hello from a world of craziness

let's see...
election is coming up, I'm kind of nervous.
Auburn is doing well in football... yay.
work is keeping me busy, I'm trying to log some overtime, and I'm having fun getting to know my co-workers... a lot of really good, fun and funny people. The work itself: a bit stressful. After a hiatus from the phones, I got to train people and process claim payments... now I'm back on the phone on a full time basis. It sometimes gives me a metaphysical headache.
I'm in NC, had a long drive here (didn't arrive until near 2-3am) and I am going to head back to KY now... but I have a visitor with me, Johanna! It is so nice to see her, and at least I have someone to talk and laugh with for the 14 hours of driving.
Leo is perplexing me as ever before. Freaks out at cars, men, and peanut butter; refuses to eat his food in one sitting (he's practically fasting like a little monk); wakes me up- and keeps me up- at 1am, 2:40am, 3:47am.... but then lets me oversleep until 8:09am and then I'm late for work; he likes to jump on me and Karen and tries to bite us, but runs and hides around most other people; he gets car sick for the first month every time I took him in the car, then I take him on a 7 hour car ride and he silently sleeps in the back without being bothered or getting sick...
I'm thinking about how when I want to talk to someone, it's not so much that I want to be heard, but I want to hear. I long not so much to answer everyone's questions and share every waking moment and thought of my life but the longing is to hear behind the walls of someone else's mind and heart. Yet how easy it is when the walls don't ever seem to come down in others, that I then build my own walls and keep people from knowing what I really think about and feel when I'm by myself, mind wandering, praying, and trying to fall asleep at midnight. I always have felt "cursed" (I jokingly would say, though I'm aware it's a gift) with compassion and empathy for others... but as I have been dealing privately and corporately with the death of the pastor at my church, I've been hearing people/psychologists/counselors say that pastors often have a gift of empathy and in turn makes them more susceptible for this strength to be attacked and turned against them as a weakness... it makes them more susceptible to depression by carrying these burdens of so many people and internalizing them... so maybe I am not so crazy for feeling like this "unnatural" compassion for people, the desire to help someone behind the walls of their soul, the craving to connect, is a curse... it is a gift but perhaps sometimes it is turned against me by the powers that be, pulling me down, draining me emotionally, making it hard to let people be in and out of my life, fluid, and not constant or steady, and for me to find balance and solidity on a daily basis by myself...

enjoy the photos, I thought I'd give a little tour of my life here in KY... places I spend a lot of my time...