Karla's Chronicles

  "Barren Spirits" You searched for decades To find the missing part Of your life In every nook  And in every cranny You searched until Your eyes could no longer  Look You wanted so badly For something to appear To get rid of this barren spirit That seems to sit dormant There is nothing around me to make  It move The darkness has surrounded me And has refused to relent I have prayed for relief But my prayers have remained unanswered No matter how hard I plead God does not seem to want me to succeed The barren soul feeling just continue to bleed  Within me

 Dear Simone,  I feel like I should begin this letter to you by introducing myself. My name is Karla Culbertson. I am a 36-year-old woman from Baton Rouge, Louisiana. I suppose my interest in gymnastics is influenced by my disability. I am wheelchair dependent due to Quadraplegic Cerebral Palsy. As you can probably guess, gymnastics is even more fascinating to me when compared to the average fan because I cannot even walk and to be able to see you defy gravity time and time again is just that much more incredible to me.  My gymnastics fandom was first inspired by the Magnificent Seven in 1996. Once I watched all seven of those women capture the Gold Medal, I was hooked. I remember buying Dominique Moceanu's autobiography and studying the skills index in the back of the book until I was cross-eyed. A couple of months prior to the 1996 team winning gold, I found out that LSU had a gymnastics team. I have been a loyal follower and fan of the LSU ladies for a good 26 years or...

 I am sure this is rather obvious, but I have not been posting on here as much as I had planned. I was in a writing block phase recently, and this blog has not acted as the right tool to resolve it. In the beginning of the year and toward the end of last year, I thought that the blog would be the answer. I was wrong. You see, as a writer, we go through phases where one tool works better than the other. For the next couple of weeks, I am going to be focusing on posting on a website called The Prose. This site gives me an opportunity to have my writing seen and read and it offers a chance for me to put myself out there... At this point, I am not sure when I will be back on the blog. I am hoping to make a regular return in about 2 months. So come read my stuff on www.Theprose.com

 Hello, there, my people, I have taken this week to focus on a writing contest sponsored by www.biopage.com. I will be uploading my essay to the BioPage website tomorrow. I will post about it on here as well. PLEASE GO AND READ IT!!  I have never won anything in my life, and I would absolutely love it if I were to win a writing contest! This might sound kind of weird, but winning something like that would really boost my confident and alleviate much of my doubt. Thank you so much in advance for your continuing support!!

 Hi, there, everyone.  Let me explain. I have been dealing with a particularly annoying depression episode this week, and I made the decision to take the week off from postings on this page, Monday not included. I should back on my regular schedule come Monday. I am going to be signing up for a writing project/contest on www.biopage.com and the essay will probably be posted here on my blog. It has to be linked to a website, and I figured that linking it here would be the wisest choice. I cannot lie, I am a little nervous about putting my writing out there because there are so many other tremendously talented writers out there. Things like this really put me into a challenging sort of mindset. I figure they are good for me because even if I don't win, (Which I am highly doubtful about) I still am giving myself the opportunity for others to take a peek at my work.  I am also giving other people a chance to judge me as well based on my writing, which is where the nervous par...

 Hello there to all of my blog readers, I want to start out this blog by apologizing for not making a post yesterday. It was one of those days where I just didn't have the motivation to do anything and to be truthful, was not feeling like myself at all. Depression is tricky like that. It will sneak up on you for no reason and make you feel sad and down. I am still sort of feeling off, but I thought I would come on here and say hello. To make up for missing yesterday, I am going to post on Friday.  Even though I don't feel that great, I still feel like I need to keep up with this project. I am not sure what the posts will look like, but we will just roll with it. I am the type of person who just likes to go with the flow and do what I want and wherever my mood takes me... so we shall see.

Happiness is something everyone wants. It's the singular emotion that everyone seems to chase in a circle, but they never can catch it. It's like playing a game of duck duck goose and never getting to the goose. It's elusive. The devil tells us this when we are spinning out of control with sadness and depression. It's something we see in others, but never imagine seeing in ourselves. You see, the depression scratches and claws in an attempt to completely destroy and ravage you. It comes in with that specific plan and agenda and doesn't leave until it is complete.  This leaves you confused and confined by sadness. After about a month or two, you tire of crying until your vision is blurred  You decide to make a change and seek help from a therapist for the sake of your mental health. You realize later that this was the best decision you could've made for yourself. After a few months of investing in yourself, you notice a complete change in your happiness levels. I...