Today I celebrate the 31st continuous day of blogging, and there is truly no better topic for today than this one. It is not just an eye catcher, dear readers. It is true. I got hit on. Before I divulge the scandalous details, however, I have to say that my husband knows about the incident and even has thoughts about what God is trying to tell me through the experience.
I have fallen, again (July is over....it was Water Only July...this is now August), into the habit of stopping at a gas station every day on my way to work and buying a can of Coke as well as, sometimes, a 33cent bag of Lay's BBQ chips. It truly is the breakfast of champions! I pretty much stop at the same gas station every day because it is convenient, they have cans (my preferred mode of Coke delivery), and they have 33cent bags of chips (cheaper and smaller portion sizes). While I could blog until I am blue in the face about the negative effects of Coke on my life, that really is beside the point here. In addition, I realize that a piece of fruit would satisfy me more than the bag of chips; however, again, that is beside the point.
So - for the past month on weekdays, I have frequented - almost daily - the same gas station. The same person is attending the gas station every day; I have made the assumption that this man is the owner, but I could be wrong. Being outgoing and polite, I greet this man when I enter the store; he responds in kind. This has repeated itself several times in the past month. I probably had stopped there some in the spring and early summer (before July) as well, but I have been to work now pretty solidly for the past three weeks.
Looking back on the month with the lenses of a post-hit-on moment, I recall some events that could have predicted yesterday's "hit" and may even realize that today is not the first actual "hit." One such incident occurred a few weeks back. I had collected all of the change that I could find on my side of the bedroom, had combined that with the change in my car, and had placed it all in my back pocket. When it was time to pay, I struggled with getting the change out of my back pocket. The gas station attendant had offered - what I thought was innocently - to help me get the money out of my back pocket. I had laughed off the incident.
Early in the week last week, we exchanged pleasantries, he asked my name, I told him, I asked him his name, and he told me. I saw this as completely innocent at the time, but now I am super glad that we had remained on a first name basis.
And then yesterday.
It went just like any other day. I walked in, said hello, headed to the cooler to grab my Coke, walked over to the chips to get my chips, and then stopped to pay before heading out the door to work.
But then it went differently.
I had placed my phone on the counter so that I could get the money out of my pocket.
He said, "I like your phone."
Smiling, I said, "Thank you; I like it too."
Then he said, "I would like to call it sometime." Or it could have been, "I would to know the number." Or it might have been, "I would like it to call me sometime." It's really hard to say!
Well, HELLO! I did not see that coming!
Thankfully I regained my senses quickly enough to make some comment about how my husband and I are happily married and that he might have something to say about that. I tried to laugh the whole thing off, and he said, "Well, he is a lucky man."
I called Kerry right away and told him the whole story.
I was sort of shaken by this event. I was not sure how to feel, how to react, and how to think. I am 37 years old; I have no idea if someone has ever hit on me! This was so out there, so obvious...so uncommon for me. For a minute, I was flattered. And the next minute, I felt wrong - almost dirty. After I got off the phone with Kerry, I started to analyze any event that I could remember to see if I had somehow brought this on or if I had misled this man to thinking I wasn't married. But I could not think of anything that I would have done to make this happen.
In a way, it was sort of comical. I think that is where I am right now. The whole thing was just sort of funny. I told co-workers about it in the afternoon, and we had a good laugh. The reason I told them about it was because I had lost my phone at that point. This is funny too! I had gone into the ladies' restroom before a meeting because another co-worker had told me that I had a spot of white dust on the back of my pants. When I came out, I could not find my phone. I went nuts - all of my contacts are in there, five email accounts, etc. I even ran out to my car! During the meeting, a co-worker showed me the phone through the window. I was so relieved that she had not toyed with me and kept it from me!
Back to being hit on...
Of course, Kerry has his take on why this happened. While I was recounting the events to him over the phone as I sped away from the gas station post-event, he listened intently.
I said, "Now I can't go there anymore!"
His response: Maybe this is God's way of telling you to stop drinking Coke.
Wednesday, August 31, 2011
Tuesday, August 30, 2011
Something is Better Than Nothing
I would love to be able to report that yesterday morning at 6 a.m. I woke up ready to conquer the new exercise regime.
That was not the case.
The plan for this week, because Beth is still gone, was for us to walk the dog together for about 30 minutes each day this week. We will then conquer the gym starting next week. That had always been the plan. Yesterday morning came, and - although we had gone to bed early enough to get 8-9 hours of sleep - I was so tired! I reset the alarm for 6:30. And then I reset it for 7:00. Feeling completely defeated, I pulled myself out of bed and thought, "Well - that's that." I had every intention on Sunday evening of getting up and doing what I had said I would do, but Monday morning at 6 a.m. was just not kind to me.
I could have just given up completely at that point. All of the usual overwhelming self-doubting thoughts crashed in on me. You are never going to exercise. This is the way it always is - make a plan and then drop it. You can't stick to any commitment. You are never going to get this right. You are doomed to be out of shape, unhealthy, blah blah blah. Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah...blah blah blah.
Instead I thought that something was better than nothing. I hooked up the dog to his leash and headed out the door. Although I did not walk for 30 minutes due to needing to get in to the office, I did a great loop - the dog was happy.
Something is better than nothing.
That was not the case.
The plan for this week, because Beth is still gone, was for us to walk the dog together for about 30 minutes each day this week. We will then conquer the gym starting next week. That had always been the plan. Yesterday morning came, and - although we had gone to bed early enough to get 8-9 hours of sleep - I was so tired! I reset the alarm for 6:30. And then I reset it for 7:00. Feeling completely defeated, I pulled myself out of bed and thought, "Well - that's that." I had every intention on Sunday evening of getting up and doing what I had said I would do, but Monday morning at 6 a.m. was just not kind to me.
I could have just given up completely at that point. All of the usual overwhelming self-doubting thoughts crashed in on me. You are never going to exercise. This is the way it always is - make a plan and then drop it. You can't stick to any commitment. You are never going to get this right. You are doomed to be out of shape, unhealthy, blah blah blah. Blah blah blah blah blah blah blah...blah blah blah.
Instead I thought that something was better than nothing. I hooked up the dog to his leash and headed out the door. Although I did not walk for 30 minutes due to needing to get in to the office, I did a great loop - the dog was happy.
Something is better than nothing.
Monday, August 29, 2011
Changing My Ways
When I started blogging again on August 1 and committed to blogging every day, I envisioned that I would sit down at the computer every day and pour out whatever prose came from the top of my head. As the name of my blog insinuates, there are times when my mind races, and I needed an outlet to slow the mind, catch the thoughts, record them, and share them. What I have found over the course of the past twenty plus days is that thoughts tend to be tied to images. As I go through my day, I think,"Oh, I should blog about that..." about twenty times. The thought that typically follows that one is, "I should take a picture to remind me and to share on my blog."Cell phones are a fabulous companion as most of them have cameras on them. Over the past few weeks, though, I have found the limitations on my Blackberry annoying. I want to share better images. I want to see the images as I did when I was there.
I want to capture the memories better.
When I wrote that last sentence, part of me wants to look in the mirror and be sure that I am still me. Who is this person?
The person who has poo-pooed (is that how we spell that? well, it is now!) scrapbooking and memory books wants to capture memories better?
Who am I and who stole the old me?
In order to better capture the images around me, we have purchased a new camera for my use.
I am so excited!
Sunday, August 28, 2011
6 a.m. Tomorrow Morning
On our way to Village Creek Bible Camp on Friday, Kerry and I had nearly four hours of uninterrupted time to talk to each other. We never run out of things to talk about because we are both talkers. I had left work expecting to be on a conference call for the first hour of our trip, but that did not occur. We found that we had some extra time, and we put it to good use.
We often will use drives to talk through things that we do not seem to be able to get through at other times. When we are both at work, it is hard to talk during the day. In the evenings, items at home call our names - unless we choose to relax, and then who wants to talk through important things?
The most pressing of the items of conversation was our future work out schedule.
Both Kerry and I realize that the quick march toward 40 is not far away, and we both need some "whipping into shape" so that 40 is not the last year that we see. We both realize that medical issues related to lack of exercise and poor diet could shorten our lives together, and we would prefer to spend more time together as opposed to less.
We have already taken advantage of the summer to make some changes in our lives. So far, we have tackled the eating of more fruits and vegetables. I have a massive issue with Wavy Lays potato chips with Heluva (say it this way: He-loo-va) dip. When we have the combination in the house, I will eat an entire bag in a sitting. We have bought those less, and we instead purchased a CSA with some friends from church. Even though we are canceling the "subscription" early due to some issues that we need not mention, I learned that I like fruit. As opposed to being thirsty and craving more as I do when eating chips, I feel hydrated and satisfied when eating fruit. I also think that pluots (a hybrid of plums and apricots) are one of the best things ever made.
A very big item on this list is exercising more. When I signed us up for Snap Fitness in June, our family was very gung-ho about this. However, as the summer went on, the kids were not home. Kerry and I felt, at times, overwhelmed with the day-to-day, trips to camp, trips to visit our families, and - well - more trips to camp. When this was true, our original dedication to the gym waned.
I excused this absence from the gym by saying, "Well, I walk the dog twice a day." While that may have been true back on June 29, to be honest, there have been few days recently that the dog and I walk twice in a day. Although I try very hard to be as faithful to Bagel as Beth, I am not. I even forgot to feed him this morning!
In an effort to make some of these life changes, Kerry and I entered a challenge with some good friends that entailed eating better and increasing exercise. Every two weeks, the losers owe the winners a dinner. We currently owe this couple three dinners. However, the challenge itself has been useful for me as I focused on the exercise part of the challenge. I almost always earned those weekly points!
Kerry and I literally spent an hour or longer working through when we could make it to the gym together at least three times a week. With our two schedules, the "interruptions" of the kids' schedules, and life in general, finding the time to do this together was very difficult. We struggled over this for a long time. As we would think that we had answered the problem, one of us would come up with an exception.
What we have realized is that the important things in life seem to need to be scheduled otherwise they are not a priority. In addition, some things simply will not be accomplished unless they are done before the start of the work day. I have found this to be true with writing this blog. As the day slips away from me with work, laundry, dishes, and driving to camp, the time to blog is lost. Because I have dedicated myself to this task, however, and simply will not allow myself to fail, I have found myself blogging at 11:20 p.m. - a full 2 hours past when I should be asleep.
Because of that, we are both agreeing to another change - an earlier bedtime - to accommodate that we exercise regularly together before the start of the day. We realize that the success of this hinges upon the dedication of both of us agreeing to it and carrying it out. I claim not to be a morning person, but that appears to need a change as my life, quite literally, depends upon it. The later in the day that I schedule this very important change the less likely that I am to follow up on doing it.
6 a.m. tomorrow morning it is.
We often will use drives to talk through things that we do not seem to be able to get through at other times. When we are both at work, it is hard to talk during the day. In the evenings, items at home call our names - unless we choose to relax, and then who wants to talk through important things?
The most pressing of the items of conversation was our future work out schedule.
Both Kerry and I realize that the quick march toward 40 is not far away, and we both need some "whipping into shape" so that 40 is not the last year that we see. We both realize that medical issues related to lack of exercise and poor diet could shorten our lives together, and we would prefer to spend more time together as opposed to less.
We have already taken advantage of the summer to make some changes in our lives. So far, we have tackled the eating of more fruits and vegetables. I have a massive issue with Wavy Lays potato chips with Heluva (say it this way: He-loo-va) dip. When we have the combination in the house, I will eat an entire bag in a sitting. We have bought those less, and we instead purchased a CSA with some friends from church. Even though we are canceling the "subscription" early due to some issues that we need not mention, I learned that I like fruit. As opposed to being thirsty and craving more as I do when eating chips, I feel hydrated and satisfied when eating fruit. I also think that pluots (a hybrid of plums and apricots) are one of the best things ever made.
A very big item on this list is exercising more. When I signed us up for Snap Fitness in June, our family was very gung-ho about this. However, as the summer went on, the kids were not home. Kerry and I felt, at times, overwhelmed with the day-to-day, trips to camp, trips to visit our families, and - well - more trips to camp. When this was true, our original dedication to the gym waned.
I excused this absence from the gym by saying, "Well, I walk the dog twice a day." While that may have been true back on June 29, to be honest, there have been few days recently that the dog and I walk twice in a day. Although I try very hard to be as faithful to Bagel as Beth, I am not. I even forgot to feed him this morning!
In an effort to make some of these life changes, Kerry and I entered a challenge with some good friends that entailed eating better and increasing exercise. Every two weeks, the losers owe the winners a dinner. We currently owe this couple three dinners. However, the challenge itself has been useful for me as I focused on the exercise part of the challenge. I almost always earned those weekly points!
Kerry and I literally spent an hour or longer working through when we could make it to the gym together at least three times a week. With our two schedules, the "interruptions" of the kids' schedules, and life in general, finding the time to do this together was very difficult. We struggled over this for a long time. As we would think that we had answered the problem, one of us would come up with an exception.
What we have realized is that the important things in life seem to need to be scheduled otherwise they are not a priority. In addition, some things simply will not be accomplished unless they are done before the start of the work day. I have found this to be true with writing this blog. As the day slips away from me with work, laundry, dishes, and driving to camp, the time to blog is lost. Because I have dedicated myself to this task, however, and simply will not allow myself to fail, I have found myself blogging at 11:20 p.m. - a full 2 hours past when I should be asleep.
Because of that, we are both agreeing to another change - an earlier bedtime - to accommodate that we exercise regularly together before the start of the day. We realize that the success of this hinges upon the dedication of both of us agreeing to it and carrying it out. I claim not to be a morning person, but that appears to need a change as my life, quite literally, depends upon it. The later in the day that I schedule this very important change the less likely that I am to follow up on doing it.
6 a.m. tomorrow morning it is.
Saturday, August 27, 2011
OUCH!
We had a great time seeing our kids at Village Creek Bible Camp for about 24 hours. We just pulled in, and I need to get this blog post up to fulfill my commitment to blog every day.
At supper tonight, I bit down on a super soft piece of yummy turkey and heard a crack. I slammed my hands down on the table and yelled at everyone sitting around me, "Did you hear that?"
I could tell right away that they did not hear it, and it became obvious rather quickly to me they thought I was a little nuts. I informed them that I thought I cracked my tooth. Using my tongue, I felt around my teeth and discovered a little line on my very back tooth. Shortly thereafter, I pushed on the tooth with my finger, and part of it fell off leaving the inside of the tooth exposed. It is Saturday! My dentist will not be open until Monday!
