Shhhh!

As part of my attempt (and I really should stop calling it that – I’m dooming it for failure) of crafting a well-lived day, every day, I am carving out time daily to read books and articles and things that don’t pertain to work.  Reading provides great mental clarity for me.  Normally, my brain buzzes around a mile a minute.  My thoughts begin to feel like bursting popcorn kernels hopping all over the place.  Consequently, my computer screen always has a million windows open.  I can't tell you how many times people have commented on this.  Yesterday, I read this New York Times article and found much of it so true. 

The best vacation I’ve had in while was to Kauai last year.  I stayed in a hotel that didn’t have internet and I vowed to only check my phone once a day.  I had a great time except for the giant Cane spider that tried to sleep with me.  YUCK.  Perhaps I should employ some of those unplugging strategies in daily life. 

Question:  Do you spend a lot of time plugged in?  How to you break away or do you?


(Please note: that lovely Cane spider picture is from the site Instant Hawaii.  I did not need a picture to remember that beast).

Eat your veggies!  If you were just reminded of your childhood and your parents' stern looks from across the dinner table, you are not alone.  So was I.  However,  the saying has become somewhat of a mantra at my parents' house again this past week, some 20 years later.  This time, though, I am the one giving the looks.

I distinctly remember my 7 year-old self having a showdown with brussels sprouts, sitting at the table so long my mom finally left to call a friend.  Thinking I was in the clear, I scooped everything into my napkin, tiptoed around to the trash can, and stuck my arm all the way down to the bottom to hide the evidence.  So clever!  Except my mother, with her bat-like radar senses, beat me back to the dining room.  She emptied every last sprout onto my plate by the time I got back to the table and greeted me with a smile - one like Vanna White makes.  Damn.  That was a looong night. 

To say I wasn't a fan of veggies wouldn't be completely true either.  I did like raw bell peppers and took them in lunch like some took potato chips but that ended when Justin J, the love of my childhood heart, said my breath was stinky.  He pinched his nose when he said it and popped the "i" and "y" for emphasis.  That ended my relationship with bell peppers for a while. 

Today though, I try to eat veggies with every meal, even breakfast.  My parents look at me like I'm nuts and make a "yuck" face when I put my poached egg on a bed of sauteed kale.  When did this happen? This morning I cooked up some spinach with tomatoes and piled it on a piece of yummy sourdough bread.  My smom (loving combo of step + mom) actually stopped in her tracks when she saw it.  

It was SO good.  Now if only I could get her to try it.  It seems "the look" doesn't work as well on parents as it did children.

* Do you eat veggies for breakfast?  If so, what's your favorite recipe?
* What's one of your childhood food memories?

Life Changes

Every year I have a lofty list of things I am going to do or change THIS NEXT YEAR but then nothing happens.  I mean nothing.  I may last a day, but usually not even that.   Things have changed this year though, I quit a job I had a love-hate relationship with, I got sick, my family got sick, and I then I got angry.  Very angry, and then I saw this: 

This was my tipping point. 

Yum, dollar tacos and curly fries, you might say.  But to me this lot is where I’d thought long and hard about opening a community tutoring center in the low income community I teach in.  It hadn’t been a complete pipe dream.  I’d worked out preliminary plans but never did anything with them.  I was waiting, but for what exactly?  I don’t really know.   The Jack in the Box reminds me of inaction and wasted intentions.  Then I started to think about all the things I never seem to do:

·      I love to cook but only do so in spurts.

·      I like to get outside and find adventures but I always seem to be working.

·      I get spurts of craftiness but they pewter out.

·      I want to make a meaningful positive impact on my community; I want to help people.

·      I want to learn another language.

·      I want to enjoy everyday instead of looking forward to someday. 

Therefore, I’m not making resolutions; just like diets, I don’t think they work.  Instead, I’m looking for a life change.  Bold? Yes.  But, I don’t like regrets and if I don’t make a change, I feel I might have a lot of regrets down the road. I want my life to be mine, controlled by me, not by work or by money or by materialistic desires. 

Here goes…