The Plight of Ambiguously-Colored Eyes

I accidentally pushed "Publish" instead of "Save" while writing this, so it may have showed up in your feed in its incomplete form.  Oops.

It's been a while.  I've had my hands full with random obligations.  Last month I got called as the ward choir pianist.  Pshhhhh...  I know, right?  Piano isn't my best talent.  I only excel with tons and tons of practice.  And excel is a pretty generous word to use.  More like "crank it out somewhat acceptably" with tons of practice.  I got the music for our first song, and it's probably the most awkward piece of music I've ever played.  Neither the top nor bottom hand have any flow.  It's a bunch of random, notes.  Sigh.  Bless the poor choir.

I've also been working endlessly on report cards.  Yes.  Report cards for preschoolers.  It's crazy.  I get why they do it--they like to show parents that their kids are learning.  But as a teacher it's overwhelming.  I think I've spent a total of ten hours in the past week just on report cards.  And this is in addition to my normal in-class time.  I'm all preschool-ed out this week.  I'm so happy it's a long weekend so I can recoop.

On to the matter at hand.

Eye color is often categorized into four neat classes:  blue, green, brown, and hazel.  If you don't qualify for strictly blue, brown, or green you are labeled hazel.  Hazel is the catch-all of eye color.  The only thing people of this category have in common with each other is the ambiguity of their eye color.  If you do a Google image search for "hazel eyes" it comes up with a huge variety of eye colors that range from brownish to greenish.  Some are a murky yellowish-brown, or brownish-green, and some I would consider mostly green or mostly brown.  The vast majority have a certain degree of brownish, but then some have no trace of brown.  It's pretty bizarre that hazel covers such a huge range.

What color is hazel, anyway?  Wikipedia says, "Definitions of the eye color hazel vary: it is sometimes considered to be synonymous with light brown or gold, as in the color of a hazelnut shell."

When I was young, I was told I had hazel eyes.  And because I figured others could see my eyes better than I could, I believed them.  I even indicated "hazel" for eye color when I got my driver's license at age 15.  (True story--I'm an Idaho girl.)  And then when I was about 17 or 18 I took a close look at my eyes in the mirror and decided, "I think they were all wrong about my eyes."

I found that the color near my pupils is a combination of light and dark greens, and then it's rimmed by a dark blue.  There is no trace of brown at all.  No yellow either.  Mostly green with a dark blue rim.  This isn't hazel.

Take a look for yourself:

I made it nice and big so you can better analyze my eye color.  Pictures are a little tricky because they rarely capture the true essence of your eye color due to lighting, etc, but this one is kind of close.

So I decided to take charge of my eye color.  I, Lindsey, have green eyes.

Challenge 40

Challenge #40:  What is the story behind your name?

Ok, so I skipped a few challenge questions.  It's the end of the month, and I'm about to go on a little get-away for my first anniversary (one year, what?), so this will be the last "This is Me" question.  I thought I'd make it an interesting one.

I'm the first child in my family, and thus when my parents went to name me, they were at a loss.  They couldn't pick a name, so I was "Baby {Last Name}" for about two days.  Not that I hold that against them--naming a child seems like a HUGE decision.  Almost as big as the decision to actually have a child.  I actually talked to my mom about this last night.  She told me how it's one thing to like a name, but it's completely different when you're thinking about naming your child that name.

Anyway, after a few days of this name-less business, my grandma laid down an ultimatum.  My parents were going to a doctors appointment or something together, and they weren't to return without a name for me.  I can just imagine my parents sitting in the car outside my childhood home deciding on my name while my grandma stood poised by the door, waiting for the affirmative that the child had been named.  I'm sure that's not how it really was, but that's what I like to imagine.

Eventually my parents narrowed it down to two options:  Lindsey and Courtney.  At this point they left it up to fate.  They flipped a coin.  As my name is Lindsey, one of two things happened at this point.  It might have landed Lindsey-side up and they rejoiced and embraced their fate.  Or just maybe it landed Courtney-side up and they experienced extreme disappointment, so they decided (just between them) that they'd pretend it landed Lindsey-side up.  I'm ok with either version.

I've been Lindsey ever since!

Challenge 15

Challenge #15:  What are some of your routines?

As I mentioned in my last post, routine isn't one of my strong points at this juncture in my life.  So here's my one routine:  bedtime.