A good friend (and camp employee) assisted me in a temporary fix. I am a total wimp when it comes to teeth issues, and she handled me quite well - firmly.
Thanks, Sue!
That is all for tonight - this girl is tired from the drive home from camp!
At supper tonight, I bit down on a super soft piece of yummy turkey and heard a crack. I slammed my hands down on the table and yelled at everyone sitting around me, "Did you hear that?"
I could tell right away that they did not hear it, and it became obvious rather quickly to me they thought I was a little nuts. I informed them that I thought I cracked my tooth. Using my tongue, I felt around my teeth and discovered a little line on my very back tooth. Shortly thereafter, I pushed on the tooth with my finger, and part of it fell off leaving the inside of the tooth exposed. It is Saturday! My dentist will not be open until Monday!
A good friend (and camp employee) assisted me in a temporary fix. I am a total wimp when it comes to teeth issues, and she handled me quite well - firmly.
Thanks, Sue!
That is all for tonight - this girl is tired from the drive home from camp!
Friday, August 26, 2011
Dunk Tank!
They dunked me more than 20 times in 30 minutes.
Perhaps I am a glutton for punishment, or it could be that I like to draw attention to myself. It does not really matter what the motivation behind it was; either way I found myself in the dunk tank at my district's annual marketing event last Saturday. Everyone in the district who can works four hours in support of this event so that they can get the day before Thanksgiving off in exchange. It is a great deal. The assistant to the superintendent promotes the dunk tank as an even better deal - work one hour in the dunk tank (half an hour out of tank helping; half an hour in the tank) instead of four hours doing manual labor. This is also a great deal.
What I do not understand is why more people do not do this, why there is not a waiting list of people for the dunk tank, and why - after I finished my shift - two shifts remained unfilled.
I had a blast.
The pictures below, taken by the awesome marketing guru named Jenny Buck, pretty much show exactly that.
[slideshow]
The ironic thing about the fact that I did the dunk tank "as a way to avoid a four hour shift" is that I was there all day anyway. Because I did the 5k in the morning, I saw no reason to leave at 10:15 a.m. only to return for my 12:30 shift.
Honestly, I went in the dunk tank because it is fun. I screamed the whole time, gathered a crowd, made fun of the people throwing balls at me, and even jumped in once because I got spooked. Administrators in the district office came out to see who was screaming because they could hear me through the windows inside the building. There is not another shift that I would have wanted instead.
I already plan to sign up for the tank again next year.
Now I just need to find a wet suit and a lucky hat.
Perhaps I am a glutton for punishment, or it could be that I like to draw attention to myself. It does not really matter what the motivation behind it was; either way I found myself in the dunk tank at my district's annual marketing event last Saturday. Everyone in the district who can works four hours in support of this event so that they can get the day before Thanksgiving off in exchange. It is a great deal. The assistant to the superintendent promotes the dunk tank as an even better deal - work one hour in the dunk tank (half an hour out of tank helping; half an hour in the tank) instead of four hours doing manual labor. This is also a great deal.
What I do not understand is why more people do not do this, why there is not a waiting list of people for the dunk tank, and why - after I finished my shift - two shifts remained unfilled.
I had a blast.
The pictures below, taken by the awesome marketing guru named Jenny Buck, pretty much show exactly that.
[slideshow]
The ironic thing about the fact that I did the dunk tank "as a way to avoid a four hour shift" is that I was there all day anyway. Because I did the 5k in the morning, I saw no reason to leave at 10:15 a.m. only to return for my 12:30 shift.
Honestly, I went in the dunk tank because it is fun. I screamed the whole time, gathered a crowd, made fun of the people throwing balls at me, and even jumped in once because I got spooked. Administrators in the district office came out to see who was screaming because they could hear me through the windows inside the building. There is not another shift that I would have wanted instead.
I already plan to sign up for the tank again next year.
Now I just need to find a wet suit and a lucky hat.
Thursday, August 25, 2011
Blogging on the Slow Mind
On August 1, 2011, I committed to blogging every day. I thought that it would be good for me, that it would ease my racing mind, and that I would capture wonderful metaphors. I am now 25 days into it, and for the past few days my mind has been nothing but slow. There are few thoughts today that actually cross my mind let alone need any finishing in mind.
Three weeks ago I had more thoughts than I could catch or write in a single blog post, and blogging helped me focus. For the past few days that has not been the case. It could be this summer cold, or perhaps this summer cold is actually one of my crash moments after a rather highly productive mini-manic time. It is hard to say. It is certainly hard for me to say. I cannot catch the thought, I cannot analyze it, and I certainly cannot come to a conclusion about it. In fact, what I would like to do is go back to sleep.
Yesterday I went to Minute Clinic to see if I had left the cold long enough to turn into a bacterial sinus infection. The nurse practitioner said that I had not, that I did not qualify ("you poor lady" were her exact words as I described the sinus pressure in all parts of my head) for any sort of intervention on her part, and that a high dose of Sudafed - the real stuff that you have to show your ID in order to buy - was my best bet.
I made the purchase, returned home, and settled in for a four hour nap. Rest is the best of physicians, but I have not lacked in sleep this week. In fact, if one would count the number of hours that I have spent in bed as opposed to out of it, one would find that I have slept more that I have been awake.
While I am committed to blogging every day, I cannot commit to being interesting or to being profound or even to being .... ummm .... seriously - I just lost the third thing. See what I mean? Maybe what I meant to say was that I cannot commit to completing thoughts?
I am hopeful that today and tomorrow can be better days in my mind and in my body than the past few have been. There always is another day to blog. As for today, I will end this blog at just over 400 words - nearly 1/3 of my regular word count.
Three weeks ago I had more thoughts than I could catch or write in a single blog post, and blogging helped me focus. For the past few days that has not been the case. It could be this summer cold, or perhaps this summer cold is actually one of my crash moments after a rather highly productive mini-manic time. It is hard to say. It is certainly hard for me to say. I cannot catch the thought, I cannot analyze it, and I certainly cannot come to a conclusion about it. In fact, what I would like to do is go back to sleep.
Yesterday I went to Minute Clinic to see if I had left the cold long enough to turn into a bacterial sinus infection. The nurse practitioner said that I had not, that I did not qualify ("you poor lady" were her exact words as I described the sinus pressure in all parts of my head) for any sort of intervention on her part, and that a high dose of Sudafed - the real stuff that you have to show your ID in order to buy - was my best bet.
I made the purchase, returned home, and settled in for a four hour nap. Rest is the best of physicians, but I have not lacked in sleep this week. In fact, if one would count the number of hours that I have spent in bed as opposed to out of it, one would find that I have slept more that I have been awake.
While I am committed to blogging every day, I cannot commit to being interesting or to being profound or even to being .... ummm .... seriously - I just lost the third thing. See what I mean? Maybe what I meant to say was that I cannot commit to completing thoughts?
I am hopeful that today and tomorrow can be better days in my mind and in my body than the past few have been. There always is another day to blog. As for today, I will end this blog at just over 400 words - nearly 1/3 of my regular word count.
Wednesday, August 24, 2011
Feeling Icky
It is Wednesday, August 24, 2011, and I have not felt 100% since Friday night.
It started out as itchy and watery eyes with a bit of an "out of body" feeling on Friday night. Yes - I went to a wedding dance and stayed out late that night. It was great fun! Perhaps I pushed myself too far?
On Saturday morning, I think I was too tired from the night before to notice if I felt icky or not. I sniffled through the 5k (see First 5k Conquered for info on that experience), but I did not feel awful. However, by the time that I hit the dunk tank, I knew that something was amiss. My nasal passages were full of gunk, and I sniffled a bunch. The dunk tank was great fun (when I get pictures from a few photographer friends who snapped some real doosies [sp?] of me in the tank, I will blog about that experience), but I kept forgetting to plug my nose throughout most of the 27 dunks in my 30 minute shift. Water being forced upwards into my brain did not feel good. After I realized that no one else planned to get dunked after me, I started blowing out of my nostrils as I plunged into the water.
When I dragged myself home on Saturday afternoon, I said to Kerry, "I do not feel well." My throat hurt, my nose was full, and my head felt like it was much bigger than it is. We had plans to go out that night, but we changed them. When I say "we," I mean "I" and that he obliged. Who wants to go out with a sick woman anyway? My wonderful husband went to Chipotle to get me food that I could taste and that I could eat in the comfort of my pajamas.
We had plans on Sunday afternoon that we followed through with. Thankfully, I found some Dayquil in the medicine cabinet; it helped immensely. We enjoyed a fun afternoon with some people from church who had invited us to attend a performance of a musical at the Plymouth Playhouse. Even though it hurt to laugh, I laughed because it was so funny. That evening, after making a stop at CVS to replenish my cold medicine stash, I attended a backyard event where women from my church shared about their faith walks. I was so blessed by all three of them; I am so glad that I did not stay home.
The cold hit me full force on Monday, and I left work as soon as I could. This is not a good week to be sick as new staff training and teacher workshops are happening. There are few things that are sacred in my district; this week of staff training is one of them. If I am not in the hospital or have a doctor's note saying that I am contagious, I need to be at work. Yesterday was my last day to get any extra rest, and rest I did. I slept from 4:30 p.m. until 6:30 p.m. and then went down for the night at 8:30 p.m.
When I woke up yesterday morning, I dreaded that it was Tuesday and that I had a new staff person who needed my attention. Thankfully, the new staff person is someone I know - she knows what I am like when I am not sick. That made all of the difference.
I do not like being sick. Since changing jobs in January, I have been sick less than I had been in my old job. I do not know if the new challenge helped me or if I saw fewer people and contracted fewer germs. All I do know is that I do not like who I am when I am sick. The selfish and whiny side of me pushes its way to the front, and I have a harder time reigning it in. When I am sick, I do not want to care about what others say. I want to talk about me, how I feel, and how I want to crawl in bed. I have a harder time concentrating and articulating when I am sick.
The upside of this is that this state is only temporary. Once I have doused this virus with enough water and Lemon Chicken soup from Panera, have slept enough to ward of the germs, and have blown the nasty gook out of my nose, I will return to my normal self. I will be cheerful, kind, and considerate because all of those things are easier to be when I am not sick. Right?
Actually - I think that being sick simply exaggerates my personality. When I am sick, I think that I simply let down my guard and am the sinful, selfish, and horrible person that I am. I do not mean this in any self-denigrating way. All I mean to say is that when I am not being intentional about the way I treat others or see others, I allow my sinful side to reign. Being sick just requires me to be even more vigilant about this - or I should stay away from people. I wonder sometimes if our bodies' requirements for rest to recover from illness are not in someways a safeguard so that we do not say things we would not normally say or that we do not do things that we would normally do.
I cannot wait to get better.
It started out as itchy and watery eyes with a bit of an "out of body" feeling on Friday night. Yes - I went to a wedding dance and stayed out late that night. It was great fun! Perhaps I pushed myself too far?
On Saturday morning, I think I was too tired from the night before to notice if I felt icky or not. I sniffled through the 5k (see First 5k Conquered for info on that experience), but I did not feel awful. However, by the time that I hit the dunk tank, I knew that something was amiss. My nasal passages were full of gunk, and I sniffled a bunch. The dunk tank was great fun (when I get pictures from a few photographer friends who snapped some real doosies [sp?] of me in the tank, I will blog about that experience), but I kept forgetting to plug my nose throughout most of the 27 dunks in my 30 minute shift. Water being forced upwards into my brain did not feel good. After I realized that no one else planned to get dunked after me, I started blowing out of my nostrils as I plunged into the water.
When I dragged myself home on Saturday afternoon, I said to Kerry, "I do not feel well." My throat hurt, my nose was full, and my head felt like it was much bigger than it is. We had plans to go out that night, but we changed them. When I say "we," I mean "I" and that he obliged. Who wants to go out with a sick woman anyway? My wonderful husband went to Chipotle to get me food that I could taste and that I could eat in the comfort of my pajamas.
We had plans on Sunday afternoon that we followed through with. Thankfully, I found some Dayquil in the medicine cabinet; it helped immensely. We enjoyed a fun afternoon with some people from church who had invited us to attend a performance of a musical at the Plymouth Playhouse. Even though it hurt to laugh, I laughed because it was so funny. That evening, after making a stop at CVS to replenish my cold medicine stash, I attended a backyard event where women from my church shared about their faith walks. I was so blessed by all three of them; I am so glad that I did not stay home.
The cold hit me full force on Monday, and I left work as soon as I could. This is not a good week to be sick as new staff training and teacher workshops are happening. There are few things that are sacred in my district; this week of staff training is one of them. If I am not in the hospital or have a doctor's note saying that I am contagious, I need to be at work. Yesterday was my last day to get any extra rest, and rest I did. I slept from 4:30 p.m. until 6:30 p.m. and then went down for the night at 8:30 p.m.
When I woke up yesterday morning, I dreaded that it was Tuesday and that I had a new staff person who needed my attention. Thankfully, the new staff person is someone I know - she knows what I am like when I am not sick. That made all of the difference.
I do not like being sick. Since changing jobs in January, I have been sick less than I had been in my old job. I do not know if the new challenge helped me or if I saw fewer people and contracted fewer germs. All I do know is that I do not like who I am when I am sick. The selfish and whiny side of me pushes its way to the front, and I have a harder time reigning it in. When I am sick, I do not want to care about what others say. I want to talk about me, how I feel, and how I want to crawl in bed. I have a harder time concentrating and articulating when I am sick.
The upside of this is that this state is only temporary. Once I have doused this virus with enough water and Lemon Chicken soup from Panera, have slept enough to ward of the germs, and have blown the nasty gook out of my nose, I will return to my normal self. I will be cheerful, kind, and considerate because all of those things are easier to be when I am not sick. Right?
Actually - I think that being sick simply exaggerates my personality. When I am sick, I think that I simply let down my guard and am the sinful, selfish, and horrible person that I am. I do not mean this in any self-denigrating way. All I mean to say is that when I am not being intentional about the way I treat others or see others, I allow my sinful side to reign. Being sick just requires me to be even more vigilant about this - or I should stay away from people. I wonder sometimes if our bodies' requirements for rest to recover from illness are not in someways a safeguard so that we do not say things we would not normally say or that we do not do things that we would normally do.
I cannot wait to get better.
