Tag: Love

Home Is Where The Heart Is

On By MirjamIn life, RelationshipsLeave a comment

I have moved over six times in the past four years. I have lived in five different countries since I was born, each time allowing that place to become ‘home.’ Yet as I sit here in Connecticut, the place where I grew up and lived for over twenty years, I know for a fact, home is ONLY where the heart is.

For me that home is wherever J is.

Of course, I love being in Connecticut for a visit, but after two weeks, my heart has started to hurt a bit. While I know all the ins and outs of my childhood home, I somehow feel like a stranger being here. It surprising really how homesick a person can get while being in a familiar place surrounded by family.

I’ve changed a lot over the past few years. Done a great deal of growing and getting to know myself. This included growing out things and people as well. It has also taught me who and what is important in a happy life, things that previously in life I may have dismissed. Mostly, I have learnt to let love and happiness in and not to let my past dictate my present too much.

Love is the biggest lesson for me. It’s been the most special one to me as well. It has taught me that I am capable of loving and capable of being loved back. That if there is anything I really want out of life, it is to know that I loved as hard and as freely as I could. That I never held back even when I was terrified. I believe I can achieve that out of life.

Mostly though, love has taught me that home is not a place, but a person for me. That it is with that person I feel safe. That I feel I can be 100% myself and never judged. That I can sing and dance and feel beautiful always. Just the two of us, surrounded in the love we have made together. Yeah, that’s home for me.

When You Miss Someone

On By MirjamIn life, Relationships1 Comment

I’d have to say that one of the shittiest (excuse my French) feelings in the world has to be missing someone.

As talked about in a previous post, my love, aka my boyfriend, lives quite far away from me. 3,074 miles to be exact. Not even a drive away, but a six hour flight away. Add a five hour time difference, and you’re living the life.

The life of missing that person, that is.

Long distance is tough, it revolves around a lot of scheduling, waiting, and planning. You miss out on the things that most couples experience together daily and wish constantly that they were there with you.

Life becomes almost split, living in moments, waiting for the day you get to sit in each others company once more or have your toe touching their foot, at the very least. (One of my love languages or how I show love, other than giving gifts*, is physical touch, so that should explain that.)

But the missing, oh the damn missing, that is a feeling that is hard to control. You can control the sadness, the paranoia, and the stress, but the missing, I think is the feeling that always sticks around.

I could be the happiest person in the room, and a part of me will always feel the missing. The, just wanting to be with that person because they are the part of you that makes you feel the most whole.

Missing comes in waves mostly, sometimes it’s a little less because there’s more to distract you and other times, like nighttime, it’s like a smack in the face. I’ve really grown to hate the nighttime since there’s nothing I’d like more than for him to be next to me. Nighttime also tends to be the time of day my thoughts go on turbo engine mode, so it’s not a pretty mix, to say the least.

But the thing about missing is that it always comes to an end because you’re finally with that person again. And the funny thing is, the second that you’re with them, you forget about all the missing, and all that matters is that you’re together.

So, while missing is brutal, it has also taught me to appreciate the time I do get with my boyfriend a whole lot more. Even the times we FaceTime, those few moments a day, where I just get to stare at him** or hear his voice, count the most. They are, by far, the best part of my day, everyday.

The same goes for the days I have gotten to spend with him in person, because of all the missing, every second with him means something to me. They were some of the best days of my life, because he is the most important person to me. We could be doing absolutely nothing and I would rate a 11/10 day.

The fact of the matter is, missing someone is shit, but if you love them, you do what you can and you deal with some of the shittier things, like missing, to be with them. And like I said before, it’s never forever, the missing always comes to an end.

Cheers!

Mirjam

*I know the love language is receiving gifts, but since it is in regards to how I express love, I put it as giving.

**He hates when I stare, which means I have to do it even more, in even creepier ways, muahaha

Love Makes The World Go Round

On By MirjamIn life, RelationshipsLeave a comment

Love is said to be hard, but I say with the right person it’s the easiest thing there is. J helped show me that.

In the past, I did everything I could to avoid love, I had no interest in it and the thought of opening my heart up to someone with the potential of getting hurt seemed impossible.

I probably would have continued on with that belief for quite a while if I hadn’t stumbled upon J. Well, more like if I hadn’t swiped right (if you catch my drift.)

He’s pretty much turned me into a complete mush without even trying, so much so that I’ve become that annoying spokesperson for love to my friends. I used to hate that person.

But continuing on with my “annoying spokesperson” role…. There are many things I love about J, all things that I believe everyone should have in a partner. Some of these are:

