I hope you're having a good time Patty, good for you on the positive thinking. Somewhere along the way I quit pushing reality away and started letting it in, 'wearing it' a friend of mine likes to say. I say embrace it, not because you want it but you're going to start accepting it, then something starts to creep back into your core, a little foundation to build on. Gosh, not sure what I mean here, just would like to give you a pat on the back. Safe travels Patty.
Hugs,
Jean

OK Scott , you know when you say heres your sign.... well I was driving down international speedy way here in Daytona beach the other day and found the sign lol.


http://www.dailystrength.org/people/5012207/photos-videos/0

and other pic

http://www.dailystrength.org/people/5012207/photos-videos/1

I think you will get a kick out of it.

I'm trying places I have never eaten at before or atleast that don't exist in Texas or that I haven't ever heard of before.

Yall can look at some pics I posted on my profile.

Hello Patty! First, your new hair style looks really good. Too bad you had to go all the way to Florida for it, but now you can show those Texans how you want it. Second, you had me gut rollin with the picture of the Shark Lounge (women and drinks inside!). As Gomer Pyle would say, Gawl-Lee. Reminds me of the first (and only time) I went to New Orleans when I was the ripe young age of 18. I probably would have stopped in at the Shark Lounge if they had one. Thanks for the laugh! Keep it up Patty, and before long you will invent the Patty you want to become as you keep piecing your life together, just like a jigsaw puzzle, one piece at a time. Your Friend, Scottie

Well I have a busy sister that is a hairstylist and she lives 80 miles from there in Texas. So its always hard to catch her and have her to do my hair. So the other day when I looked up a hair salon there was one right down the road from where I'm staying here in Daytona. So I called and made an appt. It was a place called Unique Designs. So the name I'm thinking fancy smancy. Well I show up and there is a black man doing a black man hair and I was like ok so he is the barber. Then I look over and there is another black woman. This guy said you most be Patty. I said yes. He said your stylist is on her way here. I was like ok. She finally come walking in and I almost well out of my chair. Her hair was so BIG. I was like what did I just get myself into. I ended up texting my sister and told her that I thought I was in the hood salon not the hair salon. Come to find out the woman had an accent and she was somewhere near Barbidos the island and had moved to Florida 3 years ago. So as we were talking she said just the day before her and her other coworkers were talking about what they liked the most with hair etc and she said she loves her caucisian women hair . I just busted out laughing and so we both started laughing. She repeated that several times thoughout doing my hair. I was stuck with this woman for 3 hrs . It was fun talking with her. She said when her and her coworkers were talking the day before and she said that about her white women hair ,the very next day here I come walking in. She said it was meant to be.

Yesterday when I was getting ready for my friends wedding I had this girl that was the daughter of the maid of honor do my hair and she was a hair stylist. She said I'm sorry if I'm being rough I said no not at all. I said my sister has been a hairstylist for 21 years and I'm use to her being rough with hair/head. She did a fab job on my hair.

Ill post in another post my pic of my hair.

http://static.dailystrength.org/userfiles/7/0/2/2/5012207/pg_5012207_1756715989.jpg

there are some more in my photos.

Way to go Patty! Your new hair is absolutely lovely - you're sizzlin girl. Now, just don't go backwards -- it takes work I know, but you keep that hair looking good and build on it as your foundation of the new you. You've now broken free to define who "you" are, and have broken free to discover the world. Welcome to the great adventure - the redo of ourselves and our lives! ~~ Scottie

Maybe making friends with widowed people is a bad thing. I'm was in contact with several widowed women while I was in florida for a week. I was willing to drive too them but everyone of them had an excuse. I finding people seem to have lots of excuse but they sure want to wine and complain because they don't have friends or are lonely. I have been in contact with even people in Texas where I live and am willing to meet up for lunch or etc. But if you want to complain and whine because you don't have friends and are lonely and someone such as another widow/er wants to meet up to chat /lunch. Then you kinda of deserve to be alone. Quit making people feel sorry for you. GRRRR. None of us want to be alone and understand everyone is at different stages. Don't get on social media and announce to the world you are so alone and then the minute something ask you to meet up you give them the cold shoulder. Because if you give them an excuse everytime its always gonna be like that.

I'm very frustrated right now. I see this on this site and I see this one several other groups on W&W facebook groups.

If I reach out to you on a social site its because I do truly care enough to build a friendship with you.

I wanted to vent in my own discussion.

Patty,
I know that at different times in my life I feel totally at opposite ends of the social spectrum. Sometimes I'm a social butterfly and sometimes I'm still in my cocoon.

We have to allow each other the space to be whomever we want to be. To blame it on widowhood simply isn't fair.

I do feel sorry for people who are trapped within themselves or are so fearful of making new friends they're stagnant.

Some people are threatened by people like me who like to make new friends. Being a judgmental friend is not being a friend at all!

This doesn't negate the question I asked before how some people can move with lightening speed into new relationships [very different than new friends.] I don't know if I envy or feel sorry for them!

Roz

Even a friend on here is now telling me that are basically not gonna gonna write me for a while. I thought everything was going good in our messages. I had a moment today when I opened up the message and see what this person wrote. Trust me I most not be very likely person. I feel like just going under a rock and hiding for ever. If I can't even have widowed people want to be my friend and talk to me then I must be that bad of a person.

It's sounds like a recording, but it's not you, it's me. At least in my case. We're friends here, but I don't check in all that often. Sometimes I'm away for several days. Or I might read a few messages, but have nothing to add to the conversation. I think I'm not the only one like this. My first couple of friends here, we haven't sent each other messages in many months. But I think we're still friends. Maybe it makes a difference that we're all guys. On the other hand, I don't think I whine about being lonely either.

I can't speak for your widow contacts in Florida and Texas. Hopefully they will speak up for themselves.

I have quit calling people my friend. They may have different term of what they call friends. If someone never messages me/call/email me I don't call that a friend.

I think I have lost what the point of this discussion is -- it seems to have gone off in half a dozen different directions.