26.2

Birdie and I finished a marathon!

Last weekend my sister and I flew to Orlando to run a marathon with our aunt at Disney World. It was fun/hard/rewarding/painful/long/awesome/FINISHED! It was especially wonderful running and training with my sister and being there with my aunt. Plus, if you're going to run 26 miles, I suppose Disney World isn't the worst place to do it!!

I have to confess though, I don't think I'll do it again. Too hard on the old body for me! So, after marathon #1, I am officially retiring from my marathoning career. But I'm glad I did it once. Now at least I know I can. And that is something to be pretty amazingly grateful for!

My sister, aunt and I all done!

The whole running crew with our medals!
My aunt's running group let us wear their team shirts..
"Will Run For Food!"
Right up my ally.

once upon a time it was the year 2012

and in that year I did not die. Though perhaps I went into hiding for a bit. Maybe I haven't come out yet completely. But I can't move on without saying something.

Last year was... not really a year. It was not one. A whole. A unified entity.

I think of last year and I feel I lived so many lives in so little time. It is a little scary. And a little hard to explain--being many people. And yet only one.

2012 started smack dab in the middle of my life in Spain. I rang in the new year with my Spain family in the living room of that house where I lived that part of my life. We celebrated with food and dancing and music and joy. Just a year later and it feels like an eternity ago.

The women of my Spain family!

A reason to go home.  (photo by Spencer Boerup)

A month later, in February, I was home. I was celebrating again. This time, the marriage of a dear best amazing darling friend. It was like being picked up and dropped, for a few days, right into the middle of a life I hadn't lived for years--my friends and family together again for the first time in more than a year for some of us. It was magical. And hard. And wonderful and frightening and short.



Within a week, I was back in my Spain life. Teaching. Traveling. Hanging out with friends and alone and living as if it was all normal and real. Dating and breaking up. Laughing and crying and just being. Until it was done. And there were goodbyes and endings and unanswerable questions about futures. As there usually are.

Half way through 2012. Just turned 25.
Florence, Italy.

I left Spain on my own. I spent my 25th birthday as a tourist somewhere in Tuscan Italy, in the middle of a new adventure that was, for the first time, mine alone. Post-Spain. Pre-NewTucson. I wandered through Italy and fell in love with the beautiful landscapes and churches and paintings and history. I drifted through Paris and was enchanted with everything, even though it was sometimes cold, even in July. I ate the best falafel of my life and entered the homes of great artists and felt like the very air there made the world and people and myself lovelier somehow. I decided that my next language would be French.

(I'm not joking, but I should be.) 

Dad and me at The Alhambra.
Granada, Spain.

Days later, in mid-July, I was traipsing through southern Spain with my Dad. Driving on back roads through beautiful countryside. Hiking through otherworldly rock formations. Floating in the salty sea waters of the Mediterranean. Trying to take it all in. But already being pulled into what was next.

When I arrived in Tucson at 11:30 pm on July 29, I was already scheduled to attend training for my new job at 8 am the next morning. In the most unlikely turn of events, I was already a teacher. A 4th grade teacher at a little charter school. And the next unbearably new part of my life had started.   right at the end of July. Without pomp or ceremony. Without time to wrap anything up or become (re)acquainted with this new home. What was had ended and what would be was already bulldozing a new path I hardly had time to consider before launching myself into it.

The last 5 months of 2012 were a blur. A terrifying, glorious mess. An education and a re-education. A new beginning. A return to the past. I still hardly know what to do with those months. They disappeared faster than my brain could take them in. I was home for the first time in 6 months or 7 years, depending on how you look at in. But really, I was in a new life and a new place, not even knowing the street names (anymore). There was no time to think or process, there was barely time to breathe. Luckily, I had my family. My friends. Such good friends! And zumba classes and running and great co-workers and funny moments and busy-good weekends. I even went rock climbing--a new love!

Then it was over.

Well, sort of. Because the year and the phase are not the same thing.

I still don't know what to make of 2012. Except that it is all a blessing. One more piece of my life. Of my heart. Of my soul. Of who I am and will be. Whoever that is.

