My Valentine? Radical Self Love!

I suppose any one who runs a blog about themselves is automatically categorized as fully self-loving.  I sort of disagree.  Yes, I respect myself, and I am happy with where I am in life right now, but if I had confidence, I wouldn't be posting my thoughts and pictures to the safety of a non-reactive screen, I'd be on stage slamming poems, writing songs for the guitar, and working on my fiction.  Blogging is much safer, easier, and offers a far slimmer chance of tangible failure.  While I love blogging, I need to bust-a-rut of holding back in my non-cyber life and practice the sagely and tired advice of: accept failing as a possibility, and go forth anyway. 

The first blog I ever started reading that wasn't a live journal was Gala Darling's.  This month, she's proposing a project of "radical" proportions: stop trying to please others, and make the world better by being our best and true selves.  Sounds good to me.  I'm certainly lucky to have a boyfriend as my Valentine this year, but I'm completely on board with her proposition to be my my own "Valentine," and light up the world through acceptance and love, starting with ground zero.

"I’m delighted to announce that from now until the 28th of the month, in addition to your regular content, I’ll be dishing out tips on how to really truly madly deeply fall in love with yourself! Topics will range far & wide. Girl love...honoring & respecting yourself, positive self-talk, being assertive, manifesting your own dream girl persona & self-marriage are all up for grabs! Homework will be assigned (though it is totally optional, of course!), & I’ll be asking you to participate by sending in photos, stories & spreading the word!"  - Gala

Sounds great!  Speaking of self-love, while outfit photos may seem silly to some, it really is worthwhile to have the motivation to not dress like a slob everyday, and walk into a public space not feeling invisible and sloppy.  The clothes don't make the man by any means, but they can help make the attitude.  Self-love made manifest round one! 

My attitude is triple improved in this outfit, because I got the skirt for free at Tolly's Rock N'Swap last Saturday!

Skirt: free and snagged at the Austin Rock N' Swap
Boots: Hunter
Hoodie: Fossil (note those awesome pockets!)
Cardigan: Gap
Tank: Banana Republic (can I be any more preppy?)
Dove necklace: from Little Rock
Butterfly necklace: from Etsy
Rain: delightful

My photographer makes me feel very pretty.  What makes you feel beautiful?

If you're wanting to throw embarrassment, self-consciousness, any any other suffocating hang-ups to the proverbial wind, consider participating in the radical-self-love challenge, and swing by here!

Evolution & Patriotism Do Mix, and Happiness Reins Supreme

One thing about working in after-school programming is that it's imperative to have pockets.  I carry two cell phones, a walkie-talkie, various documents, lots of keys, writing utensils, and the occasional citrus fruit when I'm on patrol.  So this outfit does double duty, having the blue jean pockets, and two giant pockets in the dress.  Several of the teachers have, what appears to be, very cute "tool belts" for dry erase markers, scissors, pens, and all the other things I wish I'd had attached to my person when I had my own classroom.

I feel like reminiscing a bit, so indulge me...

This was my classroom last year, (on the first day, before havoc was wreaked upon it by doodle and destruction happy teenagers).  I miss it... even though it didn't have windows.  Actually, I don't miss that at all.  Now I'm in an office that has windows looking out on a hallway.  It's sort of like being in a fishbowl.  And yes, that is Kurt Cobain behind my desk, the exact same poster my tenth grade English teacher, Mr. Cochran, had.  Rock on.

This is a kick-butt bulletin board I did when I was teaching ninth graders the Odyssey.  They were in teams, or "ship crews," and they "sailed their ship" from Troy to Ithaca by doing well on homework and quizzes.  The symbols in the water marked where we were in the reading.

And these are some of my kiddos from last year - sophomores - dressed up to act out scenes from Antigone.  Sometimes I came home so frustrated with various students, administration, paperwork, policies, etc, that I forgot how much I laughed in my classes on a regular basis.  They cracked me up - even if I didn't always get to show it because I was supposed to be tough :)  My first group of babies are graduating this year, and I'm going to trytrytry to get back to Arkansas to be there.

