Third Update

So, let's pick up from where we left off. We departed from Hampton on the 9th of October and instead of heading south, we headed northwest, towards Vermont. See, we were sitting in our motel room in Hampton watching the Travel Channel and saw people eating Vermonsters at the Ben & Jerry's factory in Vermont. We thought, "We need to go to Vermont!" So, instead of heading south, we headed northwest to the Ben & Jerry's factory.

On the drive there, we were able to get gorgeous views of the fall foliage, something we had kind of missed on our drive, because we didn't take the Kankamagus Highway. We took tons of pictures on the drive to Vermont, we promise to bore you with them soon!

In Vermont, we opted not to take the factory tour as we would have had to wait more than an hour to do so. We did poke around the gift shop and get another bumper sticker for the car, wait til you see it! We also got some ice cream from their scoop shop and made ourselves sick, because we all ordered a large like a bunch of nutcases. Well, except for Shane, he had a smoothie and then finished all three of the lady's icecream.

From there, we headed southwest into New York state and avoided going through the city, but paid $16 in tolls. We think the tolls were cheaper than the gas sitting in traffic in NYC. We took a nap in the car in Virginia, then drove in to NC in the am on Friday, the 10th. Since we had motelled in NH, we're camping in NC and that's why we don't have internet access.

We've gotten to see Alex and attended his b-day party. We're here now and basically spending every day with him and his family for a week before returning to Texas. We'll see all of you in Tejas soon!

Life just works

Sam and I have been participating in a seminar on Integrity lately, which has brought many fun distinctions to our life. In this seminar, integrity is simply defined as having workability in one's life. It is separate from morality in that something can be moral, but still not have integrity because it doesn't work.

This one has been difficult for me because during the course, I came to realize that I have no integrity whatsoever and my life doesn't work. I tend to avoid making commitments and then tend to not keep the ones I make. After that happens, I usually feel terribly guilty and then go hide under a rock and don't answer the phone or e-mails. This doesn't work for people and has consequently left me in a place where I have almost no friends.

It finally all came together for me yesterday. My best friend was terribly angry with me for leaving her high and dry lately and I had no time to go sit down with her to talk things out. I wrote her a long, teary e-mail about how I was sorry and discussing some finer points of our relationship. I consequently made my kids late to their pool party.

On the way to the pool party, I realized I could ask another mom to keep an eye on my kids and then go see to my best friend. I did just that and then while we were mid-stride in conversation, the other mom called letting me know that it started raining, everyone was leaving the pool, and she needed me to come get my kids. On the way to the pool, I realized I hadn't called my seminar group members to let them know I had scheduled a group meeting for 6pm the same day.

I called another group member (the one who already knew) and asked her if she could call everyone else. Then I called someone else for coaching so that I could get what didn't have integrity (that I didn't think of my group members until 3pm) and get clear on that. I picked up my kids, took them home, then headed back to see my best friend and complete our conversation.

I was so powerful in my communication that by the time I got to the seminar at 7pm (after apologizing to my group), I was absolutely high on how well things could work if I simply honor my word. I was floored by this notion and really got that's all there is to making life work, just give my word and then honor it.

Here's to honoring word and living powerfully!!