With that, I wish you all an abundance of peace and love, wherever this crazy life takes you!
xo

It takes me back

I don't quite remember how I stumbled upon the video of Bon Iver performing a cover of Bonníe Raitt's "I can't make you love me." His version is beautiful in its own right, but in the end I had to go back to the original. Gorgeous! (Adele's version is pretty too, by the way.)

The thing is, listening to this song takes me back in time. For some reason I was suddenly overcome by a memory of sitting in the backseat of my grandparent's car with my sister. We were driving to a swimming pool in Albuquerque while there on a visit. Maybe I was 8. The truth is, it's fuzzy and hazy and unfinished. I don't know if the song was playing on the radio, or a CD, or goodness, probably a cassette tape! while were driving. Or maybe some other Bonnie Raitt song. I can't say, but it's strange the way a lost memory can submerge like that, for no apparent reason. But beautiful too. I love it.

And it made me think about other favorite songs we used to listen to in the car when I was little. There were many-- but here are few songs that really stand out in my memory from ages 3-6 or so, when we used to drive half an hour across town to visit my (other) grandparents. At the moment I remember these specifically...

The Judds...

And Eric Clapton.. this is still one of my favorite songs..

Plus a Disney cassette
with "Zip-i-dee doo dah" and "We are Siamese if you please," etc. , etc.
that we must have played 3 million times! 

It will forever remind me of winding roads and fields of flowers

 from summer visits to the White Mountains.

But I'll spare you....

Thanks for indulging me in this blast from the past. Does anyone else have any songs that just can't be separated from your childhood?

Skewed perceptions

Today I somehow found my way to this article/photo essay about celebrity moms feeding their babies in public, in various forms. What was shocking to me was that many people are "offended" by images of breastfeeding women.

What??

To me this is so skewed and twisted it is hardly comprehensible. Today we live in a culture which has turned women's bodies into sexual objects, and then so normalized this objectified, sexualized image that when we see nearly nude women in magazines and movies and television we hardly think twice. Yet, somehow an image of a woman feeding and nourishing her child in the way nature intended is unsettling. Am I the only one who sees a problem with this situation?

Maybe having spent time in cultures where public breast feeding is completely normal and common place, or knowing the some of the benefits mother and child can receive from breastfeeding, or the impact that breastfeeding can have for children and families in developing nations, or knowing women who would love to breastfeed but are unable to has changed my perspective. In our culture I know it isn't common to see a mother openly breastfeeding. What I don't know is why. I am offended, if we want to talk about offensive things, that we as a society hardly say a word when scantily clad women are posted on every magazine cover and make appearances in practically every film and TV series, often in demeaning and horrifyingly objectified ways, and then turn around and act as though we've never been so shocked when a woman happens to expose her breast in order to feed her child. It's beyond me!

Breastfeeding is awesome. And while not all moms can breastfeed and there are also many other good options for feeding babies today, there is no reason for this weird cultural taboo against a beautiful act of motherhood!

Welcome to the world

2 lb. 12 oz miracle!

Congratulations Jamie and Joel!! My heart is full of joy for you and your precious little boy! I love you all!!!

The End of An Odd Year

It is the last day of the year 2011. If you lived in my world that would mean the end of an odd year, literally. For me, anything related to numbers is automatically catagorized in to even and odd. And I confess I have a rather unjust bias against odd numbers. If I encounter them I consider it a bad omen, or I attempt to mathematically manipulate them into becoming even. And yes, I know that this tendency is, in fact, quite odd. Of course, I like oddities--any odd thing really, except an odd number. Which only makes my distaste for odd numbers stranger and more unfair than ever. But that's the way it works, in my mind at least.

2011. Yes, it is quite an odd year. But, if we take a closer look, it really has an even tendency that is just crying to get out. The first step to achieving evenness is to recognize our odd number is really quite even at heart: being as 1+1=2 we find a lovely and symmetrical 202. Then, of course, we see that 2+2= 4, thus the sum of this year is pleasantly even. And should we care to, we could divide it into each place perfectly evenly as 1111.

What does all of this mean. Well, nothing. But I guess, in reality, I feel like 2011 was a bit odd, but not in a bad way. It must be those even undertones!