Ok - memory trip over!  I actually need to go to bed so I can wake up for my current job.  Without further hesitation:

Dress and Belt: BB Dakota
Cardigan: Gap
Shoes: BCBG Girls
Jeans: Joe's Jeans

I also want to announce how excited I am to have gotten the Happy Award from Prima!  Danke danke!  (I'm also reliving my days in German class).

This award says to list ten things that make me happy, and I really need to do this right now because I've had a terrible, emotional day with lots of arguing and pouting.  Not very lady-like.

Ten happies:

1) Music I can swim in.  Lyrics, melody... I especially like acoustic guitars.  Sorry About Dresden came on a second ago and it seems fitting for the arguments I've been having.  That's music you can swim in.

2) Cooking and baking, when things turn out well and the people you feed smile when they taste it.  I really like kneading bread dough.

3) My puppy baby, who isn't really a baby anymore, and I adore even though she has yucky dandruff and licks herself a lot.  Ew.

4) The sea.  I have a jacket my mom ordered me from Lands End in seventh grade, and it still fits.  I wore it to the shore in Turkey and there are still crushed sea shells and sand in the pocket.  I love touching them.

5) Sale shopping.  And thrift shopping.  I like getting new things but hate spending money.  

6) Rare produce.  The words "heirloom tomato" make the room a little warm.

7) My grandmother.  Sometimes we drive each other crazy but I still love her and miss her a lot, and she likes pizza, beer, and new clothes almost as much as I do.

8) Photo albums.  I browse them a lot.  Facebook has ruined my life with the plethora of photos to go through.  I like remembering things to the point that it hurts.  This makes getting over past relationships hard.  I don't think I ever really let myself.  

9) Singing with the guitar on key.  I know I'll never be Beyonce, (I'm kinda glad...) but when I know a song and sing it while playing, it makes me really really happy.  

10) Aquariums.  Cutty took me to the Boston aquarium the last time I was there and I loved it.  Then I got to spend the rest of the weekend with my girls Joanie and Julia.  I went to archeology camp at the Toltec Mounds when I was ten, and a news crew interviewed me when I was digging in the dirt,and their cut away quote was me saying I wanted to grow up to be a marine biologist.  

Just ten?  There are lots more flooding to my mind - fresh flowers at the Fayetteville Famer's Market, strawberries, coffee and cinnamon rolls, Taste of Thai with Emily and Stephanie, going to lunch with Michael on Saturdays, playing golf with my dad, reading books about religion, researching and writing lesson plans, (yes I'm weird), The Flying Saucer when it's sleeting outside, recipes in my grandmother's hand writing, live music with dancing, kissingkissingkissing, open windows in summer, my grandfather humming made up songs in his Buick, Top Chef marathons with Scott... what a wonderful rush of thoughts!!

I'm supposed to tag people for this award - but can I be unconventional?  If you're reading this then I tag you.  Please take this award, post it, and write ten things that make you happy.  See if you can stop at ten.  I bet ten bucks you can't.  (I don't really have ten bucks, but the sentiment stands).

Strawberry Fields Forever: John Lennon, Andrew Zuckerman's Wisdom, and Hug-a-Lennon

John Lennon

 9 October 1940 - 8 December 1980

We All Shine On

One of the books on my Christmas list this year is Wisdom by Andrew Zuckerman.    It features photographs and interviews with fifty writers, actors, artists, designers, politicians, musicians, religious and business leaders who are all over sixty-five years old.  People interviewed include the Dalai Lama, Ted Kennedy, Desomd Tutu, Nelson Mandela, Madeline Albright, and my personal favorite: Jane Goodall. 

I heard about this book from Jim Burke, the teacher every teacher aspires to be, when he mentioned it as supplemental reading for Herman Hesse's Sidhartha.  It seems an appropriate mention on the anniversary of John Lennon's death, as his ideas of peace permiate Zuckerman's book. 

If ordering a book isn't on your agenda, then you can always celebrate John Lennon's life the way I did: hug-a-living-Lennon.  Unless they're making scary faces like this.  Then wait till later. 