1.  Use the bathroom.
2.  Wash hands.
3.  Take out and rub contacts.
4.  Brush teeth (with hot water).
5.  Put hair in ponytail and get bangs out of the way with a headband.
6.  Wash face.
7.  Remove ponytail, headband, and any stray bobby pins.
8.  Take birth control and prenatal vitamin (contradictory, I know)
9.  Read scriptures on my own.
10.  Read scriptures with my husband.
11.  Pray with my husband.
12.  Pray on my own.
13.  Sleep.

I've been doing it this way for years, and there's a definite logical reason for this particular order.  It's the most efficient way.  The bathroom comes first since I need to wash my hands before taking out my contacts anyway.  The contacts come before teeth-brushing because I wouldn't want the residual toothpaste on my fingertips to get in my eyes.  That would sting.  And I wouldn't want to wash my hands twice.  That's just asking for dry skin.  Face-washing is after both teeth-brushing and contact removal for two reasons.  One, I would hate to accidentally get soap in my eyes with contacts still in.  Contacts make it way worse.  Two, I've got to give the water time to warm up before face-washing, and what better way than while brushing your teeth.  You can't wash your face in cold water.  A beverage is the only good excuse for cold water.

Now, I do stray from the routine occasionally.  I don't venture too far away, though.  It just works so well.

Challenge 14

Challenge #14:  What are some of your {detailed} favorites?

 I had to cheat a little and look at her examples because I was stumped.  So pardon my lack of originality.

My favorite kind of apple is Jazz.  So sweet and a good texture.

My favorite pizza is Hawaiian.  I used to think pineapple on pizza was nasty, but then I had some while I was in Bulgaria.  It changed my life.  It was amazing.  On the other hand, I'd been eating a lot of hard bread and mystery meat, so maybe it was the familiarity that made it drool-worthy.  Anyway, I like it now.

I go through phases with ice cream.  I went through a Superman ice cream phase.  Also cookies and cream.  And cookie dough.  And peanut butter.  My most recent favorite is a salted caramel.  Yuuuuum.  However, I always like some vanilla with hot fudge sauce.  Also there's something I love about Dairy Queen chocolate sauce.

I go through phases with cold cereal too.  I like Fruity Dino Bites (it's also really good on ice cream).  I like frosted flakes.  My very favorite is Berry Active Lifestyle (Kroger's version of Special K).  I like generic brands of cereal.  They taste just as good as the expensive kind.

As far as shampoo and conditioner go, I try something new every time.  I love shampoo shopping.  There's nothing more refreshing than a new smell for your hair.

I like my toothpaste good and minty.  I'm not a huge fan of cinnamon flavored kind or anything that tastes like cough syrup (why do they even make it in that flavor?).  I'm pretty easy to please, which is good because we seem to go through toothpaste like crazy.

I like clean sheets.  I look forward to changing the sheets because they feel so nice when they're clean.

I love cute flats that work with jeans, shorts, or a skirt.  They're good in most seasons (with the exception of snowy winter) and are usually pretty comfortable to wear for extended periods of time.

 My favorite pair of jeans are some DownEast skinnies I bought a few years ago.  They're the only skinnies I've ever tried that don't strangulate my well-endowed calf muscles.

I'm hugely into Criminal Minds lately.  It's on Ion Television almost every night and we watch it almost every night.  It does make me more wary of taking the garbage out by myself after dark, though.  You never know when there will be a homicidal person hiding in the shadows.

I've talked about this before, but my favorite kinds of books are the classics and social worky memoirs.  The writing has to be real or real good.

Everybody Loves Raymond is probably my favorite comedy.  It's so funny.  I just love to hate Marie.  I've also been a fan of The Middle.  And yes, the shows happen to have the same actress as the mom.  Not that I'm her number one fan--I don't even know her real name.  I just call her Deb.

I love love love So You Think You Can Dance.  I got really into it when I was in high school, but then when I went to college I never had TV channels so I never got to watch it unless I found recorded segments on Youtube.  Fox was lame back then and didn't bother putting the episodes for SYTYCD online.  However, now that we have TV channels I watch SYTYCD faithfully.

Challenge 13

Challenge #13:  What are some health challenges you've faced in your life?  What are you currently doing to be healthy?

