Flashbacks

I was deleting a ton of old pictures today, and came across some pleasant memories in the out-of-order scramble from my two flip phones.  I'm so grateful for the ability to snap pictures almost any time so I can preserve so many moments.  And there is so much, still, that I can never capture.  Life is so beautiful!

Beautifying the rubbish cans.

The summer of Free Inspiration tins that I left all over the place, inspired by Dale.  I have a box full of empty tins that are ready to be filled and decorated and deposited when the weather comes 'round again!  Who's in for some inspiration making parties?

Cali

Lovely puddles on a day I took my AP class to the park to do a walking meditation.

Self explanatory.

From when I had long hairs-- I like how the natural highlights look.  

Jonah meets his first rambutan, because I felt obligated to introduce my kids to real Thai food when I could find it. 

Mints!  Long hair!

One of the most unreasonable requests I have ever EVER seen.

This picture we found of really excited kids with potatoes... which we gifted to my parents for their anniversary.  

A really disturbing statue.

My sport cards, Care Bears, and pager?!?

My epic grace resulted in tea on my dress on the way to Lucy's wedding.

I like this string's view kite shot.

Dad.  I love my dad. 

Me and Joe in the park.

Maternity leave glory days.

Emilia downtown for Ralph's graduation.

Our Easter pumpkin.

More victories of maternity leave-- mud jumping park adventures!

My little boy.

Emilia

And again a few weeks old.

Me and Em in Bangkok-- first night with a legit shower in two weeks!

Compassion incarnate, brought to you by Parma.

Home is where the stranglers live.

Nursing.

My only NFL game so far.  I was transfixed with this spider on this guy's hat.

And the sport game.  That was also very exciting.  And the yelling.  And the cold. 

Three giant metal letter that, according to Dar, were FREE, but that I did not steal.  Alas.

Concert makeup!

A proud day for my car.

One of a great many four leaf clover pictures

A fantastic place to hear an orchestra play, if you have to sneak around security at an Ivy League school, break into the backstage, leave notes in a bunch of instrument cases, and hide out behind the orchestra.   Very cool experience.

Jones gets a serenade. 

And his excellent newborn hair shortly after it started falling out.

Lots of pictures of picnics.  This one, with fresh flowers, on the hood of my car in the school parking lot.

I left some for someone else to find.

=)

Most human looking sheep ever.

Preggo belly, wine, cookin'.  Lots of these kinds of pictures, too.

Jellies!!!!

And lots of magic front porch pictures.

A cool graffito.

More picnics.

Walking with my girl.  

Vantage points

Some of my favorite vantage points from the weekend:

My swallow's nest o' grading.  

Fantastic snow drifts that looked like river bottoms when I was walking through frozen tundras between Great Clips and Giant Eagle.

And tonight's good company, brought to you by "Helen's a sucker for graphic design."

Scraps

"Mommy." she said with absolute force like the word was a decision, "I have a ca-razy idea and I know you're going to love it because you're crazy."

There is much value in watching good movies over and over.  They become like barometers against which you can measure your state of mind.  We watched Frozen tonight and, in between balancing Nora and the 2.5 foot tall dinosaur stuffed animal she insisted on cuddling, and reading all her little books to her, I was able to notice which parts of the movie tugged at me in the person I am on this night.

I think about the father and his insistence on concealment.  What a foolish king!  And how much the concealment of the powers created the fear that made the powers harder to control.  I just thought about how hiding what we perceive as our problems creates so much anxiety and stagnation.  We can't learn our way through something if we try to bury it.  Maybe it hurts and we break stuff.  And maybe the badness doesn't go away, but we also won't be able to uncover any goodness, because everyone knows our strengths and weaknesses are closely intertwined.  Elsa didn't learn that love was the key to thawing the kingdom until after she let her freeze powers just go freely and flow out of her.

Tonight was the first time, I think, that the scene at the end of "Do You Want to Build a Snowman" when both sisters are sitting against opposite sides of the same door choked me up.  Usually it's the part where the parents' ship goes down, but I sailed (ha) through that part just fine.  No, it was the sisters hurting near each other but not with each other that made me feel that tightness in my throat.  I felt so bad for Anna, who kept returning to the same closed door for years on end.

And I haven't been able to figure out who I most identify with in this movie until tonight.  But it's definitely Kristoff.  Because my reindeer and I were adopted by a bunch of small boulders, but I never really put the connection together before.  This is why rewatching is so important!

Finally, I have been wanting to write a lot of more academic essays-- for example about how sports' function is closer to art than pure competition, or about how relevant this satirical essay from 1711 is today and why.  The idea of the "blanks of society" and all... When can I take a sabbatical year and write all the writes and make all the makes?!  Ha.  Guess I'll just have to be choosier about where I sink my time in the meanwhile.  As long as the ideas keep coming, too, I know I'll feel okay.  It just adds to that itchiness, though, you know?

Inclement Weather

Sometimes it's inside and outside.

I hauled our beautiful Christmas tree out to the front yard in my pajamas and slippers, with minimal needlemess thanks to clever planning.  #likeaboss

So tired.  So tired.

