Amurica and Broken Turtles

What broke my day: A broken turtle. Lori, if you haven't gotten permission from me to read this stop now, skip ahead to the happy part. I MEAN IT!  Okay, so technically I had two sad things happen today, but I'm going to write about the other one tomorrow. What really broke my day, was a broken necklace. Lori (my Italian bestie) brought me(and my other friends) a necklace from Italy. It wasn't a super expensive necklace, but I thought it was beautiful, and I treasured it. It was a silver turtle, which had these cute cubic zirconium crystals imbedded in the shell. Notice how I'm using the past tense? Poor Zippy somehow got run over by a car; poor thing. I got it 4 days ago, and I wore it every single day, except today. Yesterday, I was at the beach (yes again: Hi, my name is Beth and I have a beach addiction), and I took it off and put it in my purse so that I could go swimming. I guess that it somehow wasn't in my purse very good, and it must have fallen out of my bag when I got out of the car, because I didn't notice it was gone, and wasn't wearing it today. I forgot about it, until of course my brother comes in the house and asks who had the turtle necklace. HAD, as in past tense. Yeah, he ran over it, and now Zippy is in 10 tiny peices: 4 legs, 1 head, 1 tail, 3 crystals, and 1 shell. Insert dramatic meltdown with extreme tears here. I know it's just a necklace, and a cheap one, but it was so adorable, and it was new, and it made me feel that I break everything precious in my life. It was from my best friend, and it had some sentimental meaning, since the entire friend group all has a necklace....except me. I feel like the turtle represented our friendship, and this means our friendship got run over by a car. Perhaps I'm being super-duper melodramatic, but it was brand new, and it hurt a lot. Now, I have to figure out how to tell Lori that I ruined the necklace, the beautiful necklace.  I mean, I guess I'll get over it eventually, just look at my mom: she broke her engagement ring a long time ago, and doesn't even have a diamond in it anymore (just cubic zirconium), and she's not sad about it. But for now, R.I.P. Zippy. :(What made my day: AMURICA, or AMERICA, if you want to be boring. Yesiree, it is the Fourth of July, and even though Independence is great and all, I didn't expect to feel so patriotic today. I usually try to downplay the birth of our country, because my sister's birthday is tomorrow, and I'm a little bitter that she gets fireworks for her birthday(but that's for tomorrow). But I woke up today, super chipper and in the mood to celebrate this great country of ours. Yay for Capitalism, Yay for Democracy, Yay for Freedom, Yay for fireworks that I can sneak out onto my roof and see without my mom knowing (she thinks I'll fall and die, even though she didn't seem to be worried when I was helping my dad put the roof on in the first place...but whatever), and Yay for saying Amurica (it's funny, just like saying diabetus, instead of diabetes). I woke up and said Happy Birthday to my sister (but when she said thanks, I promptly told her I was talking to America, not her.) then plopped down on the couch, and turned on the TV. After watching 5 minutes of Cake Boss, I got in the mood to bake. What better than an America Cake? Yay for red, white, and blue!(told you I was chipper.) I mean, I even subconsciously dressed in red, white and blue. Granted, my dress is blue and white, but my bra is red, so that totally counts. Maybe it's the feeling of the day, maybe it's because I am truly greatful for our country (even if every other country in the world hates us), or maybe it's because I'm a closet pyromaniac and like to watch things blow up. But I'm happy that it's the fourth of July and that our forefathers risked their life and thier heads all so that we could live in the beautiful, diverse country that we live in today. It doesn't matter what you see when you look outside your window. Weather it's in the city, the slums, suburbia, or in the middle of nowhere, there is beauty everywhere: if  you look close enough. The fact that we here in America have so much space, so many natural parks, so many freedoms granted to us is beautiful, and that puts me in an amazing mood. For one day we can forget about the national debt crisis, racism in any form, the pain and sorrow that our in our lives, that we are in a war and so many of our soldiers are over there serving for other countries' freedom, and that so many people are out of work (including me). Instead, today we can remember that we are blessed to have what we do. I don't care if you don't believe in God, or are all for the separation of church and state: but it's hard to argue when I say this: God Bless America.