The Telling of Christmas

The beginning of the goodness began with the coming of the Smallcomb. She flew out the Thursday before the week of Christmas...I’m going to stop making this as wordy as possible now. Right. Good. So Smalls came, and we played and frolicked with Jess and had such a jolly time. Whilst eating delicious Chinese food (vegan!) in Provo, we randomly ran into Pips, Coxi, and co., and promptly arranged a Sunday dinner to catch up with them. That was a lovely Christmas miracle. I love them.


We also watched ice skaters skating (it was much too cold to skate ourselves), walked through the Gil-Gal Garden (a must for any Salt Lake visitor), and checked out the Dickens Village, a somewhat disappointing marketing trick to get us to pay to shop. But at least there was wassail!

Then Smalls left, on a cold, sad, dismal day, but at least there was peppermint hot chocolate!

And then, three days later, I was picking up my brother Shawn who had flown in from California, and we caravanned up to Idaho with Chris to bring he whole family together again.

And there was much rejoicing.

We spent the first day last minute shopping. Everyone was very excited and involved. My mom cooked a delicious dinner. Then the grandparents, an Uncle, and a cousin came over for dinner, one of the funnest family dinners we’ve had in a long time. At least at the kids table.

Saturday the fam went snowboarding/skiing at Beaver, a wonderful resort that had more snow than Snowbird at this sorry time of year. Wait, what? It’s a sorry time for snow, that is. Not much snow. but Beaver was delightful. And tiring.

We had leftover turkey (or tofurkey!) sandwhiches on the drive back that were amazing. Then, while waiting to take a shower (5 people and one shower takes a bit of time), I tried to make some fudge. Let me tell you, I’ve never struggled so much to make a candy as I did this year. My first attempt at fudge-grandma’s old fashioned fudge-resulted in failure. A fudge so hard it couldn’t even be jack-hammered off the plate I put it on, with the few chocolate flakes we managed to scrape off bringing a strange burnt flavor that just wasn’t quite fitting. So I was bound and determined that this second, easier fudge recipe would not get the better of me.


But boy did it. In a huge way. This recipe called for a double broiler, something we surprisingly do not have. But two pots we had, so away I went, boiling water, then placing the second pot on top to melt the cocoa and sugar all together into a delicious, creamy, smooth mixture that suddenly-BOOM! exploded in my face. Hot water all over my chin and hands, not to mention the kitchen wall and floor. Chocolate splatches also spattered my clothes, the floor, and the kitchen counters. this was perhaps the most disastrous baking incident since the glass pan exploded from sitting on the burner, nearly 10 years ago!

To make a short story long, no good fudge this year. Very disappointing.

But after the shower David showed up and that was not disappointing at all. He got there just in time for the opening of presents, which we did early because Chris had to leave the next day. I don’t know what I did right this year, but I was sure spoiled by Santa, and everyone else! My brothers gave me their old XBox 360, and Rock Band 3. And Shawn’s old guitar and drum set. I love that my brothers treat themselves to much more than I do, and then get tired of their treats. Fantastic.

My parents gave me a TV. A new one, that doesn’t need a digital converter to get TV. A flat screen. It’s actually kind of fun to join the new century.

David competely fooled, and kind of annoyed me, by giving me a scooter cover. It’s a lovely present, but he made it appear as though that was all he got me, which honestly was all I was expecting. But then, after everything else, he brings in this other huge box, with snoopy wrapping, that contained a record player/CD player/tape player/ radio. Old fashioned but with all the cool gismos. And of course, a record to play, since I don’t have any. My mom sure had fun going through all her old record though, and finding a Christmas one to play.

It was so nice. What a nice boy. What a nice Christmas. I haven’t even started playing with all my toys yet, as coming back to work and life have taken something of a toll on me. But I am very excited. And content.

Now to get ready for next year!!!

The Prelude to Christmas

And now, after a 7 month break, I am back on my blog to tell you about Christmas. It was fantastic. I don’t want to write about it because that makes it seem over and done with, and I’m still under the impression we are at the height of Christmas season. I do want to write about it though, because it was great and happy and more I just miss writing on here.

