1. Freshly mowed grass. Walking downtown I stopped for a moment startled by this familiar scent transporting me to my childhood of watching our father mow the lawn, the piles of cut grass ready for us to herd into piles to jump into. Florida's version of autumn leaves.
2. Walking out of a chilly office building and thawing out under the warm summer sun. Maybe its the vitamin D my skin absorbs as my chilly hands and face thaw under the sun, but this soothing feeling is one of the things I look forward to as I leave a day's work.
3. Home grown tomatoes. Two of our friends are in Australia at the moment and we check on their house from time to time and also have the pleasure of plucking fresh cherry and roma tomatoes from the vines in their backyard. The taste of home grown tomatoes makes you realize how watery and flavorless grocery store tomatoes truly are. Next summer, I too will have my own vines of this sweet fruit.
Thursday, August 20, 2009
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
The bling versus thing gift giving dilemma
When it comes to gift giving my parents are more of the give cash because then it can be used for something they want camp. As I grew up in that household, for the most part, when gifting I give cash or gift cards. No one hates cash as far as I know, and I don't have to wrack my head for the perfect gift. But the irony comes in that as much as I give out cash and gift cards, when I get gift cards I hardly ever spend them (note #52 on my 109 in 2009 is to spend a gift card, and its AUGUST and I have yet to do it!) and when I get cash its not like I use it to get my nails did or something fun and giftie. I usually just save it and buy a soda or pay for gas. Yesterday I checked the mail and there was a gift for my upcoming birthday and I got so excited. I wondered would I be this excited if it was cash?
The thing is I love giving gifts and if you've been reading long enough you know its a thing I don't take lightly. I'm getting ready to give a gift to someone near and dear to my heart. I have this great idea for a gift that would be part handmade and part professionally personalized. It would cost a good amount of money (in the $100+ range) when all is said and done. While I feel so excited to give the gift the practical side of me is considering, is the cash equivalent better?
My question is two fold (1) what do you generally prefer receiving? Bling or a thing when it comes to gifts? (2) If you were to give advice on my specific dilemma regarding this friend, what would you advise? Your advice is much appreciated!
The thing is I love giving gifts and if you've been reading long enough you know its a thing I don't take lightly. I'm getting ready to give a gift to someone near and dear to my heart. I have this great idea for a gift that would be part handmade and part professionally personalized. It would cost a good amount of money (in the $100+ range) when all is said and done. While I feel so excited to give the gift the practical side of me is considering, is the cash equivalent better?
My question is two fold (1) what do you generally prefer receiving? Bling or a thing when it comes to gifts? (2) If you were to give advice on my specific dilemma regarding this friend, what would you advise? Your advice is much appreciated!
Thursday, August 13, 2009
Three Beautiful Things Thursday
1. An understanding of my blessings. No matter how difficult life can feel there are still blessings to be counted. Sometimes we can look at the surface of another's life and think wow they have it all, and look at our own and find it lacking. Perhaps we don't know what lies under the stillness of the surface or perhaps they simply appreciate what they have. Its important to know that toes, fingers, eyes, ears, running water, air conditioning, are blessings. Each day I try to visualize and experience the blessings in my life. No matter how difficult our circumstances there are blessings, too many to count.
2. The Shadow of The Wind. Some of you asked me during my last 3bt what book I'd recommend to you and I must say it is this book. This is easily one of my favorite books of all time. It fits in no genre because it encompasses them all and the writing is not only fast paced and fun, the prose is stunning. After reading it from the library I bought myself a copy. It's the kind of book that you can lose yourself in entirely which is rare to come across that these days.
3. Silence. Sometimes we're moving so fast it feels like we're hamsters in the wheel, or like we're running on a treadmill and the stop key is stuck. In an era of cell phones, and ipods, and other distractions readily at hand to eliminate any silent moments, taking a few minutes to experience silence and feel how it touches the soul, can be beautiful indeed.
2. The Shadow of The Wind. Some of you asked me during my last 3bt what book I'd recommend to you and I must say it is this book. This is easily one of my favorite books of all time. It fits in no genre because it encompasses them all and the writing is not only fast paced and fun, the prose is stunning. After reading it from the library I bought myself a copy. It's the kind of book that you can lose yourself in entirely which is rare to come across that these days.
3. Silence. Sometimes we're moving so fast it feels like we're hamsters in the wheel, or like we're running on a treadmill and the stop key is stuck. In an era of cell phones, and ipods, and other distractions readily at hand to eliminate any silent moments, taking a few minutes to experience silence and feel how it touches the soul, can be beautiful indeed.
Monday, August 10, 2009
A day in the life
Me: My birthday is less than a month away.
K: How should we celebrate?
Me: I think I'll crawl into bed and wish the day away.
K: No, we have to do something special!
Me: Like what?
K: Hmm, we could go out for dinner, or I know, I'll throw you a surprise birthday party!
Me: Yeah?
K: Yeah, surprise birthday parties are the best kind.
Me: Okay, just make sure I don’t find out about it.
K: Exactly, that's the hardest . . . Oh . . .
K: How should we celebrate?
Me: I think I'll crawl into bed and wish the day away.
K: No, we have to do something special!
Me: Like what?
K: Hmm, we could go out for dinner, or I know, I'll throw you a surprise birthday party!
Me: Yeah?
K: Yeah, surprise birthday parties are the best kind.
Me: Okay, just make sure I don’t find out about it.
K: Exactly, that's the hardest . . . Oh . . .