  1. He makes me feel special, like really special. And it is in a way that I actually believe I am.
  2. He makes me feel calm. I am a ball of anxiety, there’s no way around that. I could be having the most anxious morning, and the second I get on a call with him (we are long distance) that anxiety is gone. I might be hella hyper then, but at least I’m calm.
  3. I can trust him. I have never been the most open person, with my thoughts and emotions, and so far I have been very slow with opening up about certain things from my past. He knows this, but it has meant a lot to me that he’s been patient and has not pressured me to talk about the things I’m not ready to. It’s what has really gotten me to trust him as much as I do today. If we are talking, trust, as in faithful wise, then yeah he’s the first person I’ve ever felt secure about.
  4. He’s always there for me. He’s really like my own personal hype man, makes me believe I am a lot more capable of things then I had previous thought. Besides that, he always there for a talk when I’m having a bad day. He’s a man of few words so he always gives the most simple answers or advice, which tend to the trick compared to complex ones, in my opinion.
  5. He makes me feel beautiful, like probably more than I actually am.
  6. He makes me laugh, he’s 100% a goof and loves to push my buttons. It’s brought out a lot of the carefree side of myself, which I have missed.
  7. He does the little things that make me smile. For example, I LOVE reading, huge bookworm over here, so I talk about books all the time. Mind you in the time I have known him, I’ve never seen him read books, but recently he started one and has stuck to it (even though he always falls asleep reading it.) It’s a minor thing, but is one that has stuck out to me tremendously.
  8. He listens to me. Which sometimes I’m on the fence about because he actually remembers everything I say, and I say some questionable things.
  9. He matches my effort, which makes it a real two way street, and that’s important to me in a relationship, especially a long distance one.
  10. He made me believe in love again. Just by being him.

I could probably go on for days about that things I love about J, but some things are meant to be a bit more private. The reason I picked the things I did for this post, is because I believe they are things that a person should make you feel in a healthy relationship. I have been through the unhealthy situations and from those I was able to figure out the way I wanted to be treated and the way I wanted to feel when I love someone. J gives me that. In essence, he is who makes me feel safe and he will never know how much that truly means to me.

Long story short. Wait for your J. If you are in an unhealthy relationship, leave, it’s not going to change, they will always remain the same. And if you finally get the courage to leave, just know that there is a person out there that will give you all the love you deserve and more. I promise.

Cheers!

Mirjam

P.S. J is not his actual name, it will just be used when he is referenced to in my posts.

P.P.S J also reads my blog so, hey babe, I love you.

Mothers & Daughters

On By MirjamIn lessons, Relationships1 Comment

The mother/daughter relationship for me has always been one of the harder relationships to handle. For many, the mother/daughter dynamic is seen as a “best friend” relationship, where they go shopping together, talk about boys (or girls) together, and gossip about whatever else. It is a thought that has always put a lot of pressure on the actual relationship I have with my mother, a strain almost, to try and create that “ideal” relationship, one that we have never really had.

Let me continue by saying that I love my mother, I really do. I look up to her, I see how strong of a woman she is, how hard she has worked to raise my brothers and I, and how loving of a wife she is to my father. Regardless of all of that, she is not an easy woman, and neither am I.

My teen years were not easy, I was a bit of a nightmare teenager, and with my mother having a similar personality to mine, our relationship took a huge hit during those years. In fact, we sadly stopped speaking for a while. Looking back on it years later, I wish it had not happened that way, but yet it is what has given us the relationship we now have. We pulled through, I got older, matured, and saw my mom in a different light. She went from being someone I really had no interest in knowing, to a person I work really hard to understand. Through that effort of at least trying to understand her, we have almost developed societies “ideal” mother/daughter relationship, I just think we have changed it to fit our ideal. It may not be telling each other secrets all the time and calling each other our “best friend,” but we respect each other, and have fun when we get together to have a girl’s day. For me, that’s really all I ever wanted, just to have a mom who gets me and for me to get her. I’m lucky in that, I have a mom that would never give up on me , and “ideal” relationship or not, I’m forever grateful.

To all the girls out there who might have a difficult relationship with your mom, know that sometimes it just takes time.** Try and see things from her perspective a bit more, and remember she is only human, and everyone makes mistakes.

Cheers!

Mirjam

**P.S. I know that this is not the case for everyone because sometimes there are very bad situations between mothers and daughters. This is a very broad statement more based on my own experience and what I took from it**

Life in Cork, Week One

On By MirjamIn TravelLeave a comment

Let me start off by saying…I LOVE IT HERE. Literally, it is as if Cork and I are a match made in heaven. There is not one thing I don’t like about it, and for someone who always has something to critique, THAT is saying a lot. Now, it has only been one week, so who know what will happen? For now, I will give you my first five observations of Cork.

  1. The people here may be the friendliest in the world.

This is not New York, people here want to talk to everyone. They are ridiculously welcoming and would do anything for anybody it seems. Go anywhere alone and I guarantee you will end up having made a new friend.

  1. The weather is a popular topic.

I have not had one conversation which the weather did not become an important topic. It isn’t a one sentence type of topic either, the Irish really put their hearts into it and this topic can last a few minutes. It is quite impressive.

  1. Cork is a small, but extremely charming city.

Honestly when it comes to city size, small is always better. I love being able to walk literally anywhere in at most 20 minutes. It helps that its beautiful too, no matter where you look there is something which will catch your eye and you will have to stop for a second and stare.

  1. People love to drink.

I LOVE to drink, or so I thought… no, the irish LOVE to drink. Compared to the Irish I am at a “like” level and need to step my game up. It is fascinating how early in the morning (every morning) you see the empty kegs lined up alongside the street and a special truck just for kegs picks them up. If that doesn’t tell you what a love for drinking is, I don’t know what will.

  1. It rains a TON.

They weren’t lying when they said Ireland gets a ton of rain. They also didn’t mention that it isn’t a bad sort of rain, it’s more like a half drizzle. Most of the day it’s not raining at all, but I always pack an umbrella cause those downpours catch you when you least expect it. Living here for only a week, it turns out that I rather enjoy the rain.

 

So, these are my first five observations, clearly all very positive. I think as this journey in Cork continues, my love will only become stronger for this wonderful, tiny city.

 

Cheers,

 

Mirjam