"Our fingerprints don't fade in the lives we touch."
Its been 11 years. Yet I know he is still with us. 11 years without seeing his smile. 11 years without hearing his voice. 11 years with no advice- guidence- jokes or life stories. 11 years!
I don't think I will ever find a day where I won't think of this man, that I called Mr. Swegarden. I know I will never reach a day where I find myself not grateful not honored not blessed to have been one of oh oh soo many forever changed by having him in my life. I am one of soo soo many who still find the fingerprints he made in my life. His legacy lives on because of the lives he touched refuse to forget the change he made in us and the diffence he made in our lives. We honor him and his life because we carried on. We grew. We became. And I know he would be so pleased that the death of his life here wasn't the death of our life now.
I know he would be just torked at us if we didn't be the person he knew we were capable. I found out this lesson shortly after he left teaching and found that my grades in his class weren't what he thought I was capable of doing. While waiting for his daughter one morning to give her a ride to school, he had me come sit down next to him. and he told me that I can't just be the person I am fully capable and should always be at just certain moments or just for certain people. I have to be that person constantly! Esp when its hard and easier not to. That IS him thou always making sure we are always doing our very best and giving our very best. He wouldn't settle for slackers who were capable of being more.
Thank you Mr Swegarden for always demanding and expecting the very best from me not just in your classroom but more importantly life. Thank you Mr Swegarden for encouraging me, supporting me, believing in me and seeing what I am capable of doing and being and holding me to just that. Thank you Mr Swegarden for your greatest gift in my life... The friendship love and family I have found in your wife, Janelle and daughter, Jami. I realize the blessing, the greatness and importance of having these two gifts in my life. I hope more than anything I have been able to fulfill my promise to you and that I am able to always in the days and years to come.
And I hope that I am always being the person I am capable of being.
I hope you are enjoyin Paradise. We are missing you here!
"There are some who bring a light so great to the world that even after they are gone the light remains."
"More than anything I want to trust in a journey that I don't understand."
"I write entirely to find out what I am thinking & feeling, what I am looking at, what I see and what it means. What I want and what I fear."
"Loving you changed my life. It should come as no surprise that losing you has done the same."
"I am living proof that a shattered heart can still beat.:
"I am living proof that a shattered heart can still beat.:
LOVEthisLiFE
- Michelle
- "Life lies in the JOURNEY not the Destination." Everyday I awake to embrace the day I have been given. Thru times of struggle and in happiness--I find reasons each and everyday to LOVEthisLIFE.
Every story is one to be heard....
"You have been given the chance to live, so LIVE."
"Your soul knows the geography of your destiny. Your soul alone has the map of your future. Therefore, you can trust this indirect, oblique side of yourself. If you do, it will take you where you need to go. But more importantly it will teach you a kindness of rhythm in your journey."
"Those who love you are not fooled by mistakes you have made or dark images you hold about yourself. They remember your beauty when you feel ugly, your wholeness when you are broken, your innocence when you feel guilty and your purpose when you are confused."
"I may not have gone where I intended to go - but I believe I have ended up where I needed to be."
"When I was 5 years old, my mother always told me that happiness was the key to life. When I went to school, they asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up. I wrote down 'happy.' They told me - I didn't understand the assignment, and I told them they didn't understand life."
"If you cry because the sun has gone out of your life, your tears will prevent you from seeing the stars."
"Some people just live life in a way that well seems against the grain - never taking the paved way the easy way never living to the checklist of life...but maybe just maybe they are seeking a little bit more from life."
"All of your life is about growing into your personal best...all of your life is about growing into greatness."
"When something bad happens, you have three choices...you can either let it define you, let it destroy you OR you can let it strengthen you."
"I ask not for a lighter burden, but for broader shoulders."
"Do one thing everyday that scares the complete shit out of you."
"Try to be like a turlte, at ease in your own shell."
"There is a great mystery that none of us will get until that last breath and EVERYTHING will become VERY CLEAR."
"There is something beautiful about all scars of whatever nature. A scar means the hurt is over, the wound is closed and healed, done with."
"Overcome the notion that you must be regular it robs you of the chance to be extraordinary."
"Too much has been given much is required. You must do something for the greater good to show your gratefulness for the blessings in your life."
"The CHALLENGE of my LIFE is to see how far I can take it."
"There are things that we don't want to happen but have to accept, things we don't want to know but have to learn, and people we can't live without but have to let go."
Never ask, "What reason do I have to be happy?" Instead ask, "To what purpose can I attach my happiness?"
"Maybe mistakes are what makes our fate - without them what would shape our lives? Maybe if we never veered off course we wouldn't be who we are now."
"The turning point in the process of growing up is when you discover the core of strength within you that survives all hurt."
"Michelangelo said the best way to judge the essential elements of a sculpture is to throw it down a hill and the unimportant pieces will breake away. Sometimes life is like that. It tosses us down a hill. But when we reach the bottom and only the important things are left, that's when our vision clears. That's when we hold on tight to what we know, while hope stirs inside us. It's all a matter of perspective."
"Clouds come floating into my life, no longer to carry rain or usher storm but to add color to my sunset sky."
"Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces - I would still plant my apple tree."
"Turn your wounds into wisdom and your mess into your message."
"Even a happy life cannot be without a measure of darkness, the word happy would lose its meaning if it were not balanced by sadness."
"Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek & find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it."
"Thousands of candles can be lighted from a single candle and the life of the candle will not be shortened. Happiness never decreases by being shared."
"It is impossible to win the race unless you venture to run, impossible to win the victory unless you dare to battle."
"The foolish man seeks happiness in the distance, the wise grows it under his feet."
"When you find the way others will find you. Passing by on the road they will be drawn to your door. The way that cannot be heard will be echoed in your voice. The way that cannot be seen will be reflected in your eyes." -Choose your own journey even if it means taking a path no one ever has.
"The truth is that our finest moments are most likely to occur when we are feeling deeply uncomfortable, unhappy or unfulfilled. For it is only in such moments, propelled by our discomfort that we are likely to step out of our ruts and start searching for different ways or truer anwsers."
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