Of all the dumb things to do...

***Hey, guys! I actually wrote this early early this morning, but for some reason blogger wouldn't let me upload the post. So I'm uploading it now. Hope it doesn't cause too much confusion!***

Today has been a stupid day. A very, very stupid day.

It all started with the fact that I (oh, so foolishly) stayed up until about 2am Thursday night (or rather Friday morning) because I knew I wouldn't have to work today. (Er, or I guess technically 'yesterday,' because now it's early Saturday morning.)

Anyway.

So, I slept in late (naturally) when I had intended to be up & about by 7am. (Oh, foolish, foolish me.) After kicking myself angrily out of bed at approximately 10:30am (ICK) I managed to mess around doing pretty much nothing for nearly an hour, after which I (finally) exercised & (at last) ate breakfast (which meal was consumed at about 12:30pm).

So, as you can see, I was off. Very much off today.

I meandered back into my room to kill time on the internet, maybe check a blog or two along with my email, and I got sucked into... Huh. I can't even remember now what I got sucked into, so I guess it doesn't really matter.

Then I realized that my back was stiff from the awkward way I'd been sitting with my laptop, so I laid down. On my bed. And also it was cold, so I kind of pulled my blanket up, and then... I woke up at 4pm to a phonecall from my boss asking if I could come in on Monday which, of course, I said 'yes' to, and then, being unspeakably disheartened that I couldn't have a 4-day weekend after all, I plummeted miserably back into the dark depths of unconciousness.

One of the appealing things about sleeping is that you forget for a time that you're you. I mean, sometimes I dream as if I were myself, but more often I take on some kind of different personna. I jump in & out of the heads of my dream 'characters' (I don't know what else to call them) so I could 'be' a guy or a girl or a kid or an alien, or just a 3rd party observer hovering somewhere near the action. Today when I dreamed, I was both myself and my sister and then later I was some sort of space-adventurer man (also sometimes a woman) who was concerned about the air being depleted from his/her spaceship. (I have no clue why gender seems to be such a fluid thing in these dreams.)

Coming to after dreaming like that can be a jarring experience; your contact with the real world begins again with the realization that you're really you, and that the world you're waking into is what reality really is, and that the places and events and people you've recently been experiencing are NOT real, however tangible they may have felt up until the point you opened your eyes.

And it was dark. And you knew that it couldn't possibly be any earlier in the day than 7:30, which is an unbelievably atrocious hour to wake up from a nap, and then you fumbled fearfully for your glasses after refusing to even try to find out what time it is because you knew you'd hate yourself when you did and OH...............................

It's 8:36.

And you have literally slept the entire day away.

Yes, that day: the day you had HUGE plans for, the day you were going to use to get everything done, the day you were going to get on the ball and finally take some steps to assure that you didn't spend the next 20 years of your life living as an appendage to your parents. That day.

Once, before my mission, I went through a period of time that was...just about the darkest time I've experienced. I was completely withdrawn from people; I failed classes, slept through church, never paid my rent on time, and was, in short, a miserable hulk of a human being. I couldn't face anything--I couldn't even face being myself anymore, so I slept. Sleep was a greater escape than even books could be, and I used that escape more and more as I became more and more disgusted with myself and more and more in despair of ever being able to break free of the downward cycle I was in. I've come to realize since then that this period marked an episode of some serious depression (although never fear--fortunately, I never really thought of suicide as any sort of option).

I think one of the reasons why I hate days like today is that I'm afraid it's a return to that dark period. I'm afraid I'm on the verge of swinging back down into depression. It's a place I haven't been, at least for any lengthy amount of time, since then, thank goodness, and I've always been afraid that somewhere in my brain is some balance that, if tipped the right way, could send me swirling downwards into that same place. Sleeping in excessive amounts (like I did today) seems to me to be a tip-off. I'm not sure if I get depressed because I have the unenviable capability of sleeping circles around everybody else, or if I sleep so long because I can't stand being around myself anymore, and my self-disgust is what leads to depression.