I am not good at pulling out each moment and making lists of favorites and important events. These things slip through my fingers and the individual moments meld into what becomes an overall feeling or idea of the year. This year I am left with a feeling of blessedness.When I look back at this year (and at my life as a whole up to this point) there have been ups and downs and twists and turns; tears and laughter and joy and pain; struggles and doubts and fears and growth. But what I feel more than anything is love and happiness. I love my life, even though it is simple and small in the scheme of things. I love my life because of everything I have learned and everywhere I have been and, more than anything else, because of all the people who have shown up along the way to teach me and love me and help me and who make each moment, no matter how difficult, terrifying or incomprehensibly beautiful, worth living.

I have a faulty memory and at times it is hard to really put together the pieces of my life and figure out how one led to another. There hasn't always been continuity in the path I've taken, and it definitely hasn't been a straight shot from one point to the next. Yet I have enjoyed every bump and hill and tangent. I wouldn't change where I've been. I am happy where I am. And I am excited...SO excited... for whatever is coming next.

Farewell 2011. Hello 2012. May this year be, for all of us, one filled with love, joy, hope and opportunities for growth and change! Sending my best wishes, love and blessings to one and all!

Add one more to the list

I am also grateful for this beautiful work of art from a girl I knew once upon a time in college. She is an incredible woman, and I have been inspired by her since we first had a class together a few years ago. Now, she is a beautiful mother and an inspiring artist who has created this lovely tribute to a some strong, faithful, independent, and generally amazing women who inspire her. I love it!

The women in my life have always been a vital part of changing me, influencing me, inspiring me and helping me in basically every conceivable way. I am convinced that there is a power in sisterhood that we have only barely begun to tap into or understand. I love that. I love the power and influence of good women in my life! And as most of you who might read this are women, let me say, thank you, my dear sisters, for your love, your examples, your laughter and hugs and encouragement. Thank you for sharing; for talking and listening and for sometimes knowing how to sit in silence. Thank you for your patience and your advice. I love you!

never enough

Even though my last post was about Christmas, I didn't forget Thanksgiving, nor could I. Perhaps never before in my life have I been more aware of the incredible blessings that allow me to function from day to day. More than anything else, I am overwhelmed by the kindness of others and the incredible strength I receive from my friends and family (and sometimes even complete strangers who show up out of the blue just when I need them most). I am completely incapable of expressing how much love and gratitude I feel for all those who love me and help me and keep me sane from one day to the next. I think many people will never realize how much they have blessed me and how I have depended on them; how they have been for me blessings from God and answers to prayer. Nor will I ever be able to fully explain what all the hugs and smiles and talking and listening, the calls or emails or texts or letters, the examples, the words, the images, the inspiration- all of it and more- I cannot begin to wrap all these things into words or any expression that I know of that could express what it has meant to me. For now, suffice it to say,

Truly. Sincerely. And with all my heart. Thank you. I love you.

Happy Thanksgiving!

P.S. Just now, after writing this post, I read this verse

that is only too perfectly fitting not to share:

Now my brethren, we see that God is mindful of every people,

whatsoever land they may be in;

yea, he numbereth his people, and his bowels of mercy are over all the earth.

Now this is my joy, and my thanksgiving;

yea, and I will give thanks unto my God forever.

Amen.

alma 26:37

xo.

Fairly Representative

I have been in Spain for two days, and I already did this:

In addition to falling down and twisting my ankle, I got sick on the plane, couldn't get money from the ATM or exchange dollars for Euros, felt compelled to eat the ceviche I was served for lunch, and repeatedly embarrassed myself by not understanding or not even hearing things people are saying to me in Spanish (sometimes I have a tendency to kind of block out conversations in Spanish until all of the sudden everyone is looking at me and I have no idea what they just said and then they think I am really stupid).... only 9 months to go.

On the other hand, I've already met some great people. The family I'm living with are so kind and they have helped me out a ton. And the other teachers are fun and friendly. A few of them helped me hobble to the metro after I fell down outside of our meeting (causing the previously mentioned ankle injury). I honestly don't know where I would be, in Spain or in life, if it weren't for the kindness of other people. I am nothing without my family and friends! I love you all! (But if you don't read my blog you won't know it ;))

rain rain, come today

When did it happen?