I've been blessed to be a pretty healthy girl.  I had ear issues when I was tiny, so they put tubes in my ears.  Unfortunately they caused some damage--they left holes in my ear drums.  I guess I couldn't hear very well (but maybe it was just because I wasn't listening--haha).  Thus, the summer before second grade I had surgery on one of my ears, and then had the same surgery on my other ear a few months later.  What happened with the surgery is they made a little incision behind my ear and snipped off some of the muscle (I imagine that's why I can't wiggle my ears) and transplanted it onto my ear drum to seal up the hole.  Both surgeries went fabulously and now I can hear normally.  I haven't had too many problems since.  I think I'm a little more sensitive to loud music than most people (it gives me a bad headache), but I don't know if that's related to my childhood ear issues or not.

Because I always had tubes (or holes) in my ears, I was commanded to never ever EVER get my ears wet as a child.  So I was that awkward child at the pool with loads of wax stuffed in my ears (to keep the water out) that kept saying, "Huh?  What did you say?"  Dunking my head underwater was never very enjoyable because I could just envision buckets of water leaking into my ears.  Floating on my back was a joke.  It created a unique kind of pressure on my ears that freaked me out and sent my arms and legs flailing.  I never did pass level 4 in swimming.

I am wanting to be more healthy lately.  For a long time I had a job where I was constantly speed walking around and lifting things, but my job for the past year has been slightly more sedentary.  Well, a lot more sedentary.  There's more treats, too.  Plus, Pinterest happened in my life, so now I eat really well (although not always very healthy).  Thus, I'm trying to work out some kind of workout routine in my life... but currently the only routine thing about my life is how I get ready for bed.  I'll keep you posted on that one.

Challenge 12

Challenge #12:  Find your favorite “somethings” (old, new, borrowed, blue) and record a little bit about them!

Old:

 We bought an old candy machine while we were in St. George a few weeks ago and it is so awesome.  This candy machine isn't exactly like ours, but you get the idea.  I'd take a picture of ours, but we don't have any candy in it right now so it looks kind of lame.  I'll post a picture one day.

New:

I've been desiring some sandals that weren't cheap Old Navy flip flops, and I found these at Kohls the other day for a mere $9.99!  Now, they aren't the cutest sandals I've ever seen in my life, but I think they're $10 worth of cute.  They'll go with everything and I'm pretty satisfied with the comfort level.  I wore them pretty much all day after right after I got them and didn't get any blisters.  Win!

Borrowed:

Since we are renting, technically our front porch is borrowed.  I love sitting out there.

Blue:

There's nothing like a bunch of blue bachelor's buttons growing in the wild.

Challenge 11

Challenge #11:  What are 5 things you have (or almost have) perfected? What are 5 things you are far from perfect in?

Almost perfected:
1. Mac and cheese from scratch.  It's the only way to go.  The box kind is yuuuuuuck.  I love this recipe from Pioneer Woman.
2. The bed-time routine.  I'm awesome at getting ready for bed.  I never forget to brush my teeth or take out my contacts.
3. Mopping the floor.  My house is almost all hardwood floors, so I go with the Swiffer Wetjet along with all the Swiffer hacks I've learned from Pinterest.  I refill the spray bottle with self-mixed cleaner and use dollar store washable "microfiber" cloths.  It's so fast, so easy, and so tight-budget-sustainable.  I rock at mopping.
4. Mock-braided bangs.  The last time I got my hair cut, the stylist cut my bangs a little too long, so they got to the awkward phase pretty quickly.  Thus, I've gotten fairly good at the two-strand twist.  It looks a lot like a French braid, which is awesome because I can't get the actual French braid thing down.
5. Walking.  Taking into consideration that my left leg is 5/8 inch shorter than the right one, I feel pretty good about having a fairly straight gait.

Far from perfection:
1. Project clutter.  If I start a project, but don't quite finish that day, I like to leave it out in sight so I am reminded to finish it.  Thus, I have random visible project clutter throughout the house.  I'm working towards finishing projects asap so the project clutter doesn't have to sit out for weeks and weeks and weeeeeeeeeks.
2. Frisbee throwing.  Sometimes I can throw it nice and straight with the appropriate distance and direction.  But only sometimes.  I'm slightly better at catching a Frisbee, but only slightly.
3. Dishes.  It's my least favorite house chore, and thus I avoid it like crazy.  It's pretty miraculous that I have a husband who is willing to do my dishes for me.  He's great.
4. Drawing.  I'm reminded daily of this as I play Draw Something.  I'll pick a word that I feel is totally do-able, but mid-drawing I realize that I was wrong.  Soooo wrong.
5. Interviewing.  I haven't done a ton of interviewing for jobs, but I tend to get all quiet and awkward.  It's like 5th grade Lindsey steps into the interview rather than a confident 23 year old with a college degree.