Uch. Guys, I'm so sorry this topic is heavier than usual. Please don't be afraid for me. I learned many, many things on my mission: one was the importance of not letting the past prevent you from taking action in the present, and another was to keep moving and keep working and keep getting up every morning and keep going out and doing things. One other advantage I have now is that I work full-time. While I sometimes took the unfortunate view that I didn't have to go to class and could therefore sleep through it, doing the same thing with a full-time job has never been an option. So. I'm not going to start sleeping through every day, lose my job, have my parents shaking their heads in flabbergasted despair, etc., etc.

I also don't live with someone who hates me, which, unfortunately, was also part of that really, really unpleasant time. Part of the reason I slept so much then was also to avoid her. And, while I may have the occasional spat with a family member, I'm really reasonably certain that they actually do love me.

In short, the danger I'm in now is just wasting time that I have available and feeling really bad about myself because of it. And the solution? I guess it comes back to those same mission lessons: repent of your mistakes and then let them go, and BLAST it all, GET OUT OF BED ON TIME! (Which also means that I probably ought to try to sleep soon so I can be up by 8am. Here's hoping!)

***(Edit: I actually got up about 8:30, which isn't bad considering I didn't go to sleep until after 3am this morning. I think I'm mostly normalized now. In more ways than one.)***

It's snowing pizzas!

For those of you who like the thought of whole wheat anything, and for those of you who have wondered all your lives what exactly an uncooked whole wheat pizza with mozzerella, Canadian bacon, tomatoes and assorted bell peppers (not to mention a sprinkling of Parmesan cheese) would look like, I have graciously uploaded the photo to the left. Mmm.

For those of you who have wondered what exactly a cooked version of the same pizza would look like, gaze on this little beaut:















Okay--so the lighting's weird. Okay, so the peppers are all kind of scattered haphazardly and okay, so not everyone likes Parmesan cheese.

But I will persist in believing that my pizza was delicious.


Oh, and while I'm on the subject, isn't October just a little bit early for snow? I mean, I thought El Nino was supposed to bring us a mild winter this time around, so how can it have snowed here already??? For evidence, brace yourself for yet another picture:

(My front lawn this early evening)

And this one (my strangely elongated hand holding a fistful of (very cold) snow...in, like, freaking OCTOBER):

Weeeelll, I guess that's enough pictures for today. I could show you a closeup of those gorgeous tomatoes on the pizza, and I could show you a picture of my tennis shoe (which I am now wearing instead of the flip-flops) crunching down the powdery white stuff, but I won't. Not unless you beg. Really hard.

Why Whole Wheat Flour is Super-Oopity-Duper

Ahem.

So when I say I'm going to post on my blog sometime later that day, what I really mean is that if I were a less flawed version of a human being, I would post later that day in accordance with my less-flawed and more-perfecto way of doing things. I would not delay something I said I would do; I would not gaze at my lappy with apathy and turn (yet again) to flipping the channels on the tv set, watching a steady stream of mundanity flow by.

I would post, by gum.

Alas. I am not as perfecto as I would wish.

So, in accordance with my rather more-flawed way of doing things, I am posting about whole wheat flour today, dutifully (nay--blissfully) ignoring the promise I made to talk about it, oh, um, three or so days ago.

...

...

...

So, that whole wheat flour, huh? Pretty nifty stuff!

Actually, I'm really rather excited about whole wheat flour at the moment. You see, I've sworn off (at least for the forseeable future) refined white flour & all the attendant easy-digestibleness thereof. So whole wheat flour has become my semi-staple, my way of eating lovely bready foods like...bread...and........dough. Actually, the only thing I've made so far with said whole wheat (hereafter referred to as "ww") flour is some (or is it 'was some') ww pizza dough, to which I added toppings like fistfuls of mozzerella, sliced tomatoes and (mmm) triangles of Canadian bacon. Yummy! (Is it just me, or is the word 'yummy' a trifle too...perky?)

I hope to soon go on (ooo...a split infinitive) to ww bread (in loaf format) and ww rolls, soon to be followed by ww chocolate chip cookies (sweetened with Splenda) and ww brownies and other delectable artificially sweetened bits of not-so-decadent-decadence.

And perhaps, perhaps in a very long while, I'll feel prepared to make and bake and eat a lovely, dark, whole wheat chocolate cake, that will be mine...all my own...in memory of that cake I never had.

Mmmmmmmmmm. How I long for that delicious whole wheat chocolate cake. And I won't share. No, not one bit.

