OMG...the judges for our competition are evil! The reason they let us start rehearsing our second week dance is because it's really our first week dance and they just sprung it on us last night. So the Samba is up first and we're performing it tomorrow night.

I am really upset. I thought I had a great strategy - start with a sweet, romantic Waltz and then follow it up with a fun and sassy Samba. It doesn't work the other way! We're dancing to "Run the Show" and I'm afraid the audience will think we're making a statement about how we run the show and it will come across as arrogant. Audiences don't like arrogant. They like underdogs. ARRRGGGGHHHH!

This whole thing is really hard. I can't get comfortable with Josh. All of the fun and friendly banter we had going this summer is gone. I was so relaxed when I was texting him from a distance but now that we're in constant physical contact, I am freaking out. I feel so uncomfortable and I'm having a hard time. Actually, the Samba is easier in that regard because it's not sweet and romantic and the physical contact is different.

Josh actually called me out on it last night. He said that I am holding him at arms length, and that we're not going to win if we can't connect. He's right. I know he is, but I'm scared.

The competition begins this week! Our first dance is the Waltz and we've been rehearsing for a few weeks now. It's been going really well. There are some times that it is kind of hard. I'll admit that the dance has brought up some old feelings. We're dancing to a song called "Softly As I Leave You" by Michael Buble.  I doubt it is bringing up old feelings for Josh, but it definitely reminds me of the times he's left, but more that that, it brings up a lot of my abandonment issues with my parents. I really should go into dance therapy...

We are doing so well on our rehearsals for the Waltz that we got permission to begin our second dance. We're doing the Samba, which I am super excited about. Josh not so much since that was his most challenging dance, but I think it's good strategy for us. Lets get the most difficult dance out of the way while there are lots of competitors that can be eliminated. If we wait until there is less competition, there is more chance of us being eliminated. I think it's going to work in our favor.

Lauren and I had lunch last week and she brought up the pact. Our conversation went something like this:

Lauren: “I don’t understand. You guys text each other non-stop. You’re going to dance together, but you’re not a couple?”Me: “Nope. Just friends.”Lauren: “Do you have another one of those stupid pacts?”Me: “Wow...I forgot about the pact.”Lauren: “You guys should be a couple.”

Even after all these years, Lauren is still hell bent on me and Josh being together.

I’m not sure that I really forgot about the pact, but I have been avoiding the topic. A pact makes sense when you’re still a very young, immature kid, but Josh and I are adults now. I don’t think we need a pact to guide our behavior. I mean, we should be grown-up enough now to properly navigate our relationship. At least that’s what Josh told me when it came up in a conversation a few hours after my chat with Lauren.

“No pact,” is what he told me, and that it was non-negotiable. I’m not sure if he’s so against the pact because there is nothing between us, or if he wants there to be something between us. Probably the former and not the latter. I don’t even want to let my brain go down that road.

I guess it’s time to address the elephant in the room. Two blog posts down and I haven’t mentioned his name, but let’s face it, if you read the archives, you’ll see this blog has been about my life as it pertains to Joshua Anderson.

Josh and I are not a couple, nor have we been a couple in a very long time. I feel like I need to put that out there since so much of this blog has been about my life and the role he's played in it. He is still a part of my life - a dear friend that I cherish - but we are not in a romantic relationship.

After my post about wishing for snow storms, we had no more snow storms. It seemed like the Universe was sending me a clear message: it ain’t gonna happen, honey. So I got on with it.

Last fall Natalie told me that she found an engagement ring in Josh’s drawer (leave it to Nat to “find” something in someone’s drawer, right?). I was surprised me how upset that made me, even though we haven’t been together in years, and the fact that Josh didn’t have a girlfriend.

I think that is why I felt so free and relaxed in Florida. I didn’t want to be around if he was getting engaged. We’re friends but I’m not sure I can muster that kind of grace to handle that well.

He never did get engaged though. Nat and I have no idea why he has a ring, but after avoiding him for several months, I realized I would be a really crappy friend if I didn’t call him on his birthday. I called and got his voicemail and then it was phone tag for a few hours before he called me late that night. We ended up chatting for a few hours. I was a good conversation, but I didn’t get up the nerve to ask him about the ring!

