Hello joy.

    Happy Tuesday, fair lords and ladies!

I am in this mood today.

    I went to a Renaissance Fair on Sunday and had some major flashbacks to when I was younger and obsessed with faraway, magical lands.
    I used to dream about being a gentle yet fierce warrior-princess with an endless trove of bravery, intelligence and compassion stored up in her heart. I dreamed of riding into battle to fight dragons and hosting grand balls in a castle lit merrily by candlelight. I dreamed of a chivalrous prince in a suit of silver armor, swooping in and carrying me off into the sunset on some gloriously romantic adventure.
    I had a wonderful childhood, marred only by events which were out of my control and, as I have come to terms with ten years later, not my fault. I am in love with those happy years of imagination and laughter, yet haunted by that darkness which seeped in and robbed me of my innocence too soon.
    I let that darkness manifest itself inside of me, thinking I deserved all the guilt and anxiety and suppressed anger. I stopped trying to be a princess and did my best to simply blend in and survive, forcing myself to be ordinary. The dragons I battled waged war in my head- most days, I let them win. I pushed friends and family away, convinced I was hard to love and too much of a burden. I did not let myself dream of a Prince Charming, so convinced was I that the only boys who spent time with me wanted to use me.
    I lived in that hell, a bleak, cold, ugly ghost of all the potential God had so graciously bestowed upon me. It was during my first semester of college, the first real length of time I spent away from home, when I realized how completely not okay my life was. It took some serious self-evaluation, the gentle interventions of close friends, and a lot of the princess-like bravery which I thought I lacked for me to reach out and get help.
    It took a long time for me to remember how to dream again. I don't recall the exact day when I started actually laughing- deep, breathless laughter, complete with my signature shrieking. It took me a while, but all of the sudden I could smile in photos again. I looked in the mirror one day and thought "whoah, I'm a pretty lady."
    I stopped hiding my body underneath layers of clothing. I stopped regretting eating an entire sleeve of Oreos in one sitting. I stopped having emotional breakdowns before every test in school. I stopped looking for the exits in a room when I was alone with a boy.
    I stopped being bound by fear and started being set free by grace.
    These days, I am back to trying to be that warrior-princess, attempting to be that example of beauty and courage in the face of adversity, to be as fierce and assertive as I am kind and caring. It is my intention to fight for justice in this world, slaying the monsters of slavery, poverty and greed for the sake of those who cannot advocate for themselves. I have learned that princes are sometimes frogs, but once in a while you find one who treats you like a lady and opens a door- literally and figuratively. And those are the ones worth following into some delusional sunset like a dopey-eyed fool.
    I don't have happiness. Happiness is transient. I have chosen joy. And I pray that, if you are reading this, you will choose joy too. It is never easy. But it is always worth it. :)
   

yes and yes and a thousand times yes.

--Laura :)