In Houston, we have clouds that hang low, low in the skies, appearing to be mountains in the distance.
In Loma Linda, they have real mountains… and I love it.
However, it keeps making me feel like I’m in Japan and am suddenly on the wrong side of the road, and the wrong side of the car, and I need to fix it immediately… (because that’s the only place I’ve ever had real mountains)
Post-a-day 2019
Sometimes, we need only ask, and adventure will find us.
About a week and a half ago, I looked at my blank schedule for the next month, and felt not only a desire but a need to go somewhere… and I said it out loud, and began searching for how to make a trip happen.
Within 24 hours, a friend with whom I catch up only occasionally, and always over the phone, and who doesn’t even live in the same state, sent me a message, asking if I wanted to road trip with her to California.
And only days later, after a few changes in plans, here we are, staying in a hotel by the airport, preparing to fly to California to move her temporarily to a fancy place in SoCal, and, essentially, just adventuring and hiking and playing around.
Score one for life being awesome. 😛
Post-a-day 2019
“Go,” she says.
“With what?”
She points at the tv show that was paused long before she arrived, and which has yet to be referenced.
“We’re Talking,” I declare, happy, but a bit indignant.
“I’m done,” she says back, chomping on a cracker.
“Uh!…”
And we both crack up into laughter at the absurdity of our conversation.
Times like these make it all worth while, visiting my mom. 😛
Post-a-day 2018
Lady-stuff-talk below:
There’s nothing quite like starting off the new year by dropping out a pint of blood…
Add to it the uncommon pains and extreme headache that seem to be hanging this time around, and it kind of really sucks.
I was even curled up, crying earlier on this evening, it was all so uncomfortable and stressful.
Yet, as a sort of blessing, I was visiting my mom’s for New Year’s Day food when it all started, and my headache has me stranded here for the night, making my bathroom within ten steps of my bed, as opposed to the entire floor, three doors, and double staircase that usually sit between us.
My mom has, therefore, lent me the sleeping clothes and underwear I’ll use for the night after a normal shower (woohoo!) (the shower head broke at my place, so it’s a bit odd showering at the moment), and I can hopefully rest calmly, if not so comfortably, for the night.
Post-a-day 2019
The Beatles sure do have a song for every occasion.
Tonight, we say hello to the new year as we say goodbye to the one that’s been here for a while (for a year, to be exact).
And it really has been a year, this one… life has looked little like how I might have expected.
And yet, the good and the bad, the ups and the downs and the plateaus, have all balanced out rather nicely for this year… it kind of even has me terrified for this next year, because of how wonderful these unexpecteds keep turning out.
Kind of like the beautiful Marianne Williamson quote, where she says that ‘it is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us,’ and that ‘our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate,’ but ‘that we are powerful beyond measure.’
This year has been an even more clear example of that entire quote for me in my life, as each year has been progressively showing me, more and more… and so this next year definitely has me on the edge of my seat in slight but giddy and delighted terror. 🙂
P.S. For those who want to read the full and fabulous quote (which I didn’t even have to reference when writing this, though I haven’t seen it in probably years – I just know it so well) from Marianne Williamson: a link.
Post-a-day 2018*
*The Last of its group
At 35, you’re considered geriatric.(!)
I’m not gonna be geriatric.
I stopped by to visit a friend at her extra job today, so I could pick up her key to go play with her cat and dog.
We started with talk about Christmas presents and CrossFit, and ended up on careers and finances, houses and babies, all within about three minutes of chatting.
We joked about how her husband (currently boyfriend) who is finishing medical school right now, will be super poor for the next several years, and so she wants to work and save as much as possible now, so she can buy a house and have babies at the latest by 30.
Thus the glorious comment at the start of this… gotta love the oddities that drive us all forward in life. ;P
Post-a-day 2018
Sometimes, a Barbie musical is just the way to go.
When I lived and studied in Wien (Vienna, Austria), I hit a point of lonesome depression as the Fall weather of constant overcast skies and regular rain took its place over the city.
When talking one night with my best friend, she and her then-boyfriend, now-husband, declares that my tasks for the rest of the evening were to go for a walk outside (bundled up, of course), and then to watch a Barbie musical movie.
That way, I got outside air and some physical movement in, plus I got a really good, feel-good story and music.
Turns out, their prescription was perfect, and it still is useful to this day – whenever I’m feeling lonesome and/or down, a walk and a Barbie musical movie fill me with fresh air and cozy comfort.
And even tonight, when I wasn’t particularly down, but just wanted some love, watching Barbie’s “Princess and the Pauper” gave me those loving snuggles I was craving.
Plus, it always feels good to have the bad guy in a story end up on bottom and the good guys to end up on top – Barbie movies are always sure of having that happen!
Also, the bloopers at the end are tops – an even better ending than the wonderful happy ending the film already has. 😛
Post-a-day 2018
When we notice something that is extremely difficult for us, but is normal for others, is it something worth addressing face-on?