Suddenly you're a 24 year old woman standing beside the window of your apartment watching it rain and wishing more than anything else that it was fifteen years ago: you are with your sister in the backyard splashing in puddles and laughing, screaming and grabbing each others hands when you hear thunder, running under the porch where you'll watch the sky glow with each electrifying bolt of lightning and count 1 mississippi, 2 mississippi, 3 mississippi until you hear the thunder rumble through the sky and shake the whole world a little and you'll guess how far away it is and you'll wave to mom in the kitchen where you know she's watching you to make sure you aren't still out in the yard with all that thunder so close.

Now, the best you can do is throw on shorts and running shoes to give yourself an excuse to go out into the rain. And while you'll pretend to be a dignified adult taking a jog, all you'll really care about is making sure to jump in each puddle and feel the rain on your face and those pockets of thick, heavy, humid air that hit you like a wall of fire. And it's good.

But running the streets of Provo with shoes on in rain that dries up two minutes after you leave the house, well, it isn't the same. It isn't the same as an Arizona monsoon. And it isn't the same as dancing barefoot with your sister in the yard, drenching yourselves until you're pruney and sopping wet and unfathomably happy; it isn't the same as yelling and hiding under the awning but giggling too because you're not really scared and you know (I mean you really know) that whenever you need to you can turn around and walk through that back door and be home safe. Perfectly safe. Confident that you will have everything you need, and more. And that you'll always have these people to be with you through everything--your sister and your mom and your dad and your dog and cat and tortoise. It's all so sure.

And I want that now. I want to know that everything is always going to be okay and that no matter what I can always run back inside and someone will be there to take care of me. Because while I try to be brave and adventurous sometimes, there is nothing better than the safety of your own home. I really can't imagine that there ever will be.

endings/beginnings

Yesterday I made a decision about what I am going to do now that I finished my year as a VISTA at United Way.

Today I changed my mind... I think.

I probably shouldn't even be able to change my mind. Maybe I haven't. Maybe tomorrow I'll change it back. And really I can only go on like this for so long. Really, Monday morning is about 5 days later than I should have to make a decision. But that's the limit I'm setting for myself--Monday by 9am (with the help of dear Jessica who talked to me in the middle of the day even though it meant accidentally hanging up on one of her clients. oops.)

Talking helps. Feeling like someone is listening helps. Knowing that people care about you enough to let you talk both of you dizzy with circular logic even helps.

There have been a lot of conversations in the past month that have honestly saved me and my sanity. I haven't needed to talk to my mom and dad so much in years. And so many friends have listened to me vacillate back and forth that I don't know what I should do to apologize or thank them for giving me that time.

Yet, all the while I know very well that I can't take too much advice from anyone. I know that no one can tell me what to do. And if they did I probably wouldn't do it because, well, that's just kind of how I've always been.

And there is a point when all of then listening and talking in the world can't help me put off a choice I am avoiding any longer. And that time has really come. and gone. And Monday awaits.

I'm terrified. and I'm thrilled. because I will have to move forward in some direction, and that, at least, will be some kind of a relief.

summer sweet

It all started with the sweetness of the white nectarines whose delightful scent wafted over to me from across the produce department and lured me in. I couldn't resist. And then, there they were, right next to the nectarines, a precarious pile of small, soft, pale sunset-orange apricots. I almost left without them, but then, why not? It's been so long, I thought. And I brought them to my apartment and left them sitting, waiting. Until today. I picked one up at lunch, and with the first semi-sweet bite, I was suddenly 5 years old again, in my backyard-- laughing and playing in the grass with my sister, enjoying a mild summer evening with my family as we picked and ate the warm, delicate fruits from our beautiful giant of an apricot tree. The tree that my dad meticulously pruned and my parents carefully protected with huge patchwork sheets on the coldest winter nights to save the delicate branches and leaves from (the occasional) freezing temperatures. The tree we tried to take with us when we moved to our new house when I was six, but which failed to thrive and blossom again after being transplanted into its (and our) new home, thus confining those fine memories of apricot summers to the few years of my life at our house on Mona Lisa Drive.

