Thursday, April 30, 2009

Official Day One

Well, I'm counting today day one. Today is the first day in a while that I have been totally without a love interest. Fasting... can you fast love interests? If you can fast television and criticism, then you can fast love interests. 40 days seems like a very Biblical number to fast. But it seems awfully easy to do. Six months.

It will be easier if I don't wash my hair or shave my legs. Look ugly and it will be easy, right?

Wednesday, April 29, 2009

Goodbye?

i really can't explain what happened with adam. i don't even really understand it. all i know is that we had a really fantastic time together. really, really fantastic. he is outrageously wonderful. and i am shocked that it's all over.

i really do hope that it isn't over. i feel like there is alot more for us. and i keep running the details through my head. most of the time, i've got so much going on that it doesn't cross my mind. but then i come home to my very lonely house or i see a blue subaru on the road or someone on a motorcycle or a bike or i drive past a restaurant we've been to and it all comes rolling back.

adam is one of those amazing people you never want to say goodbye to.

Tuesday, April 28, 2009

A Minute of My Brain Today

stage left. stage right. how are we going to get the props there? that was a really great scene. awesome inflection! i guess we can do without the gong. i know she wasn't center stage but at this point, i don't have the patience to mess with it. seriously... you have had your lines for five months and you don't know them still? where is your prop? can i trust you not to miss your cue? pitches, guys. please listen to the music. watch me! get that bench out. whoa. totally lost. stage voices - louder! do you even know the words to this song? didn't i send that e-mail last week? when are we going to go over lights? what about the curtain? and the fog machine? how's that going to work? oh. they're hungry. they need food. be quiet! open up. do you see you are blocking the people behind you? stand in the window! watch it with the swords! you missed your cue because you were eating a snack. hmmm. wow... that was incredible. amazing! wait for that scene change music. you come on stage during a blackout. what are the motions for that? give me more energy, please. videographer. photographer. program. t-shirts. kudos board. headlamps. directions to the place. costumes. costume change. get me out of here. we need more rehearsal. my dogs. bills. adam. second grade assessments. plan garage band unit. i am hungry. go eat. go back to work. fix the car. cancel guitar lessons. i need a beer.

STOP!

breathe.

fizzle... sizzle... poof...

Sunday, April 26, 2009

Living Praise

Imagine this... if daily life, the regular coming and going, tasks and rendezvous, instead of taking the form of monotony were opportunities to celebrate and to learn. If we weren't so consumed with the to-do's that we would take each situation as it came to fully live it and enjoy it. To gulp it down and to get sloppy in it. I wonder how many people have truly made this concept come alive in their own lives. We get so bogged down and busy.

And when we take the time to develop a routine to slow down - to take walks, to read, to write - it often becomes taken for granted. These habits we develop to enrich our lives become tedious and we dredge through them without the wonder and appreciation that we had when we first began them. Does this happen with everything we do? And how can we keep that joy for those little moments while being sucked into the daily monotony of our own lives?

It is easy for me to see God in a lightning storm... to pause and to watch and to let gratefulness fill up my muscle and bone - in every nerve and every vein. But I've let that wonder slip out of the everyday. I am reading a book called Praise Habit by David Crowder. I love how the author talks about the first time you let that gratefulness and wonder pound back into your conscious... "It is the deep breath after having forgotten to breathe." He talks about how in the beginning, we knew that God was everywhere around us and in us... "He was in the breeze and under rocks and in our love and in our skin".

That just makes me feel alive.

Saturday, April 25, 2009

Ok, Fine...

I admit... marriage is a good thing.

It took me a while to find myself out of that bitter, hate-the-world stage I was in just after Rob and I split up. After everything ended, I couldn't care less about anything. There was almost nothing that mattered to me. I became pretty desensitized. I remember being at my best friend's wedding. The bouquet toss. All the lovely single ladies clustered together like a flock of geese... gaggling about catching the bouquet. And calloused, newly 'single' me, remained a hefty 20 yards away, just to be sure there was no danger in me catching anything. I even folded my arms. Yet, due to the gradually intensifying heckling I underwent from my friends and the single guys in the area, I reluctantly agreed to step 10 yards forward. I figured it would appease my best friend if I at least participated. Well, I'm sure you can guess what happened next... the bouquet sails through the air as though it were an arrow, and I, its magnificent target. Whap! It hits the ground right at my feet. Had I held my arms away from my body, as is tradition in an event of this sort, I would have caught it. I glared at it. Devil poison. Get thee back, you detestable beast. You love-rubbish.

Don't worry. I was peer-pressured into picking it up.

Anyway, that one event describes quite perfectly my feelings on marriage and love at the time. I was exactly the girl you did NOT want at your wedding. Well, I've found my way through the days since then and somehow have come out on the other side of this terrible stage. Singed, perhaps... but suffering no third-degree burns as I thought I had.

Marriage is worth it. I know that now.

Friday, April 10, 2009

Love Languages a la Doggie

Ever read The Five Love Languages by Gary Chapman? My dogs each have their own little love language.

Harley could not possibly survive without physical touch. He is in doggie heaven if only my fingertips would brush across him. When we go on walks, he checks in every now and then, touching his nose to my fingertips. He LIVES for touch.

Wyatt... quality time. He needs to be walked and to be played ball with. He wants to spend the first moments of the day nestling and snuggling with me. If he doesn't get his quality time, I can expect an over-hyper doggie zombie when I come home.

And Mocha, my roommate's dog, is all about receiving gifts... food, namely. He is a food hound. Whereever he can get it, he does. And if it comes from you, well, you are his new favorite person.

As you can see, I've got a lot of needs to fill.

Thursday, April 2, 2009

That Leather Jacket

I've had dresses hanging in my room for a few days. They are hanging across the front of my bookcase. There's silky slender blue ballgowns. There's a crazy patterned black and white knee-length go-go dress. There's strapless cocktail dresses and beautiful embroidered full ballgowns.

As I look across my room, I've got sultry red candles and reed diffusers. I have lotions and high heels. Yesterday's discarded clothes including underthings and tailored pants... fitted shirts and bits of jewelry. There's mascara and foundation and lip gloss.

One item doesn't go with this theme... a burly chocolate-colored retro-style motorcycle jacket.

It's awesome. It's not mine. But I really wouldn't mind if it hung there for days and days. The leather is thick. The zippers make a deep scratching zzzzzzz. It smells of metal and cologne and hide. And seeing it there among my dresses makes me smile. It's comforting in a way... like being wrapped up in a man's arms. Like feeling his scratchy face on yours and hearing his broad footsteps cross the floor.

I miss all that.