Challenge 10

Challenge #10:  How are things different now from when you were a kid?

This is a hard question, because "when I was a kid" was approximately 5 years ago.  Literally.  So it's kind of hard to come up with a really good.  It's mostly just the obvious changes that come with growing up. 

I cook now. 
I clean more (and more willingly). 
I do more laundry. 
I'm married. 
I'm more willing to try new food. 
I can stay out as late as I want.
That being said, I prefer to go to bed before midnight.

Challenge 9

Challenge #9:  Make a timeline of your life!

1988: I was born.
1990: My brother was born.
1994: I started preschool.
1995: My other brother was born.
1996: My family moved, I started piano lessons, & I had surgery on both ears.
1997: My sister was born.
1999: I started violin lessons.
2000: I started jr. high band.
2003: I learned to drive.
2006: I went to Bulgaria.
2007: I graduated from high school.
2008: I went to Poland.
2011: I graduated from college, went to England, & then got married.

Challenge 8

Challenge #8:  What are some addictions that you have?

 I am addicted to naps.  I'm better than I used to be--I used to require one every day.  Now it's just a special treat if I had to stay up late or get up early.

 I don't know that I'm addicted to Coke, but I sure do like it.  Especially Vanilla Coke from Sonic. 

 Oh how I love cookies.  Hot out of the oven and gooey.

 Dr. Mario is one of the few video games I'm kind of addicted to.  I do ok until I start playing, and then I can't stop.

 Last, but not least, I adore hot chocolate.  I drink it in all seasons.  It makes me feel warm and fuzzy inside.

Challenge 7

Challenge #7:  What numbers best represent you?  

Back in 8th grade basketball I was number 35.  One day in 8th grade math my friends and I were working on an assignment together in class.  There was one problem in particular that we couldn't figure out--a dreaded story problem, no doubt.  Thus, each of us decided to put our basketball numbers in as the answer.  I put x=35.  At the end of class we corrected the assignment.  You'll never guess what the answer was.

 x=35

I was thrilled. All the practice I'd put into making the basketball team had culminated to this magical moment when I got a question right because I had made the team.  Unfortunately, the assignment was a practice test that wasn't being recorded in the grade book.  But this meant something.  I finally had a lucky number.

I was number 35 for such a short period of time, and yet it somehow ended up being the number I chose to use in countless usernames and passwords for years afterwards.  (I don't use it much anymore, so it won't be of much help to you if you're interested in hacking into any of my accounts.)  So I don't know if the number 35 represents me, but it does remind me of a time when I cashed out with a lot of hard work and a little bit of luck.

Challenge 6

Challenge #6:  If you could write a letter and send it to yourself when you were younger, what would you say?

Younger Lindsey,

In all honesty, I don't have much advice for you.  You're making good decisions.  Keep it up.

A few things to remember:

• You do like lettuce and tomatoes eventually.  But not onions.  Onions are still gross.
• You will get tired of peanut butter sandwiches.
• You will have a country music phase.  It won't last long, though.
• It's ok that you aren't good at volleyball.  Don't sweat it when you don't make the team in jr. high.  You are good at other things.

Much Love,

Older Lindsey

Challenge 5

Challenge #5:  What is something that describes you from each letter of the alphabet?

  

A:  Agreeable

B:  Blind (not legally)

C:  Christian

D:  Danish (partially)

E:  Earthling

F:  Fiddler

G:  Grass-loving

H:  History

I:  Indexing

J:  Jigsaw Puzzle

K:  Kelly Green

L:  Law-abiding

M:  Married

N:  Night Owl

O:  Objective (mostly)

P:  Pasta

Q:  Quesadilla

R:  Resourceful

S:  Sample Tasting

T:  Tallish

U:  Underwear-wearing

V:  Violin

W:  Waffles

X:  X marks the spot

Y:  Yard

Z:  Zodiac is Libra

 

Challenge 4

Challenge #4:  When you have a few minutes or a few days, what do you like to do in your “play” time?

