The Best Wedding Proposals of 2008

Story Book Proposal


"He took me out to dinner, and afterward we went to Barnes & Noble. We meandered over to the children's books section to pick up a few Christmas presents, and then he pulled a little red book off the shelf and said, 'Oh look, what's this?' The book was called, Fun with Emily and Jarrod, kind of like a Dick and Jane book, but instead, it was the illustrated story of our relationship. He read it to me, and at the end, the 'Jarrod' in the book had a pressing question to ask the 'Emily'...and he pulled out the ring and proposed! The last page of the book said, 'The beginning...'"



A Real Winner


"The date of a triathlon I was competing in happened to fall on the two-year anniversary of the night I met my fiancé. After a 1-mile swim, a 24.2-mile bike ride, and a grueling 6.2-mile run in the hottest part of the day, I rounded the corner and headed for the finish line. My friends and family were cheering as I crossed it, but then I received the biggest surprise of all! Right at the finish, Brian was down on one knee holding my finisher's medal and a ring!"




Magazine-Worthy


"My sister, who was in NYC doing an internship at US Weekly magazine, asked if she could take pictures of me holding the magazine for a project she was working on. When I got to the "Shopping" page, I noticed a picture of a really cute dog in an ad. I thought, 'He looks just like my dog, Aspen.' Then I realized that it was my dog ─ and he had an engagement ring. The ad included my name in big letters, and read, "Will you marry me?" Then my now-fiancé came out of nowhere, got down on one knee, and proposed. For the next week, I continued to get emails and calls from people that knew me and had seen the ad in the magazine. It was amazing!"



Artfully Done


"We were at the museum, and in the middle of one of the exhibits was a timeline about scientific discoveries and advancements. At the end was a slideshow of pictures of us and our families that he'd had the museum add. It read: 'On February 16th, 2008, Will discovers that he is a perfect match with Andrea.' As soon as I saw it, he got down on one knee and presented me with an engagement ring."




The Right Words


"He took me to a local rose garden to play Scrabble. It was a travel Scrabble board where the letters stick in place, so when I opened the board and saw letters already in place, I thought, I don't think we were in the middle of a game. I took a second look, and saw that he had spelled, "Laura, will you marry me?" When I looked up at him, he was on his knee holding out the ring. We haven't taken the letters off of that board since."



Swimming with Dolphins


"On Valentine's Day we found ourselves on a small island just off of Paradise Island swimming with the dolphins. They did the cutest tricks: danced with us, kissed us, and dove to the ocean floor to retrieve 'presents' for us. James' dolphin came up with only a pebble, but my dolphin handed me a big white box, in which was my engagement ring!"



Top of the World


"My dad had plans to fly to a business meeting in a helicopter, but things fell through and there was an extra seat, so he invited me to go up with him and my mom for a ride. We flew into the Rockies and were getting close to Fisher Peak when my Dad said, 'Hey Cas, what's that?' And there was Evan on the highest part of the tallest mountain holding a sign that read, 'CAS, WILL YOU MARRY ME?' My mom passed me a gift bag with a ring inside. It usually takes about four hours to get off of the mountain, but Evan was on one knee at our front door an hour later."

Worst Wedding Proposals of 2008

Slept Through It


"My proposal was a surprise. The night before it happened, I had a minor disagreement with my fiance and I went to bed early. In the middle of the night, the phone rang and it was him. He said "I came like a thief in the night to profess my love. Will you marry me?" I thought he was messing around. He said he was serious and that I should check my hand for the ring. There was no ring. Apparently the ring had fallen off and I was lying on it."


Vegas, Baby


"I was eating lunch at my desk two weeks after starting a new job. Joe called me and asked if I'd like to go to Vegas with him that weekend and spend the rest of my life with him. There was no bended knee, no handholding, no eye contact, no kiss...I just said, 'Um, okay,' and he responded, 'Okay, love ya. Bye!.' Click."


Showered With Love


"As I was showering, I saw him walk into the bathroom with his laptop in his hands. It was playing a romantic R&B song called 'Let's Chill.' He placed the laptop on the toilet and started dancing. I thought he was nuts and started laughing. He then proceeded to step into the shower with all of his clothes on. I shrieked, 'What are you doing?!' His response, 'Baby, I love you.' I shrieked back to him, 'I love you too, but get outta here. Your clothes are getting wet!' Then he slowly bent down on one knee, took out the ring box, opened it, and asked me to marry him."


Up High and Uneasy


"At the last minute, we decided to climb Snowmass Mountain in one day. It's a 14,092-foot peak and all the guidebooks say that it's a two-day hike. At the top, I plopped down on a giant rock. Travis came over and held my hand. I was so sick from the climb and the altitude, I quickly pulled my hand away and told him I thought I was going to puke. He took my hand back and said, 'Don't throw up, marry me.'"


Déja Vu in Paris


"On our first night in Paris, Paul suggested we go to the Eiffel Tower. At the top, he reached into his pocket to dig out the ring, and I blurted out, 'I can't believe Tom Cruise proposed to Katie Holmes up here. It's so ugly!' He didn't propose then. Before we left for the airport to return home, we were sitting in this garden behind Notre Dame. Paul explained he didn't really enjoy the vacation because he was so nervous, and then told me that he had tried to propose on the trip several times. I felt horrible and sat silent for a few moments before he said, 'I can't take it anymore!' and got down on one knee in the middle of the park and proposed."


Bite Your Tongue


"I guess he had planned on proposing the next day when we had plans to go hiking...but he got tired of waiting. So at around 11:30 p.m., he woke me up and said, 'You really need to come outside and see the stars.' Half asleep, I got up. With two sweatshirts on (complete with hood) and socks pulled up to my knees, I walked out onto the deck. 'Okay, what did you want me to see?' I asked. He pointed into the middle of nowhere and said, 'I think that's the Milky Way over there...' Not convinced I said, 'Shut up, you don't know what you are talking about. I'm going inside.' And by the time I turned around, he was on one knee."



Murky Water


"While scuba diving together, we got to about 15 feet and the visibility of the water was horrible. He stopped and made us kneel on the bottom of the ocean floor. He kept pointing out to sea, then pointing to me and then to himself. I was confused and getting upset because I didn't understand what he wanted. I started to cry and tried to surface. When he came up, he said, 'I was trying to ask you to marry me!'"



With Extra Cheese


"We went to Chuck E. Cheese's for some really bad pizza and fun games. Once we were done, we went to exchange our tickets for prizes. I let the guy know that I wanted the pink star ring and he proceeded to pull out a blue ring box. Inside the box was a piece of paper that read, 'Do you want to trade?' and a blue plastic ring. Yeah, I wanted to trade -- I wanted the pink star! I l told the guy and he just stared at me. 'Uh, are you sure you don't want to trade for the one behind you?' I turned around and I saw JJ on one knee. Was he really proposing at Chuck E. Cheese? I started to laugh and said, 'Yes! Of course I'll marry you!'"

COMFORTABLE

IM AT THE POINT IN TIME WHERE I AM COMFORTABLE WITH ME AND ALL I HAVE TO OFFER. I THINK THERE WAS A DARK PERIOD FOR ME AND NOW THE LIGHT IS SHINING THROUGH. SOMETHING ABOUT HAVING FAMILY, FRIENDS AND BEING YOURSELF THAT MAKES IT A BIT EASIER THAN ANYTHING ELSE YOU HAVE EVER DONE. IM HAVING FUN WITH LIFE AND I KNOW THAT THERE IS SOOO MUCH MORE TO COME IN THE FUTURE

ALWAYS BE COMFORTABLE WITH YOU

SHE IS 10

MY BABY IS 10 TODAY AND I CANT BELIEVE IT. IT SEEMS JUST LIKE YESTERDAY THAT I WAS CHANGING HER DIAPERS, CHASHING HER AROUND, WALKING HER INTO PRESCHOOL AND NOW, SHE IS 10...WOW WHAT AN AMAZEMENT FOR ME.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MISS JACELYN BREANNA JACKSON, LOVE MOMMY

THANKFUL

I AM TOTALLLY EXCITED FOR THANSGIVING AND ALL THE THINGS I HAVE TO BE THANKFUL FOR..... GOD IS GOOD ALL THE TIME

FLY DIVA SHOT...

SOMETHING FUN FOR EVERYONE

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Ways to make her melt

Ways to Melt a Woman’s Heart (menshealth.com)

Ask her to dance.

On windy days, brush wayward strands of hair from her eyes and mouth.

When she’s coming down the street, across the room, or up the stairs to meet you, walk towards her as soon as you see her.

Kiss her between her shoulder blades when she turns her back to you to go to sleep.

Put your arm around her when you introduce her to your friends and family.

Grasp her hand when a scantily dressed, beautiful woman walks by.

Call her when you’re feeling sad.

Kiss her eyelids.

Ask to see a picture of her when she was a child.

Wash her from head to toe in the shower.

If she’s crying on the phone, go over to her place. Immediately.

Occasionally call her by her first and middle names.

Buy her your favorite rock album of all time on vinyl.

Order coffee for her, remembering exactly how she likes it.

Mention your upcoming anniversary before she does.

Send her something in the mail. Anything.

When she’s feeling insecure, stare into her eyes and tell her there is no-one in the world who could be as right for you as she is.

Call her just before you get on the plane.

Pick her clothes up off the floor.

Try desperately to make her laugh when she’s feeling down.

Take her to see your favorite sport live. Pay more attention to her than to the game.

Touch her arm when you leave the table to go to the bathroom. Touch her again when you come back.

Shave just before you see her. She’ll notice.

Hug her when she gets jealous. Hug her hard.

Give her jewelry.

Hand her two towels when she gets out of the shower. (The second one is for her hair.)

Ask her specific questions about her work.

Keep her favorite cereal on hand.

In the middle of a conversation, tell her you love her.

Send her very expensive flowers when you screw up.