Well, maybe just a little.

Argh! I will post!

For those of you who believed I was dead, fear not. I am yet alive.

In fact, I will do my best to post a little something this evening...Hm... I think it will be about whole wheat flour & all the joys associated with it.

Yes. Mmm...

So, like, later, yo.

Oh. Ouch.

I got hit really hard today. I mean really hard. Like a guy with brass knuckles kind of hard. My day had been...less than stellar already & I was feeling, erm...disappointed in myself (yet again) and I came home & checked out my mail, and lo & behold I got a bill for $2400. Yep.

Apparently a surgery bill I thought had been covered by insurance really wasn't, and now I have to dish out a little over $2000. (The insurance company was kind enough to furnish roughly $370.)

I seriously went through the stages of grief, as if that big ol' chunk of cash was some beloved relative who was quitting this sphere forever and whom I would never see again until the blessed eternal realm. I was shocked; I denied it, tried to prove the bill wrong; I realized it was really real and sat on my bed & bawled. I think I was angry in there too somewhere ($370??? COME ON!!!!) but I can't remember exactly when it hit.

Actually, I'm now a little ashamed about the way I reacted. I mean I sobbed. I haven't sobbed in a long, long, LONG time, and there I was, unable to draw in a single breath without it breaking up like a teenage rock band after high school. And really, when it comes down to it, it's only $2000. I can cover that. Granted, my savings account will take a serious blow; granted, I'll have to postpone some things that I wanted to do NOW because I simply don't have the cash I thought I did; granted, my plans are utterly and completely screwed up now...(Oh! THERE's that anger!) But I am glad that at least it wasn't some astronomical amount that I didn't have. I'm glad that I won't need to be like Fred Vincy in Middlemarch and foist out my debts on other people. At least my parents won't have to pay this. At least I won't be more of a burden to them than I already am. (Darn [mumble-mumble]-year-old living with her parents still...)

And, when this bill is paid, then I'll be square. I'll be completely free of debt & I'll feel all nice & liberated (even though I already felt liberated; I just didn't know I wasn't liberated at the time).

So, to all of you who thought that I was going to move on soon? Oh, no. I ain't. Not now. Nohow. No-can-do.

Blech. Sorry. That's even too bitter for me to swallow at the moment.

Does this hymn make me look hot?

Just as I was wrapping up my singing this evening for the folks at that one retirment home, (you know--the one where I thought I saw Donny Osmond), some folks from the next group arrived, just a bit early. In fact, I was just starting the introductory measures of "Be Still My Soul" when about 5 of them walked in and surreptitiously took seats in the back of the room to listen to my warbling.

While I was a little distracted (I always find it easier to just sing to the old folks rather than younger people) I still felt like the last hymn went off pretty well, which was fortunate since my voice, by that point in the evening, was pretty much shot.

I finished singing, gathered my various books from the piano & floor & started to make my way down the aisle to shake hands with the afore-mentioned (and very, very nice) old folks and thank them for taking the time to come & listen to my poor renditions of old familiar hymns. As the five members of the second group came forward to claim the piano, several of the people in the group (all males, I noted) nodded at, smiled or complimented me on my singing. One of the guys even grinned at me & said, "Great job!" (And he weren't bad lookin' neither.)

So, I have to inquire: does singing hymns make you seem hot? Does singing hymns well to old folks make you appealing to the opposite gender? Did those smiles and nods and little teeny itsy bitsy compliments mean that these young men somehow found me attractive???

Well, no.

Does it mean it gave me something to write about on my blog this evening? (And a super-duper post title?)

Heck, yes.

Blah.

No really, I mean it. Just: blah.

I must apologize to you all, because frankly, that funk that I mentioned earlier has come back. With a vengeance. And it's been hovering incessantly for the past week. Obviously impeding my ability to write complete sentences. Yerg.

And, to top it off, Cathy & Ed & Morgan have moved, darn it. And I hate goodbye-ing. You always feel like you should be saying something profound that you all will be able to treasure in your hearts for years to come, but what you actually end up doing is standing (or sitting) around stupidly for a couple of hours, helplessly trying to think of something wonderful & comforting & warming to say & failing utterly, and then leaving, only half-convinced that you're worth much of anything as a friend. Ugh.

