Tag: friends

Southern work

I have worked in private Catholic schools, and so prayer and Bible verses aren’t entirely uncommon here and there slash every morning.

However, any work that I have had outside of these private schools usually has little to do with religion or God.

Sometimes, a prayer or invocation will happen at some event or other, because, well, this is Texas – there is a certain wholesome Christian-ness toy the culture, and so prayer before their performances was entirely normal and acceptable for the theatre kids at my cousins’ public high school in small-town Texas.

Houston is a whole ‘nother story – big city here means a certain amount of he open Christianity is lost – we have people from all over the world living here, and I’m not so sure Christianity has the majority hold here, even.

Therefore, it is uncommon for me to have strongly open Christianity show up at work here – leave Houston and enter smaller towns, and it absolutely is the norm… but not here.

And so, it was extremely odd for me to have the Bible quotes to me as part of my internship training the other day.

Yes, it was totally relevant to what I was being taught, (the quote, I mean), but the assumed foundation of Christianity was never discussed and was somewhat irrelevant to the topic of discussion at the time.

However, it reminded me that, well, I am in Texas and I am in the South, and I’m working with someone who is not Houston…, so of course Christianity is the standard foundation for anyone around – being not-Christian is rather abnormal and extremely uncommon.

And something about it was beautiful to me – no one was aiming to convert or preach or anything like that at all… it was merely a matter of, ‘Well, it is our task, given even by God, to do this and that, so it brings everything full-circle,’ having it make even more sense that we would do something a specific way in this job I’m learning (which, recall, is not a job about religion, but about caring for animals).

In any city-like job, I think I would have been uneasy about the comment, concerned that it was a radical Christian trying to convert me from my sinful ways without even getting to know almost anything about me, let alone the fact that I am Catholic – yes, we have these radicals here from time to time, too – but in the somewhat countryside, working with horses, it was utterly normal and acceptable, and it even surprised me that I wasn’t expecting it.

I guess I was thinking more about how this is a ‘work situation’, which I relate to big city, as opposed to that it is a ‘country work situation’.

Because if I had put in the word ‘country’, I’d have been ready and waiting for all sorts of Bible and God tidbits to show up – countryside in the south equals God-fearing and God-loving brings who are grateful for the gifts that God has granted them in their lives… for men, it means Christian cowboys through and through.

Traditionally, anyway… I guess we’ll just have to see how things go for the future of our Southern countryside, but I do kind of like it – the kindness and love that is always there really is wonderful.

Anyway, that’s all I have to say about that right now.

Goodnight! 🙂

Post-a-day 2019

… And so I did

Today, I accomplished money-earning work that helps others, I learned something, I trusted my instincts, I interacted with and chatted with smart, kind people, I did someone a big favor, I completed one of the assignments from school (the one I had most nearly despised), I ate quite decent food (and twice!) for myself, I talked with my cousin about useful things for the both of us, I patted and got licked by a dog, and I got licked and leaned against a bunch as I learned about and helped care for and rode horses (which included detangling a bunch of hair).

Then, while showering and running my fingers through my own hair to detangle it, I felt something strangely similar to the feeling of the horse’s hair – recall that my hair is dirty blonde and just about as opposite in texture from horse hair as is possible – and eventually discovered that the slightly knitted area felt similar due to the fact that it had hay in it. 😛

Totally chuckled at that, if only on the inside of me. 😉

I did many things today, and they all contributed to my day being beautiful for my life, and even extremely helpful for my struggle-filled mood of the past couple weeks… I don’t want to do lame work, but I can always find something interesting within it, once I get started on it.

And so, as I suspected, getting going was what I needed most to get on track with things – resisting, evading, and avoiding, as I already knew, were definitely not the beneficial path for me. 😛

So now, preparing for bed, I’m not even attempting to turn on a film or anything, despite the fact that I needn’t actually be up until around 1pm tomorrow, because I am exhausted in a good way and I feel good, and so I want to go ahead and read and sleep.

Super signs of a good day, a day well spent. ❤

Post-a-day 2019

How You doin’?

How am I doing, she asks?