I like to read.  I read both books and blogs.  I like to write.  This blog is my major playtime activity.  I like to browse on Pinterest.  I like to start projects I find on Pinterest.  I like to bake.  Oh dear, how I like to bake.  I bake way too often.  Lately I've been on a cleaning kick.  We might be moving soon, so it's my own little way of coping with potential change.  I like to go on walks.  I like to play board and card games.  I like to take naps.   

Challenge 3

Challenge #3--A fill in the blank challenge: Whenever I ________, I ________.

Whenever I brush my teeth, I use hot water.  I never realized this was weird until I got married--my husband uses cold water.  It had never crossed my mind to use cold water.  He asked why I use hot water, and after a bit of soul searching I realized why.  Growing up, I usually brushed my teeth in the basement bathroom of our house.  It took a looooooong time for the hot water to get to the faucet.  Thus, at some point I'd made the subconscious decision to turn the water to hot while brushing my teeth so that the water would be warm by the time I washed my face.

Whenever I stop at a stoplight, I try to be the first one out of the intersection when the light turns green again.  I drive a stick shift, and when I first started to learn stick I struggled.  I killed the car all the time.  Thus, I became very self-conscious of the time it took for me to get from stop to go.  So I went into drag racing mode and have been there ever since.

Whenever I go for walks, I inwardly test myself on the names of almost every plant I see.  After years of working in garden retail, I can't help myself.  When I see a plant I like that I've never seen before, I have half a mind to go knock on the door to ask what it is.  I don't though.

Whenever I think about hot chocolate, I want some.  It doesn't matter what the temperature is outside.  I love it always.

Challenge 2

Challenge #2:  What are some choices in your life that affected where you are now?

I think I always knew where I was going to attend college, so when the time came to head in that direction, the biggest decision was where I was going to live while I attended school.  I picked one based mostly on the fact that my mom lived there while she was going to school.

 Many of my friends were staying in the same complex for the next year, so I decided to stay for another year too.  I had new roommates and became really good friends with one roommate.


The next year my roommate and I were looking to try out someplace new.  We had some friends from our freshman year who had moved to a different complex and liked it, so we decided to try that our for our junior year.


When it came time to find housing for senior year, my roommate found a house of girls to live in and decided that's what she'd do.  I, on the other hand, didn't feel like that's what I should do.  So I procrastinated.  I told this part of the story more in depth in a previous post.



Finally I ganged up with a fellow social worker I knew from my ward and found someplace to live.  It was while I was living here that I met my husband. 


If I had decided to live somewhere different my freshman year, I would have met different people and may not have ended up in the same place.  It's kind of a sobering to think that if I had made a different decision anywhere along the line, I may not have met my husband.


Then again, one of the places I considered living my freshman year just happened to be the same complex my husband was living at the time.  Maybe we would have met and married earlier had I chosen to live there instead.


Good decisions can lead to all sorts of good ends.  I really like where my choices have led me

Challenge 1

For this month, I've decided to do a little bit of personal history.  It sounds dorky, but I promise it's not.  I found a website via Pinterest called the "This Is Me Challenge" and she gives a great list of challenge questions that help you dive into recording interesting and unique things about yourself for all your posterity.  It seems like personal history is something old people do after they've had all their best and craziest experiences.  But why wait?  I've got 23.77 years of awesomeness under my belt.  Might as well record it!

If you were forced to go back in time to the olden days, but were allowed to take 10 modern conveniences with you, what would you take?

Modern plumbing.  I can't imagine having to haul all your water into the house from a well outside.

Dishwasher.  This is a modern convenience I don't have right now.  It would be even more nice to have one in the "olden days."

Toothpaste.  I'm not sure how far back "olden days" goes, but they used to use some pretty nasty things as toothpaste.  I do love that minty fresh feeling you get from modern toothpaste.

Pillow.  Ok, so maybe some old-fashioned pillows are good, but I don't want to take any chances.  I like sleep too much.

Refrigerator.  I can't fathom how people manged to keep food good before fridges.

Pandora Radio.  Now, if nobody else had internet, I would have no need for internet either.  However, I would miss that magical music station.