So, Cathy, when you get a chance to peruse this blog again, I apologize. Mostly for being a little bit dumb & a lot self-centered &...not able to do the whole goodbye thing very well. Hwaet.

(Leave it to me to use an old Anglo-Saxon word improperly. It was just the first thing that came to mind, okay? Ptooey.)

Okay. So, I guess that's it. I'm just blue & have been for a while...I'm sure I'll snap out of it soon. Give me a good spiritual experience or 5 minutes doing something I really believe to be productive & I'll be back to me old chipper self. So I will. And I will be jocular & verbose instead of the taciturn wretch I've been for the past week. Yeppers. And I won't cry over accidentally dousing my dad with cold water. And I'll get out of bed ontime. And also there will be a little bluebird singing merrily on my right shoulder. And if it...does its business once in awhile on my tshirt, I'll only have myself to blame. My very, very happy self. Ick.

So if you ever start packing...

Okay--so my blue funk is gone at the moment, mostly because I'm just so darn tickled at a dream I had last night (or more accurately this morning).

Sometimes I have dreams that I'm moving; these dreams usually involve some sort of process of packing up all of my belongings & trying to get them over to some other place. (Which I guess is the essence of moving. Duh.)

Anyway--while these dreams obviously have distinct differences from each other, (like the one this morning had me moving from one room in a house into another room in the same house--the new room had a bathroom inside the bedroom & two bathtubs--I even asked one of my roommates why on earth they put two bathtubs in the same room...but anyway--), they always seem to have a single thing in common.

I pack up what I believe is all my stuff, and then I suddenly realize that--HOLY COW!--I've forgotten to pack up the stuff in my closet & all the stuff in my drawers, so I still have TONS of things to go through & try to get in boxes. (Usually this is also accompanied by a feeling of urgency, like I have to be out of the room in 10 minutes or something.)

Delightfully, the dream this morning contained the same familiar scenario. I still had all my clothing (and board games--who would dream about board games???) hanging up in the closet, and I noticed several boxes kind of lying around in a tumbled heap that I hadn't sorted through yet.

I woke up this morning & just had to laugh at myself, mostly because it's really kind of a silly thing to dream about.

However, I still haven't been able to figure out exactly what this dream means. Here's one theory though: I want to move on in my life, but I still have things that are holding me back. I want to ignore these things, but heck--I can't move on without my board games, can I??? So, I still have things to do before I can make a clean transition.

Hey! That actually doesn't sound so bad. Maybe the important thing about dream interpretation is not that you figure out exactly what your silly brain was trying to process, but that you discover something important about yourself that you need to address, whether it was what your subconscious was trying to tell you or not.

So, if you'll excuse me, I have a few boxes to pack up.

And also, here's a weird picture I made out of a closeup of a peach blossom (ooooh...neon....). Seemed kinda dream-like, so I thought I'd include it. Enjoy!

This must end

I have GOT to stop watching romantic comedies. I mean it--I absolutely HAVE to stop watching them. You see, watching them turns me into a sighing soggy mess. I feel all...oogey inside, and believe you me, I definitely do not need oogey in my life.

Aside from that, it was actually a pretty good day. Conference was lovely, of course. I thought Elder Wirthlin's talk was especially touching, and Elder Oaks's talk was, I think, the most geared towards what I needed to hear. I think I often fail to think of the Savior when I'm going through problems in my life, or when I face unhappiness or disappointment. I tend to wallow a bit in my own misery, or think bitter thoughts rather than turning to the Lord as I should. I hope to do a bit better than I have been doing, which I guess is one of the points of having General Conference every six months. We get a small dose of self-improvement (or rather improvement through the Lord) twice a year. Thank goodness for that.

I'm not sure what else to write about. I've been in a bit of a funk these past couple of days--work has been kind of stressful and I've got deadlines looming at me and making threatening gestures. I guess I'm just not feeling perky happy cheerful at the moment, but I guess that's okay too. After all, life isn't entirely spent in a state of euphoria. And, if we didn't have blue funks, would we even know what euphoria tasted like? I doubt it.