Take her to a cabin with a fireplace. Build her a fire.

Moan her name when she goes down on you.

Read her a story when it’s her turn to drive during a long road trip.

Offer to fix something at her place that you realize is broken.

Notice when she’s wearing something new.

Kiss her hand in front of your most die-hard bachelor buddies.

Ask if she wants to wrestle.

BUTTERFLY VS SHY

THE INTERESTING PART ABOUT BEING ME IS FROM TIME TO TIME, I CAN BE A SOCIAL BUTTERFLY AND MOST OF THE TIME, IM JUST THE SHY GIRL. RIGHT NOW I FEEL LIKE THE SHY GIRL THAT JUST WANTS TO BE IN A SHELL AND THINK. TOO MANY THOUGHTS RUNNING THROUGH MY MIND AT ONCE AND I ALMOST FEEL LIKE I AM ON OVERLOAD...... RELEASE IS NECESSARY, BUT HOW? GET AWAY? SOME ME TIME? WHAT WILL IT TAKE? ANOTHER THING FOR ME TO THINK ABOUT I GUESS....

GREAT SLIDESHOW

http://flickr.com/photos/barackobamadotcom/sets/72157608716313371/

I HAVE MADE IT

TALK ABOUT A WEEK ON A ROLLERCOASTER.... I HAVE MADE IT OVER AND NOTHING CAN HOLD ME DOWN.

Football star faces his mother’s killer

In his memoir, “Running for My Life,” NFL running back Warrick Dunn shares his journey as a football star. In this excerpt, he writes about making the emotional decision to speak to the man who's on death row for murdering Dunn's mother.
Chapter one: Face to faceTo get to Angola State Prison from Baton Rouge, Louisiana — a distance of fifty-six miles — you go north on Highway 61, then take a hard left on Highway 66. Or you can get there by committing the most serious of crimes.
For years I had wondered about Kevan Brumfield. He had confessed to killing my mother, Baton Rouge police corporal Betty Smothers, in the early morning of January 7, 1993, in an ambush at a local bank. Two years later a jury deliberated a little more than sixty minutes and decided that Brumfield should die for murdering Mom in the fatal attempted robbery
In the months and years afterward, I wrestled with one question that was never answered: Why? What was on Brumfield’s mind as he and another man, Henri Broadway, lay in wait in near-total darkness as Mom’s police cruiser pulled up to the bank’s night deposit box? What did Brumfield think when he and Broadway charged out from behind bushes and fired shots into the car, killing my mother and wounding her passenger, Kimen Lee, night manager at a local Piggly Wiggly store, as she made a store deposit? Did Brumfield understand the severity of his actions as he and Broadway piled into the getaway car driven by a third man named West Paul?
It made absolutely no sense. Why?
Then an opportunity presented itself in October 2007 to go to Angola State Prison and actually get the chance to ask Brumfield the questions that have haunted me for years. Questions that kept me awake for so many nights. Questions that caused me to cry. Questions about a moment that changed my life like no other.
The meeting took months and countless telephone calls to arrange. There were casual and personal conversations with lawyers, prison officials, and football coaches. There were delays, changes of minds, emotional highs and lows. But it finally all came together on Tuesday, October 23, in a bye week of my NFL season with the Atlanta Falcons. My coaches realized how important this was and they decided to cut me loose for a day.

I flew from Atlanta into New Orleans, where my younger brother Derrick Green picked me up and drove me back to my hometown of Baton Rouge. I was accompanied to the prison by Maelen “Choo-Choo” Brooks, my youth football coach and mentor. I was also accompanied by Don Yaeger, this book’s co-author. Choo-Choo is probably as much like a father as anybody I’ll ever have. He was one of the first people I saw after Mom’s murder, and his guidance and support have been invaluable over the years. Still, Choo-Choo couldn’t believe I wanted to do this. That was the reaction I got from almost everybody. Most people couldn’t believe I wanted to make this visit. But I knew it was important for me to finally face my demons.
Before I went to Angola, I spent hours in conversation with my Atlanta counselor, Pauline Clance. She believed it was a good idea, a positive move, because she clearly understood that there were some things in my life that I would never get over until I sat across the table from him.
It was set.


I found myself in a small break room on Death Row at Angola State Prison, eye to eye with Kevan Brumfield. The days and nights leading up to the visit were somewhat unsettling. I tried not to let it dominate my mind, even pretending the meeting wasn’t happening. I went to the movies. I slept a lot. I started gathering my thoughts and talking to my brothers and sisters, compiling questions they wanted me to ask. The weekend prior to the trip was difficult because we also lost to the New Orleans Saints on that Sunday. It was our third consecutive defeat and the sixth in our first seven games. Drained and tired, I actually just wanted to relax and enjoy the time off. It was really my first break since the start of the 2007 season.
As I prepared for the visit, however, people often said or asked, “Do you need anyone to go with you? Do you need anyone to be there for you? How do you feel? I’m proud of you that you have the courage to do this. Hopefully, you will find the answers you are looking for.” It was crazy. I think they made it more of a big deal than I had. The truth is, I was nervous but really didn’t want to let it show. How would the conversation go? What if he said something horrible or acted as if this were no big deal? How would I maintain control?


There were more questions than answers. Friends tried to caution me, prepare me. What I have always tried to tell people is that sometimes in life, you really don’t know what you can do until you have to go through it. If my mom were still on this earth, I would probably tell people that I couldn’t go on without her. But I have overcome that one. I knew that no matter how bad this meeting was, I could overcome that, too.


It was a calm, cloudy morning on Tuesday, October 23. We had an official escort named Chad who drove us to Angola State Prison from Baton Rouge in a prison SUV. While we navigated the long roads in near silence, the text message alert on my cell phone kept going off. It was my sister Summer Smothers and others all sending me notes wishing me luck, praying for me. An earlier text nearly brought tears to my eyes. It was from Hue Jackson, my offensive coordinator with the Falcons, who encouraged me to remain strong. He hoped that I would find the answers and peace my heart looked for.


As we got closer, there’s no question that I became more physically tight. It had been a roller coaster of emotion. One day I was ready for the visit, another day I wasn’t. Earlier dates had been scheduled but were snatched away. I also contemplated asking Summer and Derrick to join me, since they are only a few years younger than me and they remembered that horrific night vividly. While Mom’s murder also had greatly affected them, I just didn’t think either one was in the right frame of mind to meet face to face with Brumfield. I still appreciated their support, along with that of my three other brothers and sisters, because everyone felt this meeting could offer some type of freedom for me.


I also know that Choo-Choo, who I wanted at my side, had concerns about my decision. He wondered what my reaction would be if Brumfield wasn’t sorry or repentant, or if Brumfield simply gloated over the fact that he had taken something away from a successful, professional athlete. Choo-Choo wanted me to feel sorrow, not hatred, for Brumfield if that was the case. I also knew Brumfield might not say anything at all. If that happened, that was fine, but I wanted Brumfield to sit there and listen to what ever I had to say. I wanted him to understand the change he had made to our lives. Another friend wondered how I would react if Brumfield asked for forgiveness. Would I forgive him? I decided in advance that I would do it for me, not for him. I would do it for myself because my life has been a struggle for so long, and I held on to so much anger and hatred. I had so much bottled up inside that it stopped me from being whole. To let someone know that he has that much control over me and my life, I can’t continue to live like that. It took me a long time just to get to this point.

I had to play many years of college and professional football to reach the point where I went to counseling just to seek help so I could be sane and happy. Because I was hiding so much inside, I knew I needed help to get to the point where I wasn’t depressed, wasn’t sad all the time, so that I could laugh more, smile more. This visit was part of that journey. I was doing this for my soul, for my life. It was time for me to move forward. In God’s eyes, you have to forgive. I won’t ever forget it, but I have to forgive to get that burden off of me.


In the end, Brumfield and Broadway are going to get what’s due in their lives, so I can’t hold that hatred inside. I’ve tried to tell Derrick the same thing. It’s crazy because we discussed on the drive from New Orleans that you can’t hold onto something for so long, because it eats you up. It stops you from growing as a person — in my case and in my brother’s, as men. We are still alive. We are still doing well. We are starting families. We are moving on and starting our own traditions. We’re not holding onto the things that woulda, shoulda, coulda been. That’s done and over with. This is your path and you have to live that life.


My heart started to race as we closed in on Angola. Usually, when I play football, my heart doesn’t race until I get ready to pull up to the stadium. That’s just from my love and excitement for the game. This was going to be a lot different because it was not about football. It was about life. Now I would have to face another fear in my life that I didn’t know anything about or understand. I didn’t know if I was going to talk straight or be nervous the whole time. I could tell I was nervous because my voice was cracking; it was just one of those things where I would have to try to stay calm.

We were en route to one of the most desolate spots in all of Louisiana.
Highway 66 ends at a prison that’s known as the most notorious in the South, a prison from which 91 percent of all inmates never leave. They either die on Death Row or because their sentences are longer than their lives. I was surprised when Richard Vannoy, the prison’s deputy warden for security, met us at the gates and asked me to get in his truck with him. As I got out of the car, our driver, Chad, looked at me and said, “Man to man, I respect what you are doing.” That really hit me. This was going to happen.


Vannoy joined the prison staff at age eighteen and has worked at Angola for thirty- three years. He explained how inmates on Death Row such as Brumfield and Broadway are locked in single- man cells. They are allowed out an hour each day to shower and an hour alone in the yard five times a week on a rotation basis that’s kept a secret even from them for safety reasons. Inmates are moved in full restraints: leg irons and waist chains. The only time their hands are unbuckled from their waist chains is when they are alone in their exercise pen. They are never in the proximity of anyone when they are not fully restrained.

