To prepare for the Panic! At The Disco show, Meredith volunteered to cut over a thousand paper hearts. Last night our family joined a handful of others around the stadium who passed out hearts and explained their purpose to anyone within reach.
“When the band plays Girls/Girls/Boys, shine your light through the heart to show your love. We’re going to fill the stadium with light!”
Many of the people who took our hearts knew exactly what they were for. A few didn’t know, but were excited to participate. (A few more thought we were selling something, so they quickened their step while staring into the distance.)
My favorite:
A boy who looked to be 17ish approached me and asked for a heart. When I handed one over, he said, “Thank you. I’m gay!”
The result of the heart cutting efforts?
A stadium rainbow that nearly drove me to tears.
Like holding up lighters, but with a clever dash of politics.
(My camera isn’t the best for photos, and doesn’t even come close to capturing the rainbow.)
I love that my kids listen to good music.
I love even more that they’re getting their activist feet wet. ‘ ‘ ‘text/javascript’>
I had a six month check-in with my migraine doctor this morning.
Doctor B: How are the headaches?
Me: They would be better if I started doing yoga again.
Doctor B: How about your mood?
Me: It would be better if I started doing yoga again.
Doctor B: Is there a reason why you haven’t been practicing yoga?
Me: For the past several months I’ve been unfocused and blergh and pppffffffff.
I walked away with four prescriptions: One for yoga, one for meditation, one for mindfulness, and one for research into the AHA guidelines for aerobic exercise. She said too many of her patients believe yoga/meditation/mindfulness is just a bunch of crazy voodoo wizardry, and those are the ones who tend to reMAIN PAINed in the CRAAAAYNium. Anyway? I’m all in, and I’ll go back in three months with Birkenstocks, a shaved head, and a sore throat from singing my sorcerous circus incantations.
What else? I’ve got some sloppy spinning going on:
Also, I’ve made a little more progress on my Lucca:
Not a Memoir It was a Sunday night, and ten or more of us were sitting in the front room of the rented house we called 210. We gathered there weekly to watch The Simpsons and decompress before the week began. The topic of prison came up (as it sometimes does) and he made us laugh when he said he could never go to prison because he didn’t look good in orange. We stopped laughing an hour later when the police came to the door and arrested him for something having to do with a bad check. The only one of us who had money decided to let our arrested friend stew at the police station a bit to teach him a lesson. We took a vote and decided that three hours in jail was sufficient, because it would give us more than enough time to order pizza.
I watched the presidential inauguration with a friend who was wearing a neck gaiter. When I complimented her gaiter, she showed me how it can be worn twelve ways. Miracle gaiter! I immediately shifted my focus away from the inauguration (not a difficult shift) and toward my phone where I logged in at Amazon and went gaiter shopping. This is the gaiter I purchased and I love it. Yes, I love my gaiter, yet I still haven’t worn it outside of the house.
On Monday as I sat in the pickup line at school, I studied my (still and always growing!) hair in the rear view mirror.
“Although I haven’t worn my gaiter outside of the house, I believe I need ANOTHER gaiter,” I said to myself, “to wear when the wind is blowing and I need to remind myself that I’m still alive.” Because most of my clothes are black I decided to go with a black gaiter with white dots, AND I decided to immediately stop using the word Gaiter and start using the word Headband.
Later that evening, I put on my Delhi headband and went to Harper’s room.
Me: Harper, I know YOU would not wear this, but is it okay on me?
Harper: No.
Me: Why do you say no?
Harper: It’s fine if you don’t leave the house.
Meredith: It just looks like you’re trying to be young again.
The black and white headband arrived on Wednesday. I took it out of the envelope, put it on my head, and asked Instagram to give me a quick and honest Yes/No vote.
Everyone on Instagram (where Everyone = The People I Allow Into My Mostly Filtered World) voted Yes.
