Look, Ma.. No Hands!

I thought it was just homesickness. I thought maybe I'd come back to Dillon and feel right about my choice again. I thought I'd miss NC.

Being back in Dillon for these 12 days has shed some new light for me and has given me a vision of how I could actually manage to grow further as a person here. In the town so many refer to as a trap.

I've never actually lived on my own in Dillon. Every time I've lived here I've lived with my mom. I've never really given myself that chance to practice the art of adulting here. I lived here until I was 18. With my mom. I moved to Missoula and lived with one of my best friends for 2 years. I moved back to Dillon for about 2 months. I moved to Wyoming with a boyfriend. We were there for 2 years. I moved back to Dillon and back in with my mom.

I got a lot of grief from people during those next 6 years in Dillon. Maybe they had their own assumptions. But I was a full time student with a full time job and yes...I loved to also party full time. But I wasn't just living in the basement working towards nothing. I had goals. My goals twisted and turned and changed with the wind. I never got to really know me other than the student, who worked full time, and drank a lot. I always was accused of never having any real responsibility. I don't have kids. I've never been married. So maybe to some I didn't have "real" responsibility. That's really all subjective though isn't it? I made the decision a long time ago to not have kids. Oops or otherwise. It's not in the cards for me. And after the relationship in Wyoming fell apart I made the decision to not have one of those again because I needed to focus on me. I needed to learn about myself and get to know me.

Then I thought that I could never possibly get to know myself still living in my mom's basement in Dillon, Montana...so I left. I followed a dream. I was going to be a publicist in a powerful agency. Wear business casual to lunch with my associates and make a shit-load (technical term) of money. Well, I moved to North Carolina. I didn't find that job at that agency and I didn't buy those clothes. But I did learn that I am really good at taking care of me. Living without your backbone is hard. My backbone of course being the support system I've always had. I thought that's how life goes. Make things as hard as possible on yourself and that's how you really succeed.

I always wanted to prove to people that I was a city girl with big dreams and ambitions. And I've learned over the last year that I'm a small town girl with those same dreams and ambitions. And there is nothing at all wrong with that.

"I put one foot in front of the other...I don't need a new love or a new life. Just a better place to die!"

I'm not afraid to admit that Dillon is home. Dillon is my lifeline. Dillon is where I'm going to raise myself even further. People can call it a trap, call me stuck, call me what they will. I'm calling it a revolution.

I did get to know myself in the year I was absent from Montana.
1. I can be a really negative person and when I'm negative my world is negative. And life gets harder.
2. Budgets are crucial no matter how much money you make.
3. I am so afraid of not being accepted I become incredibly two faced. I just like everyone and I've always been that way.
4. I'm incredibly talented artistically. I actually love painting and I hate that I resisted it so hard in high school! (Sorry, Ang..if you're reading this. I wish I would have learned more from you! But there will be time for that when I come home)
5. I enjoy my own company a lot.
6. I really do want to get married one day. Settle down and have a family of golden retrievers.
7. Being alone in small doses is okay, but I'm a people person and I love social interaction.

I learned a lot of this through a hard process. I did something not a lot of people have done. I didn't fail...I just realized that all of those things existed in me prior to moving and now I can bring them all back to Montana, make a life here, and still find time to explore and adventure.

Life is an adventure. It's not where you live. It's what you find inside of you...