The 18,000-acre penitentiary is surrounded on three sides by the Mississippi River. Vannoy also told me that the prison is still run as a working farm — inmates grow and harvest their own vegetables and raise cattle. Vannoy drove me through what seemed like miles of dirt roads to get back to an area that was guarded with rolls and rolls of razor wire. The building’s official name is Camp F. It was as dank and dark a place as you would ever see.
This was Death Row.


Brumfield’s lawyers, the husband-and-wife team of Nick Trenticosta and Susan Herrero, were very quizzical about my visit. They’ve represented Death Row inmates for many years and really never had a request quite like mine, to sit down with one of their clients. I tried to explain to them that sometimes you just have to do it, that this was just a matter of opportunity for me to do something that I never before really thought I should even try.


The rules surrounding my visit had changed, however. I had hoped to meet with both Brumfield and Broadway. Brumfield agreed to the meeting, but Broadway did not after he initially said he would. Paul, meanwhile, had been released months earlier from another institution and had returned to Baton Rouge after serving 13 1/2 years of his 25-year prison sentence.


As I walked into the prison staff’s multipurpose break room, Room 116, Brumfield was already seated at a round brown table. He wore a white shirt, jeans, and Reebok tennis shoes. His hands were shackled to his waist. He was bald, with glasses; a scar was visible over his upper lip, and I noticed he had gold-capped teeth.


I have to admit that I was shocked when I first saw Brumfield. It didn’t seem like this was real. It didn’t seem like I recognized him at all. I didn’t imagine him looking like he did. I thought he was going to be a smaller man, but he was a big guy, broad and wide-shouldered. At thirty- four years old, Brumfield was just two years older than I was. Still, I didn’t think I would see a guy with a bald head and glasses. It had been so many years since I had seen him at his sentencing in a Baton Rouge courtroom in July 1995. I remembered him with hair and looking much different.
After a few moments of awkward silence, Brumfield spoke first. He explained how he had changed as a person, that he shouldn’t have done some of the things that he did in the past and that he had grown into a better human being. He apologized for what happened to my family.
And then he said it.

“I didn’t kill your mother. They got the wrong guy.”


I had been previously warned by Warden Burl Cain to expect that response, and I certainly understood that with an appeal pending, this was the way Brumfield would handle himself. Brumfield has claimed he is mentally retarded, and his appeals have argued that the U.S. Constitution prohibits the execution of mentally retarded people. But judges have ruled that Brumfield’s IQ shows that he’s not retarded. I listened to Brumfield explain how, because of the life he had lived, he would have probably been dead by now if he hadn’t been arrested for this crime that he now claims he didn’t do ... but to which he confessed.


Brumfield also told me that he had “messed over” people on the street like himself, but he had never “messed over” a family like mine, that he had never “messed over” hard-working people. Brumfield also pointed out that he had seven children, including a daughter who was in the courtroom when Brumfield was tried and convicted twelve years earlier, and was now in college. I asked him what his daughter thought of him being in prison, and he responded, “She’s not proud.” Brumfield also showed me the scars on his arms and recalled his shootouts on the streets with others like himself. He told me I needed to understand that when my mom was murdered, the police were looking for somebody. They had to have somebody. “I was that somebody,” he said.

As I listened to Brumfield, I realized that most of the questions I had crafted in a spiral pocket notebook that I brought with me, questions that I had compiled from my family, were suddenly irrelevant. If he wasn’t going to admit that he murdered my mom, as he did in his confession to police, I couldn’t ask him questions about that night. It changed the dynamic of the conversation I had come to have.
After Brumfield professed his innocence, I told him that I didn’t come to Angola to say “you, you, you” and get in his face. I had been through a lot and I wanted to tell him about it. I quickly flipped through the first three pages of my notebook, which had these handwritten questions in black pen:

• Why did you rob the Piggly Wiggly that night?
  
• How do you feel today about your situation?
  
• Why did you guys shoot a police officer? Didn’t you think she had kids, husband, family?
  
• How could you guys do something so dreadful without even thinking who you may be hurting in the long run?
  
• Why would you shoot a police officer and not think about the consequences?
  
• Do you feel remorseful towards what you have done that night?
  
• How would you feel if someone did to you what you did to my family?
  
• Why did you guys agree to the meeting?
  
• What made you guys feel comfortable enough to talk about the killing of our mother?
  
• As you had the time to examine your life and the killing, was it worth the time and effort that you guys put in planning and carrying out this selfish act?
  
• When you took the time to plot and accomplish this killing, what did you think would be the outcome of your deed?
  
• It has been almost 15 years since the killing. If you could say anything to our family, what would it be and why?

Finally, after listening to Brumfield for a while longer, I decided I just wanted to tell him about what that night did to me and how that night changed my life. I wanted him to know that I used to play football with passion and emotion. I still play with the passion for the game, but I no longer play the game with emotion because the night Mom was murdered took all the emotion from me.

When you loved somebody like I loved my mom, it is as great an emotional experience as you could have. I wanted to explain to Brumfield how it affected the lives of my brothers, Derrick, Bricson, and Travis, and sisters, Summer and Samantha. I wanted him to know that I remembered that growing up as a kid, I wanted to be a father, I wanted to be a husband, I wanted to be a dad. I wanted him to know that what he did that night to my mom ruined a lot of that for me. I flipped to the fourth page in my notebook. My hands trembled slightly as I began to read:

I have struggled with this loss. My family has struggled.
I don’t think you realize the life changing experience it has caused.
You took my life away, changed my dreams and made them desires.
I am the oldest and it was my responsibility to look after my family. My life will never be the same. My best friend in the world was taken away from me by you guys.
Thank God that she raised and prepared me for that day.
Things have not been easy. I’ve been depressed for years, lying to myself that I am OK.
I’ve cheated people in my life because I wasn’t giving them Warrick.
I’ve had a tough relationship with my brother Derrick who I love, ’cause you took his opportunity to be my mom’s little man.

It has been up and down with my family because I had to become Daddy, not just Big Brother. It wasn’t easy deciding someone else’s life when you can’t decide your own.
I’ve had some serious issues over the years in my personal life: afraid of commitment, fully committing myself to anything other than my family; not wanting to have kids or get married; not enjoying life, laughing or smiling; not letting people love me.

Over the last few years, I’ve been trying to be at peace with things in my life because I have to move forward. I am yearning for something new, a new start. Family, kids — just to get my life started.

I guess I am searching for answers. You guys have short-changed my family.
As I looked at this man who I never met, I bared my soul to him. I told him how in the years after my mom’s death I had been hesitant about being in a committed relationship, how I’ve been afraid to lose people. I’ve been in counseling for many years over this very concept of having a true committed relationship because I don’t want to lose somebody I love twice in my life. I don’t think I can do it. I don’t think I could suffer that pain again.
Tears started to well in my eyes when I realized that I was laying it all on the line for a guy who had killed my mom. As I looked around the room, I realized everyone else in the room had tears in their eyes, too — Brumfield included. I took thirty seconds, paused, collected my thoughts, and finally looked at him and told him:

“If you didn’t do it, I don’t know why you are here today, but I know why I am here today. I am here because I need to forgive somebody. I am here because it has been fourteen years and it’s time for me to move on. I was searching for answers. I’ve been going to counseling. I’ve started smiling. I’ve started laughing. I even had my first drink two years ago during a fun moment. It is time for me to forgive and move on.”

Everyone went silent. I had said it. I was there to forgive.
Brumfield stuttered for a moment, then told me that as he watched me on television over the years, he wondered what path I would have taken, or the life I would have lived, if that night never had happened. He promised me that the Lord would take care of me. Brumfield added that he wasn’t blessed with a support system and a mother like mine. He told me a story that in 1987, my mother, working security at a store, caught him stealing and made him put back what ever he took. Brumfield said my mom told him, “Boy, get your butt out of here.” Brumfield said my mom could have made an example of him that day, but she elected not to. I thought to myself, that was Mom — always giving people second chances to do right.

Brumfield looked at me and asked, “Why now? Why meet?” I told him I was finally strong enough to do this, that years of counseling had made this possible. Brumfield told me not to hold onto my anger anymore, and he said that he prayed for me and my family. I answered that God has a path for all of us, and that I was happy that his life hadn’t been taken away. I told Brumfield that it took me a long time to stop blaming God for that night.

Excerpted from “Running for My Life” by Warrick Dunn and Don Yaeger. Copyright (c) 2008, reprinted with permission from HarperCollins. To read more, click here.

SLEEP TIME

I JUST NEED SOME SLEEP...THATS ALL I NEED

MY NEW DESKTOP I CREATED THIS MORNING....

THE GREATEST BIRTHDAY GIFT EVER

MY GRANDFATHER TURNED 78TH YEARS OLD YESTERDAY ON ONE OF THE MOST HISTORAL DAYS IN HISTORY EVER. I LISTEN TO HIM TELL ME HOW WHEN HE FIRST GOT TO VOTE, HE HAD TO PAY A VOTING TAX BECAUSE HE WAS BLACK AND THEN THEY HAD HIM TRY TO GUESS HOW MANY MARBLES WERE IN A JAR IN ORDER TO VOTE. YESTERDAY HE GOT TO VOTE WITHOUT PAY AND WITHOUT GUESSES. HE GOT TO CELEBRATE HIS BIRTHDAY AND HIS RIGHTS WITH MY DAUGHTER AND IT IS A MOMENT IN TIME THAT I WILL NEVER FORGET. 3 GENERATIONS OF FAMILY, TOGETHER AT ONE TIME, TO CELEBRATAE HISTORY AND THE PATH THAT WE TOOK TO GET HERE.

THE DREAM IS REALITY....

Barack Obama

Barack Hussein Obama II (pronounced /bəˈrɑːk hʊˈseɪn oʊˈbɑːmə/; born August 4, 1961) is the junior United States Senator from Illinois and presidential nominee of the Democratic Party in the 2008 United States presidential election.