I’ve been keeping a written journal of college/high school/childhood memory blurbs, and this morning I thought it might be fun to occasionally share some of those entries over here. (To the people in my past who are now nervous: I’ll be using gender specific pronouns, but never names.) Let me know if you like these or don’t like these and I’ll probably keep putting them up anyway because this is MY house.
Here goes.
It was hot and it was humid but most importantly, it was dark. We were walking from a friend’s house back to my dormitory when she suggested that we take off our shirts and walk the remaining few blocks in just our bras and jeans. The streetlights were fairly dim and we hadn’t seen a car in several minutes, so off went the shirts. Less than five minutes later, a car pulled up and stopped when it reached us. It was a carload of friends from the band and we carried on a ten minute conversation during which no one mentioned that we were walking the streets with our shirts in our hands.
Spring break came and went without any trips or hiccups. People stayed over. Movies were seen. IKEA was explored. Falafel was eaten with friends. Jeff saw Son Volt. I drank a beer and ate cheesecake with a pregnant friend (she did NOT drink beer. put your eyebrows back down.).
Meredith woke me at midnight to tell me she was going to bed. She held her phone as a flashlight in one hand and her Bible in the other.
Meredith: I’m going to bed. Good night.
Me: What’s with the Bible and the light?
Meredith: Oh. I watched a few too many ghost videos on YouTube and I’m freaking out a little, so I figured I’m safe with the Bible. Unless the Bible could serve as a ghost portal.
Me: Shit! Do you think…?
Meredith: I know. I don’t know!
This morning on the way to school we talked about high crimes and misdemeanors and our discussion eventually twisted and whirled until we were wondering how many homeless people spent time in medical school and how you can never assume that someone lacks skills or is uneducated or unwilling to bend or learn until you know their full story.
I started reading The Idiot on Saturday, and I’m IN. Definitely recommended. I’ve been reading quite a bit lately (The Nix was incredible. The Family Fang was very much okay.), because I’m trying to figure out my ratio of reader to writer. I went to a writing group a few weeks ago, and I sat at a table with some talented writers who were WRITING. Meanwhile, I sat with a notebook and scribbled out some lines about how I had just eaten my first bit of cream cheese brioche and was feeling sad about the 46 years I spent NOT eating my first bit of cream cheese brioche. I’ve been challenging myself lately. (These challenges have nothing to do with brioche.)
“Moreover, my policy at the time was that, when confronted by two courses of action, one should always choose the less conservative and more generous. I thought this was tantamount to a moral obligation for anyone who had any advantages at all, and especially for anyone who wanted to be a writer.”
-Elif Batuman, “The Idiot” ‘ ‘ ‘text/javascript’>
Amy Krouse Rosenthal died last Monday at the age of 51 and her death was a punch to my gut and to my head and to my heart, so I did a little bit of this:
Ah, but then I grabbed a few of these:
And then I made this list:
This was one of my favorite moments of the week:
It’s the first time both dogs napped lion and lamblike on my leg. Jeff on guitar and Chris Hayes on the television? Bonus.
This was the best sentence I read on Wednesday:
This:
is going to grow up to look like this:
Graham is completely done with me dicking around and acting sad:
He says (that) he can’t eat hummus at the new place down the road but (that) he encourages me to live out his dream, so I declared (that) yesterday had become Take Your Wife Out to Lunch Day, and Jeff was in:
Look at these middle school kids performing James and the Giant Peach:
Let’s all start feeling a little more like the middle school kids. Hands up and out and heads high and take a knee so we can see the people behind you. (I’ll always be behind you.) ((Figuratively.)) ‘ ‘ ‘text/javascript’>
Question From People Who Probably Mean Well: So, what have you been up to since Jeff’s position was eliminated? Walking in the open wind? Talking like lovers do? Do you want to dive into the ocean? Is it raining with you?
Answer: Actually, Jeff has been taking classes and networking and searching out new positions, and I’ve been eating. A lot. A HELL of a lot. And not moving around very much. Not moving around at all. Two years ago I lost 20 pounds with the help and encouragement of an amazing health coach and it felt great and I felt healthy and: All 20 of those pounds (plus a few more) have found their way back to me in the past seven months.