Tuesday, August 23, 2011
The Law is the Law
When I attended Jamestown College and received my teaching degree in English, I never considered that my path in education would lead me to pouring over Minnesota state statutes. In fact, I thought I would teach grammar and literature until either I turned blue or my students did. It did not take me long to realize that the classroom was no place for me. As much as I love to read, motivating the unmotivated in terms of reading, writing, and correct grammar and punctuation really left me unsatisfied. Classroom management seemed tedious, and I often felt like I had 150 children instead of my own two. I felt badly for few the students who wanted to learn when I could not wrangle in the many who did not.
Over the past six years, I have blazed through the online learning world with a passion that I did not know I had. Even though for the better part of those six years I still had to teach a bit of English, I put up with that for a while because other things on my plate were fun. Helping students get into college, arguing with army recruiters that an online diploma from a certified online learning provider in Minnesota had come under more scrutiny that one from the nearby high school and therefore warranted my student a spot in the infantry, and essentially creating a framework for truancy in the online world gave me life. In my most recent employer change from Wolf Creek Online High School to Minnesota Virtual High School, I have learned the difference between a small online school and a very large one. Problems are multiplied. There are more students who need more of the same.
The past six years have also provided me with quite a lesson in Minnesota state statutes as they pertain to all things education. Whether truancy law or charter school law, concurrent enrollment definitions or PSEO age restrictions, open enrollment permissions or independent study funding - I have learned a lot. Much of that is due to my the director at Wolf Creek. She positioned me to be on committees, working groups, and even a drug court in Chisago County. I represented the school, but more than that I was learning about Minnesota education law. And there is plenty - and at times conflicting items - to learn.
Although all of this has served me quite well professionally, the area where I find myself the most thankful is in educating my own children. Minnesota is Pandora's box of educational opportunities. From the time a child starts kindergarten, there are choices and decisions to be made. Who needs a private school when we have Minnesota education? There are district magnet schools that focus on the arts, science, math, or computing, charter schools that promote language immersion programs, online schools, and even project based schools. This is all in addition to the typical traditional school district that resembles my own Grand Forks Public School District back in North Dakota.
As children grow older, there are more opportunities, more literature to sift through, and more decisions to be made. In the current charter school where I work (Minnesota Transitions Charter Schools), there are more than ten programs alone - each with a different focus. These choices overwhelm parents, and I even hear some them say, "What if I choose poorly?" I understand this feeling as I have struggled with the same question with my own children. What if I choose the wrong school district, program, or emphasis? And, of course, there are other things to consider - school size, programs offered such as International Baccalaureate, advanced placement classes, or pre-professional training such as EMT certification, sports, theater, choir, language...oy vey! I get tired just thinking about it, and I work in this system!
The one thing that I have valued most as I maneuver these "halls" of choice in Minnesota is that the law is the law. Schools will try to limit the number of students who attend college during their junior and senior years (a program called PSEO - post-secondary enrollment options), but they cannot limit that number except for what is allowed in law. They will try to tell students that they cannot take up to half of their coursework online with an online provider in Minnesota, but they cannot limit students except for what is allowed in law. Schools may try to keep that seventh grade student from taking advanced math available online as a high school credit, but they cannot. The law allows that seventh grade student to take advanced classes as long as there is evidence to support that the student has the ability to do it.
In the most recent Minnesota legislative session, changes were made in the areas of PSEO, concurrent enrollment (ie: College in the Schools), and early graduation incentives. I am thankful that I am on a listserv where I find out these changes as they occur. This past week, as I worked with Josiah's counselor to set up his schedule, I brought up the newest legislation changes as it would benefit my son greatly. Most schools are not even telling their guidance counselors about these changes, and that is a tragedy for those younger, more able students who would benefit from these programs. In fact, the website for the Minnesota statutes has not been updated. I had to get the newly approved language sent over to me from the department of education.
The law is the law, but if no one knows about it - what good does it do? The intent of the lawmakers who authored the bill that became a law (check out the Schoolhouse Rock video for a refresher course on how that happens) was that students would have more opportunities open to them. However, if no one is telling students and parents about these opportunities, what good does it do? While I am thrilled that I know what I know and that it will benefit my son (and possibly my daughter...still waiting to hear back from her counselor!), I am a little annoyed that others may not know about this.
And this is not the only instance of this...online learning, PSEO, alternative learning, open enrollment, charter schools, homeschooling - each of these areas have laws that pertain to them but they get pushed underground in the muck and mire of traditional schools. I am not against traditional schools. Beth goes to a traditional school and does very well in it; however, she has taken advantage of some of the options allowed in law so that she can personalize her education. That is what these laws really are about. They seek to undo the cookie-cutter approach to education because they recognize that we are not all one shape. If that were the case, these laws never would have existed.
Oh my - I have stood on my soap box! The bottom line is that I want others to know about the choices out there so that all students in Minnesota can seize what the law permits them to seize - an education that differs from their siblings if that is what is best for them.
Over the past six years, I have blazed through the online learning world with a passion that I did not know I had. Even though for the better part of those six years I still had to teach a bit of English, I put up with that for a while because other things on my plate were fun. Helping students get into college, arguing with army recruiters that an online diploma from a certified online learning provider in Minnesota had come under more scrutiny that one from the nearby high school and therefore warranted my student a spot in the infantry, and essentially creating a framework for truancy in the online world gave me life. In my most recent employer change from Wolf Creek Online High School to Minnesota Virtual High School, I have learned the difference between a small online school and a very large one. Problems are multiplied. There are more students who need more of the same.
The past six years have also provided me with quite a lesson in Minnesota state statutes as they pertain to all things education. Whether truancy law or charter school law, concurrent enrollment definitions or PSEO age restrictions, open enrollment permissions or independent study funding - I have learned a lot. Much of that is due to my the director at Wolf Creek. She positioned me to be on committees, working groups, and even a drug court in Chisago County. I represented the school, but more than that I was learning about Minnesota education law. And there is plenty - and at times conflicting items - to learn.
Although all of this has served me quite well professionally, the area where I find myself the most thankful is in educating my own children. Minnesota is Pandora's box of educational opportunities. From the time a child starts kindergarten, there are choices and decisions to be made. Who needs a private school when we have Minnesota education? There are district magnet schools that focus on the arts, science, math, or computing, charter schools that promote language immersion programs, online schools, and even project based schools. This is all in addition to the typical traditional school district that resembles my own Grand Forks Public School District back in North Dakota.
As children grow older, there are more opportunities, more literature to sift through, and more decisions to be made. In the current charter school where I work (Minnesota Transitions Charter Schools), there are more than ten programs alone - each with a different focus. These choices overwhelm parents, and I even hear some them say, "What if I choose poorly?" I understand this feeling as I have struggled with the same question with my own children. What if I choose the wrong school district, program, or emphasis? And, of course, there are other things to consider - school size, programs offered such as International Baccalaureate, advanced placement classes, or pre-professional training such as EMT certification, sports, theater, choir, language...oy vey! I get tired just thinking about it, and I work in this system!
The one thing that I have valued most as I maneuver these "halls" of choice in Minnesota is that the law is the law. Schools will try to limit the number of students who attend college during their junior and senior years (a program called PSEO - post-secondary enrollment options), but they cannot limit that number except for what is allowed in law. They will try to tell students that they cannot take up to half of their coursework online with an online provider in Minnesota, but they cannot limit students except for what is allowed in law. Schools may try to keep that seventh grade student from taking advanced math available online as a high school credit, but they cannot. The law allows that seventh grade student to take advanced classes as long as there is evidence to support that the student has the ability to do it.
In the most recent Minnesota legislative session, changes were made in the areas of PSEO, concurrent enrollment (ie: College in the Schools), and early graduation incentives. I am thankful that I am on a listserv where I find out these changes as they occur. This past week, as I worked with Josiah's counselor to set up his schedule, I brought up the newest legislation changes as it would benefit my son greatly. Most schools are not even telling their guidance counselors about these changes, and that is a tragedy for those younger, more able students who would benefit from these programs. In fact, the website for the Minnesota statutes has not been updated. I had to get the newly approved language sent over to me from the department of education.
The law is the law, but if no one knows about it - what good does it do? The intent of the lawmakers who authored the bill that became a law (check out the Schoolhouse Rock video for a refresher course on how that happens) was that students would have more opportunities open to them. However, if no one is telling students and parents about these opportunities, what good does it do? While I am thrilled that I know what I know and that it will benefit my son (and possibly my daughter...still waiting to hear back from her counselor!), I am a little annoyed that others may not know about this.
And this is not the only instance of this...online learning, PSEO, alternative learning, open enrollment, charter schools, homeschooling - each of these areas have laws that pertain to them but they get pushed underground in the muck and mire of traditional schools. I am not against traditional schools. Beth goes to a traditional school and does very well in it; however, she has taken advantage of some of the options allowed in law so that she can personalize her education. That is what these laws really are about. They seek to undo the cookie-cutter approach to education because they recognize that we are not all one shape. If that were the case, these laws never would have existed.
Oh my - I have stood on my soap box! The bottom line is that I want others to know about the choices out there so that all students in Minnesota can seize what the law permits them to seize - an education that differs from their siblings if that is what is best for them.
Sunday, August 21, 2011
Testing: Blogging From My Phone
It is 3:30 a.m., and I cannot sleep.
This happens every now and then either because something is on my mind or because I went to bed too late. Regardless of the reason, I am up and hoping that sleep meds will kick in quickly.
As is often the case when I cannot sleep, I have turned to my phone (against all wise sleep doctor advise) for a bit of distraction from the fact that I cannot sleep. What is super annoying about not sleeping tonight is that morning means Monday - the start of the week, the first day for new staff in my district, and the first day of a week training the new staff. I need to sleep!
This morning, while I tended sleeping twins (adorable!!) in the nursery, I had discovered that I could download software onto "the boiphren" (my phone's nickname) and write (with my thumbs) blogposts on my phone without my computer available. Heee-haaaa!!! A few minutes ago, I downloaded the software so that I could give it a whirl. If this works, I can blog from (not during) court!!
The name of this blog came to me in July as I had felt a manic sideways turn coming on. I can tell that this is about to happen in the same way that some can smell a storm coming from the north. When this happens, I struggle to sleep because my mind doesn't want to shut down. The name seemed fitting, and I imagined sparse posts with choppy content that couldn't pull off a concluding paragraph, let alone have any point or even readers! I have since turned downward and hover around the middle ground that - for me - is a great place that I seek to stay in as long as possible.
Since I started blogging daily on August 1, I find myself seeing blog content all over in my daily life! And I think that my posts to this point have reflected an active but calm person, one who maybe takes herself too seriously, one who reveals a bit more about herself in itty tidbits, and one whose racing mind can pull thoughts together somewhat decently.
That is not the person blogging tonight. The mind whirls around - almost outside of myself - and complete thoughts can evade. Typing with thumbs on my phone forces my brain to slow a tish but not much...just enough to keep typing. These are the nights that I envisioned that a blog would help. Ideas, plans, and words could flow effortlessly out of me, and I would have finally caught them and put them down on "paper."
I just had not planned on doing this with my thumbs. Well, surprise!!
This happens every now and then either because something is on my mind or because I went to bed too late. Regardless of the reason, I am up and hoping that sleep meds will kick in quickly.
As is often the case when I cannot sleep, I have turned to my phone (against all wise sleep doctor advise) for a bit of distraction from the fact that I cannot sleep. What is super annoying about not sleeping tonight is that morning means Monday - the start of the week, the first day for new staff in my district, and the first day of a week training the new staff. I need to sleep!
This morning, while I tended sleeping twins (adorable!!) in the nursery, I had discovered that I could download software onto "the boiphren" (my phone's nickname) and write (with my thumbs) blogposts on my phone without my computer available. Heee-haaaa!!! A few minutes ago, I downloaded the software so that I could give it a whirl. If this works, I can blog from (not during) court!!
The name of this blog came to me in July as I had felt a manic sideways turn coming on. I can tell that this is about to happen in the same way that some can smell a storm coming from the north. When this happens, I struggle to sleep because my mind doesn't want to shut down. The name seemed fitting, and I imagined sparse posts with choppy content that couldn't pull off a concluding paragraph, let alone have any point or even readers! I have since turned downward and hover around the middle ground that - for me - is a great place that I seek to stay in as long as possible.
Since I started blogging daily on August 1, I find myself seeing blog content all over in my daily life! And I think that my posts to this point have reflected an active but calm person, one who maybe takes herself too seriously, one who reveals a bit more about herself in itty tidbits, and one whose racing mind can pull thoughts together somewhat decently.
That is not the person blogging tonight. The mind whirls around - almost outside of myself - and complete thoughts can evade. Typing with thumbs on my phone forces my brain to slow a tish but not much...just enough to keep typing. These are the nights that I envisioned that a blog would help. Ideas, plans, and words could flow effortlessly out of me, and I would have finally caught them and put them down on "paper."
I just had not planned on doing this with my thumbs. Well, surprise!!
First 5K Conquered
My name is Stacy Bender. On August 20, 2011, I completed my first organized 5K Run (Walk) in 50 minutes.
I have plenty of friends and family members who run. They run for exercise, they run for fun, and they run for the companionship that comes with it. Running seems to be its own culture - especially here in Minneapolis. There are special stores with names like The Running Room that do not hire the non-running type (like me) to assist with shoe choices. My son joined that culture last fall when he chose the individual sport of cross-country over the team sport of...well, any team sport. Siah can blog about that some day.
When the district that I work for announced in June that they planned to host a 5K in August, I decided it was time to try out this event for myself. Josiah runs 5K races weekly during cross country season. Granted, the boy is in much better shape than I am, but he should not have the market on these experiences. I also knew that a little motivation - a planned event in eight weeks - could motivate me to prepare for the completion of a 5K. I intended to sign up, and I started to get ready. I signed the family up for a membership at Snap Fitness, and I started going there daily. I was advised to do weight training as part of this experience in order to build up my leg power so that I could run faster.
I am not sure that I ever planned to RUN the race.
Summer hit, Beth left her dog in my care, and I found that the gym did not fit into my schedule when I also walked the dog one-two times each day. I still plan to return to the gym, but that will have to wait. I downgraded my expectations of running to walking the race. To be honest - I am not sure that I ever truly planned to run the race. However, I did want to finish the race in some walk/run combo in 45 minutes. I started walking the dog in longer lengths, and we did a 5K at least once a week. Our time together tended to be around 70 minutes. That was nowhere near my goal.