What if it turns out to be something that is better left undone, like rudeness to waiters or cursing, and we already do not do it?… is it still worth facing and evaluating?
I understand easily the value of reevaluating something negative we do, but does it work the other way around, too?
In the dreaded words of Dagny Taggart, it seems to me that only benefit can come of the evaluation – either we are reinforced in our good behavior and ways of thinking, or we are reconstructing our behavior as we deal with our poor ways of behaving and thinking.
It is a win-win situation… or something much like that, anyway.
Perhaps my first step of this will be to stay home alone and be productive (not just sleep all day), and voluntarily so… I could use some evaluation in that department…
Post-a-day 2018
I figured out what to do with that money.
I talked with my brother today, after thinking about different things, and we both agreed that it was a beautiful and practically perfect in every way use of the money… and I’m terrified in a good way about it all, which shows how good of an idea it is.
So, yay! for that.
Also, did I mention that I’ve been wondering what I might do in my life, if I had someone to fund me in whatever I chose?
I’ve been thinking on that these past couple or few days, because I had this sudden realization that I actually quite likely could find someone to fund something I really wanted to do, and quite likely could make it into a monetary gain for myself with whatever it is, anyway, so it is well worth considering what I would do, if I had the someone to fund me…
It’s been tough to start out, because I’ve grown quite accustomed to cutting myself off on those absurd dreams that require money I really don’t have right now…, but I’m growing into the thinking style, and am liking it more and more – I’m excited to see what I come up with. 🙂
And, of course, terrified, because I know myself, and I know that even a simple idea in this case has a high chance of turning into actual actions. 😛
Kind of like the whole “Be careful what you wish for,” thing in a positive way, because I so totally might make it happen, and new adventures can be really scary – in a good way, but scary nonetheless.
Post-a-day 2018
I kind of gave up on Christmas presents over the past handful or so of years.
You see, Christmas is about the story of Jesus the Christ, not about giving a present to everyone we’re ‘supposed’ to like and be related to… and I feel wrong pulling a holiday so far away from its foundation.
Plus, this whole consumerism thing has really gone a bit out of whack in recent years, and it might just make me sick, if I were to think about how much waste is caused, first) in terms of physical items, and then, second) in terms of mental effort.
We work so hard to give gifts to people, and we usually fail at bringing them the joy we were hoping to share with them – we want them to feel our love, but why must our love be so shallow and know them so poorly that we gift them ‘crap’ they never really liked and now feel obligated to use?
So, my goal has been to find ways to share my love with the world instead… I’m not so sure I’ve done a great job of achieving that goal, but I’ve been working on it.
Plus, for gift-giving, I do that normally in life – when there is a gift I want to give to someone, I do my best to make that happen, whenever it arises… I don’t wait ten more months for the excuse of Christmas.
Someone once told me that I must be an awesome friend, because I gave him a book and out of nowhere, shortly after we’d really met – just because our conversation had led me to believe he would really love reading the book.
I kind of shrugged it off at the time, I think, but I’ve come to see how valuable that is nowadays, where people do often give because they feel obligated to give, and not because there is something they truly want to share with the individual.
Anyway, the whole reason I brought all of this up, is because I was given a check this evening, as a Christmas present.
I had already said that I didn’t need it – separately to both parties involved – and that I didn’t expect anything to be given to me – and I’ve said the latter for years, more or less – … and yet the check was given me in double the amount from years past.
It made me want to cry with frustration as I examined the check (and I did actually tear up from that a bit)… I didn’t know what to do about it.
After a quick but genuine text chat with my brother, I mentally accepted the money, finally able to see that this was their way of showing that they cared about me.
Plus, it gives me an opportunity to do something great with the money that they likely never would have done with it – it doesn’t have to become just plain groceries for me alone… it is, instead, an opportunity for good.
I was hesitant to reject the money, because I didn’t want to leave them feeling rejected by me, nor did it make any sense whatsoever to pass up money being given rather freely to me at the present point in my life (remember the grad school and total uncertainty situation).
And yet, I felt utterly pathetic for having been given money in the first place – like sad charity, is how it felt for me.
But it worked out, thanks to my brother’s wonderful alternative approach:
Hannah, you should accept the gifts people give you. They want you to have them
Be grateful you have people in your life that have those resources
Use the money for something good, be empowered by it. Don’t pity yourself, instead, make its value exponential
Also, consider how much more good you can do with that money vs what they’d do with it. A transfer of wealth is much more than a gift
And I can see that now the way he saw it.
The funny part about it is that I had said that I felt similarly about a gift he, my brother, had just given me, too.
I had known that my view was not so good nor healthy, and I was glad to have a new way to see it all, as well as something beautiful to go do with these gifts given to me.
Post-a-day 2018