To explain my absence, I did not stop writing because I had nothing to write about. In fact, the last six months have brought about some of the hugest changes my life has seen in quite some time. But those changes, including gaining-to some extent-a life, have hindered my ability to spew my thoughts on the internet for you poor innocent victims to read.

The first change = the coming of David. My boyfriend.

Gasp everyone, it’s true. I have a boyfriend. I met him on a scooter ride to Antelope Island, and he has taken much of my time since then.

The second change = homeless! Yes folks, once again I was homeless for a time, which was severely detrimental to my comfortable, laze about at home and write on my blog time. It was actually a pretty horrid time, where I discovered once again the absolute joy of having a place to call home, to sit and relax, to take a shower, and to keep all of your things together and in an organized fashion. Homeless was my decision, but my car breaking down for the entire two month duration was not, and let me tell you, homeless on a scoot is not fun. But times have changed and improved, which leads to change 3

Change 3 = my new apartment! My very own, all to myself apartment. In Salt Lake City! I love it. It’s downtown, in a historic apartment building, with glass doors leading into my kitchen, old school leaded glass windows and cabinet doors, original tile in the kitchen and bathroom, just adorable. All to myself. AND, my kitties...

Changes 4 and 5 = Charles Darwin Jr. Jr. Finn and Captain Lewis Robert Hobbes (Bob Hobbes. Just say it, it’s phenomenal). The best, most adorable kittens ever. My little terrors and my little loves.

However, I don’t have internet in this most wonderful of apartments. So to get on the internet, I have to either go to the coffee shop on the corner (where I feel the need to buy something in order to sit there and use their internet, and I’m poor!) or the library, a wonderful building but quite overwhelming and time consuming. so I just stay off the internet mostly. But I’ve missed reading about everyone’s life, and sharing mine, so here I sit, writing a blog to save on my computer until I can get to an internet source and upload. Whoa is me. Hahaha! I couldn’t remember how to spell the woe here, but I like the other version :)
Anyhoo, the only other changes are the extreme haircut, and the more extreme haircut.

And tonight the new car! Well, the new, used car. If it actually pans out, that will be my next blog.



Okay, are we all caught up? Then maybe I can move on to Christmas.

Goals?

Okay, so remember how sometimes I get really ambitious and make all these goals and plans to improve myself?

Well, the coming of Spring has rejuvenated me, and I feel inspired to improve myself once again, or work towards something, or, at the very least, make some more ridiculous names for the week that sync with my desires for improvement. So here's what I've come up with so far.

Monday:
Tuesday Tummy Day (work the abs)
Wednesday Weight Day (use weights. probably the focus will be the arms)
Thursday Thigh Day (not sure if this is soley thighs or incorporating butt. Gotta see if butt fits in elsewhere)
Friday:
Saturday

That's all I've come up with. I wanted to just start doing little exercises everyday to get this ol' bod beach worthy (I know, starting a bit late, but better late than never, right?), so I just need a day for abs, arms, butt, that's all I can think of really. So are the other days freebies? Monday Moon day? hmmm, a work in progress. suggestions appreciated.

Also, there is this silly idea that I'm running another half marathon in a month. The thing is, when I don't have a race planned, I make all these running goals and plans to get faster and endure and be an amazing runner. and then somehow when I do have a run planned, I get sick and feel tired and never train, maybe so as to have an excuse to do poorly? I don't know, I just know I haven't run since my last half marathon, so i feel this bear lake one may kick my butt worse than the first. We'll see.

Also, I'm planning on  a week of only fresh stuff, veggies, fruits, maybe rice cause I feel I will need something more. Felt like I needed some intense cleansing before my birthday.

On that note, I'm working to make this birthday one of the best ever. I don't usually make a deal about my birthday, but maybe the fear of a breakdown next year (30!!!) has made me cautious to enjoy this last one before that happens. So not that the fresh diet will make me love my life, but the rewards after will.