Obama is the first African-American to be nominated by a major American political party for president.[1] A graduate of Columbia University and Harvard Law School, where he became the first black person to serve as president of the Harvard Law Review, Obama worked as a community organizer and practiced as a civil rights attorney before serving three terms in the Illinois Senate from 1997 to 2004. He taught constitutional law at the University of Chicago Law School from 1992 to 2004. Following an unsuccessful bid for a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives in 2000, he announced his campaign for the U.S. Senate in January 2003. After a primary victory in March 2004, Obama delivered the keynote address at the Democratic National Convention in July 2004. He was elected to the Senate in November 2004 with 70 percent of the vote.

As a member of the Democratic minority in the 109th Congress, he helped create legislation to control conventional weapons and to promote greater public accountability in the use of federal funds. He also made official trips to Eastern Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. During the 110th Congress, he helped create legislation regarding lobbying and electoral fraud, climate change, nuclear terrorism, and care for returned U.S. military personnel. Obama announced his presidential campaign in February 2007, and was formally nominated at the 2008 Democratic National Convention with Delaware senator Joe Biden as his running mate.

Contents [hide]
1 Early life and career
2 State legislator, 1997–2004
3 2004 U.S. Senate campaign
4 U.S. Senator, from 2005
4.1 Legislation
4.2 Committees
5 2008 presidential campaign
6 Political positions
7 Family and personal life
8 Cultural and political image
9 Written works
10 Notes
11 References
12 Further reading
13 External links



Early life and career
Main article: Early life and career of Barack Obama
Barack Obama was born at the Kapi'olani Medical Center for Women & Children in Honolulu, Hawaii,[2] to Barack Hussein Obama, Sr., a Luo from Nyang’oma Kogelo, Nyanza Province, Kenya, and Ann Dunham, a white American from Wichita, Kansas.[3] His parents met while attending the University of Hawaii at Manoa, where his father was a foreign student.[4] They separated when he was two years old and later divorced.[5] Obama's father returned to Kenya and saw his son only once more before dying in an automobile accident in 1982.[6]

After her divorce, Dunham married Lolo Soetoro, and the family moved to Soetoro's home country of Indonesia in 1967, where Obama attended local schools in Jakarta until he was ten years old. He then returned to Honolulu to live with his maternal grandparents while attending Punahou School from the fifth grade in 1971 until his graduation from high school in 1979.[7] Obama's mother returned to Hawaii in 1972 for several years and then back to Indonesia to complete fieldwork for her doctoral dissertation. She died of ovarian cancer in 1995.[8]

As an adult Obama admitted that during high school he used marijuana, cocaine, and alcohol, which he described at the 2008 Civil Forum on the Presidency as his greatest moral failure.[9][10]

Following high school, Obama moved to Los Angeles, where he studied at Occidental College for two years.[11] He then transferred to Columbia University in New York City, where he majored in political science with a specialization in international relations.[12] Obama graduated with a B.A. from Columbia in 1983, then at the start of the following year worked for a year at the Business International Corporation[13][14] and then at the New York Public Interest Research Group.[15][16]


Barack Obama was raised by his mother, Ann Dunham.After four years in New York City, Obama moved to Chicago, where he was hired as director of the Developing Communities Project (DCP), a church-based community organization originally comprising eight Catholic parishes in Greater Roseland (Roseland, West Pullman, and Riverdale) on Chicago's far South Side, and worked there for three years from June 1985 to May 1988.[15][17] During his three years as the DCP's director, its staff grew from one to thirteen and its annual budget grew from $70,000 to $400,000, with accomplishments including helping set up a job training program, a college preparatory tutoring program, and a tenants' rights organization in Altgeld Gardens.[18] Obama also worked as a consultant and instructor for the Gamaliel Foundation, a community organizing institute.[19] In mid-1988, he traveled for the first time to Europe for three weeks and then for five weeks in Kenya, where he met many of his Kenyan relatives for the first time.[20]

Obama entered Harvard Law School in late 1988. At the end of his first year, he was selected, based on his grades and a writing competition, as an editor of the Harvard Law Review.[21] In February 1990, in his second year, he was elected president of the Law Review, a full-time volunteer position functioning as editor-in-chief and supervising the Law Review's staff of eighty editors.[22] Obama's election as the first black president of the Law Review was widely reported and followed by several long, detailed profiles.[22] During his summers, he returned to Chicago where he worked as a summer associate at the law firms of Sidley & Austin in 1989 and Hopkins & Sutter in 1990.[23] After graduating with a Juris Doctor (J.D.) magna cum laude[24][25] from Harvard in 1991, he returned to Chicago.[21]

The publicity from his election as the first black president of the Harvard Law Review led to a publishing contract and advance for a book about race relations.[26] In an effort to recruit him to their faculty, the University of Chicago Law School provided Obama with a fellowship and an office to work on his book.[26] He originally planned to finish the book in one year, but it took much longer as the book evolved into a personal memoir. In order to work without interruptions, Obama and his wife, Michelle, traveled to Bali where he wrote for several months. The manuscript was finally published in mid-1995 as Dreams from My Father.[26]

Obama directed Illinois' Project Vote from April to October 1992, a voter registration drive with a staff of ten and seven hundred volunteers; it achieved its goal of registering 150,000 of 400,000 unregistered African-Americans in the state, and led to Crain's Chicago Business naming Obama to its 1993 list of "40 under Forty" powers to be.[27][28]


Right-to-left: Barack Obama and Maya Soetoro with their mother Ann Dunham and grandfather Stanley Dunham in Hawaii (early 1970s).Beginning in 1992, Obama taught constitutional law at the University of Chicago Law School for twelve years, being first classified as a Lecturer from 1992 to 1996, and then as a Senior Lecturer from 1996 to 2004.[29]

He also, in 1993, joined Davis, Miner, Barnhill & Galland, a twelve-attorney law firm specializing in civil rights litigation and neighborhood economic development, where he was an associate for three years from 1993 to 1996, then of counsel from 1996 to 2004, with his law license becoming inactive in 2002.[15][30][31]

Obama was a founding member of the board of directors of Public Allies in 1992, resigning before his wife, Michelle, became the founding executive director of Public Allies Chicago in early 1993.[15][32] He served from 1994 to 2002 on the board of directors of the Woods Fund of Chicago, which in 1985 had been the first foundation to fund the Developing Communities Project, and also from 1994 to 2002 on the board of directors of The Joyce Foundation.[15] Obama served on the board of directors of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge from 1995 to 2002, as founding president and chairman of the board of directors from 1995 to 1999.[15] He also served on the board of directors of the Chicago Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, the Center for Neighborhood Technology, and the Lugenia Burns Hope Center.[15]


State legislator, 1997–2004
Main article: Illinois Senate career of Barack Obama
Obama was elected to the Illinois Senate in 1996, succeeding State Senator Alice Palmer as Senator from Illinois' 13th District, which then spanned Chicago South Side neighborhoods from Hyde Park-Kenwood south to South Shore and west to Chicago Lawn.[33] Once elected, Obama gained bipartisan support for legislation reforming ethics and health care laws.[34] He sponsored a law increasing tax credits for low-income workers, negotiated welfare reform, and promoted increased subsidies for childcare.[35] In 2001, as co-chairman of the bipartisan Joint Committee on Administrative Rules, Obama supported Republican Governor Ryan's payday loan regulations and predatory mortgage lending regulations aimed at averting home foreclosures.[36]

Obama was reelected to the Illinois Senate in 1998, and again in 2002.[37] In 2000, he lost a Democratic primary run for the U.S. House of Representatives to four-term incumbent Bobby Rush by a margin of two to one.[38][39]

In January 2003, Obama became chairman of the Illinois Senate's Health and Human Services Committee when Democrats, after a decade in the minority, regained a majority.[40] He sponsored and led unanimous, bipartisan passage of legislation to monitor racial profiling by requiring police to record the race of drivers they detained and legislation making Illinois the first state to mandate videotaping of homicide interrogations.[35][41] During his 2004 general election campaign for U.S. Senate, police representatives credited Obama for his active engagement with police organizations in enacting death penalty reforms.[42] Obama resigned from the Illinois Senate in November 2004 following his election to the US Senate.[43]


2004 U.S. Senate campaign
See also: United States Senate election in Illinois, 2004
In mid-2002, Obama began considering a run for the U.S. Senate; he enlisted political strategist David Axelrod that fall and formally announced his candidacy in January 2003.[44] Decisions by Republican incumbent Peter Fitzgerald and his Democratic predecessor Carol Moseley Braun not to contest the race launched wide-open Democratic and Republican primary contests involving fifteen candidates.[45] Obama's candidacy was boosted by Axelrod's advertising campaign featuring images of the late Chicago Mayor Harold Washington and an endorsement by the daughter of the late Paul Simon, former U.S. Senator for Illinois.[46] He received over 52% of the vote in the March 2004 primary, emerging 29% ahead of his nearest Democratic rival.[47]

Obama's expected opponent in the general election, Republican primary winner Jack Ryan, withdrew from the race in June 2004.[48]

In July 2004, Obama wrote and delivered the keynote address at the 2004 Democratic National Convention in Boston, Massachusetts.[49] After describing his maternal grandfather's experiences as a World War II veteran and a beneficiary of the New Deal's FHA and G.I. Bill programs, Obama spoke about changing the U.S. government's economic and social priorities. He questioned the Bush administration's management of the Iraq War and highlighted America's obligations to its soldiers. Drawing examples from U.S. history, he criticized heavily partisan views of the electorate and asked Americans to find unity in diversity, saying, "There is not a liberal America and a conservative America; there's the United States of America."[50] Broadcasts of the speech by major news organizations launched Obama's status as a national political figure and boosted his campaign for U.S. Senate.[51]

In August 2004, two months after Ryan's withdrawal and less than three months before Election Day, Alan Keyes accepted the Illinois Republican Party's nomination to replace Ryan.[52] A long-time resident of Maryland, Keyes established legal residency in Illinois with the nomination.[53] In the November 2004 general election, Obama received 70% of the vote to Keyes's 27%, the largest victory margin for a statewide race in Illinois history.[54]