"I'm walking to New Orleans...
No use for you to cry,
I'll see you bye and bye.
'Cause I'm walkin' to New Orleans...
I've no time for talkin'
I've got to keep on walkin' [awesome]"

Stuck and Itchy

This is no night for grading essays.

This is a night for low light and music like Cosmo Sheldrake's playlist, which I'm only two songs into, but I trust the rest will be good too.

Winter is when this feeling comes upon me most strongly.



This is a night for pumping legs on the swings til my hands burn and smell like rust and I fling myself skyward and burst into sparks.

This is a night for drifting slowly back to earth and falling asleep in a field near a thicket of birch trees.

This is an electric snow night.  A red cheeks glow night.

This is a night to ache with being alive.

This is a heavy footfalls cracking through the top layer of snow that was semi-melted in this afternoon's sun and has refrozen now, so that it kafrumps kafrumps with each step night.

This is a night to wake up with a whiskey voice without having had a drop.



I will twist and pull my hair and pin it to my scalp in vile configurations and relish the discomfort of it.

 And I will grade these damn essays.

Mixes

I wrote this yesterday and it didn't post for some reason:

Made my first mix in way too long.  Feels hecka good. 

If you can figure out which song the toddlerly misheard lyrics "boog it in, right dere right dere/ are you compta bowl, right dere right dere" go with, you win a special prize.

Making mixes for the kids dancing requires a different approach than making a mix for another person.  You have to play with the momentum so it's crazy early on and then starts calming down so the back half of the disk allows everyone to mellow out.

And it was a success:  it resulted in a pretty brutal table crash and head injury by track five.

I took the tinsel off the tree tonight, but first I took some pictures of the glowy goodness:

"Walking to New Orleans" by Fats Domino makes me feel some type of way.   And by that, I mean I start to get a lump in my throat.  Those pizzicato strings holding rhythm like tip toes... 

The accusation that I am not grateful fills me with a sort of aggressive gratitude.  If you've never experienced aggressive gratitude, I recommend it.  

So here are some slices of life whose praises I sing tonight:

Shallots, who make my artichoke, smoked fish, balsamic white pizza just that extra level of delicious.

My fresh herbs, because while they do not exist right now, when I make a pizza like that and know that it would be soooo good with some fresh basil too, I feel grateful that in a few more months I'll have fresh basil all over the place.

(Can you be grateful for something that hasn't happened yet?  Stupid question.  The answer is YES).

My gloves with mitten flip tops, whose colors perfectly match my high school gloves and whose rainbowiness I do so enjoy.

Doing laundry.  It's my favorite chore by far (probably because it's the easiest and one of the most sensual-- smells, textures, temperatures, colors!)

The little tags on my sheets that say "side" and "top/bottom" because when I see "top/bottom" I have to mentally recite all of the flavor pairs of quarks.  It's become a bit of an OCD thing, but I'm fairly certain reciting quark flavors is a harmless manifestation.  

I miss physics.  Probably forgot almost everything, but I miss learning about it and playing with the ideas and the names.  I like the words in physics and chemistry.  Centrifuge, velocity, Semi-micro qualitative analysis, titration, and so forth.  Biology didn't light me on fire, except for adenosine triphosphate.  Pop!

So I'm saying I'm grateful for physics.  And quarks.  And string theory.  And for the parts of Elegant Universe that I read and for Golden Charlie for recommending it and for Golden Charlie for finishing it.  

I'm thankful for great books.  Like Carter Beats the Devil.  It's been sitting beside my bed for two weeks waiting for me to transcribe the rest of my favorite lines, but there are so many that I have shied away from that task.  What a delightful problem to have!

I'm thankful for unimpressively written, chatty girl books because they make me feel less embarrassed about my own writing.  

I'm thankful for Pablo Neruda.  I like things that confuse me when they stay on a piece of paper... but not so much when they can stare me in the face. 

OH, and I may have started a new song addiction.  Listened 4 times in 20 minutes... So I'm grateful for that, too!

Break's Over Already!?

Well that was a doozy of a two week period of time.  Holy Smokes.

We don't need to talk about everything, but I know I'm going to miss all my time with the kids, especially Nora because she needs me the most and so we interact so much more closely during a day.

I'm also going to miss Emilia's "manicures" which involve:
her taking away my tea or coffee so I don't spill it
giving me a photo album to read while I am pampered
lotion on my hands and arms
followed by hand sanitizer on my hands
lotion on my face
sparkle powder on my face
hand sanitizer on my legs
and in between each of my toes, one drop at a time
lotion on my legs and, if I'm lucky, my feet,
and finally, gingerbread hand sanitizer on my stomach.
All over my stomach.

And then she usually asks me to rub lotion on her hands and arms and legs and feet, which I do until it gets too ticklish.

Just think how unsanitary my abdomen is going to be all week without these spa treatments!  Terrible.  But my hands have gotten softer.

I'm not ready to teach again yet.  But at the same time I'm kind of pumped for it.  For being on stage again and the constant motion.  For the fast talk and the laughter.

But not for five am. Or for no opportunity to nap.  I need to start drafting out my dream job.... heh.