On the night before the race, Kerry and I attended a wedding and its dance. We stayed far too late, and I left wondering if I would get up in the morning. My motivation was starting to succombe the doubts that plague many of us. If you do not try at all, you cannot fail. You have a good excuse; you were out all night at a church function. Well, I could laugh all morning, but I have twenty minutes to wrap up this post, shower, and get to a church function this morning!
As we left the dance, the father of the groom gave me great advice about how much ground I had covered while there tonight, "You probably did a 5K tonight out there on that dance floor." I love that man! It was almost enough encouragement to stay in bed the next morning and just go at my scheduled time for the dunk tank.
But then my husband made a comment that pushed me to do the 5K in the morning.
I had been waffling, on the fence, about the morning commitments. Every time he had suggested that we leave the dance, I had said, "Just one more fun song." Well - that happened for about 90 minutes straight. When we pulled up to our house, he said, "I'll be you dollars to donuts that you don't go in the morning."
Nothing motivates me like a little "dollars to donuts" comment. He was not saying that I could not finish the race. He was not saying that I I would not make the goal itself. What he was saying was that I would not even try. And - to be honest - that was exactly where my head was at the time that he said it. Sleeping in was exactly what I thought I would do. But I had been talking to him about this race for eight weeks. And now I was going to give up. Really?!?!?! No - dollars to donuts (whatever that means!) pushed me over the edge.
I packed my bags for the day, fell into bed, and set my alarm. I would not look pretty all day, but I would earn that t-shirt. I finished the race - walking - in 50 minutes along with a friend and her five year old in a walking stroller. We both work for MN Virtual High School, one of the several programs of Minnesota Transitions Charter Schools represented at the marketing day yesterday.
Funny little fact that the JROTC recruiter/boot camp guy pointed out yesterday: our program, the virtual high school, represented 70% of the total participants in the 5K yesterday. Take that! He also pointed out that there were a lot more people wearing t-shirts from that run at that moment. Yes - they gave away the t-shirts to staff people because only 10 people took part in the 5K. I have to admit that it cheapened my t-shirt experience.
I think I will do another 5K...the next one might be one that actually does competitive timing and has a t-shirt that means you actually completed rather than that you work for the place that ran the 5K...but I will do another nonetheless. I will do it, not because I want to become a competitive runner (I'm a little late for that!) but because I would like to meet that 45 minute goal. In order to get to that point, there needs to be an increase of fitness in my life.
Fitness is my number one goal when it comes to this...
I have plenty of friends and family members who run. They run for exercise, they run for fun, and they run for the companionship that comes with it. Running seems to be its own culture - especially here in Minneapolis. There are special stores with names like The Running Room that do not hire the non-running type (like me) to assist with shoe choices. My son joined that culture last fall when he chose the individual sport of cross-country over the team sport of...well, any team sport. Siah can blog about that some day.
When the district that I work for announced in June that they planned to host a 5K in August, I decided it was time to try out this event for myself. Josiah runs 5K races weekly during cross country season. Granted, the boy is in much better shape than I am, but he should not have the market on these experiences. I also knew that a little motivation - a planned event in eight weeks - could motivate me to prepare for the completion of a 5K. I intended to sign up, and I started to get ready. I signed the family up for a membership at Snap Fitness, and I started going there daily. I was advised to do weight training as part of this experience in order to build up my leg power so that I could run faster.
I am not sure that I ever planned to RUN the race.
Summer hit, Beth left her dog in my care, and I found that the gym did not fit into my schedule when I also walked the dog one-two times each day. I still plan to return to the gym, but that will have to wait. I downgraded my expectations of running to walking the race. To be honest - I am not sure that I ever truly planned to run the race. However, I did want to finish the race in some walk/run combo in 45 minutes. I started walking the dog in longer lengths, and we did a 5K at least once a week. Our time together tended to be around 70 minutes. That was nowhere near my goal.
On the night before the race, Kerry and I attended a wedding and its dance. We stayed far too late, and I left wondering if I would get up in the morning. My motivation was starting to succombe the doubts that plague many of us. If you do not try at all, you cannot fail. You have a good excuse; you were out all night at a church function. Well, I could laugh all morning, but I have twenty minutes to wrap up this post, shower, and get to a church function this morning!
As we left the dance, the father of the groom gave me great advice about how much ground I had covered while there tonight, "You probably did a 5K tonight out there on that dance floor." I love that man! It was almost enough encouragement to stay in bed the next morning and just go at my scheduled time for the dunk tank.
But then my husband made a comment that pushed me to do the 5K in the morning.
I had been waffling, on the fence, about the morning commitments. Every time he had suggested that we leave the dance, I had said, "Just one more fun song." Well - that happened for about 90 minutes straight. When we pulled up to our house, he said, "I'll be you dollars to donuts that you don't go in the morning."
Nothing motivates me like a little "dollars to donuts" comment. He was not saying that I could not finish the race. He was not saying that I I would not make the goal itself. What he was saying was that I would not even try. And - to be honest - that was exactly where my head was at the time that he said it. Sleeping in was exactly what I thought I would do. But I had been talking to him about this race for eight weeks. And now I was going to give up. Really?!?!?! No - dollars to donuts (whatever that means!) pushed me over the edge.
I packed my bags for the day, fell into bed, and set my alarm. I would not look pretty all day, but I would earn that t-shirt. I finished the race - walking - in 50 minutes along with a friend and her five year old in a walking stroller. We both work for MN Virtual High School, one of the several programs of Minnesota Transitions Charter Schools represented at the marketing day yesterday.
Funny little fact that the JROTC recruiter/boot camp guy pointed out yesterday: our program, the virtual high school, represented 70% of the total participants in the 5K yesterday. Take that! He also pointed out that there were a lot more people wearing t-shirts from that run at that moment. Yes - they gave away the t-shirts to staff people because only 10 people took part in the 5K. I have to admit that it cheapened my t-shirt experience.
I think I will do another 5K...the next one might be one that actually does competitive timing and has a t-shirt that means you actually completed rather than that you work for the place that ran the 5K...but I will do another nonetheless. I will do it, not because I want to become a competitive runner (I'm a little late for that!) but because I would like to meet that 45 minute goal. In order to get to that point, there needs to be an increase of fitness in my life.
Fitness is my number one goal when it comes to this...
Saturday, August 20, 2011
Getting Over Myself: Part2
Last night was magical. As I think about the evening, I think of the song, "I Could Have Danced All Night" from the musical My Fair Lady. Being in a dress and feeling beautiful - well, that was something I have not looked forward to in years. In fact, it has been nearly six years since I have worn a dress to a wedding.
For more details on this recent explosion of mine into the dress world, feel free to read my post on August 10, 2011 titled "Getting Over Myself." At the time, I had no idea that this could become a series, so I did not add "Part One" to the title. Apparently, I should have!
I have not looked forward to wearing a dress in years. Literally years. Since starting the shopping spree as referenced in the previous blog post, I have been waiting for last night to come, well - for about eight days. I doubt that I anticipated Mark and Stacy's wedding as much as they did, but I was really excited. In the past ten days, I have purchased two awesome dresses. I had gone on to search for a third dress on Thursday, but, after trying on more than fifteen dresses in two hours, I gave up. Instead - yesterday I headed to another source: my daughter's closet. Surprise, Beth!
Last year, one of my thirteen Italian cousins - Jonathan - married the sweet and lovely Beth in an outdoor wedding on 10/10/10. I had searched high and low for the perfect outfit for the occasion, and I eventually settled on a fun orange, veneer top with a pair of brown slacks. I felt comfort in the slacks. On the day of the wedding, though, I realized that I felt left out of the dress club that most of my lady cousins were a part of for the day. I had tried on one dress in the mix of things, and it had looked awful. My chubby knees showed, and they were atrocious. That was not going to happen.
In the fall of 2009, another Italian cousin - Travis - married a witty beauty named Elise. It turned out to be a great idea to wear pants to that wedding as I had the job of doing an unofficial video of the wedding and reception. That being said, though, I doubt I would have been caught dead in a dress. As I was thinking about the information for this blog post, I could not figure out why I struggled to recall details of the wedding. Then I remembered - I had driven all night from Minneapolis to Nashville without sleep. What a nut!
In July of 2007, I attended the wedding of another Italian cousin - Karissa - who married the quiet but smart and funny Stanley in a wedding that ended in a reception by the ocean. In pictures of that wedding, I see the same black pants that have become a Stacy trademark. As I reflect on that wedding's timing, I am pretty sure that I weighed less then than I do now. Perspective is a funny thing!
In many shopping trips over the past few weeks, I have discovered that, though my body type is nearly impossible to cloak well, there are dresses that fit me and even look good...great...on me. The hours and hours of searching and trying on are all worth it when the perfect dress, at a nearly perfect price, surfaces from the pile of the unwanted ones and goes from the fitting room into my closet in a matter of minutes. Twice in the past ten days, I have found a perfect dress....well, two perfect dresses. They each accent certain parts of my figure while hiding well the ones that should remain hidden (the knees! oh, the knees!).
Last night, although I did not wear a dress different from either of the purchases, the dress itself had similar elements to the two that I purchased. As I wore it last, I cared less about how I looked and more about enjoying myself in it. I do not know if I care less about how I look or enjoy more the possibility that I have been wrongly seeing myself in the mirror. The eyes that I use can find every problem with my figure, and in my eyes - there are plenty to find.
What I have come to realize recently is that my eyes are blurry. I do not see others in the same way that I see myself. Others may weight more or less than I or be in better or worse shape than I, but I do not find myself seeing them with the same blurry vision. When I take some time to objectively think about about myself, I realize that I weigh less now than I did a year ago, but - more importantly - I am in overall better shape than I was a year ago. Taking frequent walks, eating fruit and veggies more often, drinking less Coke, and drinking more water are good steps.
I actually feel better. And when I feel better, I do better...and I want to look better. I wear clothes that fit well rather than hide well. And last night - I spent less time in a chair exercising my mouth and more time on the dance floor.
I doubt that I could say that I am completely "over myself"...but... last night was not a step in the right direction but a leap. The best part is that another wedding is just around the corner, and a perfect dress for that occasion hangs in my closet waiting for me to put it on and enjoy another night in the right direction.
For more details on this recent explosion of mine into the dress world, feel free to read my post on August 10, 2011 titled "Getting Over Myself." At the time, I had no idea that this could become a series, so I did not add "Part One" to the title. Apparently, I should have!
I have not looked forward to wearing a dress in years. Literally years. Since starting the shopping spree as referenced in the previous blog post, I have been waiting for last night to come, well - for about eight days. I doubt that I anticipated Mark and Stacy's wedding as much as they did, but I was really excited. In the past ten days, I have purchased two awesome dresses. I had gone on to search for a third dress on Thursday, but, after trying on more than fifteen dresses in two hours, I gave up. Instead - yesterday I headed to another source: my daughter's closet. Surprise, Beth!
Last year, one of my thirteen Italian cousins - Jonathan - married the sweet and lovely Beth in an outdoor wedding on 10/10/10. I had searched high and low for the perfect outfit for the occasion, and I eventually settled on a fun orange, veneer top with a pair of brown slacks. I felt comfort in the slacks. On the day of the wedding, though, I realized that I felt left out of the dress club that most of my lady cousins were a part of for the day. I had tried on one dress in the mix of things, and it had looked awful. My chubby knees showed, and they were atrocious. That was not going to happen.In the fall of 2009, another Italian cousin - Travis - married a witty beauty named Elise. It turned out to be a great idea to wear pants to that wedding as I had the job of doing an unofficial video of the wedding and reception. That being said, though, I doubt I would have been caught dead in a dress. As I was thinking about the information for this blog post, I could not figure out why I struggled to recall details of the wedding. Then I remembered - I had driven all night from Minneapolis to Nashville without sleep. What a nut!
In July of 2007, I attended the wedding of another Italian cousin - Karissa - who married the quiet but smart and funny Stanley in a wedding that ended in a reception by the ocean. In pictures of that wedding, I see the same black pants that have become a Stacy trademark. As I reflect on that wedding's timing, I am pretty sure that I weighed less then than I do now. Perspective is a funny thing!
In many shopping trips over the past few weeks, I have discovered that, though my body type is nearly impossible to cloak well, there are dresses that fit me and even look good...great...on me. The hours and hours of searching and trying on are all worth it when the perfect dress, at a nearly perfect price, surfaces from the pile of the unwanted ones and goes from the fitting room into my closet in a matter of minutes. Twice in the past ten days, I have found a perfect dress....well, two perfect dresses. They each accent certain parts of my figure while hiding well the ones that should remain hidden (the knees! oh, the knees!).
Last night, although I did not wear a dress different from either of the purchases, the dress itself had similar elements to the two that I purchased. As I wore it last, I cared less about how I looked and more about enjoying myself in it. I do not know if I care less about how I look or enjoy more the possibility that I have been wrongly seeing myself in the mirror. The eyes that I use can find every problem with my figure, and in my eyes - there are plenty to find.What I have come to realize recently is that my eyes are blurry. I do not see others in the same way that I see myself. Others may weight more or less than I or be in better or worse shape than I, but I do not find myself seeing them with the same blurry vision. When I take some time to objectively think about about myself, I realize that I weigh less now than I did a year ago, but - more importantly - I am in overall better shape than I was a year ago. Taking frequent walks, eating fruit and veggies more often, drinking less Coke, and drinking more water are good steps.
I actually feel better. And when I feel better, I do better...and I want to look better. I wear clothes that fit well rather than hide well. And last night - I spent less time in a chair exercising my mouth and more time on the dance floor.
I doubt that I could say that I am completely "over myself"...but... last night was not a step in the right direction but a leap. The best part is that another wedding is just around the corner, and a perfect dress for that occasion hangs in my closet waiting for me to put it on and enjoy another night in the right direction.
Friday, August 19, 2011
That Ain't Right
People have called me many things in my lifetime so far.
Adjectives that I have heard others use in reference to me include bossy, unpredictable, explosive, bossy, passionate, opinionated, and a lot of bossy. I sealed the deal of having others call me names when I signed up for an English teaching major in college. If there is one thing that this does is make people around me uncomfortable as they speak and see me as some kind of grammar police (and that is the kind noun!).
I find that a well-placed incorrect grammar moment can go a long way to make a point. The examples of this could be listed on a bathroom stall for entertainment purposes. Perhaps I and several other English majors would be the only ones amused by it, but I find this hysterical.