U.S. Senator, from 2005
Main article: United States Senate career of Barack Obama
Obama was sworn in as a senator on January 4, 2005.[55] Obama was the fifth African American Senator in U.S. history, and the third to have been popularly elected.[56] He is the only Senate member of the Congressional Black Caucus.[57] CQ Weekly, a nonpartisan publication, characterized him as a "loyal Democrat" based on analysis of all Senate votes in 2005–2007, and the National Journal ranked him as the "most liberal" senator based on an assessment of selected votes during 2007. In 2005 he was ranked sixteenth, and in 2006 he was ranked tenth.[58][59] In 2008, he was ranked by Congress.org as the eleventh most powerful Senator.[60]


Legislation
See also: List of bills sponsored by Barack Obama in the United States Senate

Senate bill sponsors Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) and Obama discussing the Coburn–Obama Transparency Act.[61]Obama voted in favor of the Energy Policy Act of 2005 and cosponsored the Secure America and Orderly Immigration Act.[62] In September 2006, Obama supported a related bill, the Secure Fence Act.[63] Obama introduced two initiatives bearing his name: Lugar–Obama, which expanded the Nunn–Lugar cooperative threat reduction concept to conventional weapons,[64] and the Coburn–Obama Transparency Act, which authorized the establishment of USAspending.gov, a web search engine on federal spending.[65] On June 3, 2008, Senator Obama, along with Senators Thomas R. Carper, Tom Coburn, and John McCain, introduced follow-up legislation: Strengthening Transparency and Accountability in Federal Spending Act of 2008.[66]

Obama sponsored legislation that would have required nuclear plant owners to notify state and local authorities of radioactive leaks, but the bill failed to pass in the full Senate after being heavily modified in committee.[67] In December 2006, President Bush signed into law the Democratic Republic of the Congo Relief, Security, and Democracy Promotion Act, marking the first federal legislation to be enacted with Obama as its primary sponsor.[68] In January 2007, Obama and Senator Feingold introduced a corporate jet provision to the Honest Leadership and Open Government Act, which was signed into law in September 2007.[69] Obama also introduced Deceptive Practices and Voter Intimidation Prevention Act, a bill to criminalize deceptive practices in federal elections[70] and the Iraq War De-Escalation Act of 2007,[71] neither of which have been signed into law.


Obama and Richard Lugar visit a Russian mobile launch missile dismantling facility.[72]Later in 2007, Obama sponsored an amendment to the Defense Authorization Act adding safeguards for personality disorder military discharges.[73] This amendment passed the full Senate in the spring of 2008.[74] He sponsored the Iran Sanctions Enabling Act supporting divestment of state pension funds from Iran's oil and gas industry, which has not passed committee, and co-sponsored legislation to reduce risks of nuclear terrorism.[75][76] Obama also sponsored a Senate amendment to the State Children's Health Insurance Program providing one year of job protection for family members caring for soldiers with combat-related injuries.[77]


Committees
Obama held assignments on the Senate Committees for Foreign Relations, Environment and Public Works and Veterans' Affairs through December 2006.[78] In January 2007, he left the Environment and Public Works committee and took additional assignments with Health, Education, Labor and Pensions and Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs.[79] He also became Chairman of the Senate's subcommittee on European Affairs.[80] As a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Obama made official trips to Eastern Europe, the Middle East, Central Asia and Africa. He met with Mahmoud Abbas before he became President of Palestine, and gave a speech at the University of Nairobi condemning corruption in the Kenyan government.[81][82][83][84]


2008 presidential campaign
This section contains information about one or more candidates in an upcoming or ongoing election.
Content may change as the election approaches.

Main articles: Barack Obama presidential primary campaign, 2008 and Barack Obama presidential campaign, 2008
On February 10, 2007, Obama announced his candidacy for President of the United States in front of the Old State Capitol building in Springfield, Illinois.[85][86] The choice of the announcement site was symbolic because it was also where Abraham Lincoln delivered his historic "House Divided" speech in 1858.[87] Throughout the campaign, Obama has emphasized the issues of rapidly ending the Iraq War, increasing energy independence, and providing universal health care, at one point identifying these as his top three priorities.[88]


Obama on stage with his wife and two daughters just before announcing his presidential campaign in Springfield, Illinois.Obama's campaign raised $58 million during the first half of 2007, of which "small" donations of less than $200 accounted for $16.4 million. The $58 million set the record for fundraising by a presidential campaign in the first six months of the calendar year before the election.[89] The magnitude of the small donation portion was outstanding from both the absolute and relative perspectives.[90] In January 2008, his campaign set another fundraising record with $36.8 million, the most ever raised in one month by a presidential candidate in the Democratic primaries.[91]

Among the January 2008 DNC-sanctioned state contests, Obama tied with Hillary Clinton for delegates in the New Hampshire primary and won more delegates than Clinton in the Iowa, Nevada and South Carolina elections and caucuses. On Super Tuesday, he emerged with 20 more delegates than Clinton.[92] He again broke fundraising records in the first two months of 2008, raising over $90 million for his primary to Clinton's $45 million.[93] After Super Tuesday, Obama won the eleven remaining February primaries and caucuses.[94] Obama and Clinton split delegates and states nearly equally in the March 4 contests of Vermont, Texas, Ohio, and Rhode Island; Obama closed the month by winning Wyoming and Mississippi.[95]

In March 2008, a controversy broke out concerning Obama's former pastor of twenty years, Jeremiah Wright,[96] after ABC News broadcast clips of his racially and politically charged sermons.[96][97] Initially, Obama responded by defending Wright's wider role in Chicago's African American community,[98] but condemned his remarks and ended Wright's relationship with the campaign.[99] During the controversy, Obama delivered a speech entitled "A More Perfect Union"[100] that addressed issues of race. Obama subsequently resigned from Trinity United Church of Christ "to avoid the impression that he endorsed the entire range of opinions expressed at that church."[101][102][103]


General David Petraeus gives an aerial tour of Baghdad to Barack Obama and Chuck Hagel.During April, May, and June, Obama won the North Carolina, Oregon, and Montana primaries and remained ahead in the count of pledged delegates, while Clinton won the Pennsylvania, Indiana, West Virginia, Kentucky, Puerto Rico, and South Dakota primaries. During the period, Obama received endorsements from more superdelegates than did Clinton.[104] On May 31, the Democratic National Committee agreed to seat all of the Michigan and Florida delegates at the national convention, each with a half-vote, narrowing Obama's delegate lead while increasing the delegate count needed to win.[105] On June 3, with all states counted, Obama passed the threshold to become the presumptive nominee.[106][107] On that day, he gave a victory speech in St. Paul, Minnesota. Clinton suspended her campaign and endorsed him on June 7.[108] Since then, he has campaigned for the general election race against Senator John McCain, the Republican nominee.

On June 19, Obama became the first major-party presidential candidate to turn down public financing in the general election since the system was created in 1976, reversing his earlier intention to accept it.[109]

On August 23, 2008, Obama selected Delaware Sen. Joe Biden as his vice presidential running mate.[110] At the Democratic National Convention in Denver, Colorado, Obama's former rival Hillary Clinton gave a speech strongly supporting Obama's candidacy and later called for Obama to be nominated by acclamation as the Democratic presidential candidate.[111][112] Then, on August 28, Obama delivered a speech to the 84,000 supporters in Denver. During the speech, which was viewed by over 38 million people worldwide, he accepted his party's nomination and presented his policy goals.[113][114]

On November 2, 2008, Obama's grandmother, Madelyn Dunham, died from cancer at the age of 86. Obama learned of his grandmother's death on November 3, one day before the election.[115]


Political positions
Main article: Political positions of Barack Obama
See also: Comparison of United States presidential candidates, 2008

Obama campaigning in Pennsylvania, October 2008.Obama was an early opponent of the Bush administration's policies on Iraq.[116] On October 2, 2002, the day President George W. Bush and Congress agreed on the joint resolution authorizing the Iraq War,[117] Obama addressed the first high-profile Chicago anti-Iraq War rally in Federal Plaza,[118] speaking out against the war.[119][120] On March 16, 2003, the day President Bush issued his 48-hour ultimatum to Saddam Hussein to leave Iraq before the U.S. invasion of Iraq,[121] Obama addressed the largest Chicago anti-Iraq War rally to date in Daley Plaza and told the crowd that "it's not too late" to stop the war.[122]

Obama stated that if elected he would enact budget cuts in the range of tens of billions of dollars, stop investing in "unproven" missile defense systems, not "weaponize" space, "slow development of Future Combat Systems," and work towards eliminating all nuclear weapons. Obama favors ending development of new nuclear weapons, reducing the current U.S. nuclear stockpile, enacting a global ban on production of fissile material, and seeking negotiations with Russia in order to take ICBMs off high alert status.[123]

In November 2006, Obama called for a "phased redeployment of U.S. troops from Iraq" and an opening of diplomatic dialogue with Syria and Iran.[124] In a March 2007 speech to AIPAC, a pro-Israel lobby, he said that the primary way to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons is through talks and diplomacy, although not ruling out military action.[125] Obama has indicated that he would engage in "direct presidential diplomacy" with Iran without preconditions.[126][127][128] Detailing his strategy for fighting global terrorism in August 2007, Obama said "it was a terrible mistake to fail to act" against a 2005 meeting of al-Qaeda leaders that U.S. intelligence had confirmed to be taking place in Pakistan's Federally Administered Tribal Areas. He said that as president he would not miss a similar opportunity, even without the support of the Pakistani government.[129]