Amazon.com (and other equivalents).  This is my main source of book purchasing.  It's so great to find cheap books so easily.

Ovens.  I love a good campfire, but it seems so unpredictable when it comes to cooking.  Plus a lot of houses (and people) caught on fire back then.  Ovens are so much more safe.

Electricity.  I've mentioned several things that require electricity, but they wouldn't be much good without being able to turn on.  That being said, I'm going to slip lights into this category, as it seems to be electricity in its simplest form.  But I'm no electrical engineer, so I could be wrong.  Electricity is nice when you want to turn on the bathroom light in the middle of the night.

Cars.  I like being in places I've never been, but I don't really like the traveling part.  I don't like being in transit.  Thus, I like to get wherever I'm going as quickly as possible.  I'm adamant about driving the speed limit, but I'm definitely not a dawdler.  I like how much faster cars make travel.

I can't decide whether my list makes me feel embarassingly spoiled or ridiculously blessed.  I live a very privileged life.

A Few Thoughts

I'm going to be spending extended amounts of time in an elementary school that has had a recent whooping cough outbreak.  I'm 95% sure I've been immunized for pertussis, but I'm still slightly nervous.

I cleaned off the yellow stuff from my bathroom ceiling with a magic eraser from the dollar store.  Victory!

Last night for family home evening we walked around the exterior of the house with a flashlight and wasp spray, looking to get rid of nests.  It was the most exciting FHE we've had in a long time.

I needed to do something trendy, so I went and bought some dry shampoo (Suave).  I'm in love.  I'm always looking for excuses not to shower.

There are ants all over our front porch.  I'm debating if I should take care of it before next FHE.

I spent a few hours this morning job hunting for my husband while he was at work.  I was tempted to look at jobs for me too, but there's no point until we know where we'll be.

I love clean sheets.  They feel so good.

I'm grateful my husband is more willing to do dishes than I am.  Hand-washing dishes always is so overwhelming for me.  Here's to hoping the next apartment has a dishwasher.

A few months ago it rained this weird, dirty rain that left my car filthy.  It has rained enough over the past few weeks that my car is basically clean again.  That was easy.

I'm want to jump on the Instagram bandwagon, but alas... my phone is plain Jane and not smart.  And my ipod is old school (it's only 2.5 years old, bless it's heart) and has no camera.  One day Instagram will be in my budget.

Life Chronicled

I never intended this blog to be something I recorded my life on, but I’m going to take the liberty of doing an update.

The most relevant new thing in my life is that I am done working in the nursery. I did the simultaneous nursery aide/Good-Touch/Bad-Touch facilitator thing for a while, but I just wasn’t loving the nursery aide part. Since Good-Touch/Bad-Touch (GTBT) was during school hours, I was scheduled to be in the nursery at nights, and this really put a damper on my evenings. It put a damper on my entire week, really. Monday and Thursday nights were the only weekdays I could spend more than 3 waking hours with my husband. Since Monday nights are FHE, Thursday nights were the only time we could do our ward missionary visits, so Thursday evenings got scheduled up pretty quickly. Thus, Monday nights were my only truly free nights. How lame is that? But I’m done now, and I’ve been loving spending more time with my husband. Maybe I can also hang out with some old friends or make new friends!

GTBT has been fun. It’s mind-blowing that I not only like this job, but that I’m actually pretty good at it. When I was twelve I gave a talk in church (very quickly, apparently), and the high councilman speaking after me said something to the effect that he’d never heard anyone talk so fast. I was mortified, and vowed to never speak in public again. Obviously, that’s going well—I give around 9 presentations (speed talking) a week. It’s so ironic. To add to the irony, the worst final grade I got in my college career happened to be in a public speaking class.

The comments kids make in GTBT are so hilarious sometimes. Before you read the rest of this paragraph, I should give a disclaimer--this story is ever so slightly inappropriate (but so funny). But keep in mind a 3rd grader said it. Read ahead at your own risk. In a 3rd grade class I asked them to give me examples of times when somebody is looking at or touching private body parts, but it’s not sexual abuse. One boy said, “When you play football or baseball you have to get a physical, and they… they…” Another boy chimed in, “They check your balls!” I had to employ some major poker face. I sensed that most of the class didn’t catch what he said, so I moved on to the next thing before they had time to start being all giggly and embarrassed because he said “balls.”