Any ideas for a fabulous birthday? I actually took a week off and I'm stoked. I want some form of camping. I want sees candy (thanks julie for already getting me wonderfulness in this area), I may want to go paragliding at point of the mountain, I want to do a backflip to prove to myself I still can, I want some feast with my parents, not sure the kind of cake, ice cream, maybe a jam session with Jo and the Gilchrist crew? hmmm. Oh and I want flowers.

So right. goals. I'm on it.

Love

Meet Craig and Connie Minowa. They are in the band Cloud Cult, which I love. Actually, Craig is Cloud Cult, though the rest of the band make it the incredibly special thing that it is.

What I love is the absolute love they seem to have for each other. Granted, Craig could just be another typical musician/artist romantic, and usually that kind of bugs me and seems overly dramatic and whatnot for my jaded little heart. But deep down, I am one sappy, hopeless romantic, and if I'm ever going to have a romance, it sure better be like this one.

I don't really know about their relationship. I know how Craig feels by his music. He is in love with this woman. But just look at this picture. What I love is the comfort. The honesty, the relaxed, here-we-are-enjoying-each-other look. I guess I just don't know how to get to this stage with people, because it seems like everyone I meet has this persona to present, and so do I, and no one can just be themselves and kick it on a couch. They're all worrying what others think, or at least thinking about what others think, and I don't know but this picture and the love it represents just makes me think of safety and comfort and just what I want. Somehow seeing Craig and Cloud Cult somehow also gives me hope that I will find this. I don't know why, but there's such a positive life-affirming-ness to these guys, it gives me hope.

Hope, may I point out, that I did not feel listening to Conference. I will say no more, just saying there's a stark contrast there.

Anyway, that's all. I'd really like to be in love. But I'd like it to come from honesty, openness, trust, mutual love and respect. I am so dishonest with everyone that seems unlikely, but still, I will look at this picture and hope.

Remember When

I couldn't sleep the other night, and I wrote that really silly blog because my mind needed something to do other than try to sleep?

That was a sad day.

Today is much better. Lets look at the facts.

This morning was really cold, but then the sun came out and the weather was beautiful, and I walked around in short sleeve shirts...nope, just the one. I just had on one short sleeve shirt. I wore it well though.

Anyway, I mean to say it was lovely. Then there's the blessed reality that my eyelids are drooping as I type, though it's only 9:25 PM, which bodes well for a blissful night of rest soon to follow.

Also the delightful temperatures today forced me outside for a run I thought I was too tired to do, but instead I thoroughly enjoyed.

RUN?! you ask. Why yes, run. Even though I just ran 13.1 miles on Saturday, my thirst for running was not satiated and I have gone twice since then. Monday I just ran on the track because it was cold out, and I wanted to work on speed a little. I only went 3 miles, but two of them were barefoot.

Let me break here to tell you that this barefoot phenomena craze is, in fact, phenomenal. I read Born to Run while down in Moab, and other than having me now planning 100 mile ultra marathons in my future (yeah right, but then...maybe), it also told me things I already suspected about running without shoes. It all started when a co-worker showed up in those ridiculous five fingered vibrams or whatever. The silliest looking shoes I've ever seen, but after discussing them with him, I have begun to see them more and more on all kinds of people. I didn't know much about the idea though, the philosophy behind it, just that some people thought it was better for you to run without your shoes.

Then, one day very early into my training for this half marathon...(so early, in fact, you might well consider that I wasn't actually training but simply attempting to move my slug-like body around a track a few times), I was having a ridiculously hard time and began to hurt everywhere. I think I'd gone a whopping total of 1 mile, when my body just started to shut down. I couldn't breathe, my knee hurt, my hip hurt, this other weird thing on my front ankle hurt, I was, in effect, falling apart. But no! I couldn't stop at ONE MILE! It was preposterous. So I hearkened back to my previous encounter with Mr. Vibram, the 5-toed, and decided to give it a whirl. I kicked off my shoes and went sailing around that track and voila! all my pain and injuries were history.