I’m doing okay, I think. Dealing with a school mental struggle of being tired of it and not wanting to do semi-pointless work (i.e. work that serves no value whatsoever in why I am getting the degree). I got sick, too, and so that aligned interestingly perfectly with the assignments, and so they are excused from being late. I still don’t want to do them, though. Life has become so interesting outside of school recently, it makes me want to take a big break from school, possibly permanently. But mostly because ‘I don’t Feel like it(!)’, and I’m not sure if it really has anything else behind it. Laziness might just be all there is in the matter, ultimately. :/

That’s the just bulk of my daylight hours… evenings and nights are a whole ‘nother conundrum these days. 😛

How are you doing?

Post-a-day 2019

Lost in the story

Do you ever find yourself so engrossed in, so invested in, so infatuated and obsessed with the fairy tale story that you choose it over your real life, the book or the movie or show instead of living the lovely parts of your own real life?

I think I sometimes grow scared of my life becoming a letdown, such that I cling to something else – another story, that is, and usually a created one – for a while instead, and dream about and long for that life, or something like it, for myself…

I unrealistically throw as much possible time as I can into reading the book further, and reading further into the series, if it is one, changing and informing planing and intended activities just so I can spend more time in the world of the book…

Until, that is, I reach the point that I notice the new infatuation interfering too much with real life – when I typically would be delighted at the prospect of spending the day with my brother, and doing photos and sports, nonetheless, but find myself longing instead to stay home alone to continue this new story in which I have mentally thrown myself.

You see, I don’t want to be like Kathleen Kelly in the first half of “You’ve Got Mail”, where she feels like all of her best life moments have been ones read in books… I want mine to be real, more like Kathleen Kelly at the end of the film…

And so, that point is when I acknowledge fully that my interest is bordering on scary, and that I would do best to look at what is behind it all – Why do I long for this other story so?

Do I want their money or love or friends or lifestyle or passion or any number of other things?

Usually, that is it exactly, and, by my acknowledging that, I can find a way to move forward powerfully within my own life, altering something that helps me in the area I found most lacking and which had drawn me so strongly and painfully to the created story…

Say I love their looks and their love story.

Then, I resolve to have my own love story…, and, seeing as how I was rather bummed the other day at the consideration of my search being at its end, I acknowledge that I perhaps do not want the love of my life to be settled yet… and so would prefer not to have Matthew Crawley become the love of my life after all, but would rather wait for the actual real and perfect man for me (because who wants to live in the age of corsets anyhow?)…

Just as an example… 😛

Post-a-day 2019

R(acc)oonmate Update (ish)

Warning: Gross stuff in this one.

….

Okay, well, the raccoons still live with me, but at least the maggots and their wretched stench are gone.

Yes, you read that correctly.

(At least, so long as you actually did read it correctly, including the part with the maggots, then you read t correctly…)

The live trap that I have had to check daily, and have checked usually twice a day, which has captured no raccoon – which I never much expected, seeing as how they all moved to the bathroom downstairs once the babies were born (at least, we think babies have been born, due to all the early morning chatter in the past couple weeks or so) – instead had its container of bait go from brown wet cat food to reddish-pink maggot mush, and stunk up the attic and, consequently, the stairway that leads into my room.

Fortunately, I was on the phone with my cousin when I discovered this, and asked her what to do, as I worked on not panicking too terribly.

She asked her mother and father, whose home she is still visiting, and my aunt quickly told me to carry the cage outdoors, dump the bait container into a plastic bag, seal the bag, drop bag in the outdoor trash bin, trip the trap, and leave it on the back outside porch to be retrieved by the company who set it and left it.

I kept them on speakerphone with the phone on my hip for moral support as I aimed desperately not to gag and hurl while bringing the whole thing down two flights of bendy staircases, and then another staircase outside to the ground, and followed the instructions of my aunt.

I dare say that, if I’d not been managing my own desperate desire to panic and cry, I would have come up with the same solution, so I was quite willing to follow the instructions.

Unfortunately, I had to jimmy a makeshift air funnel to clear out the space, since there’s only one tiny widow that even goes to outdoors up here, and so that was tough to arrange.

However, I was gone doing study buddy work with a friend of mine for a few hours, so I didn’t have to be here while it did the bulk of air clearing out.

Now, sitting on my bed, longing for sleep, I am nervous to turn off all the fans, for fear of the germs and smell that might still be lingering – eeeeeeww!!!!! – but am so sick and tired (yes, I actually have come down with a rather terrible cold today – the dry and painful kind that just make everything hurt and clog the back of the nose, but don’t provide the relief of a runny nose’s nose blow from a wet cold), I want to go to sleep.