Lesson: If you can’t eat Oreos in moderation, just stay away from the damned Oreos. The same goes for Doritos and bread and bean burritos and Panera Gluten-free Monster Cookies and anything that might be wrapped in plastic and infused with chemicals. This shouldn’t be difficult!
My Fitbit sits in the corner (on my wrist, because I’m in the corner knitting and/or eating Oreos) and sobs because she thought she was a fitness tool and now she’s having a bit of an identity crisis.
A few weeks back I talked to my health coach (and friend) on the phone, and she told me that stress makes your body crave carbs. Sadly, the stress hasn’t led me to yearn for the spiced lentils that I always keep in the fridge.
My clothes don’t fit. Like, it hurts to wear some of my clothes. Also, I might put your eye out with the button on my jeans if I don’t make some immediate changes.
(I can’t/won’t buy new clothes.)
Worst of all? I don’t feel healthy. I know people of all shapes and sizes who feel healthy exactly where they are. That’s what I want.
AND, do you know what’s funny? Nothing. Nothing is funny. (I’m exaggerating. A few things are very funny. Stop what you’re doing right now and read The Nix. Also, check out the audio version for when you’re driving. It’s a masterpiece.)
Oh, you guys. Jeff’s birthday was two days ago and one of his ex-authors sent us four jar cupcakes from Wicked Good Cupcakes to celebrate the day. Last night I dove into The Wicked Good Cupcake. It’s peanut butter and chocolate chips baked and layered with peanut butter frosting and chocolate ganache. My tongue was completely stretched out to reach the bottom of that cupcake jar. In fact, if that jar was a boy on prom night (and I gave my consent and I wasn’t the current me, but an earlier version of myself), what I did to it probably would have led to me being pregnant right now.
You know that my relationship with food is tricky. I could tell you stories that would shock (and eventually bore) you. Ugh.
I know what I need to do and because of my health coaching from two years back, I know how to do it and I just NEED to do it and stop treating myself the way I would NEVER treat others. And I’m NOT being all WOE IS ME! with my hand against my forehead. Instead, I’m more like ENOUGH, DAMNIT! (In other words, I’m not in need of kind words.)
I’m putting this here not because it has anything to do with anything. It’s just that I’ve always loved it and I think you’ll love it and let’s all have a good weekend.
Harper received a bath bomb for Christmas, and she finally got around to using it early last week. The bomb was bright blue and covered in sparkly gold glitter and as it dissolved in the tub, more glitter released itself and pretty soon we started receiving calls to see if our tub was interested in being the primary location for the sequel to a well-known Mariah Carey movie.
(I think I’ve made it very clear that if Mariah Carey was hungry, I would feed her. BUT, she is not to come within 100 feet of my house.)
We wiped the tub with a big beach towel. We then shook the towel outside to release the glitter. We then threw the towel into the washing machine with the other towels and it soon made its way into the dryer and was then folded and placed in the closet with the rest of its extended towel family.
Last Friday morning I found myself in a Catholic church parking lot waiting for my dad to arrive so we could attend the funeral service for my childhood neighbor. As I fiddled around with my phone, I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror. Glitter. In my hair. On my face. On my dress sleeve. Apparently, I had dried off with the glitter towel after my shower, and disco gear is traditionally inappropriate for a funeral but it was the powdery glitter that can’t just be swept/blown away, so I had to take a deep breath and let it be, knowing that if anyone questioned my shimmer I could smile and whisper, “I’m here to deliver Charlie home.” (I really need to throw a set of angel wings into my trunk just in case.)