Saying that ain't right with a slight country twang at just the right moment can really emphasize whatever wrong has occurred around me. This has to be placed at the appropriate place, at the appropriate moment, and in only the infrequent occasions. When used correctly, though, the point is clear; no question will exist about how one feels. Saying that isn't right with a slightly haughty English accent might bring home a strong feeling as well, but the feeling is not the same as that ain't right with the country twang.
The older I get, the more situations elicit the that ain't right-type of response from me.
In more than a decade in education, I have seen family situations that have made me think that ain't right. Wealthy parents who ignore their children completely such as the family who left their first grader in my care well after 6 p.m. (the family was charged for that extra time!) on a regular basis is one example. One day, the father picked up the student wearing sweatpants. It was obvious to me and the child that the father had been home already. That just ain't right.
Another situation that seems to make my blood boil is teachers who will not differentiate their instruction to meet the needs to students above and below the critical middle mass in their classroom. This happens to be illegal. As a parent of students who are above this mass and move rather quickly through concepts, these teachers make me say that ain't right. I am pretty sure that parents of students below the middle mass feel the same way.
As a parent and a teacher, I am shocked at the way that other students treat each other. My children attended school with a student who, due to a disability, struggled to walk through the hallways each day from class to class. Typically, the student had a paraprofessional assigned to assist in this task, and (let's be honest) to protect the student from other students. One day, the student's aide was not present for whatever reason, and the not-so-kind group of kids saw their chance to do what they had waited to do all year - trip the student on the trip from one class to another. I am proud to say that both of my own children reported their indignation in response to these actions. What those kids did - that ain't right.
While I understand the basic psychology behind the occurrence of things that are not right, I am still shocked that these things happen. These examples barely touch the tip of the iceberg of all of the things that are out of whack in our society. Our world is full of things that ain't right - graffiti, break-ins, assaults, rapes, and murders...let alone how we treat each other, our children, and ourselves.
Some days, I literally want to hold my head in my hands as I feel overwhelmed. Other days, I want to conquer it all and make it right. The more I look to the Bible for answers, though, the more I realize that these actions are not unique to our current society and that they are not likely to end any time soon. Since the entering of sin into the world, things simply have not been right. In fact, God himself knew the minute that rebellion had entered the world when Adam and Eve disobeyed and ate the fruit. I imagine that in His Spirit He felt the crash of rightness and knew the feeling of that ain't right instantly.
At a conference yesterday, I heard the story of a student who had graduated with his high school diploma from Stadium View School which is housed in the Hennepin County (Minnesota) Juvenile Detention Center. As he shared his story, that ain't right is all that could go through my head. He acknowledged that he committed the crimes that had put him into the criminal system; however, he did not have much of a fighting chance before he joined a gang at a young age and started offending shortly thereafter. As the oldest of four with a single mother and an absent dad who had fathered fifteen children before him, he looked for acceptance somewhere and found it in a street gang.
Interestingly enough, the young man who stood before us did not speak as one without hope. Having found support in the teachers at Stadium View, he discovered a world full of affirmation that did not require gang initiations, criminal acts, or fathering multiple children with multiple mothers. Instead, he found that he could change his life, attend college, and make a life for himself and his daughter that differs from the one he knew.
In the same way that the young man who spoke at the conference yesterday found hope, so can we. Unlike this young man, though, I refuse to put my hope in the teachers at Stadium View or in any other person. All of us are flawed and will let each other down. We will be both the causes and the recipients of actions or moments that make us say that ain't right. Instead of placing my hope on the people around me, I put my hope, as the hymn "My Hope is Built on Nothing Less" suggests, the blood of Jesus and His righteousness.
All other ground is sinking sand.
Adjectives that I have heard others use in reference to me include bossy, unpredictable, explosive, bossy, passionate, opinionated, and a lot of bossy. I sealed the deal of having others call me names when I signed up for an English teaching major in college. If there is one thing that this does is make people around me uncomfortable as they speak and see me as some kind of grammar police (and that is the kind noun!).
I find that a well-placed incorrect grammar moment can go a long way to make a point. The examples of this could be listed on a bathroom stall for entertainment purposes. Perhaps I and several other English majors would be the only ones amused by it, but I find this hysterical.
Saying that ain't right with a slight country twang at just the right moment can really emphasize whatever wrong has occurred around me. This has to be placed at the appropriate place, at the appropriate moment, and in only the infrequent occasions. When used correctly, though, the point is clear; no question will exist about how one feels. Saying that isn't right with a slightly haughty English accent might bring home a strong feeling as well, but the feeling is not the same as that ain't right with the country twang.
The older I get, the more situations elicit the that ain't right-type of response from me.
In more than a decade in education, I have seen family situations that have made me think that ain't right. Wealthy parents who ignore their children completely such as the family who left their first grader in my care well after 6 p.m. (the family was charged for that extra time!) on a regular basis is one example. One day, the father picked up the student wearing sweatpants. It was obvious to me and the child that the father had been home already. That just ain't right.
Another situation that seems to make my blood boil is teachers who will not differentiate their instruction to meet the needs to students above and below the critical middle mass in their classroom. This happens to be illegal. As a parent of students who are above this mass and move rather quickly through concepts, these teachers make me say that ain't right. I am pretty sure that parents of students below the middle mass feel the same way.
As a parent and a teacher, I am shocked at the way that other students treat each other. My children attended school with a student who, due to a disability, struggled to walk through the hallways each day from class to class. Typically, the student had a paraprofessional assigned to assist in this task, and (let's be honest) to protect the student from other students. One day, the student's aide was not present for whatever reason, and the not-so-kind group of kids saw their chance to do what they had waited to do all year - trip the student on the trip from one class to another. I am proud to say that both of my own children reported their indignation in response to these actions. What those kids did - that ain't right.
While I understand the basic psychology behind the occurrence of things that are not right, I am still shocked that these things happen. These examples barely touch the tip of the iceberg of all of the things that are out of whack in our society. Our world is full of things that ain't right - graffiti, break-ins, assaults, rapes, and murders...let alone how we treat each other, our children, and ourselves.
Some days, I literally want to hold my head in my hands as I feel overwhelmed. Other days, I want to conquer it all and make it right. The more I look to the Bible for answers, though, the more I realize that these actions are not unique to our current society and that they are not likely to end any time soon. Since the entering of sin into the world, things simply have not been right. In fact, God himself knew the minute that rebellion had entered the world when Adam and Eve disobeyed and ate the fruit. I imagine that in His Spirit He felt the crash of rightness and knew the feeling of that ain't right instantly.
At a conference yesterday, I heard the story of a student who had graduated with his high school diploma from Stadium View School which is housed in the Hennepin County (Minnesota) Juvenile Detention Center. As he shared his story, that ain't right is all that could go through my head. He acknowledged that he committed the crimes that had put him into the criminal system; however, he did not have much of a fighting chance before he joined a gang at a young age and started offending shortly thereafter. As the oldest of four with a single mother and an absent dad who had fathered fifteen children before him, he looked for acceptance somewhere and found it in a street gang.
Interestingly enough, the young man who stood before us did not speak as one without hope. Having found support in the teachers at Stadium View, he discovered a world full of affirmation that did not require gang initiations, criminal acts, or fathering multiple children with multiple mothers. Instead, he found that he could change his life, attend college, and make a life for himself and his daughter that differs from the one he knew.
In the same way that the young man who spoke at the conference yesterday found hope, so can we. Unlike this young man, though, I refuse to put my hope in the teachers at Stadium View or in any other person. All of us are flawed and will let each other down. We will be both the causes and the recipients of actions or moments that make us say that ain't right. Instead of placing my hope on the people around me, I put my hope, as the hymn "My Hope is Built on Nothing Less" suggests, the blood of Jesus and His righteousness.
All other ground is sinking sand.
Thursday, August 18, 2011
Love Those Pastors' Wives!
On Monday night, Kerry and I attended the 2011 version of what has become an annual event: Pastors and Wives Appreciation Dinner. Held in August for the past four years, this event is hosted and provided for by the Minnesota Association Executive Board members who treat the pastors (and wives if they have them...in Minnesota's case all of the pastors at the moment are men - with wives) to a beautiful spread of food that includes yummies from the grill. My personal favorite this year happened to be the mushrooms. Is that weird?
As usually is the case at these events, the men migrated to one another and started talking shop while their wives migrated to each other and asked about updates in life. Although the pastors get together once a month for prayer and support, we wives rarely do. Our schedules do not tend to mesh well. Two of us work in public education, one is the church secretary and recently started working a bunch of hours at a flower shop, and yet another is a daycare provider. None of our time off seems to overlap, we are spread out from one another, and our jobs do not give us release time to get together like our husbands' jobs do.
Being the wife of a pastor is different than being the wife of just about any other man with an occupation. While every other job has its own family "requirements," few people understand the exceptionally unique elements of the pastors' family. I find that being in the company of other pastors' wives relaxes me. They understand our strange rituals, odd hours, and secret handshakes. Ok - that one might not be true! What is true is that we do not have to explain much. A knowing look communicates so much when we are together. Needless to say then, it was great to chat with these fabulous ladies.
Typically at these dinners, we sit as couples for the main course; this time was different. As ladies, we had been sitting in sort of a semi-circle in close proximity to a table. When the "servers" (they are wonderful people!!) announced that it was time to gather around the tables, the wives sat at one table. After some jabbing from the pastors (I am not sure if they were jealous that we were laughing so much or what), they sat at their own table as well. The hosts gave us a bit of a hard time, but the women would not budge. Some might say that I was a ring leader in this whole thing; I do not know where that idea comes from!
I cannot recount every conversation in this blog post - in part because of protection of my dear friends and in part because some of it may have only been entertaining in the moment. Our conversation covered a grand pendulum swing from updates on our children's lives to a performance of "The Wiggles" live to the costs of weddings and funerals and the various ways that they could go badly. One of the most entertaining conversations recounted the strange unwillingness of a wedding caterer to serve decaffeinated coffee at a reception. Yet another spoke of inconsiderate, though well-intentioned, actions of funeral attenders. "The Wiggles" conversation had me laughing so hard that I wiped tears from my eyes.
These encounters, though infrequent, are precious to me. My fellow Minnesota pastors' wives are not cut from a specific mold. Our approach to how we support our husbands differs in each of our lives. They represent, though, a strong back-bone to each of their husbands ministries. Everyone present last night has lived longer than I, has been married longer than I, and has been in ministry longer than I. They have seen their struggles and their joys in their marriages, in the raising of their children, and in their churches' ministries. They march in front me and encourage me to keep marching.
I love our church; I would not trade it for another at this point in my life. However, being in ministry, no matter how much one loves her church, can stretch us out of our comfort zone. Few of us thought "pastor's wife" would be one of the many hats we wear. But we do. And those women sitting around the table with me last night model for me what I can become and, at times, offer their guidance and support as I stumble along the path of the pastor's wife.
As usually is the case at these events, the men migrated to one another and started talking shop while their wives migrated to each other and asked about updates in life. Although the pastors get together once a month for prayer and support, we wives rarely do. Our schedules do not tend to mesh well. Two of us work in public education, one is the church secretary and recently started working a bunch of hours at a flower shop, and yet another is a daycare provider. None of our time off seems to overlap, we are spread out from one another, and our jobs do not give us release time to get together like our husbands' jobs do.Being the wife of a pastor is different than being the wife of just about any other man with an occupation. While every other job has its own family "requirements," few people understand the exceptionally unique elements of the pastors' family. I find that being in the company of other pastors' wives relaxes me. They understand our strange rituals, odd hours, and secret handshakes. Ok - that one might not be true! What is true is that we do not have to explain much. A knowing look communicates so much when we are together. Needless to say then, it was great to chat with these fabulous ladies.
Typically at these dinners, we sit as couples for the main course; this time was different. As ladies, we had been sitting in sort of a semi-circle in close proximity to a table. When the "servers" (they are wonderful people!!) announced that it was time to gather around the tables, the wives sat at one table. After some jabbing from the pastors (I am not sure if they were jealous that we were laughing so much or what), they sat at their own table as well. The hosts gave us a bit of a hard time, but the women would not budge. Some might say that I was a ring leader in this whole thing; I do not know where that idea comes from!
I cannot recount every conversation in this blog post - in part because of protection of my dear friends and in part because some of it may have only been entertaining in the moment. Our conversation covered a grand pendulum swing from updates on our children's lives to a performance of "The Wiggles" live to the costs of weddings and funerals and the various ways that they could go badly. One of the most entertaining conversations recounted the strange unwillingness of a wedding caterer to serve decaffeinated coffee at a reception. Yet another spoke of inconsiderate, though well-intentioned, actions of funeral attenders. "The Wiggles" conversation had me laughing so hard that I wiped tears from my eyes.
These encounters, though infrequent, are precious to me. My fellow Minnesota pastors' wives are not cut from a specific mold. Our approach to how we support our husbands differs in each of our lives. They represent, though, a strong back-bone to each of their husbands ministries. Everyone present last night has lived longer than I, has been married longer than I, and has been in ministry longer than I. They have seen their struggles and their joys in their marriages, in the raising of their children, and in their churches' ministries. They march in front me and encourage me to keep marching.
I love our church; I would not trade it for another at this point in my life. However, being in ministry, no matter how much one loves her church, can stretch us out of our comfort zone. Few of us thought "pastor's wife" would be one of the many hats we wear. But we do. And those women sitting around the table with me last night model for me what I can become and, at times, offer their guidance and support as I stumble along the path of the pastor's wife.
Wednesday, August 17, 2011
Faithful in the Little Things
With the kids serving at Village Creek for most of the summer, the chore of walking Beth's dog (Bagel the Beagle) has often fallen to me. Much like yesterday morning, I had no desire to walk the beast today. Even though he provides me with exercise, I had no interest in that this morning. I wanted to stay in bed and wait for Aleve to kick in to ban the headache with which I awoke. However, because I skipped all of his walks yesterday, I felt a certain amount of guilt, pulled myself out of bed, and headed out the door with Bagel in tow. Actually - it is always the other way around as Bagel does most of the towing in this relationship. He can find joy in walking at a manageable pace until a squirrel crosses our path. Because the baby squirrels born in the spring are now out of the nests, the squirrel population is out in full force. This makes for an exciting walk - one which varies in pace from manageable to nearly running. I do not run.As I walked today, though, I did think about how all of the tasks that we do such as walking the dog, paying the bills, wedding the garden, folding the laundry, and washing the dishes are simply an exercise of faithfulness. As parents, we expect Beth either to talk the dog twice a day or to ensure that she has found a replacement to do so. We expect her to be faithful to this task. We want her to learn the value of routine and being faithful in the little things. Bagel did not join our family until Beth had reached an age where we could expect this bigger thing from her and until she had already been faithful in other, less important areas.