Perhaps I’ll leave it all as-is, and go to sleep anyway… if I get too cold later, I’ll swap the fan nearest me with the heater (only one outlet over here, you see, and no central air option).

Yes, I think that is my plan now.

Ow… my body and head and throat hurt.

Goodnight, folks.

Post-a-day 2019

Here I am

I am myself, completely, including and especially in the face of difficulty.

That is something I have wanted for myself for quite some time now… tonight, reflecting upon my day today, I have come to see that, so far as today was concerned, I did an amazing job with this idea.

No, I wasn’t perfect with it.

However, it was beautiful to see how things worked out when I was being true to myself.

Such an odd feeling, and such a wonderful one (that keeps on going).

Post-a-day 2019

Do I belong here?

I sometimes forget that I belong with my family.

I aim to find other people in my life, to surround myself with people who get me and love me just about no matter what…, and I always seem to be failing at it, at least in terms of life in the daily.

And then I spend some time with my close family, and it is only upon consideration afterward that I notice how I have experienced entirely “belonging” and “being loved”.

This family is good for me, and they are the ideal that many people dream of finding in their own families… and I have them in my own family.

Friends all seem to pale in comparison, because my family is already everything I’ve been looking for in friends – the bar and standard are too high for new people to reach.

And, perhaps, one day, someone will meet or surpass that bar…, but only a few have so far, and they don’t live even in the state, so it hardly affects my day-to-day.

For now, though, I still have my family, and they still have me, and we all can love and spend time with one another, as we still seem to do, even though we are in our adult lives and have little ease in arranging simultaneous visits to the same spot.

But we do it, and the time together is always great…, just like this week, and how I was supposed to go back home Thursday afternoon…, but am currently, as of tonight, actually scheduled to leave tomorrow, Saturday, morning around 9am.

What a time, heh? 😛

Post-a-day 2019

Tantalizing Fantasizing

At this one school where I worked, it wasn’t that I felt unappreciated, because I didn’t…, but more that I felt unnoticed…, which, in a way, feels kind of way worse.

I remember finding myself fantasizing about receiving this particular award at the end of the school year – it was an award given to a teacher whom the senior class had elected as invaluable for their own educations… aka an extra-special teacher.

Since the students elected it, I had a chance of actually winning the award, though I had so few of the seniors, it wouldn’t happen, anyway.

Nonetheless, as I sat amongst the miniature version of the band during the senior awards ceremony, at which this teacher award also was awarded, I would ‘read aloud’ in my head the write-up they would give about me, before officially revealing my name… mentioning how I was involved in many areas of the school: dance PE class, teaching foreign language, helping with theatre on many levels, assistant coaching and co-founding the women’s lacrosse program, helping and participating in band events, actually playing trumpet in the band (including at this ceremony), founding of an acts of kindness group on campus, and much more in the unique realm of student interaction… and the kids would choose me for the award, because they acknowledged my utter awesome-ness and outstanding-ness as not only a person but a person who encourages and empowers them to be the best people they can be… I think no student who has known me would deny that fact.

My students know that I love them and that I want all the best for them, including if that means they need to suffer a bit to get themselves straightened out… they know and understand this all just from being with me in class or the various activities.

I take no nonsense, which they know, too, but my love and concern for them are unwavering and undeniable, and they know it.

I miss that.

And that is why I allowed myself to fantasize about receiving the award – if enough kids had known me, I could have won the award… if the administration ever would have allowed my winning it, of course. 😛

Anyway… yeah.

P.S. Tomorrow holds something new for me, in a sense…, if you feel up to it, I would appreciate your sending good intentions and/or prayers my way. 😉

Post-a-day 2019

True to your heart, like Stevie sang

I am finding more and more that, the more and more I am true to myself, the more and more I am presented with people who suit my self.

I have had a somewhat regular stream of people expressing desire to be around me, do things with me, especially new people to my life – they keep showing up and liking being with me.

I also have people complimenting me in various parts of all that is involved in being true to myself.

As e.e. cummings said or wrote, “It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are.”

It really does, but people seem to love and appreciate when those around them are courageous like this, and respond lovingly to the courage.

Perhaps it is like Marianne Williamson has said about how our shining light allows others unconsciously to let their own lights shine…

I hope it is.

Because we could have some really great people on this planet, if we all gave up being something other than true to ourselves and our self-expressions.

Post-a-day 2019