Luckily, the stained glass in the church blocked the sun and the funeral service was the perfect combination of lovely and sad and my dad and I went out for brunch afterwards where we talked about Charlie and our memories of him. He was a beagle breeder when I was a kid, and he would often invite us over to see the puppies. He cut his grass at least three times each week. He had a dog named Max who would come over for a cheese sandwich every day when I arrived home from work. (Max was later killed in our front yard by a pack of wild dogs on the evening of November 5, 1996 while I sat 30 miles away watching Toy Story as Bill Clinton beat Bob Dole in the presidential election and good God, life is weird, isn’t it?) ‘ ‘ ‘text/javascript’>
A habit I need to break is my frequent use of the word Dude. However, I’m going to wait a bit (maybe 450 words or so) to completely squash it because it has come in handy lately to lighten a few potentially tough blows.
For example: “Because our insurance changed this morning, a prescription that would have cost $50 yesterday may cost over $200 today.”
Tough, right?
NOW, read it THIS way: “DUDE! Because our insurance changed this morning, a prescription that would have cost $50 yesterday may cost over $200 today.”
Slightly better, right? (Also: IT’S A TRUE STORY.) 2017 is 1/6 of the way over, and I guess that’s good. Four hours is 1/6 of the day, so we’re sort of at four in the morning on this year, and didn’t Night Ranger sing a song about Four in the Morning? (They did.) 2017 hasn’t been my favorite.
Please know that I just listened to the Night Ranger song and I knew every single word. It’s interesting how my brain holds lyrics from the 80s, but it can’t retain the code to open our garage door from the outside.
Dude. Why do I have to spend time trying to track down a box from Thailand that’s filled with tiny Styrofoam balls? (Answer: Because Harper is making slime and she wants texture, so she ordered tiny Styrofoam balls. From Thailand. AND, I was supposed to sign for it but I didn’t make it to the door in time and are you still reading about the tiny balls? I love you.)
Dude. I have a friend who performs KIDNEY TRANSPLANTS, yet I’m having a hard time stirring up the energy to drive to the store for walnuts. It’s a five minute drive that I could probably do with my eyes closed. In fact, I believe I will. Later. Maybe.
Dude. Did you know that kids with lice are no longer required to stay home from school until there is no evidence of lice?! Apparently, hitting the school district attendance goal is more important than controlling a potentially wanderlusting gaggle of blood-sucking vermin.
I woke up on Sunday morning and felt an undeniable urge to knit an Obama washcloth. I drove to church, stood up in front of the congregation to read a few passages, mispronounced the word Clothes as Clowthes, forgot to ask God to help us find truth and guidance in these words (it’s a thing we do), sat back down feeling like a real jerk, ran out the side door when the service ended, drove to a craft dump for cheap cotton yarn, and before the Oscars were over, I had this guy on my chest. (I followed a pattern. I’m not a wizard.)
Dude.
AND with that, I believe I’ve now duded enough. It’s like when you decide to quit smoking after smoking four back to back packs of Camels. Or when you drink a little too much tequila and you end up throwing up and then you never want to see another bottle of tequila. (And this is where I would say something like “Been There, Done That” but that’s even more overdone than Dude.)
Today begins Lent. I’m not taking anything away. Instead, I’m giving. (You can click on the 40 Acts box up and to the right if you’re curious.) ‘ ‘ ‘text/javascript’>
At first I thought writing texts by hand would be fun, but then I quickly realized that it wasn’t and then I started thinking about the space I’m taking up in my friends’ phones, and what a horrible idea this is. (Except that it isn’t, but really it is.) Anyway, before I kicked off the experiment, I decided to create several standard messages that I tend to use fairly often when I’m texting so that I didn’t have to grab a notebook for every tiny bit of communication.
Let me just pause right here to tell you that my photo editing fallback (Aviary on Flickr) has been down for something like 43 days now (I’m exaggerating by 39 days) and if only I could fix the white balance on these photos… But I CANNOT.
(Someday soon we’ll talk about what a lazy eater I’ve been lately. It’s almost like I’m punishing myself. But why?)
Also, this is yet another reason why I know I’m at the right church:
As you know, I own this shirt.
(I’ve never worn it to church mainly because of the line that refers to grabbing.)
Earlier this week, I noticed that the church Facebook account proudly posted this pulpit pic.