In September a really fun job fell into my lap. I decided that I wanted to teach violin, so I emailed the 4^th and 5^th grade strings program in a local school district to see if they had any teacher openings. They responded no, but they were interested in possibly hiring me as a substitute. I sent them a paragraph of my qualifications, and they said they wanted to meet with me. I was expecting an interview-like meeting, but instead she just went through the paragraph I’d sent her and pointed out all the things she liked about me. She was satisfied with my violin experience (and that I play the piano) and was particularly interested in my fiddling experience. She liked that I taught GTBT not only because I had experience teaching that age group in a classroom setting, but also because I’m pretty familiar with a lot of the schools in the district. So she hired me as a sub then and there. Piece of cake. I’ve averaged about one substitution job a week, and starting next week I’m filling in for a teacher who is going on maternity leave. It’s been so much fun. Another perk is that I recognize some of the kids from GTBT. It has also inspired me to get back on the violin practice bandwagon. I’ve practiced every day this week! Lastly, it has enabled me to be freed from the nursery! I get done with work around the same time my husband does! It’s so great. The one dark cloud in my sky is that I won’t be able to do it for very long, even though I want to. Chances are, we’ll move away from our lovely blue house this summer.

In other news, I found Pinterest and have since become addicted. It is so fun. I’ve never been so crafty in my life. There are also some really awesome recipes on there. So I’ve been cooking a lot, too. I learned to make bread, so now I’m hooked on homemade bread. Now that it’s cold again, I’m addicted to hot chocolate. Not that I don’t drink hot chocolate regularly year-round, but it becomes a legitimate addiction this time of year. Lately I’m in love with two spoonfuls of regular hot chocolate mix, one spoonful of white hot chocolate mix, and a sprinkle of cinnamon.

My husband is great. I’ve not been in a joking mood lately, so when he jokes about something funny I did, it never seems funny. I was eating some cinnamon bread, and sprinkled some of the extra cinnamon sugar on my slice, and he chuckled and said something to the effect of, “You need more cinnamon sugar on there?” After a few minutes of being defensive and hurt, I told him that was the worst fat joke I’d ever heard. Bless his heart. I get bent out of shape over the stupidest things sometimes. He accepts and tolerates me so well. He and I have been watching a lot of baseball lately. By this, I mean that he watches the game and I knit. I've done a lot of knitting. I've learned a lot about baseball, though, so I think it's been good bonding time.

Well, that is the condensed update. Over and out.

Columbus

Once upon a time I faithfully posted on this blog once a week, every week. Then life got kind of crazy, and now I’m out of the habit. At this point in time, my schedule is slightly more stable, so I think it’s time to resurrect my poor blog.

In elementary school I was somewhat notorious for being the girl who could and would read every book—quickly, too. I read just about anything I could get my hands on. I did avoid sci-fi, but our library was so small that sometimes I couldn’t avoid it. We were only allowed to read books within a point or two of our reading level (I guess they didn’t want us to read easy books), so there were only so many books I was allowed to read.

I participated in binge reading for years. Once I got to high school, I hit a wall. I was finally sick of reading. After several years of recovery, I had to do some real soul searching to figure out what I really liked to read.

At times I enjoy popular fiction, but more often than not my patience with them is short. If a book gets cheesy, I immediately give up on it. If it is annoyingly predictable, I don’t bother finishing it. Even if an author’s style of writing—her voice, her dialogs, her plot —seems shallow or meaningless, I can’t enjoy it. My reading disorder has left me with an extremely picky appetite for literature.

I have yet to come across a work of classic literature that I did not love. I worked on an unabridged version of Hugo’s Les Miserables off and on for several years. It was absolutely beautiful (although he does get long-winded at times). Although I’m not 100% sure if The Little Prince (by Antoine de Saint-Exupery) really is a classic, it was so lovely and poignant that I consider it to be so. I’ve never gone wrong in reading any book by Jane Austen, and I am very fond of Shakespeare.

I also love memoirs and autobiographies—people telling their own stories. Even if the book isn’t very well written, I love the honesty of it, for fate drew the storyline. I like the interesting details of their memories. I read a ton of these for my social work classes, and I was rarely disappointed. I loved Turning Stones by Parent and Somebody’s Someone by Regina Louise. Both got a little raw at times, but life gets that way sometimes. Battle Hymn of a Tiger Mother by Chua was both funny and fascinating. I read one about a girl who was raised in an orphanage run by extremely abusive nuns (The Unbreakable Child by Kim Richardson) and another about a girl who was raised by a mother who subjected her to Muchausen Syndrome by proxy (Sickened by Julie Gregory). Most of these that I read are super depressing. I love them, though.