It was a miracle. And it has been in the back of my brain for awhile now. So reading Born to Run, I obviously related to what it said, and believed it when it stated that we are cushioning our feet into little comas, which result in running injury after injury every year, despite paying hundreds of dollars for these high-tech shoes.

Okay, why did I go on that tangent? I don't remember, and I'm not going to backtrack to figure out the grammatically correct way to continue. I'm just going to wow you all by stating that the first time I went running after my half marathon was Monday. I wanted to take it easy, so I went to the track and I ran a mile in shoes to warm up, then "kicked off my running shoes....jeez, louise...blah blah blhah" did you get the song there? I apparently don't know the words. anyway, point being, I felt like a gazelle, like a deer, like I was soaring through the air and my feet were hardly touching down. They were hardly touching down. And I ran that second mile a full minute faster than the first, and it felt magnificent. The last lap I tried to just run, fast as I could, with a sprint at the end that was unlike anything I've ever felt before. It was great. So great that I decided to run another mile after that. Tacked on 30 seconds, but some of that might be due to the large blood blisters I got on my toes which are unused to the lack of coma-inducing cushioning.

Anywhoo...running. Ah yes, so then today I went for another run. Because the weather was so nice, I went to my trails. If I am any kind of runner, it would be a trail runner. That is where I come alive, where I don't care about mileage or time, I care about leaping over that bush, or dodging that rock, or watching the two birds just soar and play in the wind, or startling that deer...it's the best ever and I went today even though I was tired and moody and didn't want to. And afterwards, bless you endorphins, I felt amazing. Scooted home with a big smile on my face and hope in my heart. Yes, a good day.

My calves are unbelievably sore, also from the barefoot running I think. Gotta re-train these muscles it seems, but it's well worth it.

Do I have a point to wrap up here? I think not. Just needed to point out how things are much better than that night, with no stress about sleep and no 13 miles to run tomorrow (thought maybe 13 hours to work! Yikes). yeah, that's all really.

oh, I do intend to blog about the half marathon but my mom took most of the pictures and I may never see them again, if things go as they normally do. So hopefully that will come soon. In the meantime, I have a rendezvous with the sandman I don't want to miss. Until next time!

Peace

seriously

Tis a sorry state I find myself in, this very top o' the morn after St. Patty's Day. Lying on my floor in a sleeping bag, eating pizza and downing a gallon of chocolate milk at three in the morning.

Why, you ask? To keep from being insanely angry at my inability to sleep.

Yes, you guessed it, my mom is here for the night again. We are heading down to Moab manana, so she came down this evening to allow for an earlier departure. Got here about 8:30 and immediately whisked me away to the Gap for some shopping. There is nothing to put me in a fouler mood quicker than a shopping trip with my mom, when I'm tired and overwhelmed and she can't stop talking about how fat she looks and how she HAS to lose weight, etc. But off we went, for the half hour before closing. Then home for a dinner of beans and Taco flavoured TVP (textured vegetable protein). It was delicious and I sold her on the taco stuff. It really tastes like tacos!! Maybe that was too late for me to be eating? Still, no excuse.

We got into bed around 10, and I laid by the light so I could read to put me to sleep, remembering previous nights with my mother and my inability to sleep. But try as I might, I could not get sleepy. Eventually I turned the light off and tried to breathe calmly, to tell myself not to worry, but all I could think about was the magazine article talking about preparing for a race, and how two nights before was actually the critical sleep night, as pre-race night is often filled with jitters. Well, something's jittering me tonight! I don't know if I am wigged out about this race, or just the anticipation of the drive and such tomorrow...something is keeping me up, and I feel like it has something to do with my visitor.

Sadly, i think this weekend is going to be hard. I turn mean when I'm around my mom, apparently. Add my brother, and two very different friends, and you have one very sketchy sounding weekend. I'll start off pulling an all-nighter, cause i dont see sleep coming in the next three hours, add a long drive, my typical family nastiness, then a grueling 13 mile run, and you basically have me exhausted the whole weekend and likely to make everyone hate me. This should be fun.

