Balloons from Livie

Do you all believe in signs?

I definitely do.

Yesterday, Ashley wrote about a big sign that she received. Ashley and her husband lost their little Nolan in 2009, and Ashley's brother, who she was very close with, also passed away a few months ago. She feels that she sign she recently received was from her brother, letting her know that "he's okay, Nolan's happy and heaven is beautiful". She wrote that she has always prayed for a sign like that.

After reading her post, I thought about how I've maybe received some little signs, but nothing that's really been noteworthy. I definitely associate dragonflies with Olivia. Seeing them makes my heart happy, but they are so common here in the summer that it's not like it's strange to see them all over the place.

I was kind of struggling this morning. For some reason there are just random days where my heart just hurts more than others. Now that it's been over a year, I wake up feeling good and go to bed feeling good. I used to have days where I woke up feeling depressed and went to bed feeling depressed, but those are far and few between now. Occasionally, someone will say something upsetting or I'll read a blog post that makes me cry and puts me in a sad mood. I don't think anything really happened within the last couple of days, but for some reason this morning I was feeling down. Maybe it's because of the BS dreary weather we've been having for the past couple of days (winter is LONG in Nebraska!). Who knows.

On the treadmill this morning, I thought back to Ashley's blog post and wondered what it felt like to *know* that she was receiving a sign from Nolan, as opposed to just *wondering* if something was a sign from him. Usually, I see something that reminds me of Olivia, but that's not the same thing as a sign. I've never received a sign that I just knew instantly was from Olivia.

Until today!!!

I left the house to quickly go tanning, because it usually makes me feel better when I'm feeling crappy and the weather is gross. I pulled into the parking lot, stepped out of the car, and looked over toward the building to see if it looked busy in there - because I was in no mood to sit around and wait for my turn.

Floating right above the building was a HUGEEEE bunch of pink balloons. I mean huge. I have no idea where they came from... logically, I would assume that some mom was probably picking them up from the nearby grocery store for her daughter's birthday and they got loose. But the second I saw them, I felt an overwhelming sense of peace and... almost joy?  I can't really describe the feeling. It was so strange, but in a good way. I'm not naive, I know that she doesn't have super powers and can't send me balloons, but I really do believe she played some kind of part in my decision to go tanning at that exact moment.

As a sidenote, I was just e-mailing this morning with Danielle about our cameras and what kinds of lenses we use. I told her that I have a zoom lens that I never use and that I think was a huge waste of money. I usually carry my Kelly Moore bag everywhere. It has dividers inside for my camera and lenses, but because I don't have a whole lot of equipment, I can use the other half of the bag as a purse. That way I've got my camera stuff with me at all times. But did I have it with me today? OF COURSE NOT! My first instinct when I saw those balloons was to grab my camera and see if I could get a cook picture. but I didn't, I only had my stone age phone. I tried to take a picture but by the time I got it up and running and took the picture, the balloons looked like a tiny gray dot. annoying. If only I had my zoom lens that I was just complaining about today, I would have been able to take a beautiful picture of the balloons. Damnit! I had to find that picture above on Google Images. :(

So, moral of the story, signs DO exist and come at exactly the right time.... and always keep your camera with you, because you never know when you'll need it!

Thank you, Olivia for giving me such a beautiful sign today, and for also providing me with a little bit of photography inspiration :).