Ask and You Shall Receive

Here it is... the speech that I think needs some improvement. You know the way it goes. You think you have this really great project completed then outta nowhere you hear someone else's and you think "This is great. Mine is crap" So now I have one more week to make it better than everyone else's and make it so good that I blow everyone else away.

Commemorative Speech
They say first impressions can last a lifetime but if you judged this person based on a first impression than you have no idea what you would be missing. I can tell you exactly what you would see on your first impression, a tiny woman rushing through the door because she is never on time, her pink curly hair blowing in the wind and a vintage tee shirt older than me clung to her body.
This is my Godmother. My best friend. My confidante. Her name is Heidi. She grew up on a farm and has known my family for many years. She has been there for all my ups and all my downs. She has never judged me or criticized me for any of the choices I have ever made. She has celebrated with me and she has cried with me. Her craziness and positive attitude is what has kept me as sane as I can be. (I blame my insanity on her – she dropped me on my head when I was little.) It is with her I can be myself completely. It is with her that I can be absolutely free. All the summers I spent at her house, picking berries, visiting the Studio and aspiring artists, these are my favorite memories. Riding horses at the farm, getting dirty and loving every second of it. Every time I see a lit candle I think of the summer we spent making our own candles which was more of a mess than it was successful.
Heidi gave me my first sketch book when I was eleven. She bought it for me after my grandfather died. It was through this book that she taught me that I could talk to her whenever I wanted all I had to do was pick up the pencil and write or draw. Just keep going until I felt that everything that needed to be said came pouring out. And now seven years later I have more than one sketch book.
Her inspiration and creativity has guided me and helped shape my artistic side. It was her creativity that finally after many attempts enabled her to have her first poem published in a book that will be released some time next year. I am so happy to be a part of her happiness as she celebrates her first piece of literature. I always knew that her writing would be published it was just a matter of time. I remember one of the first books she ever started writing, it was during one of the summers I spent at her house. It was about teenagers doing all the things we are told by our parents not to do. Another book that I remember reading was one about a young girl who everyone considered weird. Publishers criticized her writing calling it dark and claiming “that this was not what they were looking for” but to me this was all the more appealing. Her writing is so unique and different than anything I have ever read. It’s the type of reading that you can’t put down, it’s the type of book that you stay up all night to finish and then read again because it was just that good.
That was the summer we drank some of the Captain and went into the neighbor’s yard. Well let me just say that we went into the neighbor’s yard because they had a huge trampoline and we wanted to try it. Okay, I’m exaggerating this part. We weren’t drunk, but we did have a little rum and we had the neighbor’s permission to use the trampoline.
Summer of 2005 was quite possibly the best summer I ever spent at her house. We had tickets to Billy Idol, and more than a week of summer left where we could do whatever we wanted. We read books, we drank tea in the front window, and we reminisced about days gone by. And when Billy Idol day came we piled into the pit and rocked out like there was no tomorrow. It was the first time in my life where I didn’t care what people thought of me. It was the first concert I ever went to and it is one of the best memories I have. A few months later we saw Hedley. It was another awesome concert. The best part of the night was when Heidi danced on the bar and the bouncers came and told her to get down or get out. Her free spirit was alive that night and encouraged me to fully experience that night.
Her free spirit, creativity and uniqueness are what have brought her to this point. Her first publication, I am so honored and grateful to be a part of this moment. I can’t wait to read the book cover to cover and I look forward to many more publications. Here’s to new beginnings and the future.