You are a voluntary eyewitness, not an audience

Recently, I posted some pictures on Facebook of David and I riding Bike Biking Across Kansas​ in 2005. People who follow my FB feed assumed it was recently that we did this trek. This, along with recent articles I've read about how people try to paint a particular picture on their FB wall leads to this post.

I know that what I post on FB seems to all be sunshine and roses. I understand that everyone, including myself, struggle with issues ranging from mundane to worst fear material. What people need to know about my feed is that it is maintained for me. I've never posted to it to help others see how great my life is - I've always maintained it as a lifeline for myself. Whenever I let myself focus on the negatives in my life, I can always pull up my FB profile and realize how much I have to be thankful for. If it seems like my life only has positives because that is all I post on FB, it is because that is the way I choose to see my life. I have developed a habit over the years of redirecting negative thoughts to positive ones. All of this is to say I'm sorry if my FB profile looks like someone who is trying to maintain the facade of a perfect life to outsiders. The reality is, my FB profile is the life I have chosen to pursue and that choice pays rewards I never thought I was worthy of, nor believed I could receive.

I won't apologize for my life no longer having the huge weight of poverty and depression the first half of my adult life had. I won't apologize for being able to rejoice in the health of my children, rather than having to fight for every day with them. I will continue to post the sunshine and roses because that is what I see through the lens I have chosen to view life with. From time to time, you will see the darkness and thorns, if I believe there is something I need to remember from that experience.

Along this ride, you have chosen to be an eyewitness to my life.