Yeah. So, while I'm rather disjointed & half in a weird state, I just wanted to say to you all that I'm alive and I'm okay. And really, when you look at it closely, that's not such a bad thing.

I want it! No, I don't!

Okay. There is a huge ol' half-consumed chocolate cake sitting on the counter, and I want it. I want it bad.

So, you have to help me to convince myself how much I do NOT want this chocolate cake, because seriously I have been working hard the last two weeks and I don't want to blow it on a delicious slice of melt-in-your-mouth gooey crumbly chocolatey (did I mention delicious)...cake...

Okay. So, I don't really want this cake, except I do, but I really don't. Instead, I will content myself with some cauliflower. Or some sauteed peppers. Or some...er....celery. Yeah. Yum.

Aaaaaahhhhhh..... (Erm, that's supposed to be a long sigh...)

Oh, help.

Hooray! 100 Posts!

A long time ago (aka a few months) I asked you people to tell me your two favorite ice cream flavors. My plan was to throw a giant virtual ice cream party (as a celebration for the 1000th hit on my blog) & invite you all to come along! Unfortunately, as soon as I started working on putting the party together, lots of things came up like surgery & the death of my grandmother, & it just didn't seem like the right time anymore. (Plus, the hits by that point had gone way past 1000.)

So, now in celebration of my 100th post (WAHOO!) I've put together this little ice cream social. I hope you enjoy it! (By the way--there are many, MANY more people I would have included, but I either A: Did not have a high-resolution picture of you, B: Had already put together an image & no longer had any room--rats, or C: Simply did not know who you are (although this really only applies to two people who posted once on my blog & have never returned). So, I apologize if you're not in the photo. Seriously, you should be! This 'should be in here but for above reasons I could not include you' list consists of Lindsay, Libby, Pat, Annie, & my two beloved sibs Debs & Joseph (who posted under the werid but cool screen name of 'Opario'). And, if I've forgotten to include you in THAT list, well....just blame my ultra tired brain.

So, here it is! Happy ice cream! Happy friends! Happy, happy 100 POSTS! (By the way, because not everyone responded to my pleas for favorite ice cream flavors, I had to guess on a couple of you, and I even made up some flavors. So, if you have no clue what your ice cream is supposed to be, just ask. I can hardly wait to tell you.)

(And also--I know, I really KNOW--some of those poses & colors & bits of clothing are really weird. And some of your proportions are all off. And yes, I know that the lighting on some of your heads is also weird. And no, I don't intend to go back & fix it all--I'm tired of looking at this thing. Haha!)

(And also, you'll want to click on this thing for a larger version. Lots of details, man.)

***Edit: Urg! Oh, for pity's sake! I can't seem to get the darn pic to open up in a new window when you click on it. Bleh. Looks like you'll have to just be content with a smaller version. *Goes away mumbling curse words to herself* ***

***Edit: Argh! I KNEW there was someone I was forgetting! And Megan! The list includes Megan too!***

I'm turning into that girl

I never thought I would ever, EVER be that girl. You know--the one who wears flip flops in 40 degree weather and, as a single concession to the cold, dons a thin long-sleeved sort of shirt instead of wearing a proper jacket.

Yeah. I'm that girl now. And I don't think it's a good thing.

For one thing, I was much colder yesterday than I've been in a long time. I was positively shivering! (Well, more like occasionally shaking my shoulders with exclamations of "Brrr!" and "Gosh, it's cold!" (Yes. I said 'gosh.' Just like someone from the 50s. So sue me.))

Plus, with the rather persistent rain yesterday, my feet (scantily shod in flip flops) got rather wet. And kind of muddy. Ew. Plus, I forgot an umbrella, so my carefully coiffed (yeah, right--more like hastily curled) hair fell flat virtually the moment I left my house.

All in all, I'm thinking of giving up flip flops & returning to my sneakers & socks routine, although doing so would constitute a concession I'm not sure I'm ready to make.

You see, I love fall. I really, really do. But, I don't like winter. I really, really don't. Or, at least I do like winter; I just don't like shoveling the driveway & scraping ice off of my car & falling knee deep in snow drifts on my way between my car & work. Blech. No, I don't like it.