When our family lived in Beverly, MA, while Kerry attended seminary, our children grew up before us transforming from the one and two year old children who moved with us to the four and five year old children who left for Scotland with us. Because we were young parents, we sort of stumbled our way through parenting. Thankfully, we had some great advice. Surprisingly enough, the best advice about raising our children came from a pediatrician who, when the kids were about two and three, asked us what chores our kids did on a regular basis. When we shrugged our shoulders at him, he walked us through having our kids folding washcloths and towels as well as moving our dishes and silverware within their reach so that they could unload the dishwasher (not the sharp knives, of course!). This provided a framework for us to raise children who do not expect payment for mowing the lawn, washing the kitchen floor, or helping out with dinner parties.
I have often wondered why our current generation of high school students struggle so much with responsibility. I see this a lot as I talk with families when a student is truant. How can a student be truant from an online school? All they have to do is just do the work, stay off my radar, and never have to worry about truancy. However, I sent letters to, spoke on the phone with, or met in person with at least 25% of my school's population in my first four months of employment there during the past school year. When I ask them what chores they have in the home on a regular basis, they rarely even know what a chore is let alone have them. Their parents shrug at me - much like I did at the pediatrician. Unfortunately, parents of 17 year old students have already lost the battle and cannot regain ground in this area.
Behavior is learned. Behavior must be taught. Responsible, faithful individuals in the workplace will be fewer and fewer until parents realize that, by not teaching responsibility, they are teaching a lack of responsibility. Expecting my four year old to be responsible in folding underwear, socks, and pajamas prepared her to be responsible enough to work at camp this summer and be a family assistant for a family of seven. Expecting my three year old to put away the silverware from the dishwasher prepared him to work at camp this summer and be a family assistant for a family of five.
I am not a good parent by my own inklings. In fact, I would prefer to stay in bed and let them grow up on their own. Fortunately, a pediatrician a long time ago told us that we would regret not parenting. He essentially ordered us to be good parents. We were too young to ignore him. In the same way that we followed his advice and gave our kids medicine when they had ear infections, we made our kids fold the laundry and unload the dishwasher. We have expected them to be faithful in these little areas in the hope that one day they will be faithful in larger areas when the time comes.
Interestingly enough, Kerry and I recently took part in a small group at church where we read and discussed a book by George Barna called Revolutionary Parenting. The book detailed qualities of parents who raise dynamic individuals who give back to their communities and churches. Although the book details raising spiritual champions, many of the qualities and actions of these parents follow along with raising what I would call responsible and faithful individuals. I would hope that my children would be spiritual champions; I am glad that we went through this book. I am also thankful that, in the absence of this book ten years ago in my parenting walk, I was given advice from our pediatrician. The actions that we expected from our children based on his direction have given a foundation to them becoming spiritual champions.
Tomorrow or this evening, I will walk the dog and be thankful for him. He is a symbol of my daughter's "graduation" into a more responsible and faithful individual....even if she did dump him on me for the summer so that she could go to Village Creek and serve. :)
Tuesday, August 16, 2011
Getting Out of Bed
Some days it is just hard to get out of bed.
Today is one of those days. I did not sleep well. Yesterday's thoughts are still burdening my mind even though I have vowed that today is a new day. I awoke frequently, but my hair is testimony to hard night in the sleep department. If I wake up with hair that I can brush and go - great night of sleep. Today, I look like I have played beauty shop with a four year old, and I was the client.
It is now past 8:30, and I should have walked the dog, showered, grabbed food for lunch, and headed out the door. Instead I am blogging in an effort to get past the fact that it is hard to get out of bed. Perhaps, if I get out all out of my system now, I can focus on what needs to get done and possibly even have a productive day. Perhaps, if I put this all down "on paper," I can feel that the world at large has empathized with me. Then - when the people at work look at me funny - I can think to myself, "Deep down they understand."
And they do. On any given day in the office where I find myself from time to time, one person is having a day where it was hard to get out of bed. Only one of my co-workers is a self-proclaimed morning person. She smiles at the rest of us as we drag ourselves in at seven minute intervals between 8:30 and 10:30, but she has been there since 7:30 and is never late. The rest of us rely on some kind of caffeinated beverage to get us through to lunch. Once the combination of coffee and lunch kick in, productivity starts - around one o'clock. Many of my co-workers work well past 6 p.m. because they have finally hit their stride.
Getting out of bed can be pure torture some days. The pillow is perfect, the bed is perfect, and the covers are finally kicked into the proper place for a perfect warm-cold ratio. I find that all of this perfectness happens around 5:30 - just about the time that I wake up and go to the bathroom. When I crawl back into bed, I feel warm and comforted...and want to stay there for quite a bit longer.
Like maybe all day.
I have often wondered what would happen if I just stayed up for the day then instead of going back to bed and then fighting with my alarm clock to be up and out the door by....sometime. I know that the first few days would be really rough as I would struggle to shake my brain awake into functioning. But eventually - on some morning - I probably would be smiling like my co-worker. I would need to ensure that I could be back in bed by 9 or 9:30 p.m., but that could be a good thing too. It is dark by then; my body wants to sleep by then. Instead of sleeping, I push myself to write just one more email, watch just one more episode, or read Facebook just one more time.
There is little do in the morning in our society, but there is plenty around to keep us awake at night. That could be the problem. Or perhaps what I focus on in the morning that is the problem. Perhaps if I woke up and did all that I should (exercise, read Scripture, breathe in the calm of the day), I would truly be more productive for the rest of the day. "Night life" activities do not really appeal to me anyway, so maybe it would be best to become a morning person.
Someday.
Today is one of those days. I did not sleep well. Yesterday's thoughts are still burdening my mind even though I have vowed that today is a new day. I awoke frequently, but my hair is testimony to hard night in the sleep department. If I wake up with hair that I can brush and go - great night of sleep. Today, I look like I have played beauty shop with a four year old, and I was the client.
It is now past 8:30, and I should have walked the dog, showered, grabbed food for lunch, and headed out the door. Instead I am blogging in an effort to get past the fact that it is hard to get out of bed. Perhaps, if I get out all out of my system now, I can focus on what needs to get done and possibly even have a productive day. Perhaps, if I put this all down "on paper," I can feel that the world at large has empathized with me. Then - when the people at work look at me funny - I can think to myself, "Deep down they understand."
And they do. On any given day in the office where I find myself from time to time, one person is having a day where it was hard to get out of bed. Only one of my co-workers is a self-proclaimed morning person. She smiles at the rest of us as we drag ourselves in at seven minute intervals between 8:30 and 10:30, but she has been there since 7:30 and is never late. The rest of us rely on some kind of caffeinated beverage to get us through to lunch. Once the combination of coffee and lunch kick in, productivity starts - around one o'clock. Many of my co-workers work well past 6 p.m. because they have finally hit their stride.
Getting out of bed can be pure torture some days. The pillow is perfect, the bed is perfect, and the covers are finally kicked into the proper place for a perfect warm-cold ratio. I find that all of this perfectness happens around 5:30 - just about the time that I wake up and go to the bathroom. When I crawl back into bed, I feel warm and comforted...and want to stay there for quite a bit longer.
Like maybe all day.
I have often wondered what would happen if I just stayed up for the day then instead of going back to bed and then fighting with my alarm clock to be up and out the door by....sometime. I know that the first few days would be really rough as I would struggle to shake my brain awake into functioning. But eventually - on some morning - I probably would be smiling like my co-worker. I would need to ensure that I could be back in bed by 9 or 9:30 p.m., but that could be a good thing too. It is dark by then; my body wants to sleep by then. Instead of sleeping, I push myself to write just one more email, watch just one more episode, or read Facebook just one more time.
There is little do in the morning in our society, but there is plenty around to keep us awake at night. That could be the problem. Or perhaps what I focus on in the morning that is the problem. Perhaps if I woke up and did all that I should (exercise, read Scripture, breathe in the calm of the day), I would truly be more productive for the rest of the day. "Night life" activities do not really appeal to me anyway, so maybe it would be best to become a morning person.
Someday.
Monday, August 15, 2011
Paperwork - Just Details!
School is about to start in Iowa and North Dakota; I am so thankful for two more weeks of summer vacation here in the Minneapolis area. Most Minnesota school start after Labor Day, but Minneapolis Public School District #1 and the charter schools within its boundaries have received approval to start on August 29th. Thank goodness for at least two more weeks! I have so much to do as an employee of MTS/MN Virtual High School, but what is really pressing on me today is the paperwork and details of our son's fall education and activities.I went to Patrick Henry High School this morning to pay my $60 fee for Josiah to participate on the cross country team. When he comes back from working at Village Creek Bible Camp in a few weeks, we will have to buy him some new running shoes. The fees and purchases are not what bothers me, though. It is the paperwork! I completed three forms in preparation for this morning; they all had similar information on them with one or two details on each that differed from the others. Without one of the forms, he could not participate, so I had to complete all three. I love my son, I want him to run on the cross country team, but I hate filling out forms. An act of love = filling out forms.
I came home and proceeded to tackle the next stack of forms which also relate to Josiah. When people ask our son where he goes to school, he takes a deep breath, gauges how much to say, and then details how he is enrolled at Patrick Henry High School but does all of his schooling at home online. Depending on how interested the person asking appears, he may continue. He would then explain that this year, he will take Latin from one online provider (MN Virtual Academy High School), math from another (NorthernStarOnline), and the remaining classes (including a potential favorite - Forensic Science) from yet another online provider (Socrates Online). In 2010-2011, he took classes from Minneapolis Online and Wolf Creek Online High School. If you have questions about online in Minnesota, Josiah might just be your resource. All of these online providers operate out of Minnesota in some form, are certified to provide education to Minnesota residents, and - thanks to online learning law in Minnesota and MPS district waiving the 50% limit for him - access public education funding so that the courses do not cost us a cent.
The paperwork - some online while other parts in actual paper form - is daunting. And I have worked in online education for six years!!! Fortunately, one of the pages is identical for all three providers, so I simply copied it. All of this prepares me for a meeting tomorrow with Josiah's guidance counselor who seriously looked like I had run her over when I stopped into her office this morning. The school decided to pass the ninth grade class from last year onto a new counselor just as I had taught the prior counselor how this all worked. I quickly gave the new counselor the "fast fact" speech and told her I would be back tomorrow morning with all of the paperwork. She said that would be just fine. I think I saw her hold her head in her hands as I left her office.
It seems that every aspect of our lives involves endless amounts of paperwork. Most of it duplicates other paperwork. Imagine the trees that have died in the name of paperwork...or just in the name of online learning in Minnesota! Even the 5K run/walk that my school will host on Saturday requires paperwork. Email me if you want the form so that you can participate as well. The more important or detailed that the item we seek it, the more paperwork that is involved. Participation in a 5K needs one page with my signature saying that I won't sue the school; buying a house requires a book of signatures that somehow promise that I will pay my bills to the mortgage company.
These details walk all over us, crumble our spirits, and steal our time. However, I doubt any of them will disappear soon. As I closed a conversation with one of the online providers this afternoon, I made a comment that these details, though time consuming, are necessary. He agreed; signatures on the bottom of one of the forms ensures that the school gets paid and that I do not have to foot the bill. Most of the paperwork that we complete, whether an insurance form, a school enrollment packet, or a sign up sheet for a 5K, lead to something that alleviates our checkbook, to an exciting new adventure, or to ensuring that we have a roof over our heads.
These details are necessary, but we do not need to begrudge the fact that we have to do them. Instead, we can look to end and realize that the means are but a stop along the way to something else. Saving $6,000 a year to educate my son in Minnesota is worth the thirty minutes of paperwork details. I doubt that Josiah will think of me with gratitude as he crosses the finish line of a meet or learns some interesting fact in his forensic science class; however, as his mother, I have provided the end for him in both cases by attending to the details that each required.
That is satisfaction enough...and it is my job.
Sunday, August 14, 2011
Bipolar Nature
I am amazed that a one hour stop en route to a meeting in Duluth at Jay Cooke State Park in northern Minnesota keeps generating thinks day after day. As I viewed the pictures in the slideshow again from yesterday's blog post titled "Barefoot on the Rocks," two photos caught my eye and reminded me of some thoughts I had while taking the pictures a few days ago.
First the pictures; then the explanation.
The photo below shows the "raging" St Louis River - the website for Jay Cooke State Park actually uses that exact term to describe it.
The second photo (below) shows a serene "brook" or "creek."
The amazing thing about these two photos is that these are not in totally different locations - they are right next to each other - in fact, they are the same river. The view of these two locations side-by-side could be seen below, but I did not think ahead to this blog post and actually take the photo. If I had, though, it would have been spectacular.
Considering these two contradictory scenes makes me consider my own emotional self. (I did mention that there are some things I might reveal in this blog that I might not say out loud! Here is one of those.) While I have never stood up in front of a large group of people and declared this as part of who I am, I have recently been diagnosed with a mild form of bipolar illness. The psychiatrist that diagnosed me in March of 2010 and put me on medication actually said that I simply needed a little regulating. I realize that this blog post is sort of public forum, mass revealing of this somewhat private "condition." I have shared this with some in the past eighteen months as it seemed appropriate; however, not even every family member or close friend probably knows this about me. I have not kept this from anyone maliciously in the same way that I did not decide this afternoon (now evening) that I should tell the world.
Although I do not experience massive highs and lows that one could find in some people's lives, I do go through life (when not medicated) with some fury that follows by "crashes" (as I call them) that can put me in bed for a couple of days. I had been incorrectly diagnosed and treated for depression at various points in my life, and the medications had always been just a little too effective, sending me into very productive times that would eventually turn into an inability to focus, frequent car trips across various states (not always a bad thing...), or the ending of some stage in my life with a drive that could hardly be explained. The psychiatrist actually said that he would love to medicate most Italians. Haha!