After that I found myself in constant text conversations with him. He went out to California for the summer but we were in constant contact. I got a picture of everything place he went, and anything he found remotely interesting. It was cute and I found myself snapping pictures constantly and sending them to him.

In July, he asked me to fly out to California, but things were crazy at my dad’s company and I didn’t want to leave. I also was scared. I wasn’t really sure what his intentions were. We had a good long-distance friendship, but I was scared what a face-to-face visit would be like.

In early August, Natalie, Jason and Josh all came down to Florida for a visit. We had a really great time. Natalie was putting the pressure on me to return to Pennsylvania. I was struggling with it because life felt very safe in Florida, but I know that hiding isn’t the answer

Josh was the one that finally convinced me by talking me in to dancing with him again. I have been asked year after year for several years now to do an All Star Competition at the dance studio with the former contestants of our dance competition. I kept making excuses and putting it off because I knew that Josh and I would be expected to dance together and the timing never seemed right, but it finally feels right. We have a solid friendship, we get along great and neither of us are dating anyone so we don’t have to worry about anyone feeling worried or insecure about us dancing together.

The competition begins in early October and we’ll dance until we win...we are so going to win! Rehearsal begins after Labor Day weekend but Josh and I went dancing on my birthday and got a feel for dancing together again.

Today was Lindsay’s bridal shower. She’s getting married at the end of October to Henry! It makes me smile just to type that. I love them. They are such a great couple, and I am so excited to share in their celebration. I am one of Lindsay’s bridesmaids so I’m glad to be back from Florida in time to help with planning the bachelorette party and help with the last minute details.

The bridal shower was so nice. Aunt Lu hosted it at her house. We transformed her backyard into a lovely garden for the perfect bridal shower location. My mom is heading back to Florida soon, but stayed in Pennsylvania for my birthday and the shower. It was a really nice day to connect with some of the important women in my life.

I am also Natalie’s Maid of Honor! She’s getting married in the spring to Jason. This has been in the works for awhile now but he wanted to get through med school and feel like he could be ready for marriage before they settled on a date. Natalie is pretty excited. I was able to go scope out locations for her while I was down in Florida (the wedding is going to be down there). It also meant that I had lots of visits from Nat while I was down there. She was there for two weeks in April and we went everywhere. She wanted to see all of the churches and reception locations at the time of year they’d be having their wedding.

Love and marriage definitely seem to be in the air…

I've been feeling that need to write again. I think it helps me to process things when I can write them down. I'm not sure if anyone out there is still reading this, but I think it was always for me anyway.

Today is my 27th birthday. I can't believe that I started this blog when I was 15! Time has flown by so quickly.

I just returned to Pennsylvania after spending the last nine months in Florida. Yes, 2015 started off a little crazy. My mother has been helping to run my father's business. We really wanted to keep it going after he died because it was bringing in money and, more importantly, he employed a large number of people. Well, Mom also started dating our Chief Operating Officer a few years ago and it's been pretty serious, but they broke up last November and my mom just couldn't deal with working so closely with him. He's a great guy and is the person keeping the business afloat so it wasn't like we were going to fire him.

At the same time, I was feeling bored and wondering if I wanted to keep running the dance studio. I just felt stuck - like my life wasn't going anywhere. So my mom and I decided to swap lives for awhile. She moved to Pennsylvania and ran the dance studio and I moved down to Florida and worked with John (Mom's ex) at my dad's company.

Florida was good for me. It gave me time to think about my life and what’s important. I spent a lot of my downtime at the beach. I would go for walks, read or just watch the sunset over the gulf. It was also a good time for me to do a lot of self-care. I did a lot of yoga and Zumba. I also took tennis lessons while I was down there. It was me and the snowbirds for awhile. :)

I also decided that it was time to sell the house. It just felt too weird to be there. My dad didn’t actually die in the house, but his death is the only thing I could think of while I was there. My mom wasn’t interested in living there so it seemed like a good time to sell it. I spent most of March cleaning and packing. Luckily, I was able to convince my mom, Aunt Lu, Aunt Linda, Lindsay and Natalie to come down and help me out. Natalie’s mom and Arie also came over and helped. We were able to get most of the personal items packed up, donated or tossed in a couple of days. The house was listed a week later and we had an offer a few weeks after that.

It’s kind of sad to think that the house is no longer our house, but it felt good to let it go. Life moves on.