churchy times

Church was nice tonight. I'm not happy with my life yet but it's certainly getting there. I went expecting to play the piano but since E was there I ended up singing a song instead. I now love Be Thou My Vision in a new way... yay for jazzed up piano accompaniments. And friendly people. The music was good, the message was interesting, I met two new people and enjoyed some homemade cookies. All in all, a good week at Crossings.

living life and trying to love it

I have to admit, although I've been thru some rough times recently, I am really enjoying how my life is going right now: things are gelling, goals seem closer and happiness seems like it's just a carrot-on-a-stick length away from me. Old friends, new friends, music, school, classmates, professors, music, activities, music, and music are all agreeing with me. Even my house, which normally feels like a disaster zone, is liveable and, dare I say, neat?

I have not blogged on here for awhile because I have been busy blogging for school credit at femlegaltheory.blogspot.com, which is a pretty awesome website where those of us in the class share thoughts, insights and weblinks about exciting and interesting feminist philosophies. And of course, school and friends and family takes up the rest of my life. I'll try to be more present on here though if anyone is actually reading it.

Despite not being where I wanted to be in life by this point in time in life, I have to say that I have had an excellent week and a half. Game nights and weddings and yogurt, oh my. Hanging out and movies and lunches, oh my. And so on and so forth. Sure, there are parts of my life that I would still trade away with any of my friends'... but if I traded my whole life away I'd miss out on some truly amazing friendships and a very supportive family. So what if I don't have *everything* I think will make me happy? I have a lot, and I am not working for McDonald's or a mine in Minnesota (we just watched Fast Food Women and North Country in Fem Legal Theory). So life? Not all that bad.

I think every day is a new adventure, and one of the things I've been doing recently is trying to record which adventures make me happiest. I discovered this summer that swing dancing makes me happy, so I've been trying to go once a week since the discovery. Taboo (a game) makes me happy too. So does drawing funny looking cartoon people. Hanging out with friends at Yoloberry. Eating Ethiopian food. Writing songs and singing them. Listening to live standup comedy. It's all good, and I'm trying to repeat the stuff that makes me glad to be alive. Everything else, I put into the background, and just do what is absolutely necessary to be done. We don't have long to live on this earth, and I want to use that short time to do stuff that makes for good memories in the long run. Stuff that makes me happy, stuff that makes me proud of myself, nothing I would change if I went back into the past. It's not easy, but it's my goal. What about you, readers? What makes you happy? I'd love to hear it.

Books!

Well, I just got home from the local library booksale, as of an hour or two ago, and I'm well pleased with what I found:
1. an organ magazine with tunes from the Romantic era set for organ that I can play at church;
2. two Anne of Green Gables books, the good ones (the early ones!) and
3. more language learning books than I care to admit that I've bought.

The prize treasure of the foreign language book is a devotional book entitled "Actos de Fe" (whoops, almost wrote "feo" which would mean something quite different!), with a different and short devotional for every day of the year... in Spanish! :) I already have a devotional (for lawyers) but it's going to run out sooner since it goes in weeks and not days, and who says I can't do two? Praising God should be endless... or so said my devotional for last week.

I also found and have already read a little children's book in Spanish about a man who sells hats, and the trouble that befalls him when he falls asleep under a tree full of monkeys. Muy amusante...

The last (but not only) treasure was a cookbook half in Chinese, half English. I found at least one vegetarian recipe, so will have to try that. I am so very excited at the prospect of reading these books... and yes, I will get my legal reading finished too. Who says I can't take breaks? It's summer!!!

So, for all of you who have that book on the shelf that you just haven't managed to make time for, I encourage you to read it. A little bit of it. A page of it. Just read!

Plant Update

So this morning after Dad bought a box for me Mom and I planted my new stuff. We had potting soil, a watering can, a source of water and a front porch to use, so it went pretty smoothly. It's fun putting the potting soil in and then scooping out the hole JUST the right size and then coddling the plant out of its box and into its new home. We talked through the process JUST loud enough that the neighborhood kids became interested in what we were doing, so much so that when one of their moms came cycling around the corner and asked what they were doing, one little boy said, "Planting!" They were not... they were just playing quietly across the street. So I knew then that they were watching, and learning, a little. Our houses have no back yards and the plants are taken care of by the homeowner's association for the most part, so some of these kids may never have had a gardening experience before. Of course I enjoyed the process even if we hadn't had them watching listening and learning... now I have a reason to bop around my front yard every day and talk to the neighbors. Garden, and sweep.... and garden, and sweep... And I have chives and strawberries and lemon balm. And I noticed I have enough room in the front to add at least two if not three more boxes, if I can keep the first box alive that is.... we'll see.

plants are life in so many ways

Bought plants today. There's this amazing herb I had never heard of before called lemon balm... it's an herb but it tastes just like lemon, only mintier. I plan to use it to make homemade pesto for pasta. I'm really excited about it. It's now my favorite herb (less than 8 hours after finding out about it and buying some). I also got strawberries and garlic chives. I know, bad breath, but it tastes so goooood. I have officially gone vegetarian (my third try, mind you), so if you have some good recipes, I'm searching for something, anything I can eat other than omelettes and polenta. Plants are awesome. I'm currently enjoying some O2 fresh from the beautiful trees outside the door right this minute. Yay for air.

happy to live in this world

Life is like a coloring book. You find out all the cool colors and how you can use them and at first, you color EVERYWHERE and it's outside the lines and it doesn't match the picture and it's messy. But then you learn where the lines are and how to keep it contained and you put the picture together in a creative yet controlled fashion. And that's when you truly become an adult... when you get the colors to work together to create a wonderful picture, and that wonderful picture is your life, with different parts of it fitting neatly into the entire whole.

Music joke of the day (thank you, Grandma!): A doctor is talking to his patient. He is holding a box filled with musical notes. He clears his throat and says, "Well, the surgery was a tremendous success. As you can see here, we have completely removed the song that was stuck in your head."

taking care of business

Well, I have to say (and I may regret this Thursday) I do feel ready for our Business final. Kudos to all my friends who I have studied with and my family as well. In an interesting way, talking through the class with my parents tonight somewhat simulated the exam itself.

I spent an uneventful half hour with my mother, where she quizzed me on case names and rules. She tag-teamed with my dad, and I thought I'd do the same thing with him, but he interrupted me by saying he didn't think it would be good to talk about this stuff with him because he is singularly disillusioned with the state of business law in the country (hope I'm not misquoting him here). I told him he was wrong and that this is the very meat of what we've been learning, and we spent an intense half hour of me going systematically through my knowledge and explaining where he was right about the state of things and where he was wrong, where the law is actually improving things right before our eyes, and where it has some room for improvement. Telling him where the law is a little unreasonable and where it's making strides to improving all our lives. And I have to say, debating policy issues with someone who's been out there, who has experienced life and businesses in a very real and personal way, is completely different from debating theory in a classroom or a study session with friends. And yet the two of us were both happy at the end of our debate. My dad was impressed that I was able to keep up my end of the conversation so well with so many illustrative examples. He was also impressed at the changes in the law that I informed him about, reasons to hope in the midst of corruption. And I was happy that I had not only kept up in the conversation, but was able to explain exactly what the law is and how things are progressing in the law to create such hope.

All in all, I feel like I went through my own miniature version of the exam tonight in the discussions with my parents: first, the cerebral issue spotting and second, the emotion-filled policy question. I just hope it goes as well on the real exam. But however I do on paper, I feel like I really did learn something-- a few things-- this semester. And that feels good.