The first photo of a raging river swiftly moving down the river and crashing down in beautiful waterfalls reminds me of myself in "manic" times. Many friends, co-workers, or acquaintances have experienced the Stacy that exists during these times. I become a grand idea producer and a far-more-than-usual prolific writer of whatever needs to be written at work (policies, letters, etc.). I over-commit to things like school boards, more responsibilities at work, and new programs at church. In these times, I rage forward like the St Louis River, and then, like the waterfalls, my energy crashes and changes into foam that floats on the water.
The other photo shows the same river, but this side of the river is much more calm in its pace as it slowly meanders downriver and then slides over the rocks to join its counterpart at the bottom of the falls. As I took at this side of the river, I sighed deeply, feeling its peaceful approach to life. This part of the river reminds me of myself as well - not the non-manic or "depressive" side of me - but rather as the one who is doing all she is supposed to be doing. Medication only goes so far in helping me manage the raging and falling that my energy does. If I do not do my part in eating well, avoiding caffeine (I write as I sip on a Coca-Cola), exercising frequently, and sleeping long enough and often enough, the medication is pointless.
As I wrote this post, I desperately wanted to put together some inspired analogy about how both of the parts of the river are beautiful, blah blah blah, but it just kept dead-ending into something that I did not intend or like. I took a break, drove to Uptown, and cleared my head. As I drove, I realized that the problem I had with the analogy was that it focused so much on these two snapshots of the St Louis River - one calm and one raging before crashing. I realized that I hardly knew the river.
When I returned home, I researched the river more and discovered some interesting things about it. The St Louis River is nearly 180 miles long. It rages and meanders through parts of Minnesota and Wisconsin before dumping into Lake Superior. This fast moving river hosts the only opportunity for whitewater rafting in Minnesota and has rapids that are recommended only for experienced paddlers. From my two snapshots above, I could not have guessed these facts about the river!
I wonder sometimes if this is how we are with the people around us. We see people in snapshot moments and make life-long determinations of who they are, what their character is like, and if we can be friends or colleagues with them. Maxwell Gladwell takes this concept apart in his book Blink (available on Amazon for only $9.92 or free at your local library). He talks about the millisecond snap decisions we can make about others based on everything but actual knowledge of them.
Even more interesting is how our label and diagnosis laden society makes it easy for us to make snap decisions about people based on a word that has been given in an effort to help us understand behavior better. Instead of helping us, often these labels hurt us. Perhaps I am overly sensitive to this now that I have my own label, but I know I am right as I work in education, talk with others about ministry, and just eavesdrop at coffee shops. When I hear things like, "that poor woman - she has a bipolar son and a husband with depression," I am not hearing empathy from that person but rather a clucking of the tongue and a tone that insinuates that the one speaking has taken a label and missed the river for the snapshot.
My two dimensional photos, no matter how beautiful and breath-taking, cannot fully describe the 180 mile magnificence of the St Louis River. A diagnosis, though helpful at times, does not replace the full understanding that comes with a relationship with someone. When we focus so closely on the diagnosis or label that someone has placed on another person, we lose sight of the whole of that person. There is so much more know, so much more to discover, and so much more to enjoy.
More than once since I returned from my diagnosing meeting with the psychiatrist in March 2010, Kerry has demonstrated this to me. He refuses to see me as "his bipolar wife." He refuses to see me as a snapshot. In his mind, I am and always have been Stacy - full of quirks, annoyances, and fun. While the diagnosis helps us to manage the negative impact that the bipolar tendencies can have on our relationship and our family's life together, we refuse to let it define me as that snapshot.
If rivers could talk, what more would they tell us? Would we take the time to listen? Or are we content to see the two dimensional photograph?
And what about the people in our lives...
First the pictures; then the explanation.
The photo below shows the "raging" St Louis River - the website for Jay Cooke State Park actually uses that exact term to describe it.
The second photo (below) shows a serene "brook" or "creek."
The amazing thing about these two photos is that these are not in totally different locations - they are right next to each other - in fact, they are the same river. The view of these two locations side-by-side could be seen below, but I did not think ahead to this blog post and actually take the photo. If I had, though, it would have been spectacular.
Considering these two contradictory scenes makes me consider my own emotional self. (I did mention that there are some things I might reveal in this blog that I might not say out loud! Here is one of those.) While I have never stood up in front of a large group of people and declared this as part of who I am, I have recently been diagnosed with a mild form of bipolar illness. The psychiatrist that diagnosed me in March of 2010 and put me on medication actually said that I simply needed a little regulating. I realize that this blog post is sort of public forum, mass revealing of this somewhat private "condition." I have shared this with some in the past eighteen months as it seemed appropriate; however, not even every family member or close friend probably knows this about me. I have not kept this from anyone maliciously in the same way that I did not decide this afternoon (now evening) that I should tell the world.
Although I do not experience massive highs and lows that one could find in some people's lives, I do go through life (when not medicated) with some fury that follows by "crashes" (as I call them) that can put me in bed for a couple of days. I had been incorrectly diagnosed and treated for depression at various points in my life, and the medications had always been just a little too effective, sending me into very productive times that would eventually turn into an inability to focus, frequent car trips across various states (not always a bad thing...), or the ending of some stage in my life with a drive that could hardly be explained. The psychiatrist actually said that he would love to medicate most Italians. Haha!
The first photo of a raging river swiftly moving down the river and crashing down in beautiful waterfalls reminds me of myself in "manic" times. Many friends, co-workers, or acquaintances have experienced the Stacy that exists during these times. I become a grand idea producer and a far-more-than-usual prolific writer of whatever needs to be written at work (policies, letters, etc.). I over-commit to things like school boards, more responsibilities at work, and new programs at church. In these times, I rage forward like the St Louis River, and then, like the waterfalls, my energy crashes and changes into foam that floats on the water.
The other photo shows the same river, but this side of the river is much more calm in its pace as it slowly meanders downriver and then slides over the rocks to join its counterpart at the bottom of the falls. As I took at this side of the river, I sighed deeply, feeling its peaceful approach to life. This part of the river reminds me of myself as well - not the non-manic or "depressive" side of me - but rather as the one who is doing all she is supposed to be doing. Medication only goes so far in helping me manage the raging and falling that my energy does. If I do not do my part in eating well, avoiding caffeine (I write as I sip on a Coca-Cola), exercising frequently, and sleeping long enough and often enough, the medication is pointless.
As I wrote this post, I desperately wanted to put together some inspired analogy about how both of the parts of the river are beautiful, blah blah blah, but it just kept dead-ending into something that I did not intend or like. I took a break, drove to Uptown, and cleared my head. As I drove, I realized that the problem I had with the analogy was that it focused so much on these two snapshots of the St Louis River - one calm and one raging before crashing. I realized that I hardly knew the river.
When I returned home, I researched the river more and discovered some interesting things about it. The St Louis River is nearly 180 miles long. It rages and meanders through parts of Minnesota and Wisconsin before dumping into Lake Superior. This fast moving river hosts the only opportunity for whitewater rafting in Minnesota and has rapids that are recommended only for experienced paddlers. From my two snapshots above, I could not have guessed these facts about the river!
I wonder sometimes if this is how we are with the people around us. We see people in snapshot moments and make life-long determinations of who they are, what their character is like, and if we can be friends or colleagues with them. Maxwell Gladwell takes this concept apart in his book Blink (available on Amazon for only $9.92 or free at your local library). He talks about the millisecond snap decisions we can make about others based on everything but actual knowledge of them.
Even more interesting is how our label and diagnosis laden society makes it easy for us to make snap decisions about people based on a word that has been given in an effort to help us understand behavior better. Instead of helping us, often these labels hurt us. Perhaps I am overly sensitive to this now that I have my own label, but I know I am right as I work in education, talk with others about ministry, and just eavesdrop at coffee shops. When I hear things like, "that poor woman - she has a bipolar son and a husband with depression," I am not hearing empathy from that person but rather a clucking of the tongue and a tone that insinuates that the one speaking has taken a label and missed the river for the snapshot.
My two dimensional photos, no matter how beautiful and breath-taking, cannot fully describe the 180 mile magnificence of the St Louis River. A diagnosis, though helpful at times, does not replace the full understanding that comes with a relationship with someone. When we focus so closely on the diagnosis or label that someone has placed on another person, we lose sight of the whole of that person. There is so much more know, so much more to discover, and so much more to enjoy.
More than once since I returned from my diagnosing meeting with the psychiatrist in March 2010, Kerry has demonstrated this to me. He refuses to see me as "his bipolar wife." He refuses to see me as a snapshot. In his mind, I am and always have been Stacy - full of quirks, annoyances, and fun. While the diagnosis helps us to manage the negative impact that the bipolar tendencies can have on our relationship and our family's life together, we refuse to let it define me as that snapshot.
If rivers could talk, what more would they tell us? Would we take the time to listen? Or are we content to see the two dimensional photograph?
And what about the people in our lives...
Saturday, August 13, 2011
Barefoot on the Rocks
It might be cheesy to reference one's own prior blog posts in a current blog post, but I'm going to do it anyway. Two days ago, I detailed the journey that I took to Jay Cooke State Park in my blog post titled "Adventure Comes to Those Who Seek."
I was so taken with this state park's beauty only feet from the parking lot that I spent more time there than I had originally planned when I made the decision to stop there.
Because I had left my hiking shoes at home, I was in flip-flops for this adventure.This caused no issue for me on the trails or crossing the bridge; however, I could get much better views from the rocks lining the St Louis River than from the trails. The rocks themselves did not shatter my hopes of beautiful views or photos, but the flip flops on my feet did seem to possibly endanger me as I maneuvered the terrain.
I was so taken with this state park's beauty only feet from the parking lot that I spent more time there than I had originally planned when I made the decision to stop there.
Because I had left my hiking shoes at home, I was in flip-flops for this adventure.This caused no issue for me on the trails or crossing the bridge; however, I could get much better views from the rocks lining the St Louis River than from the trails. The rocks themselves did not shatter my hopes of beautiful views or photos, but the flip flops on my feet did seem to possibly endanger me as I maneuvered the terrain.
[slideshow]
I like my flip flops; Kerry convinced me to buy them earlier this summer when we walked the streets of Lansing, Iowa. Of all places to find awesome flip flops, we bought them at a hardware store! They are comfortable and cute, and they were reasonably priced. I should have bought a second pair, and, when we go to Village Creek Bible Camp later this month (twice), I still might. Did I mention that they are from Reef? And did I mention that they were only twenty bucks? Seriously - great deal. I love them.
As much as I love my flip flops, they were in my way on the rocks. In order to get the great photos in the slideshow above, I had to be willing to shed my flip flops. This is often true of other items, ideas, elements, fears, relationships - you name it - in my life. They can even be things that I love or that are good for me, but in order to move on to something better I need to shed them. The shedding in this instance was not prolonged or forever; I put them back on as soon as I finished doing what I wanted to do. However, there are times that the items I shed need to out of my life forever.
The other little side note of "learning" that I took from this is that my pursuit of something great came with a little pain. Shedding my flip flops meant that my feet were no longer spared the rocks, sand, and items left behind by others seeking similar views. While I tend to shy away from painful endeavors (exercise in general!), lately I have been willing to put up with some pain when the promise of something awesome awaited on the other side of not being able to breath as I struggled up a cliff or of painful jabbing into my feet as I winced my way across the rocks.
Who knew that taking off my flip flops could teach me so much?
Friday, August 12, 2011
Joint Accounts
When Kerry and I married in 1995 (I typed 2005 there...wow - am I glad I caught that!) at the ripe old age of 21, we never gave a second thought to the fact that we would have a joint checking account. I think that we thought that our two combined (tiny) incomes in one account would fair better than two accounts. We have lived in three states and another continent with that same joint account. In fact, we still use that one account as the springboard into our much more complicated financial lives that we lead now with two rental properties, two incomes, and older children.When I started my new job in January, it came with frequent reimbursement checks for mileage as I travel around the state doing what I do best - convincing people that I am right. In what I thought was a brilliant move, we chose to open a third checking account so that I would deposit the reimbursement checks into it and then use that money to pay for the Honda Civic's needs - gas, oil changes, etc. However, after our recent "budget talks" that nearly resulted in a shutdown of the Bender-Family's financial world due to indecision and conflicting values, Kerry and I decided that this third checking account would serve a much greater good to be used as a way to regulate our spending in certain categories of the budget.
The first day of revised Bender-Budget 2011 was to be August 1. There was only one problem: the third checking account was in my name only, but we both would be doing the spending from that account. We've managed for the past 12 days to "figure it out" - a move that neither of us found comforting - but today went to Wells Fargo and easily added Kerry to the account. He even designed his own check card so that it would be easy to tell that one apart from the other one for the other account. (Side note: his card has a picture of me on it - isn't that sweet?)
At one point in this process, Kerry asked me if I was comfortable with what we were doing or if I struggled with our decision to use "that account" for this purpose. I quickly answered, "No." However, when we were adding him to the account today, I realized that I did struggle with the decision but not for reasons that he assumed.
Marriage requires that the two become one. In this odd arrangement, we maintain our personal selves while also becoming one entity. Every couple has some struggle in this area of unity. For me, partnering in the area of finances has always been a struggle. It is not that I think that Kerry would unfairly choose his own whims over mine or that he would prioritize poorly or that together we could not come to conclusions that are fair, reasonable, and wise. Rather it is the age old issue that likely started with Adam and Eve...I want to do something my way rather than have to seek unity with my husband on the food budget.
Oddly, I struggle less with this when there is little money to be had. When Kerry was in seminary, there was no wiggle room in the budget - all of the money was spent before it was in the bank, and there was little left to haggle over. There was no need to consider who would get his or her iPad first - neither of us would have an iPad because the electric bill was being paid for with Christmas money from my grandmother. It seems easier for me to seek unity when every minute is a financial struggle.
Having joint accounts with one's husband may not be necessary for all women, but for me it is. There cannot be a mine or a his because it is ours. Unity in our household is a must, and it starts for me with our finances. Constant review of where our money is going and how we should allocate any overage (when will that happen???) requires us to have conversations that reveal more about us as people than simply how we approach our finances. Those conversations bring to light values that flow over into other areas of our marriage and assist us in maneuvering other issues such as parenting, time management, and communication.
I was a tad jealous of Kerry's new check card design (not that I was on it so much as much as the newness of a card with a cool design on it), so I created a new check card design for myself too.
Thursday, August 11, 2011
Adventure Comes to Those Who Seek
As I write this post, I am sitting in a conference room in Duluth awaiting the arrival of the rest of the staff who will present an information session about my current place of employment - Minnesota Virtual High School (not to be confused with Minnesota Virtual Academy High School - if you want to see all of the virtual/online possibilities in Minnesota, go to http://mnola.org). I have spent my day working my way up the beautiful I-35 and enjoying my time getting here.