Thursday, August 06, 2009
Thoughts on leaping
When standing at the start of one's journey the destination can seem far away but moving one step at a time you realize that in a blink of an eye you've arrived. My "dream job" ends on 09/09/09 and I'm leaving. It's not due to lack of funding or a different legal opportunity. Many raise their eyes when I explain this as though I've told them I'm running off to join the circus or have renamed myself Eileen Wigwam. It might seem strange to leave a job and not replace it with another W-2 generating job. For some time I stayed quiet about my reasons, and to those I've admitted it to, I feel my cheeks flame up with embarrassment. It seems so presumptuous, so risky that sharing makes me shy, but no more. As the months dwindle to weeks which surely will trickle to mere days, I think its time to share since this blog has always been a place where I share my dreams.
If you've been reading my blog for some time you know that beyond my dream of "dream job" or teaching a deeper dream has always resided, one I've agonized over for years. I've wanted to be a writer. When I was young I would write with abandon all the time, in math class, and while television buzzed in the background. As I grew older I found out how hard it was to actually get published much less have a career as a writer so I pushed away the dreams of English majors and creative writing courses for an education degree and eventually law school. Sure, I still freelanced from time to time for newspapers, and magazines, and I have kept up this blog for going on five years now, but the writing that I dreamed of, the novel writing, I felt too intimidated to begin. Each time I considered putting pen to paper the nasty little muse that resides in all of our heads that chuckles when we dream of things that require some risk whispered really? Forget it! Not happening!
This nasty muse suffocated my writing for years until one day as I sat in my bedroom poised to pen a blog entry the idea hit me with the force of lightening on still water. I saw her. I knew what she looked like, the room she sat in, and what she felt. That day I began writing without any worries of future publication or reviews from disgruntled Amazon reviewers. I just wrote because the story needed to be told and it appeared I was entrusted to tell it.
This was three years ago and today after countless revisions and second guessing I'm done. Seasoned authors and close friends have provided insight and I've incorporated them to the best of my ability. I've begun researching agents who publish in my genre and I am now ready to write my query letters and consider sending my little one who I poured my heart into for three years [but cradled in my heart for many more] into the huge stark world of potential rejection. I'm leaving my job to query this novel and write the next one that is drafted and sitting patiently waiting for me to finish it.
Leaving my job was not an easy decision. I've held a paying job since I turned 16 years old and the prospect of not earning a paycheck fills me with second guessing hesitations, but there is a single image that fuels me on to take this year off to see if my writing can amount to anything publishable and that is the realization that I really believe I was meant to write and I was meant to pen novels. Perhaps these novels are meant to be written but never published, but I deserve it to my dream to see it through and know the answer. In some ways I'm scared to see the dream through because there is comfort in dreaming. If I fail, then what? A dream I've cultivated since I learned how to put pen to paper will shatter. It's scary to go down the road because the road may be open but may also just as easily be barricaded shut. My rationale is: it's best to know. It's time to know the answer however harsh or kind it may be.
I'm sure after a year off if this writing business does not work out, I will find a way to get back into the traditional work force and be okay. But I don't want to defer this dream. The biggest illusion life offers us is the sense that there will always be tomorrow to accomplish what we dream of today. I think I may have the ability. I certainly have the opportunity. Now its time to leap and let come what may.
If you've been reading my blog for some time you know that beyond my dream of "dream job" or teaching a deeper dream has always resided, one I've agonized over for years. I've wanted to be a writer. When I was young I would write with abandon all the time, in math class, and while television buzzed in the background. As I grew older I found out how hard it was to actually get published much less have a career as a writer so I pushed away the dreams of English majors and creative writing courses for an education degree and eventually law school. Sure, I still freelanced from time to time for newspapers, and magazines, and I have kept up this blog for going on five years now, but the writing that I dreamed of, the novel writing, I felt too intimidated to begin. Each time I considered putting pen to paper the nasty little muse that resides in all of our heads that chuckles when we dream of things that require some risk whispered really? Forget it! Not happening!
This nasty muse suffocated my writing for years until one day as I sat in my bedroom poised to pen a blog entry the idea hit me with the force of lightening on still water. I saw her. I knew what she looked like, the room she sat in, and what she felt. That day I began writing without any worries of future publication or reviews from disgruntled Amazon reviewers. I just wrote because the story needed to be told and it appeared I was entrusted to tell it.
This was three years ago and today after countless revisions and second guessing I'm done. Seasoned authors and close friends have provided insight and I've incorporated them to the best of my ability. I've begun researching agents who publish in my genre and I am now ready to write my query letters and consider sending my little one who I poured my heart into for three years [but cradled in my heart for many more] into the huge stark world of potential rejection. I'm leaving my job to query this novel and write the next one that is drafted and sitting patiently waiting for me to finish it.
Leaving my job was not an easy decision. I've held a paying job since I turned 16 years old and the prospect of not earning a paycheck fills me with second guessing hesitations, but there is a single image that fuels me on to take this year off to see if my writing can amount to anything publishable and that is the realization that I really believe I was meant to write and I was meant to pen novels. Perhaps these novels are meant to be written but never published, but I deserve it to my dream to see it through and know the answer. In some ways I'm scared to see the dream through because there is comfort in dreaming. If I fail, then what? A dream I've cultivated since I learned how to put pen to paper will shatter. It's scary to go down the road because the road may be open but may also just as easily be barricaded shut. My rationale is: it's best to know. It's time to know the answer however harsh or kind it may be.
I'm sure after a year off if this writing business does not work out, I will find a way to get back into the traditional work force and be okay. But I don't want to defer this dream. The biggest illusion life offers us is the sense that there will always be tomorrow to accomplish what we dream of today. I think I may have the ability. I certainly have the opportunity. Now its time to leap and let come what may.
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