And so I am using my own little passive agressive streak against the seasons. By wearing flip flops & too-thin tshirts (albeit longsleeved) I am making a statement, a statement that says "I am refusing to concede that winter & snow & shoveling are all on their way. I say more summer, or at least a longer autumn, by gum, by golly." (Yes, I say 'golly.' Just like someone from the 40s. So sue me.)

And the rest of you say, "That girl (yes, that one) is totally and incomprehensibly delusional."

Well, so be it. I am that girl. That very, very cold girl.

The look in her eyes

So I was going through some old pictures today, and I came across this little wallet-sized picture of myself in (what I believe was) my kindergarten year. (Wow. That is some dress I have on.)

I'm actually pretty tickled with it, because if you can tell, I still smile the same way now, often a little half-smile with a good measure of reserve behind it. What's most different about me now (well, aside from the size issue) is that this little girl's eyes are different than mine. Oh, they're still the same light brown, but the expression in them is different. Which, I guess is only to be expected.

This little girl has years ahead of her full of family reunions & beach trips & school reports & squabbles with siblings & getting in HUGE trouble with Mom & Dad. She's got years of beating herself up for not being pretty enough or smart enough or easy enough around other people. She has strikes for independence from her parents in her future & learning how to draw properly & discovering that her voice is a pretty good instrument & finally understanding that a mission really is one of the hardest experiences you can go through in your life, as well as one of the best. She'll have struggles with friends & with grades & have moments of sheer bliss and sheer longing and will read thousands & thousands of books, both good & bad.

But she hasn't gone through any of that yet. (Except maybe the squabbling with siblings part.) And when you look in her eyes, you can see that. There's an innocence that a lack of experience brings, & it's there. It's strange to realize that I once looked out of my eyes like that, that I once carried that expression. And, while it's true that there are some days I would love to have that expression back, still I think that the expression in my eyes now is, if less innocent, perhaps (I hope) just a bit more full of the wisdom that experience brings.

Okay--didn't somebody out there have something to say?

Hmmmmm????? Cathy???? Care to update everybody?

This is me, saying here's my little piece of framework...please feel free to post what's been going on with ya! (And PLEASE tell me how Ed's trip went! (Which I guess is one & the same thing...))

If Beth can cook...

So can you! (Oh, come on. You knew that was coming.)

Truth be told, I'm pleased as pickles with myself this evening. I'm trying to incorporate more vegetables into my diet, so I experimented tonight and produced some veeeeery tasty results. (Mmmm...delicious results...)

So, firstly I threw some sirloin-type steaks into the pan & started them a-cookin', then I tossed some olive oil into another pan, added garlic (and heat) and let that sit (but only briefly). Then, I added in orange & green peppers (which I had handily cut up beforehand) and let those sautee for a spell. (Mmm...delicious sauteeing...)

After the peppers had cooked for a bit (and also after having flipped the steaks a couple of times) I added in some diced tomatos & sprinkled in some basil & oregano. (Mmm...delicious sprinkling...)

I let everything cook a bit longer until the veggies were tender but still slightly firm & the steak was only slightly rare (which is the way I like it, okay people???). Then I sat down to eat, after sampling a pepper (or two) and giving a pepper to my mom to sample too. (Mmm...delicious moms...er...no, I mean: Mmmm....delicious samples...)

And I ATE it! I DID! And it was TASTY!

And I'm still smiling smugly at my sauteeing ability (even though it's hardly anything to crow about) and feeling vaguely empowered. Cooking will do that for you, you know. Ah, yes.

Now for the dishes. DARN.

P.S. I would have included a picture of my minor triumph, but unfortunately, as I mentioned before, it's been et.

All my fears incarnate

I'm done.

I just produced five paragraphs of nonsense that, when read by the admissions folks at various MLS programs, are supposed to produce a feeling of warm fuzziness, of desire to have me come and hang with them for awhile, a desire to have me give them money, (or rather to borrow a large sum of money which I will then give to them), a desire to let me sit in as faculty members lecture about how cool it is to be a librarian.

Except that I can't help feeling that those five paragraphs of nonsense are really that--nonsensical--and that I have a snowball's chance in Phoenix of making it into these schools.

Dang it.

