Bethany N. Bella

Remember who you are

There’s a lot of new things going on in my life, lately. New apartment furniture. New job. New work clothes. A (relatively) new companion in life. A new watch on my wrist. A new purse to carry all of my new credit cards (now that credit scores seem to matter…). New favorite places to eat…

Coming Back Home

I’ve spent the last 12 months living in or within 3 miles of my childhood home. After rocketing back from a summer in southern Arizona, Singapore and San Francisco — and a full, final semester at OU — I was finally ready for a change of pace from the hectic, travel-filled sprint my life had…

Take Root: Mindful movement in practice

I knew in the first few minutes of the class that it wasn’t going to be to my liking. I noticed right away, its absence all but unnerving my supposed-to-be calm senses. There was no music. Breathe in through your nose, the instructor nudged his pupils in the stony silence. I did as he instructed,…

The girl in the mirror

The girl in the mirror She’s not just you of yesterday The girl who’s insecure Who’s not all that sure Who can’t imagine what will come tomorrow The girl in the mirror She’s not just you of now The girl with the smile With a love of all things wild With a love for a…

Reasons

I kept busy, stayed buried For years and years Worked weekends, week nights The struggle, the strife Kept feeding the candlelight With nothing much left to fight Everyone else seems to measure their life in years So why do I judge mine by the days? I have always been impatient – resigned Waiting on the…

Thoughts on my first retail job

I closed the cashier drawer for the last time yesterday evening. For the last 6 months, I’ve been working part-time (although sometimes it definitely felt like full-time) at a natural foods grocery store in my hometown. I took the job back in August, when the prospect of graduate school applications and a year “off” at…