The Get Up Kids in Austin: A Real Emo Love Story, or, Why My Boyfriend Almost Slept On The Couch

On Wednesday night, the musicians who created my number one favorite album of my quarter century life time - the Get Up Kids - came to Emo's.  The first song to ever grace my ears by them was "Holiday," on a mix CD my friend Josh gave me in the tenth grade.  I don't remember anything else on the mix CD, but I played "Holiday" so many times in my 1994 Jeep Cherokee, cruising around Fayetteville, AR, with the windows rolled down, that he finally suggested I give the whole album a try.  The Red Letter Day EP quickly followed Something to Write Home About, and the rest... wasn't history.  It was a CD that got played so much I had to buy a new one to replace it.  If you can't tell already, I'm fond of the group.

When I saw them advertised to play in Austin, I bought tickets for myself and Lennon well in advance online.  After they finally arrived in the mail - green and shiny with a holographic sticker - I proudly displayed them in the mirror's frame on my dresser, a daily reminder of my impending high school obsession to be gratified.  Wednesday finally came, I rushed home to grab the tickets and my boyfriend so we could rush right back out to go downtown, but to my surprise and dismay, the house was empty.  When efforts to get in touch proved futile, I did what any self respecting, stood-up girlfriend would do:

I calmly brought his pillows and a blanket downstairs, made him a bed on the couch, (the short one), and wrote a note in red pen that read simply: "Forget?" with the ticket receipt on top.  The spare ticket I suddenly found myself with was quickly offered to my friend Elizabeth, with the suggestion that she and her girlfriend split the price of a third ticket.  So, I left my love letter on his pillow, put a note on his laptop in our room that read "downstairs" just in case he missed it, and left.

Arriving at Emo's was also a surprise - I had no idea that a band I have adored since tenth grade, (TEN YEARS AGO - goodness), was still so popular.  It was packed, and being front row was out of the question.  Elizabeth and Andrea abandoned my plight to move forward after being elbowed back by a few misplaced fraternity brothers, with the threat of violence on the elbowers if they did not remove themselves from the situation quickly.  I'd normally agree with their stand, but this was the Get Up Kids, and I needed to be as close as possible.  "Close as possible" ended up being the third row, pressed in on all sides, with the two tallest people in the venue standing in front of me, and the one ass who thought "Holiday" was a moshable song behind me.  Nonetheless, I held my ground.  Forty-five minutes into the set, I felt someone pull on my sleeve, and before I could flash my face of annoyance, I saw Lennon, crouching behind me so that his too-tall head wouldn't block the view of the girls he'd just pushed in front of, telling me he'd promised he'd be there, and was sorry he forgot about the show when he agreed to go to the poetry slam with Eirik, (I also had a message on my phone from Eirik begging me to go easy on Lennon - aww, male solidarity).

So Lennon had forgotten the slam was that night, came home to find my note, had an "oh crap" moment, ran out the door while Eirik cheered him on with "Go boy go," drove downtown, tried to get in the door with the ticket receipt stub thinking it was the ticket, got laughed at by the door man, ran down the block to the ATM for the cover, got in, got a beer, pushed his way to the front stage left, couldn't find me, pushed his way back out, got another beer, saw Elizabeth who told him to look for the girl in yellow towards stage right, dove back in to the crowd, shoved his way toward an SLR camera up in the air with a yellow hoodie beneath it, and finally found me.  He said he suffered a black eye and bruised elbows to find me in the deluge of bodies. 

Needless to say, I brought his pillows back upstairs for him when we got home.  No too-short love seat doghouse sleeping for my forgetful, sunburned, crowd diving boyfriend.  At least, not this time around.

Love Notes; One Hundred Places

Fairy Chimneys - Cappadocia, Turkey: visited 9th grade, 1999

"I've only been to 6 of these places. You've been to way more. I need to catch up, or at least go to as many of these places with you as possible. Love, Michael"

Great Barrier Reef, Australia: adventure waiting to happen

the only love letter