In a December 2005, Washington Post opinion column, and at the Save Darfur rally in April 2006, Obama called for more assertive action to oppose genocide in the Darfur region of Sudan.[130] He has divested $180,000 in personal holdings of Sudan-related stock, and has urged divestment from companies doing business in Iran.[131] In the July–August 2007 issue of Foreign Affairs, Obama called for an outward looking post-Iraq War foreign policy and the renewal of American military, diplomatic, and moral leadership in the world. Saying "we can neither retreat from the world nor try to bully it into submission," he called on Americans to "lead the world, by deed and by example."[132]

In economic affairs, in April 2005, he defended the New Deal social welfare policies of Franklin D. Roosevelt and opposed Republican proposals to establish private accounts for Social Security.[133] In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, Obama spoke out against government indifference to growing economic class divisions, calling on both political parties to take action to restore the social safety net for the poor.[134] Shortly before announcing his presidential campaign, Obama said he supports universal healthcare in the United States.[135] Obama proposes to reward teachers for performance from traditional merit pay systems, assuring unions that changes would be pursued through the collective bargaining process.[136]


Obama speaking at a rally in Conway, South Carolina.[137]In September 2007, he blamed special interests for distorting the U.S. tax code.[138] His plan would eliminate taxes for senior citizens with incomes of less than $50,000 a year, repeal income tax cuts for those making over $250,000 as well as the capital gains and dividends tax cut,[139] close corporate tax loopholes, lift the income cap on Social Security taxes, restrict offshore tax havens, and simplify filing of income tax returns by pre-filling wage and bank information already collected by the IRS.[140] Announcing his presidential campaign's energy plan in October 2007, Obama proposed a cap and trade auction system to restrict carbon emissions and a ten year program of investments in new energy sources to reduce U.S. dependence on imported oil.[141] Obama proposed that all pollution credits must be auctioned, with no grandfathering of credits for oil and gas companies, and the spending of the revenue obtained on energy development and economic transition costs.[142]

Obama has encouraged Democrats to reach out to evangelicals and other religious groups.[143] In December 2006, he joined Sen. Sam Brownback (R-KS) at the "Global Summit on AIDS and the Church" organized by church leaders Kay and Rick Warren.[144] Together with Warren and Brownback, Obama took an HIV test, as he had done in Kenya less than four months earlier.[145] He encouraged "others in public life to do the same" and not be ashamed of it.[146] Before the conference, eighteen anti-abortion groups published an open letter stating, in reference to Obama's support for legal abortion: "In the strongest possible terms, we oppose Rick Warren's decision to ignore Senator Obama's clear pro-death stance and invite him to Saddleback Church anyway."[147] Addressing over 8,000 United Church of Christ members in June 2007, Obama challenged "so-called leaders of the Christian Right" for being "all too eager to exploit what divides us."[148]

A method that political scientists use for gauging ideology is to compare the annual ratings by the Americans for Democratic Action (ADA) with the ratings by the American Conservative Union (ACU).[149] Based on his years in Congress, Obama has a lifetime average conservative rating of 7.67% from the ACU,[150] and a lifetime average liberal rating of 90 percent from the ADA.[151]


Family and personal life
Main article: Family of Barack Obama

Barack Obama and his wife Michelle Obama.Obama met his wife, Michelle Robinson, in June 1989 when he was employed as a summer associate at the Chicago law firm of Sidley Austin.[152] Assigned for three months as Obama's adviser at the firm, Robinson joined him at group social functions, but declined his initial offers to date.[153] They began dating later that summer, became engaged in 1991, and were married on October 3, 1992.[154] The couple's first daughter, Malia Ann, was born in 1998,[155] followed by a second daughter, Natasha ("Sasha"), in 2001.[156]

Applying the proceeds of a book deal,[157] in 2005 the family moved from a Hyde Park, Chicago condominium to their current $1.6 million house in neighboring Kenwood.[158] The purchase of an adjacent lot and sale of part of it to Obama by the wife of developer and friend Tony Rezko attracted media attention because of Rezko's indictment and subsequent conviction on political corruption charges that were unrelated to Obama.[159][160]

In December 2007, Money magazine estimated the Obama family's net worth at $1.3 million.[161] Their 2007 tax return showed a household income of $4.2 million—up from about $1 million in 2006 and $1.6 million in 2005—mostly from sales of his books.[162]


Obama playing basketball with U.S. military in Djibouti in 2006.[163]In a 2006 interview, Obama highlighted the diversity of his extended family. "Michelle will tell you that when we get together for Christmas or Thanksgiving, it's like a little mini-United Nations," he said. "I've got relatives who look like Bernie Mac, and I've got relatives who look like Margaret Thatcher."[164] Obama has seven half-siblings from his Kenyan father's family, six of them living, and a half-sister, Maya Soetoro-Ng, the daughter of his mother and her Indonesian second husband.[165] Obama's mother was survived by her Kansas-born mother, Madelyn Dunham[166] until her death on November 2, 2008, just before the presidential election.[167] In Dreams from My Father, Obama ties his mother's family history to possible Native American ancestors and distant relatives of Jefferson Davis, president of the southern Confederacy during the American Civil War.[168]

Obama plays basketball, a sport he participated in as a member of his high school's varsity team.[169] Before announcing his presidential candidacy, he began a well-publicized effort to quit smoking.[170]

Obama is a Christian whose religious views have evolved in his adult life. In The Audacity of Hope, Obama writes that he "was not raised in a religious household." He describes his mother, raised by non-religious parents (whom Obama has specified elsewhere as "non-practicing Methodists and Baptists") to be detached from religion, yet "in many ways the most spiritually awakened person that I have ever known." He describes his father as "raised a Muslim", but a "confirmed atheist" by the time his parents met, and his stepfather as "a man who saw religion as not particularly useful." In the book, Obama explains how, through working with black churches as a community organizer while in his twenties, he came to understand "the power of the African-American religious tradition to spur social change."[171][172] He was baptized at Trinity United Church of Christ in 1988.[173][174]


Cultural and political image
Main article: Public image of Barack Obama
With his Kenyan father and white American mother, his upbringing in Honolulu and Jakarta, and his Ivy League education, Obama's early life experiences differ markedly from those of African American politicians who launched their careers in the 1960s through participation in the civil rights movement.[175] Expressing puzzlement over questions about whether he is "black enough," Obama told an August 2007 meeting of the National Association of Black Journalists that the debate is not about his physical appearance or his record on issues of concern to black voters. Obama said that "we're still locked in this notion that if you appeal to white folks then there must be something wrong."[176]

Echoing the inaugural address of John F. Kennedy, Obama acknowledged his youthful image in an October 2007 campaign speech, saying: "I wouldn't be here if, time and again, the torch had not been passed to a new generation."[177]

Many commentators mentioned Obama's international appeal as a defining factor for his public image.[178] Not only did several polls show strong support for him in other countries,[179] but Obama also established close relationships with prominent foreign politicians and elected officials even before his presidential candidacy, notably with then current British Prime minister Tony Blair, whom he met in London in 2005,[180] with Italy's Democratic Party leader Walter Veltroni, who visited Obama's Senate office in 2005,[181] and with French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who also visited him in Washington in 2006.[182]


Written works
Obama, Barack (1995). Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance. Three Rivers Press. ISBN 0307383415. Audio Book Grammy Award Winner: Spoken word[183]
Obama, Barack (October 17, 2006). The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream. Crown Publishing Group / Three Rivers Press. ISBN 0307237699. Audio Book Grammy Award Winner: Spoken word[184]
Obama, Barack (March 27, 2007). Barack Obama in His Own Words. PublicAffairs. ISBN 0786720573.
National Urban League (April 17, 2007). The State of Black America 2007: Portrait of the Black Male, Foreword by Barack Obama, Beckham Publications Group. ISBN 0931761859.
Obama, Barack (July-August 2007). "Renewing American Leadership". Foreign Affairs 86 (4). Retrieved on 2008-01-14.
Obama, Barack (March 1, 2008). Barack Obama: What He Believes In – From His Own Works. Arc Manor. ISBN 1604501170.
Obama, Barack; McCain, John (June 13, 2008). Barack Obama vs. John McCain – Side by Side Senate Voting Record for Easy Comparison. Arc Manor. ISBN 1604502495.
with a foreword by Barack Obama. (September 9, 2008). Change We Can Believe In: Barack Obama's Plan to Renew America's Promise, Foreword by Barack Obama, Three Rivers Press. ISBN 0307460452.

TODAY MY VOICE WAS HEARD...

I ROCKED THE VOTE AND MY VOICE WAS HEARD. THERE WAS NOT A PROUDER MOMENT FOR ME THAN TO STAND IN LINE WITH PEOPLE OF ALL RACES AND BACKGROUNDS TO VOTE AND LET THEIR VOICES BE HEARD... TODAY I WAS APART OF HISTORY. TODAY IS GREAT!

THINGS ON LOVE....

It hurts to love someone and not be loved in return, but what is more painful is to love someone and never find the courage to let that person know how you feel.



Maybe God wants us to meet a few wrong people before meeting the right one so that when we finally meet the right person, we will know how to be grateful for that gift.



Love is when you take away the feeling, the passion, and the romance in a relationship and find out you still care for that person. A sad thing in life is when you meet someone who means a lot to you, only to find out in the end that it was never meant to be and you just have to let go.


The best kind of friend is the kind you can sit on a porch and swing with, never say a word, and then walk away feeling like it was the best conversation you've ever had. It's true that we don't know what we've got until we lose it, but it's also true that we don't know what we've been missing until it arrives.



Giving someone all your love is never assurance that they'll love you back!



Don't expect love in return; just wait for it to grow in their heart but if it doesn't, be content it grew in yours.



There are things you'd love to hear that you would never hear from the person whom you would like to hear them from, but don't be so deaf as not to hear it from the one who says it from his heart.


Never say good-bye if you still want to try - never give up if you still feel you can go on - never say you don't love a person anymore if you can't let go.