My first stop was in Forest Lake where two former colleagues and their babes met me to have a mini-reunion. To say that it was great to see them is truly an understatement. I shared with them my recent love of hiking and state parks, and they both directed me to Jay Cooke State Park. I was not disappointed. If I would have had my daughter's camera along, pictures would be included in this post.
When I left home this morning, I had an inkling that I might do something adventurous. I wore Stacy-style hiking clothes, packed a bag with my work clothes and what I thought I would need for a shower (hoping that I would find somewhere to shower, of course!), and headed out the door. Twenty minutes later as I sped toward Forest Lake, I realized that, although I wore flip flops and had intended to do so for driving, I had completely forgotten to grab any form of shoe appropriate for hiking. I texted the pastor, and he said I should just buy some need Keens. How sweet of him to offer! But - I don't really need new Keens, and I had just recently invested in some new tennis shoes recently. It seemed wasteful to buy new shoes simply because I didn't plan well. My friends assured me that I could see beauty at Jay Cooke in my flip-flops as there is a well-groomed trail from the parking lot to the Swinging Bridge and along the edge to beautiful waterfalls.
My time at the state park was short as I had wasted time at the outlet mall in North Branch, but I stretched my time as much as I could figuring that I could take a shorter shower if necessary. I found the path easily (with the help, of course, of the park ranger), and I was amazed at the beauty that was literally 50 steps from the parking area. Seeking a bit of a thrill, I decided to climb on the granite rocks that line the water's edge in order to get some better angles for pictures. My flip flops were fine on the trail, but they didn't fair so well on the rocks. Having grown up visiting Rhode Island's Beavertail Lighthouse with similar rocks to those in the state park, I knew that I would be better off in bare feet.
I would love to detail my time on the rocks, but I fear that some may shudder at the fact that I was doing what I did. Suffice it to say that I loved every minute of my adventurous time in the state park, and I will do it again sometime soon. I may even have to consider snow-shoeing (sp??) there this winter en route to a court date in Carlton, MN, which is literally a stone's throw from the park.
I wrapped up my day with my first-ever shower in a truck stop. Who knew that spending $8 could feel so good? They even provided me with a wash cloth and a towel! Unfortunately, in addition to hiking shoes, I had also forgotten my shampoo and conditioner. I shrugged that off, thankful that there was hand soap in the shower that I used even in my hair. I left for my work engagement feeling refreshed, tanned, and full of gratitude that I can grasp the fun in life in these small, random snippets even in the middle of a work day rather than on a vacation day (which I am out of as of tomorrow).
Adventure rarely happens passively to us. Rather, it awaits to be found by those who seek it. I think I will plan to pack my hiking shoes every day. I never know when a trail off the unbeaten path awaits my seeking of it.
My first stop was in Forest Lake where two former colleagues and their babes met me to have a mini-reunion. To say that it was great to see them is truly an understatement. I shared with them my recent love of hiking and state parks, and they both directed me to Jay Cooke State Park. I was not disappointed. If I would have had my daughter's camera along, pictures would be included in this post.
My phone and I are not being friends right now, but I have a deadline to meet.
When I left home this morning, I had an inkling that I might do something adventurous. I wore Stacy-style hiking clothes, packed a bag with my work clothes and what I thought I would need for a shower (hoping that I would find somewhere to shower, of course!), and headed out the door. Twenty minutes later as I sped toward Forest Lake, I realized that, although I wore flip flops and had intended to do so for driving, I had completely forgotten to grab any form of shoe appropriate for hiking. I texted the pastor, and he said I should just buy some need Keens. How sweet of him to offer! But - I don't really need new Keens, and I had just recently invested in some new tennis shoes recently. It seemed wasteful to buy new shoes simply because I didn't plan well. My friends assured me that I could see beauty at Jay Cooke in my flip-flops as there is a well-groomed trail from the parking lot to the Swinging Bridge and along the edge to beautiful waterfalls.
My time at the state park was short as I had wasted time at the outlet mall in North Branch, but I stretched my time as much as I could figuring that I could take a shorter shower if necessary. I found the path easily (with the help, of course, of the park ranger), and I was amazed at the beauty that was literally 50 steps from the parking area. Seeking a bit of a thrill, I decided to climb on the granite rocks that line the water's edge in order to get some better angles for pictures. My flip flops were fine on the trail, but they didn't fair so well on the rocks. Having grown up visiting Rhode Island's Beavertail Lighthouse with similar rocks to those in the state park, I knew that I would be better off in bare feet.
I would love to detail my time on the rocks, but I fear that some may shudder at the fact that I was doing what I did. Suffice it to say that I loved every minute of my adventurous time in the state park, and I will do it again sometime soon. I may even have to consider snow-shoeing (sp??) there this winter en route to a court date in Carlton, MN, which is literally a stone's throw from the park.
I wrapped up my day with my first-ever shower in a truck stop. Who knew that spending $8 could feel so good? They even provided me with a wash cloth and a towel! Unfortunately, in addition to hiking shoes, I had also forgotten my shampoo and conditioner. I shrugged that off, thankful that there was hand soap in the shower that I used even in my hair. I left for my work engagement feeling refreshed, tanned, and full of gratitude that I can grasp the fun in life in these small, random snippets even in the middle of a work day rather than on a vacation day (which I am out of as of tomorrow).
Adventure rarely happens passively to us. Rather, it awaits to be found by those who seek it. I think I will plan to pack my hiking shoes every day. I never know when a trail off the unbeaten path awaits my seeking of it.
Wednesday, August 10, 2011
Getting Over Myself
I struggle with my weight.
I do not struggle to gain weight - that is the easy part. In parts of my past, I did not struggled to lose weight; rather, I purposed to lose weight. Not a healthy way to live...so that is no longer a part of my life. In the few months following my mom's death in 2003, I experienced a drastic weight gain to numbers that I had not even seen in either of my pregnancies. Pictures from the height of that weight gain are scary - and I say that in the most objective way possible. For the eighteen months prior to our tenth wedding anniversary in 2005, I lost over 80 pounds. Pictures from our cruise that year and from the prom I chaperoned that year show a drastic difference. I had my "skinny" (but healthy) face. By 2010, I had gained half of that back. I am so very tired of the yo-yo.
In the past year, I have been able to lose 11 pounds and keep them off. This, of course, requires rigorous change and moment-by-moment vigilance. One 99cent bag of Cheetos (yum!) can derail an entire week of positive choices. I figure if I can lose 11 pounds a year from now until age 40 and then just keep it off, I should be on the road to health in the second part of my life. In the meantime, though, wearing pants to every wedding, funeral, church service, and court appearance is starting to get old. When I look in the mirror, though, I don't like what I see.
In the next three months, Kerry and I have four weddings to attend. For three of them, he is the officiating pastor. This makes me the pastor's wife. For the other, a family affair, we are one of the host couples. Regardless of which of these four you choose, proper attire is necessary and desirable. Today as I drove toward home, Sears called my name. I stopped to find a new top to wear with my ever-present and very comforting black pants. I actually dreaded it, though. It is not that I do not like the black pants; I am just tired of wearing them to every occasion. However, rather than humiliate myself in the dressing room by screaming at the image in the mirror, I tend to choose fun tops that I know will work well with black pants. What doesn't work with black pants?
I do not know what possessed me, but I took a chance and tried on a dress as well as a few tops. And I'm taking another chance by posting the picture on this blog post. I figure most of the people who actually read my blog will see me in this dress as some point in the near future either in Facebook photos or in person at one of the four weddings (I even know which two at which I will be wearing the dress!).
Buying the dress required that I "get over myself" a bit. While I could speed up this weight loss process with more discipline to eat better and walk more, the truth is that in the next three months will not see a huge weight loss. The faster I lose weight, the more likely I am to put it back on quickly. I'd like this to be a permanent change. With that in mind, the body that I have today will be the body that attends the wedding next week, and it - or something quite similar - most likely will be the body that will attend the September wedding and the two in October. Rather than purchasing one more top to wear with the same black pants, I chose today to accept this body and put a dress on it. Fortunately, Sears had a dress that I think (and the pastor agrees) looks pretty good - so much so that I wore it tonight, and we went out to dinner.
I needed practice being in public in a dress again. And I loved every minute of it.
I do not struggle to gain weight - that is the easy part. In parts of my past, I did not struggled to lose weight; rather, I purposed to lose weight. Not a healthy way to live...so that is no longer a part of my life. In the few months following my mom's death in 2003, I experienced a drastic weight gain to numbers that I had not even seen in either of my pregnancies. Pictures from the height of that weight gain are scary - and I say that in the most objective way possible. For the eighteen months prior to our tenth wedding anniversary in 2005, I lost over 80 pounds. Pictures from our cruise that year and from the prom I chaperoned that year show a drastic difference. I had my "skinny" (but healthy) face. By 2010, I had gained half of that back. I am so very tired of the yo-yo.
In the past year, I have been able to lose 11 pounds and keep them off. This, of course, requires rigorous change and moment-by-moment vigilance. One 99cent bag of Cheetos (yum!) can derail an entire week of positive choices. I figure if I can lose 11 pounds a year from now until age 40 and then just keep it off, I should be on the road to health in the second part of my life. In the meantime, though, wearing pants to every wedding, funeral, church service, and court appearance is starting to get old. When I look in the mirror, though, I don't like what I see.
In the next three months, Kerry and I have four weddings to attend. For three of them, he is the officiating pastor. This makes me the pastor's wife. For the other, a family affair, we are one of the host couples. Regardless of which of these four you choose, proper attire is necessary and desirable. Today as I drove toward home, Sears called my name. I stopped to find a new top to wear with my ever-present and very comforting black pants. I actually dreaded it, though. It is not that I do not like the black pants; I am just tired of wearing them to every occasion. However, rather than humiliate myself in the dressing room by screaming at the image in the mirror, I tend to choose fun tops that I know will work well with black pants. What doesn't work with black pants?
I do not know what possessed me, but I took a chance and tried on a dress as well as a few tops. And I'm taking another chance by posting the picture on this blog post. I figure most of the people who actually read my blog will see me in this dress as some point in the near future either in Facebook photos or in person at one of the four weddings (I even know which two at which I will be wearing the dress!).Buying the dress required that I "get over myself" a bit. While I could speed up this weight loss process with more discipline to eat better and walk more, the truth is that in the next three months will not see a huge weight loss. The faster I lose weight, the more likely I am to put it back on quickly. I'd like this to be a permanent change. With that in mind, the body that I have today will be the body that attends the wedding next week, and it - or something quite similar - most likely will be the body that will attend the September wedding and the two in October. Rather than purchasing one more top to wear with the same black pants, I chose today to accept this body and put a dress on it. Fortunately, Sears had a dress that I think (and the pastor agrees) looks pretty good - so much so that I wore it tonight, and we went out to dinner.
I needed practice being in public in a dress again. And I loved every minute of it.
Tuesday, August 9, 2011
Baseball Makes Me Happy
Usually when we attend a baseball game at Target Field, we are cheering boldly for the Twins. We agonize over every out; we argue with bad calls from the umpires; we dance and throw our arms in the airs with each base hit or, dare we say, home run. Baseball in Minnesota is more than a pass-time, is more than something to give you a good nap on a Sunday afternoon, and is more than a conversation piece at the water coolers at work. Baseball makes some of us - myself included - very happy.
For several years, baseball has been the most financially accessible sport in Minnesota. When one compares ticket prices of attending a Twins game to those of the Wild (hockey) or the Vikings (football), the difference is daunting. The cost of a ticket to a Twins game used to be half or even an eighth of one to either of the other professional teams in Minnesota. This had made it a sport for the masses.
Baseball is such an insignificant thing overall in life. Players' stats and all of the information that we can share with each other over the water cooler don't really matter in the grand scheme of things. However, affiliating ourselves with an entity greater than ourselves makes us feel a part of that. I doubt that I will ever have a conversation with Joe Mauer or Michael Cuddyer, yet something in me is drawn to them. I want the best for them; I cheer them on in games, and I am sad for them when they are on the disabled list or have a personal tragedy. Killibrew's death earlier this summer revealed how this affiliation impacts us as the entire state mourned with his family.
Tonight, the Twins hosted the Boston Red Sox. This made it more difficult for me in terms of cheering. My two favorite teams in one ballpark - playing against each other. I chose to be Switzerland. That is a false analogy, though, as I soon realized. Switzerland in its neutrality cheers for no one.
I wanted to cheer for both teams.
As we neared the final inning, Boston led 4-3. Papelbon took the mound and faced only three hitters. He is a closing beast. Mauer's final out signaled a win for the Red Sox. While I had rooted for the home team most of the game, inwardly I was happy for Red Sox. They remain competitively in the running for the AL-East leading team; a loss to the Twins tonight would have altered that course.
I was happy.
For several years, baseball has been the most financially accessible sport in Minnesota. When one compares ticket prices of attending a Twins game to those of the Wild (hockey) or the Vikings (football), the difference is daunting. The cost of a ticket to a Twins game used to be half or even an eighth of one to either of the other professional teams in Minnesota. This had made it a sport for the masses.
Baseball is such an insignificant thing overall in life. Players' stats and all of the information that we can share with each other over the water cooler don't really matter in the grand scheme of things. However, affiliating ourselves with an entity greater than ourselves makes us feel a part of that. I doubt that I will ever have a conversation with Joe Mauer or Michael Cuddyer, yet something in me is drawn to them. I want the best for them; I cheer them on in games, and I am sad for them when they are on the disabled list or have a personal tragedy. Killibrew's death earlier this summer revealed how this affiliation impacts us as the entire state mourned with his family.
Tonight, the Twins hosted the Boston Red Sox. This made it more difficult for me in terms of cheering. My two favorite teams in one ballpark - playing against each other. I chose to be Switzerland. That is a false analogy, though, as I soon realized. Switzerland in its neutrality cheers for no one.
I wanted to cheer for both teams.
As we neared the final inning, Boston led 4-3. Papelbon took the mound and faced only three hitters. He is a closing beast. Mauer's final out signaled a win for the Red Sox. While I had rooted for the home team most of the game, inwardly I was happy for Red Sox. They remain competitively in the running for the AL-East leading team; a loss to the Twins tonight would have altered that course.
I was happy.
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