"It takes a little sun and a little rain to make a rainbow"

If I had to create a bumper sticker that modeled my philosophy for life it would be "it takes a little sun and a little rain to make a rainbow."

I believe that life is full of times of tribulation and times of success, and that our personalities and selves are formed by the sum of these experiences. Many times throughout my life, I have felt like I was at the bottom of the barrel in terms of happiness and success. I felt this last year, when I was living in Maine with my fiance Ryan. Financially strapped, we each worked two jobs to make ends meet. With little time for each other and almost no time for ourselves, Ryan and I were stressed out and disillusioned. I often felt like our time together was wasted talking about bills and how we were going to make it through another week in stead of enjoying each other. I hated waking up knowing I was facing a 16-hour day at work. Ryan hated the fact that he ended his day at the naval base by heading to his part-time job at the local toy store. We were tired and frayed, and began taking our frustrations out on each other.

It all came to a head one sunny Friday morning when we realized that we didn't have enough money to make rent on time. I knew this wasn't the lifestyle I wanted- living pay check to pay check, arguing with the one I loved, and working my self nonstop wasn't the way I imagined I'd spend my nineteenth year.

Ryan and I went to our favorite spot in town and just sat and talked about how we were going to improve our lives. We knew that it was going to take some sacrificing, but that if we wanted a better quality of life we needed to stop killing ourselves at work. We made promises to start saving rather than spending, and to use the time we had off doing wallet-friendly activities, like hiking local trails and taking our dog for long walks in Portland.

We opened a joint saving account and I talked to my manager about getting every other weekend off in addition to scaling back my hours at my second job. Ryan quit his job at the toy store and made more of an effort to help out around the apartment. We went on weekend trips to the north with money we saved by not eating out every night and made our dog happier than he'd ever been by giving him ridiculously long walks along the bay.

We found that every day we got a little happier and a little closer to one another. I also found that I had learned a lot about myself throughout the year. I learned the value of hard work and more importantly, the value of prioritizing. I learned that family always triumphed over career and that I was capable of working toward a goal and succeeding. It was the sum of my highs and lows in Maine that turned me into who I am today, a dedicated and determined person with a strong appreciation for simple fun. My rainbow is shining bright, thanks to the little bits of sun and rain that came down on me in Maine.