Lastly, I love books about ideas. I guess you could call them philosophical. Suzuki’s Nurtured by Love has some fantastic ideas about the creation of talent. In Man’s Search for Meaning Frankl combines his experiences in a World War II concentration camp with psychology to explore life’s meaning (I would classify it as an autobiography as well). The book I’m currently working on fits under this category. It is a fairly popular one by C.S. Lewis—Mere Christianity. The cool thing about this book is that he uses concrete examples to describe very abstract ideas. He explains the logic of Christianity in general terms, not favoring any one Christian religion.

I just read a part in which he makes a very interesting point. He describes a fleet of ships and the factors that make a successful journey possible. So, in honor of Columbus day last week, imagine the Nina, the Pinta, and the Santa Maria sailing together across the ocean in search of India. What do they need to do to get to their destination safely? First of all, they need to not run into each other. If the Santa Maria and the Nina crash into each other, that’s two ships down, which leaves just the Pinta—hardly a fleet if there is only one ship left. They must be unified in purpose and do nothing to sabotage a fellow ship.

Also, each of the ships need to be in perfect working order. If all three of Columbus’s ships had decided to sail in a certain formation in order to avoid collisions, it does no good if the Pinta’s steering mechanism is broken—the Pinta will crash into one of the other ships anyway. Things need to be well within each ship to make all go well in the interactions between all three ships.

Lastly, it’s great if all the ships are in perfect condition and are unified in their destination, but if they don’t reach the correct destination, those things don’t matter. Columbus’s ships were trying to reach India, but instead landed in America! Mission failed! Now, I’m glad that Columbus made this mistake, because he happened upon a pretty awesome place. As grateful as I am, the fact remains that they got it wrong. All went well on their journey, but they journeyed to the wrong place.

According to Lewis (and I agree), the people of this earth are subject to the same three factors this fleet of ships is subject to. In order to have a successful journey through life, people must be kind to each other—they must not collide with or injure those traveling alongside them throughout life. They need to be united in abiding the laws of the land as well as moral laws.

Secondly, each person must ensure that he or she has a “sea-worthy” body and mind, so to speak. They must have the ability to follow these laws. For example, if a certain substance impairs a person’s judgment, he may not be able to avoid having these collisions with the people in his life, even if he wishes to avoid them. Just as a ship with a faulty steering device can negatively affect the perfectly good ships around it, what happens within one person can negatively affect a number of innocent people around him.

Lastly, people can be following the laws and keeping their bodies and minds in good shape, but if they aren’t headed to the correct destination, they have still got it wrong. This is where Christianity comes in the picture—up until now it has been just about universal morals, such as honesty, loyalty, etc. When you consider Columbus and his journey, there was a third party. Columbus was the one who wanted to sail, but it was the Queen of Spain who gave him a destination—India. Likewise, we have a third party in our lives that gives us a destination. The third party, of course, is God, and this destination he has in mind for us gives us a reason to be nice to everyone around us; it gives us a reason to keep our minds and bodies clean. If we fail to do so, we are unable to reach this divine destination. On the other hand, things can be going pretty well (or maybe even exceptionally well) on our journey throughout life, but if we do not reach the destination God intended for us, we got it wrong.

Now, back to Columbus. We have established that he failed. He didn’t reach the destination given to him by the Queen of Spain. If the Nina, Pinta, and Santa Maria had crashed fifty miles off the coast of Spain, Columbus would have failed to a similar degree. However, I believe that God’s destination for Columbus was not India. God’s destination for Columbus was to find a land that would later become a great nation, and to open doors of opportunity for hundreds and thousands of people. Yes, Columbus failed to reach the Queen’s destination (and perhaps the destination he had made for himself), but he reached the destination that is most important.

The people around us give us destinations—they have certain expectations of what we should be doing with our lives. We also give ourselves these destinations. Sometimes we reach these destinations, and other times we fail. But wherever these successes and failures take us, we should never lose sight of that destination God has drawn out for us.