Love comes to those who still hope although they've been disappointed,

-to those who still believe although they've been betrayed,

-to those who still need to love although they've been hurt before,

-and to those who have the courage and faith to build trust again.

It takes only a minute to get a crush on someone, an hour to like someone, and a day to love someone-but it takes a lifetime to forget someone.



Don't go for looks; they can deceive. Don't go for wealth; even that fades away. Go for someone who makes you smile because it takes only a smile to make a dark day seem bright.


There are moments in life when you miss someone so much that you just want to pick them from your dreams and hug them for real!

Always put yourself in others' shoes. If you feel that it hurts you, it probably hurts the person too.



A careless word may kindle strife; a cruel word may wreck a life; a timely word may level stress; a loving word may heal and bless.



The happiest of people don't necessarily have the best of everything; they just make the most of everything that comes along their way.



Happiness lies for those who cry, those who hurt, those who have searched, and those who have tried, for only they can appreciate the importance of people who have touched their lives.


Love begins with a smile, grows with a kiss, and ends with a tear. The brightest future will always be based on a forgotten past, you can't go on well in life until you let go of your past failures and heartaches.

Hope you dream of that special someone.

Dream what you want to dream;

go where you want to go;

be what you want to be,

because you have only one life and one chance to do all the things you want to do....



-written by ur heart

I WANT TO BE A SLACKER

BEING THE RELAIBLE ONE SOMETIMES SUCKS!

5 Ways to Protect Your Vote

If there's one thing we see every election, it's that Republicans will try to manipulate the rules any way they can to prevent some people from voting. Don't be discouraged--be prepared. If we're armed with the right information, we can beat most of these dirty tricks.

Be Prepared, and Conquer the Lines. We can't let long lines stop anyone from voting. There are several ways you can reduce lines and make sure they don't prevent you or anyone else from voting:

Vote early if you can. You can find early voting times and locations at govote.org.
Double-check your polling location before you go to vote. You can look it up at govote.org.
Have a Plan & Have Fun. Have a plan in case there are lines. Bring some food, drinks, friends, books, games, a chair -- anything that will prevent you and other voters from walking away. Have fun while you wait and encourage your friends and neighbors to stay in line so their vote is counted.
Don't give up--don't walk away without voting.

Two numbers you should have in your phone. Put these numbers in your phone so you're prepared to report problems and help other voters find their polling place:

866-OUR-VOTE is a hotline that's been set up to collect information about problems on election day--lawyers and election protection advocates are ready to respond. It's the best way to make sure someone addresses any problems you see.
The number for your local election board--in case you need to tell someone where they can vote. Enter you zip code at govote.org, then look for "Contact [your county] election officials" on the right.

Beware of lies, misinformation and dirty tricks; spread the truth.
Republican operatives are spreading plain lies to frighten new voters. In Philadelphia, anonymous flyers in Black neighborhoods have falsely claimed that voters with unpaid traffic tickets or outstanding warrants will be arrested at the polls. If you hear a scary rumor, it's probably a lie. Call your local election officials to check it out--and make sure your friends and neighbors know the truth.

Leave the Obama gear at home.
In some places, you won't be allowed into the polling place if you're wearing clothes and pins that support a given candidate. This isn't true everywhere, but it's best to play it safe. You can contact your local board of elections to find out if it's a problem in your area. If it is, bring some extra plain T-shirts or sweaters to loan neighbors who show up unaware of the rule.

Read the ballot carefully, and ask questions!
Some ballots can be confusing even for smart and informed voters. Read instructions on the ballot carefully, and if you're not sure you understand something, ask a poll worker to explain. Remember what happened in 2000 in Florida--a confusing ballot caused thousands of people to mistakenly vote for the wrong Presidential candidate. Don't let that happen to you!

THE VALUE OF JASMINE

I WONDER WHAT THEY REALLY THINK OF ME...... GLORIFIED SECRETARY

AM I READY FOR DATES??

SO WHILE I WAS AT WORK YESTERDAY, MY MOM CALLS ME AND TELLS ME ABOUT MY AUNT (WHO IS NOT REALLY MY AUNT BUT HER BEST FRIEND WHO DESERVES THE AUNT TITLE) AND HOW SHE IS DATING A NEW MAN. FROM THERE MY MOM GOES INTO, WHY ARE YOU STILL SINGLE? THE ANSWER, I DONT KNOW ABOUT DATING AND HOW I WOULD LIKE TO DO IT OR IF I, FULLY READY FOR A RELATIONSHIP. MY YOUNGER SIBLINGS BOTH HAVE SOMEONE AND I HAVE MY DAUGHTER. I THINK SHE MIGHT TRY AND POST ME ON MATCH.COM OR SOMETHING LIKE THAT...HELP ME...LOL

WHATEVER YOU LIKE...

CAUSE DIDDY'S GIRLS SAID SO!

I JUST HAD TO SHARE THIS TOO....

I LOVE THIS DUDE!

THE WEEK IS OVER

TOO MANY THOUGHTS RUNNING THROUGH MY MIND AT ONCE....

THE WEEK WAS EMOTIONAL AND BUSY FOR SURE....

RELAXATION IS NECESSARY, BUT HOW WILL I DO IT?

WHAT I NEED...

I LOOK AT PEOPLE IN RELATIONSHIPS WITH ENVY FROM TIME TO TIME AND THEN I THINK BACK ON THE RELATIONSHIPS THAT I HAD. DONT GET ME WRONG..THEY WERE GOOD ONES BUT WHEN IT WAS OVER IT WAS SAD AND DISHEARTENING. NOW A DAYS, I WONDER IF I WILL EVER BE HAPPY LIKE MY FRIENDS. WILL THE IDEA OF ME BEING IN A RELATIONSHIP BE CRAZY? IS IT TOO MUCH FOR ME TO WISH FOR OR IS IT JUST WHAT I NEED?

HEEEEEEEEEEEE'S BACK!

God has amazing things in store for you...

Stars do not struggle to shine; rivers do not struggle to flow, and you will never struggle to excel in life, because you deserve the best. Hold on to your dream and it shall be well with you... Amen.

IM A THINKER

I THINK AS I GET OLDER, I TEND TO THINK MORE. A LOT OF DIFFERENT THINGS THAT I THOUGHT WOULD BE GOING ON IN MY LIFE RIGHT NOW I HAVE YET TO GET TO BUT I AM STILL HOPEFUL. BY NOW, I THOUGHT I WOULD BE MARRIED, LIVING COMFORTABLY WITH A FAMILY AND FORGING ON IN LIFE. THE REALITY IS I AM SUPER MOM, SINGLE BUT HOPEFUL AND LIVING MY LIFE LIKE IT IS GOLDEN...NOT TOO BAD FOR THIS OLE WEST SIDE GAL!

FOOD FOR THOUGHT

When you have a setback, dont step back, because God is preparing you for an ultimate comeback.

DEAR GOD

I want to thank You for what you have already done. I am not going to wait until I see results or receive rewards; I am thanking you right now. I am not going to wait until I feel better or things look better; I am thanking you right now. I am not going to wait until people say they are sorry or until they stop talking about me; I am thanking you right now.. I am not going to wait until the pain in my body disappears ; I am thanking you right now. I am not going to wait until my financial situation improves; I am going to thank you right now. I am not going to wait until the children are asleep and the house is quiet; I am going to thank you right now. I am not going to wait until I get promoted at work or until I get the job; I am going to thank you right now. I am not going to wait until I understand every experience in my life that has caused me pain or grief; I am thanking you right now. I am not going to wait until the journey gets easier or the challenges are removed; ! I am thanking you right now. I am thanking you because I am alive. I am thanking you because I made it through the day's difficulties. I am thanking you because I have walked around the obstacles. I am thanking you because I have the ability and the opportunity to do more and do better. I'm thanking you because FATHER, YOU haven't given up on me.

TOMORROW, TOMORROW THERE'S ALWAYS TOMORROW

SO TOMORROW IS BIOSPY TIME AGAIN AND I AM NERVOUS AS HELL. I DONT REALLY KNOW WHY I AM BECAUSE I KNOW WHATS COMING AND WHATS GOING TO HAPPEN. I AM JUST PRAYING FOR A GOOD OUTCOME AND FOR LIFE AS ME TO CONTINUE ON. SAY A PRAYER FOR ME SILENTLY SO THAT ALL CAN HEAR ME.

TOMORROW, TOMORROW, I WILL BE HERE TOMORROW. IM ONLY A DAY AWAY

I LOVE THIS SONG....

Write it down a thousand times

four-letter word that makes me cry ,

how I feel about it I can't decide

No I don't know, so I'll improvise,

Is it living in our heart?

Or in our mind, I don't know.

So world ready or not, here I go,

searching for the answer,

And I'm not gonna stop,

till I find where it lingers inside me,

How does it come to be?

What should it mean to me?

Teach me the definition of true love.(vocalizing)

I was so afraid I'd never succeed

But you made me feel I could do anything

Memorize the things we would say and do

Must be the love and strength that I found in you

Is it living in our heart?

Or in our mind,I don't know

So world ready , or not

Ooh ,Here I go

searching for the answerand I'm not gonna stop

Till I findWhere it lives inside me

How does it come to be?what should it mean to me?

Teach me the definition of true love

Love only feels so good

True love always believes

And it gives way the boundaries,

Willing to sacrifice

unconditionally

So world ready , or notOoh ,

Here I go

searching for the answerand

I'm not gonna stop

Till I find

Where it lives inside me

How does it come to be?

what should it mean to me?

Teach me the definition of true love

Chorus repeated

How does it come to be?..........How does it come to be?

what should it mean to me?........what should it mean to me?

Teach me the definition of true love.

THE COUNTDOWN IS ON...

