Declaration of Independence

Sometimes you just need to tell people who you are in order to remind yourself.

I, Mother of Mayhem, being of sound mind and body, do declare myself to be me in the face of you.

*Let me be messy and moody and seamlessly emotional.

*Let me be restless in my own skin and wake up searching.

*Find me laying late at night under the stars and let it not be a question what I'm doing there.

*Understand me without explanation or justification.

*Let me take up photography and design and dreaming, even when I'm not good at them.

*Don't wonder why I can't take your calls during American Idol or House.

*See me through the constant turmoil and eclectic happiness of one love.

*Let me not feel foolish for refusing to see boundaries in certain areas of my life.

*Sit with me while I reveal profound moments in days and relationships and sit longer still while I appreciate them. Appreciate them with me.

*Love my lack of self-control when it comes to my children.

*Don't look at me funny when I cry in theaters.

*Find my inability to parallel park endearing.

*Don't discount my quiet insecurities and my loud stubborness.

*Let me withhold and disclose at arbitrary moments.

*Practice with me the language of candor and of passion and of sincerity and depth that I've learned over the years.

*Embrace my inability to give up without a fight.

*Laugh with me at the same jokes.

*Accept my interest in things unjust and controversial, and embrace my love of causes for the underdog.

*Look past my passive agressive side and my proclivity for wanting to beat you at your own games.

*Let me have my hereditary insomnia love of yardwork, and need to always be busy.

*Give me my cheesy entertainment magazines, decorating books with dog-eared pages and scribbled in self help books.

*Question with me when I wonder about the hows, whens and whys. And then know why I must live a life so inquisitive.

*Remember that jaded and cynical are not terminal states of me.

*Let you not ruin my love for sappy, romantic gestures and the notion I carry that love can still be breathtaking.

And above all...let me be. Me.