On the upside, I made green spaghetti for the staff lunch today, and got dougnuts and sugar cookies, and wore green, and bought green chips for the incoming staff. If I don't have kids, at least I have someone I can feed green food to. And my turtle got a freeze-dried fish in with her food. Weird, but she liked it.

Oh, and I ate lucky charms for breakfast. Let me tell you, my plan to eat pure and do yoga and run this whole week, plus chugging tons of water, has failed utterly. I've done none of those things. I am reading Born to Run, which is spectacular and makes me want to run ultramarathons (go 100 miles!), and also makes me feel like I'm a wuss for getting worried about 13 puny little miles, so I'm trying to use that to calm myself down when I get hysterical about not sleeping. But it also makes me wish I had actually trained properly or would be in any way at all ready for this run. Ah well, let the good times roll!

(but seriously, can everyone send me a little good karma saturday morning? I think I need it)

Interconnected

As humans, we are all connected to each other. Those around us are influenced by us, and we, in turn, are influenced by them. In some ways, I want to celebrate this, applaud the strings that tie us together, and announce that these strings are what make us human. But I also wish we weren't connected, wish my actions did not impact anyone but myself. Because right now I am trying to figure myself out, trying to understand life and how I fit in, and why I have struggled all my life with some things, and as I work on figuring this out, I am doing things that others don't understand or approve of.

You have to understand my perspective. I am 28 years old, almost 29, and there are really very few people who are affected by my life. My roommate has to deal with me when she's sees me, and sometimes is concerned when I don't turn up for a while or leave for a weekend without telling her. People at work are affected if my performance changes in some way. My family is quite detached; my brothers do their own things and pay no mind to my life. My parents are concerned that I don't have a job or direction, which causes them stress, which bothers me and makes me want to cut all ties with them too so they don't have to worry. But there is no one else. No children, no permanent members of my life, just transitory friends who come and go. Their lives can in no way be changed my mine.

Other than example. Yes, we are social creatures, and we change ourselves based on what we see others do. That is regrettable, I suppose, if someone were to do something they otherwise wouldn't because of something they see in me. But I can't take responsibility for that. Even if I were trying to be good, my actions could lead someone to do something....a long chain that only someone omnipotent could unravel and understand. I make no such claims about myself, and can only hope each person take responsibility for his own actions.

I guess my point is, it saddens me that people are worried about me. It saddens me that girls from my relief society would come by for a visit, to chat, to see how I am, to tell me that they miss me, because I haven't been in church, but they don't call me to hang out or do anything other than church. Which means we have a church relationship, and if I no longer go to church, we can't be friends. Things are weird. Things somehow need explaining, because our liking of one another is based on shared beliefs that I no longer share. I really like these girls, and would like to hang out and be friends (except that every time the conversation turns to how we're single, and how all we want is to be married and have kids, and how we're running out of time, and how we need God to perform a miracle to get us married), but there's a weird vibe, a weird, "we must save Shena" vibe that bothers me. And they don't offer, really, because we're church friends.

I have so many other friends, really really good friends, who I want to be in my life for a long time, who mean a whole lot to me, and I'm not implying that the above applies to them. I'm apologizing for worrying you, for disappointing you, for not living up to what I should. I'm thanking you for loving me anyway, and for giving me space. Because of all the things I do, its not about you, its not about anyone else but me, and my struggle, and my attempt to cease being the chameleon I have been my whole life, to stop doing what everyone expects and wants me to, to figure out what I want me to do, and who I want me to be. You, dear friends, are my strength, you give me meaning, you lighten and brighten my life. I am so glad we are interconnected in that way, and I hope I can continue to lift you in some way and help you whenever you need it.

Well this is as surprising to you as it is to me, but I guess I've just been concerned lately and needed to vent this out. The girls stopping by is what triggered it but I've felt some sense of worry about many people, about my desire to be honest with them about what I feel and think and believe, tempered by my ever-existent need to do what is socially appropriate, to say what others want to hear, or at least in my silence allow them to believe I agree with them. I don't want to be two-faced anymore, nor do I want to raise concern. I am fine. :)