am so happy to know that no matter what they will always be there to support me and build me up when I need it.

XOXO

ZMH 

Caitlin, myself, and Hannah

We stopped in the Amway Grand Plaza and pretended to be fancy

Hello Break!

HELLO CHRISTMAS BREAK!

I have been on break since the 10th but I have just been taking time to relax and do some fun things. I have also been trying to organize this blog so that I can hopefully start blogging every week day (I know I keep saying this but it will happen! Please have faith and patience in me). 

Any way, this past week I spent about 4 days in Chicago with R. We had so much fun! Since we are kind of poor college students we tried to keep this trip as low cost as possible which is hard to do in the city. We did a lot of window shopping and exploring. We did take a trip out to Alder Planetarium. Neither of us had been there so it was fun to try something new. We did not go and see a show there unfortunately because it was really really expensive but we looked at all the exhibits and learned a lot about space. After that we popped over to the Art Institute because that is our second home. It was free admission so the place was packed. The museum was all decked out for Christmas and it was so pretty. I really enjoyed the miniature rooms because several of them were re-done for holidays, it was adorable!

One of the days we went down to the Magnificent Mile and looked at all of the really expensive stores. I have this goal that one day I will be well off enough that I will be able to go into those stores and actually be able to buy something instead of just drooling all over it. We peeked into the Kate Spade store, the Chanel store, and the Louis Vuitton store. Everything was packed with people buying Christmas presents, it was a little overwhelming.

We wrapped the trip up by stopping into Old Town and going to a cute little French bakery. While there I picked up some of the best macaroons that I have had since being in France. They were so good. Old Town was a little busy with people doing some last minute shopping but there was a whole bunch of holiday cheer. It made me very happy.

Instead of going out to eat all the time like we usually do we took this time to try and cook by ourselves. It was an adventure to say the least. I made tacos and beans for us one night which was really fun. Then every morning for breakfast we had eggs, bacon, and toast (breakfast/brunch is both R's and mines favorite meal). Then R made a really good green chicken chili in the crock pot! I ate so much of it I thought I was going to explode, haha! 

On Friday I got to meet up with some of my Blue Lake co-workers and it was so great to see so many familiar faces again. I missed all of them so much. It was great to see Rachel after her trip down to South America. I was so happy to hear about her wedding engagement and hear about all the plans she is cooking up. I felt right at home again and it made my heart full with love and cheer. This get together was the cherry on top of the perfect ice cream sundae.

Over all it has been a pretty great break so far but I'm sad it's going by so fast.

I have another great piece of news! Tomorrow I get to see one of my friends from when I was little! She moved out to Arizona with her boyfriend before summer started and I haven't seen since then. We have kept in touch and she has been very happy with the move but man I miss her like cray. I'm so glad I get to see her tomorrow and catch up! I can't hear all about how living in the desert has been treating her. 

XOXO

ZMH

The view of Chicago from the front steps of Alder

Me at the Christkrindle market

The Art Institute was all decked out

Miniature room

Another miniature room

R's view from the 16th floor of his place 

Kate Spade store

Hey there Coco

Life is Rough

Boy oh boy it's for sure the end of a semester.

Everyone is stressed, falling apart, and freaking out (including me).

I never look forward to this time of year because it just gives me so much anxiety. It doesn't even matter that I will be home in three weeks for Christmas break because I just keep thinking about all of the things I have to do in between that time.

Let me start with my list of bad's:

1. My iPhone will not charge. Correction it is being very picky about charging. I will hook it up and it will occasionally charge for maybe 30 minutes if I'm lucky. So I will be going to the AT&T store this weekend with my dad and hopefully get this situation fixed.

2. I found out I am lactose and dairy intolerant. YAY...not. I guess this has always been around but it recently started turning into such a big problem that I was dry heaving and getting dizzy from feeling so ill. I hate this because I live off of dairy products but good thing I have always liked soy milk.

3. I had a huge 10page ROUGH DRAFT, mind you, due yesterday and I only had 2pages. Thankfully I was not the only one but still. I keep looking at my 2pages and walking away because this paper and class is awful and I don't want to do it. 

4. My other three housemates are driving me up the walk. Don't get me wrong I love Rachel but holy cow am I ready to be home. Not everyone is doing their chores, there is stuff everywhere, and all of this is making me more stressed. I can't even hide in my room because Rachel has almost taken over the whole thing. Don't worry I will be giving everyone a piece of my mind very soon.

So yea, that is about it. Oh wait one more!

5. There will be some significant charges next semester for the sorority to fund different G.O. (Greek Orientation or Pledge) that I don't know if I can afford. Don't get me wrong, I love the sorority but I just cannot afford all of those extra little costs especially for events that I cannot be at because I have work. It's annoying is all.

Okay so now that is all.

I just needed to vent this and have someone else hear it that wouldn't immediately try to make everything positive and tell me it will be okay. That's nice that people want to give me support and I love it but sometimes a girl just has to be mad and think that there will be no good outcome. Just for a little bit let me wallow and be mad. Just a little bit, that's all I ask.

XOXO

ZMH 

Winter Is Upon Us

Here in Michigan there is never a shortage of snow during the winter months but this year Mother Nature decided to visit us a little early. Our first snow fall happened this past weekend and boy was there a lot of it.

There was so much snow that schools actually gave out snow days on Tuesday. Lucky for me my one class of the day cancelled and I didn't have to go into work. Since I had a free day I took the time to rest and really work on some homework. Plus I got to have a lovely lunch date with one of my roommates.

The big question is how in the world did we make it from our apartment to the restaurant. There was so much snow blowing around and man was it cold. We might have stayed a little longer at the restaurant then normal because of this. 

Overall it was a pretty great day and I wish we had another day off but alas no.

Thank goodness Thanksgiving break is next week.

Only three weeks left of the semester!

XOXO

ZMH

(I have a photo of our struggle but I am currently having problems with transferring photos from my phone so I will keep you posted until I fix it)

Instead here is different photo to satisfy your photo viewing needs