I like those memories. And so many memories of childhood. and summer. They make me feel warm and happy. They make me smile to myself 20 years and hundreds of miles away. I love that you never know when these reminiscences will strike. But that they are always beautiful and welcome and a little melancholy because you realize that those days are gone and there is no going back. And you miss it and want the freedom and innocence and simple joy of childhood. For me, the older I get the more I seem to long for those earlier days--"simpler times". And even though I love the ever expanding world of knowledge and possibilities around me, I still long to run carelessly around the backyard, knowing, always, that I had everything I needed to be safe and content, right where I was. It's nice to be taken care of.

The Wheels on the Bus

Back to school. Back to work. Back to, well, life I guess. It's a strange thing to go home to the house where I grew up, where my parents live still, and to see my family, my sister, my friends and to realize that as much as I love them all and as amazing it is that we are still in contact and can still fall into our old relationships as though no time has passed (after five years of separation), I don't really have a life there. It is more like an escape into the past; a world where I can postpone my responsibilities and the decisions that haunt me at every turn; a place where I can sleep in until noon if I want and where I can sit around and put together puzzles or laugh with my mom and my sister at stupid things and play with our pets or go shopping in the middle of the week with my friends and all the time without feeling the constant pull at the back of my mind reminding me that there are things to be done and appointments to get to and people to please. It's a magical thing. And a strange one too. It leaves me unsettled and confused. If I don't belong at home, where do I belong?

While I was in Tucson for two weeks for Christmas and New Years I kept having this strange feeling like I needed to go back to Utah. Like that was my home now. But the truth is, it isn't my home either. At least not in any lasting, comforting way. It's a temporary life I lead here. A transitory existence, shifting between different apartments, storing my things in stranger's sheds while I travel for months at a time, and living with new people every few months. And ever in the back of my mind is the truth that this was never meant to be forever. But I don't know what is. There is no such thing as going home anymore, and in less than a year when I receive a diploma and an invitation to enter the working world and real "adult life" I feel like I will suddenly be homeless in a very real way. Not only will my contract expire, but I will no longer have a reason to live in Provo. I will no longer fit in at my parents home. I will be, I feel, that ever so cliché leaf tossed with the wind, and who knows where I'll land.

It certainly isn't something particular to me, and I realize that, of course. Yet, it feels so solitary. There's a song I like by Taylor Swift in which she sings, "I don't know what I want, so don't ask me, cuz I'm still trying to figure it out . . . I'm alone, on my own, and that's all I know." Me too, sista! Me too. It's a strange feeling. It's as though I'm walking along this path of my life and all the way it's painted out so clearly, the light shining through beautiful trees lining the road, even the bumps and hills I've traveled are there, solid and real, but then suddenly everything becomes blackness. I see my graduation and then...nothing. A blank. An absence. And I'm headed straight for it full speed and without any breaks. It's terrifying really. And yet, I'm kind of excited. I'm just hoping that hidden behind that curtain of uncertainty is a beautiful landscape awaiting exploration. And it may not be what I expect or what I know, but there's got to be something there. My life hasn't ended yet (though that is a scary thought!). And, you know, sometimes we need a little mystery. At least that's what I'm telling myself these days. So please, if you know differently, just don't burst my bubble!

Winter Wonderland?

Even walking to campus this morning at 7am with little cold, white flakes stinging my face, I couldn't deny the beauty of the newly fallen snow. It is amazing how the millions of little crystals glitter individually in the yellow light of the street lamps. Despite the piercing cold, the early hour, and the ever present threat of falling and breaking open my face, it was really quite lovely. And when I came home after my final, I was greeted by my dear roommates making snowballs with the snow on the cars in our parking lot. At first I was a bit concerned that they were going to attack me, but they didn't and soon a few other friends came out too. We ended up playing in the snow and having a mini-snowball fight. It was really fun and I actually enjoyed the snow and the cold and all. And now I am a disaster of wetness and cold, but in our warm, toasty apartment with the hope of going home tomorrow (yippee!), nothing can bring me down. In fact, I have one final to go and I am basically free! So, I can handle this chilly winter wonderland for a day and a half with the promise of sunshine and warmth awaiting me at home! I'm dreaming of a non-white Christmas! Here I come Arizona!

ciao