This is what I've been sitting on lately

     The American Food industry has taken us hostage.  It has bombarded our arteries and kidnapped our loved ones long before their time. It has bullied it's way into our budgets, our pantries, and our belt loops.  It has reared it's ugly head for far too long.

My name is Holly Bierly Young, and I'm fighting back.

Who else is with me?

Love and being kind of overly dramatic,
H.

OR

Love and I promise I went easy on the cheese,
H.

Today is my 29th birthday.  I walked a 5k with my sister in the rain and then I held Lucy (covered in a dry blanket of course) for a good long while.  




Life is good.  


Love,
H. 

She said she usually cried at least once a day not because she
was sad, but because the world was so beautiful & life was so short.

brian andreas

I just can't get enough of that wily brunette.  Re-blogging from that corner of hers.  


Love and more love, 

H. 

Take away my mourning, give me music.

     Eee Gads.  We've been gone.   Tim and I traveled to D.C. last week to visit my Aunt & Uncle and do some touristy things.  Tim had never been there, and that is one of my FAVORITE cities.  


We had to go.  We did.  


     I wish I could tell you when I'm going to be gone.  However, posting our travel dates on the interwebz makes me nervous that someone is going to bust in and steal my record player.  


Hands off, I say! Hands off!  (((shouted at The Bad Guys, not you, Sweet Readers)))  


     Anyway, last week, I tried to convince you that crummy things will happen, but the world is still beautiful & interesting.  I feel like that has been my mantra these days (mantra?).  I want to shout it from the rooftops, and I can't be sure why. 


Perhaps because I'm still trying to convince myself of that these days.  


When we were touring The American History Museum, I started Thinking.  That's right.  Thinking.  


     When my grandpa one of my favorite people on this planet passed away, I scrounged around in his desk (with permission of course) and made color copies of some of his letters and trinkets.  You might remember this shadow box I made of all my treasures. 




I passed by it on my way out the other day, and I re read the letter he wrote to my grandma on Easter in 1945.  

"War news looks good now.  Just keep praying and all will be well, honey."

In 1945, Easter fell on April 1st, and on April 29th, Germany surrendered in Italy.  


The war was ending.  


He was coming home.

The world is still beautiful and interesting. 

Love you/miss you,
H.

     I just wanted to let you know that the other day, I wrote a post about taking food to a family who's loved one is dying of cancer and yesterday morning, that gentleman passed away.  


  Although, I am not especially close to this family,  I still find myself overwhelmed by a lot of things lately.  Sometimes that can be good, sometimes bad. 


It has been almost four days since that visit, and I still don't have any more answers for you.  


I told you that sometimes life is bad, and sometimes it is very, very good.  


I still believe that to be true.  


For you, on this warm, breezy evening,  what little of Lucy we feel comfortable sharing.  

Proof that the world is still a beautiful place.  


I love you, Lou.  


Love and everything else, 
H. 

Tonight, my dad and I left...

Tonight, my dad and I left church early to take a meal to a family who's husband/father is dying of cancer.  


He is not an old man.  


It is sad.  


Right now, the only word I can think of is sorrow. 


Sorrow.  


I got in the car and I yelled.  And I never yell in front of my dad.  It was not I-am-so-mad-at-you-right-now-yelling.  


It was life-is-not-fair yelling.  


Tonight, I felt very much like life is about being born and paying taxes and co-existing with lima beans and surviving 38-degree-weather-even-though-your-calender-says-next-month-is-April.  


And falling in love with people and then them dying in sad and sorrowful ways.  


And then my dad said maybe we should go for a drive.  


So we drove for a long time.  And he started talking about farmland, I think to keep me from doing more yelling.  We drove by the land Tim's family my family owns (where I want to build our dog farm). 


We were late for choir and it felt a lot like we were skipping school together.  


On the way back, we saw two Very Little Girls playing in someone's living room window.  


And then my dad said it reminded him of me and my sister.  


Then he asked about my car because he always asks about my car.  We picked it out together (her name is Roxanne).  And he says the thing he always says which is, "It turned out to be a good little car..."  


123,000 some odd miles, thank you very much.  


And I said, "Yea...we make a pretty good team..." and nudged his elbow with my elbow because, like I said, we picked it out together. 


And I'm pretty sure that even though tonight was sad and I used the word sorrow and there was yelling, I'm pretty sure that when my dad is the one who is Sick or Old & Leaving, this trip will be one of my favorite memories.  


I don't know why these things happen.  I don't.  


Sometimes, life is horrible.  It is Tragic.  It is Devastating.  


But I also know that sometimes, it is good.  It is very, very good.  


And that just in the nick of time, God shows up.  


In the past 4 months, five or six* of my good-good friends have had babies.  On nights like these, it helps to think of Briggs and Ephram and Vala and Levi and Lucy.  


Sometimes, life is good.  


Love and my friends picked out cool names for their babies, 
H.  


*I said six because I'm terribly afraid I'm forgetting someone.  My apologies.  

How much do you just absolutely love life?  Please say, "Lots." 


Lots and Lots.  




Love and I think I've posted this video before, 
H.  

*Video Courtesy of Mindy Gledhill and Christian Nielson via nieniedialogues