I AM DAYS CLOSER TO MY 7 DAY VACATION OF THE EASTERN CARRIBEAN... LIFE IS COOL

3 YEARS

3 YEARS OF MONKEY MADNESS AND I HAVE SURVIVED IT ALL THROUGH BLOOD, SWEAT AND TEARS. WHAT A ROLLERCOASTER RIDE IT HAS BEEN AND I WONDER WHAT IS GOING TO COME NEXT.

HAPPY ANNIVERSARY TO ME

ON MY TOES

THE FUNNY THING ABOUT LIFE IS THAT IS IS EVER CHANGING. THINGS CHANGE, PEOPLE CHANGE BUT IT IS APART OF LIFE. YOU NEVER KNOW WHAT TO EXPECT OTHER THAN JUST BEING YOU. THE BEST PART IS TGHAT YOU STAY READY AND IT KEEPS YOU ON YOUR TOES.

LOVE IS

Love is a great accomplishment. It is the meeting of your soulmate and realizing unconditional love. In search for love, we sometimes hit the bumps of failed realtionships, feeling less than we are, like we felt used, like there was something wrong with us ,that we were not substancial and almost to the point where life without love would not be a good one. And although you might feel as if that hurt and pain in your heart and soul was the greatest pain ever felt, there is redemption and hope for us all. There will be times when you will get to experience kisses and hugs as a true sign of love, when you miss someone the second that they leave and the times when you are sitting next to them but somehow you want to be closer.

GOOD WORDS TO LIVE BY....

Nothing can bring you peace but yourself.~Ralph Waldo Emerson~

I AM ME

I THINK I HAVE FINALLY GOTTEN BACK TO WHERE I WANT TO BE. SOMETIMES YOU JUST NEED TO GET OUT, HAVE A FEW LAUGHS WITH GOOD FRIENDS TO BE ...YOU AGAIN

HEALING

I NEED TO GET AWAY SO MY BROKEN SOUL CAN MEND......

A strong woman of God

A good woman is Proud. She Respect herself and others. She neither seeks definition from her man, nor does she expect him to read her mind. She is quite capable of articulating her needs.A good woman is a Strong woman. She recognizes that her Strength is weakened by attitudes that suggest that she doesn`t need a man. We all know that is NOT true. They need lots of loving, O.K.A good woman is Hopeful. She is strong enough to make ALL her dreams come true. She knows Love, so therefore, she gives love. She recognizes that her love has Great Value and must be reciprocated. If her love is taken for granted, it soon disappears.A good woman has a dash of Inspiration and a daddle of Endurance. She knows that she will at times have to inspire her man to reach the potential God gave him, and she WILL endure his pain and her own.A good woman knows her past, understands her present and forces toward the future. A good woman KNOWS God. She knows that with Him, the world is her playground, but without Him she will just be played with.A good woman does not live in fear of the future because of her past. Instead, she understands that her life experiences are merely lessons meant to bring her closer to Self-knowledge and unconditional Self-Love...

THIS IS MY NOW

There was a time I packed my dreams away. Living in a shell, hiding from myself. There was a time when I was so afraid. I thought I'd reached the end, But baby that was then I am made of more than my yesterdays. This is my now, and I am breathing in the moment. As I look around I can't believe the love I see. My fears behind me, gone are the shadows and doubt That was then, this is my now. I have to decide, Was I gonna to play it safe. Or look somewhere deep in side, Try to turn the tide, And find the strength to take that step of faith. This is my now, and I am breathing in the moment. As I look around I can't believe the love I see. My fears behind me, gone are the shadows and doubt That was then, this is my now. And I have the courage like never before, yeah. I've settled for less now I'm ready for more, Ready for more. This is my now, and I am breathing in the moment. As I look around I can't believe the love I see. My fears behind me, gone are the shadows and doubt That was then, this is my now. I'm living in the moment I look around I can't believe the love I see. My fears behind me, gone are the shadows and doubt That was then, this is my now. This is my now.

FIGHT THE GOOD FIGHT

IS THERE FIGHT LEFT IN ME TO FIGHT FOR LOVE AND HAPPINESS? I REALLY DON'T KNOW. I FEEL WORN OUT, RUN LOW AND JUST DEFEATED RIGHT NOW. HOW AM I TO BE HAPPY WITH SOMEONE IF I AM NOT HAPPY MYSELF. TOO MAY ALMOST, TOO MANY LOVES LOST, TOO MANY TEARS AND SOMETIMES I JUST DON'T KNOW IF THE FIGHT IS WORTH IT. MY HEART IS IN PAIN AND I'M TIRED. MY EYES BURN FROM ALL THE TEARS SHED. I THINK I NEED A GETAWAY FROM IT ALL AND RE EVALUATE ME AND WHAT I HAVE TO OFFER....

LIFE... I WONDER, WILL IT TAKE ME UNDER?

THIS THING CALLED LIFE.... BOY IS IT A ROLLER COASTER RIDE. THERE ARE HIGHS AND LOWS AND EVERYTHING IN BETWEEN. AS OLD AS I AM (YES I'M OLD ..I GUESS..LOL) I DON'T THINK I HAVE YET TO FIGURE IT OUT. THERE ARE SO MANY THINGS ABOUT ME AND MY LIFE THAT I WISH I HAD A BETTER HANDLE ON AND A BETTER UNDERSTANDING FOR. THE HEART OF THE MATTER IS... MY HEART. TO GIVE OR NOT TO GIVE, TH ATS THE ULTIMATE QUESTION. IT IS A FEAT NOT KNOW MY MANY BUT BRAVED BY FEW. SO WHAT DO YOU DO, BRAVE IT ALL OR LIVE ALONE IN SAFETY?

LOVED SEX IN THE CITY

IN A TALE OF ME, I WENT TO SEE SEX AND THE CITY ON SATURDAY WITH THE GIRLS AND IT WAS GREAT. I LOVE THE IDEA OF LADIES WHO WORK HARD AND PLAY HARD TOO. HOW MUCH FUN IT WOULD BE TO LIVE IN A CITY THAT NEVER SLEEPS, SHOP FOR THE LATEST FASHIONS AND LOVE EVERYTHING THAT COMES MY WAY. SOMETIMES I DREAM ABOUT LIVING A LAVISH LIFE OF MONEY, CELEBRITY AND GLAMOUR..... WELL A GIRL CAN DREAM RIGHT??

:-)

SATURDAY NIGHT

ITS SATURDAY NIGHT AND I AND I AM SITTING HOME, ALONE AS USUAL. THE SAD PART IS THAT I BELIEVE THAT THIS IS WHAT MY LIFE WILL ALWAYS BE. THE HOPE THAT I USUALLY HAVE IS NEXT TO NONE RIGHT NOW AND I REALLY DON'T KNOW WHY. IS IT BECAUSE THE IDEA OF LOVE IS HARSH AND CRUEL TO ME RIGHT NOW OR IS IT FEAR OF HAVING THE FEELING OF LOVE AND BEING HURT. WHAT CAN YOU DO? IS THERE ROOM FOR UNDERSTANDING OF LOVE? IS THERE A CHANCE FOR ME?

ANOTHER DAY IN THE LIFE OF ME

LEMONS AND SUGAR

This should probably be taped to your bathroom mirrorwhere one could read it every day.You may not realize it, but it's 100% true.

1. There are at least two people in this world that you would die for.

2. At least 15 people in this world love you in some way.

3. The only reason anyone would ever hate you is because they want to be just like you.

4. A smile from you can bring happiness to anyone,even if they don't like you.

5. Every night, SOMEONE thinks about you before they go to sleep.

6. You mean the world to someone.

7. You are special and unique.

8. Someone that you don't even know exists loves you.

9. When you make the biggest mistake ever,something good comes from it.

10. When you think the world has turned its back on you take another look.

11. Always remember the compliments you received.Forget about the rude remarks.

VENTILATOR

MY NEW NAME FOR NOW IS VENTILATOR... TOO MANY BAD THINGS HAPPENING TO FRIENDS AND I HAVE BECOME THE CATCH ALL OF THE PROBLEMS. DONT GET ME WRONG, I LIKE TO BE HELPFUL AND THERE FOR THEM, I JUST FEEL LIKE I COULD DO MORE AND I CANT RIGHT NOW. DEATH, DIVORCE, LOVE, RELATIONSHIPS,UNDERSTANDING AND JUST BEING THEMSELVES IS HARD SOMETIMES AND THERE IS NOTHING YOU CAN DO BUT ACCEPT IT AND GROW FROM IT. YOU TRY AND MAKE LIFE WORTH IT IN THE END, ITS TOUGH AND I FEEL FOR MY FRIENDS AND JUST WISH I COULD DO MORE.

29

IM A YEAR OLDER AND SOMEHOW A LITTLE WISER MAYBE. IM HAPPY TO BE AROUND FOR ANOTHER BIRTHDAY AND JUST BEING ME....

REALIZATION

AT ONE POINT IN MY LIFE, I SAW MYSELF BEING A MOM, A WIFE AND ALL THE OTHER THINGS THAT COME WITH IT. BUT NOW , WITH MY UPCOMING BIRTHDAY, I AM JUST A SINGLE MOM WITH WORK ON THE BRAIN. I HAVE COME COMFORTABLE WITH BEING A SINGLE WOMAN AND I DONT KNOW IF THAT IS A GOOD THING OR A BAD THING. I HAVE COME CLOSE TO POSSIBLY HAVING RELATIONSHIPS BUT FOR ONE REASON OR ANOTHER, I AM ALWAYS CONSIDERED THE FRIEND OR SOMEONE THAT A MAN CAN ALWAYS TALK TO. WHAT IS A GIRL TO DO IN A SITUATION LIKE THIS? WILL IT EVERY HAPPEN FOR ME? AM I WORTH IT?

IT'S MEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

SO I AM TRYING SOMETHING NEW WITH BLOGGING ON THIS SITE. IT WILL BE FOR MY FEELINGS, FEARS AND TRIUMPHS......ENJOY THE WORLD.. MY WORLD