So, I will save this little five paragraph essay of My Career Objectives and How I Really Really want you to let me into this program because I CAN become a good librarian, I CAN, and I WILL if you just give me a chance oh please oh please just let me in, please please, and then I will go back to it and (maybe) rip it apart and start over. Except that I'm really, really tired of thinking about this, and so I'm tempted to just tatter it. A little. And then...email it to everyone I can think of it so they can review it and tell me that it's mostly okay but this paragraph just needs a little bit of work and couldn't you use a different word here that doesn't rhyme with 'orange' and shouldn't you have capitalized the beginning of the sentence and I think maybe you have a snowball's chance in Seattle which is slightly better than its chance in Phoenix.

I'm just afraid that they'll say 'No,' y'know? I'm just sitting here wondering what I would do if this school that I feel drawn to does NOT feel drawn to me and I'm left to wander as a school-less librarian wannabe for the rest of my life. Not that there aren't other schools, and not that I'm unlikely to be accepted to ALL of them... It's just hard to face the possibility that you might not get what you really really want.

And I really really want this.

Really.

Cleaning out the junk

From where I sit perched on my bed (or rather slouched on my bed) the space to my left is remarkably clean & neat while the space to my right is cluttered & dusty.

I had the worthy goal today of doing a blitz on my room, leaving the whole thing sparkly clean & smelling faintly of pine sol, but I really only got to half of it. Well, actually, more like a quarter of it. But, because that quarter is currently looking so darn good, I'm not going to dwell to much on my failings. (The room is 1/4 clean, not 3/4 messy, after all.)

What always slows me down in the cleaning process is my tendency to pause over papers I'm going through. I almost never am able to grab a stack & then uncerimoniously dump it without first filing through each sheet to read what I've written there.

For instance, today I found several old letters from Cathy written within a year, I think, of when I moved from California. Holy schnikes, were we into Post Scripts! And, I could reiterate all the crushes she listed for my reading pleasure, but I will refrain. *Wink, wink!*

I also spent a lot of time going through my mission papers. I had notes saved from all my MTC classes & I still have every single letter anybody wrote to me on my mission. (They're still all hanging out in plastic bags. I'm going to put them all in a binder (or two) but for now, they'll languish in a bin under my bed until the next 3-day weekend.) I also went through binders full of stuff, papers talking about strategies to teach people I vaguely remember, and the precious written testimonies of the couple I helped teach in my second area who have (against all odds) remained strong in the faith.

I found pictures from high school and my freshman & sophmore years of college (in which I wore this really awful black cap a lot) and I couldn't help thinking that I've really done a poor job of keeping in contact with the people I knew then, and most of what was important to me during those days has faded into the back of my mind now.

It was kind of strange--I was remembering being someone that I just am not anymore, and it threw me off a little. I wondered if I had stayed true to myself, if I had changed and left the old me completely behind, or if I'd just made some improvements (and necessarily a few setbacks). I hope it's mostly the latter, although I felt a distinct feeling of disconnection from my previous self, almost as if I were reviewing the life of someone else entirely.

And, while I'm completely caught up in the hopes & fears of today, I wonder what the me of 10 or 15 years from now will think of the me today?

I hope she'll like me.

I hope I'll like her.

I want to be cool like that!

I've been clicking & clicking & clicking on the "Next Blog" link there at the top of the blogger pages, and I've noticed one very important thing:

All the cool blogs have a picture of Einstein.

Not wanting to be outdone, here you go:

So. Now I am a cool blogger too.

(And not at all influenced by a desire to conform to societal norms. Oh, no. Not me.)

All the things to love

I'm not sure why, but I think the most extraordinary part of a newborn is his or her fingernails. It always strikes me with wonder when I see them, and I'm not sure why they should be more amazing to me than their hair, eyes, cheeks or knees. But they are.

My nephew has fingernails. They're lovely. And so is he.

I'm an auntie! Again!

It's true! It's true! He's finally here! We've waited months & months and now he's finally finally out, here in the air with the rest of us.

My little sister's little baby was born this morning, probably while I was on the phone with that one customer with the broken ribbon container, weighing in at a hefty 8lbs, 11 oz. He's 21 inches long and apparently has a conical head at the moment which, considering his last 12 hours or so, is hardly surprising.

We're just about to go meet him, so I have to be brief...

But I'm happy. Really, really happy.