2014 february fun

It is February again tomorrow, that least favorite month of mine, and I'm attempting once again to force it to be enjoyable with a February Fun list: 28 small things in 28 days that will bring a little delight to every one of those days.

I am not unaware of the fact that 28 days is the typical length of an addiction-breaking cycle. Perhaps I am trying to break the winter doldrums, not that I'm addicted to doldrums. But this is the rut time of winter, and you either need to break out of it—or it will break you.

For this year, I modified previous years' February Fun lists based on some brainstorming session with friends. {That's another thing about this Fun: Everyone is invited to participate, but some of the days are pretty specific to me. Run 10 miles, for example. If that doesn't sound fun to you, I won't make you do it, shouting at you the whole time like a maniacal drill sergeant: "Are you having fun now?!??"}

Other people came up with ideas like: go to a movie, go to a new place for brunch, go to the Art Institute.

Meanwhile, I came up with ideas like: buy a new book, make sure all your pictures are up to date, bake brioche, clean out your closet {and donate what you don't need anymore}, and buy new underwear.

Broadly speaking, I'd say that other people have fun ideas of things to do together, while all I want to do is be alone with my food, books, and organizational tendencies.

In an effort to "grow as a person," though, I've incorporated some of those non-solitude activities {a less awkward way to say that: social activities, although that does sound like I'm on a cruise and the purser has planned fun things for us on the Lido Deck}.

Here's to a fun-filled February. Please report back and tell me, on a scale of 1 to 28, how fun your February was.

2014 February Fun

1. retreat far, far away (and off the grid): I'm going on a partially silent retreat with my church. Doesn't quiet sound fun?
2. wear fun earrings
3. buy a new CD
4. find a Zooniverse project to work on: I read about this in the Tribune the other day. You can help! With science! Just by using your computer! Look at the projects—I'm most intrigued by the one to help catalog soldiers' diaries from World War I.
5. make something out of my new Downton Abbey cookbook: Or since you probably don't have this same cookbook, you can just make a new recipe.
6. schedule coffee with a friend {or dinner or whatever—basically, schedule quality time with someone. Good friends don't count—this need to be someone you don't see much.}
7. buy flowers
8. bake brioche
9. clean out your clothes and donate the ones you don't need anymore
10. re-organize your books {or whatever else you want to organize}
11. read a short story
12. buy new underwear
13. eat dark chocolate {good for the brain, you know}
14. write a postcard to Java: I read about this in Oprah while I was at the gym one day. To help students in Java learn English, you can send them a postcard telling them a little bit about who you are and where you come from. If you include your address, they may even write you back. Learn more about it.
15. go to a movie
16. write to your nieces and nephews, if applicable: Otherwise, just write a card to someone, anyone.
17. bake for your neighbors {or a friend}
18. re-read a favorite childhood book
19. write a poem
20. host a craft night {or go to one, preferably the one I'm hosting}
21. school spirit day: Remember back in high school when you got to have different Spirit Days, such as Wear Your Pajamas to School Day or 70s Day? We don't get Spirit Days in the Grown-up World, so I'm declaring a personal Spirit Day. For me, this means I could wear something purple and gray in support of my high school team, the Grayhounds—Fight, Purple! Fight, Gray! Fight, fight today! Yes, I still remember my cheerleading chants.}
22. Glen Ellyn Style with friends: I'm sure you have no idea what this is, but all it means is "hang out with your friends in downtown Glen Ellyn and wander through a bunch of shops. Getting coffee is also a good idea."
23. run 10 miles
24. make something out of my new Simply in Season cookbook: I'm sure you're thrilled that I've gotten two new cookbooks just before this February Fun began.
25. go to Starbucks and pay for a random person's stuff
26. paint your nails
27. be a wine-o {or just have a glass of wine}
28. make hot cocoa. Like real hot cocoa, not Swiss Miss

seven years of bad luck? or a fall project?

It's a sign.

On Labor Day, I was in the shower, luxuriating in a schedule that allowed for a midday shower. That morning, I'd read the entire paper*, worked the crossword, journalled, and made a low-pressure to-do list for the day.

It was so low pressure that I'd called it "Labor Day Thoughts." Just some ideas, some passing fancies that might catch my eye during the day.

Sometimes I divide my to-do lists into MUST DOs and NICE TO DOs—this helps me sort and prioritize and avoid that to-do list overload {when you think, 'If I wrote it down, I have to do it, if only for the satisfaction of crossing it off.' This is terrible logic and is slightly akin to the logic of 'If I read it on the Internet, it must be true.'}.

But even that divided to-do list felt too pressured for a day like Labor Day, the last hurrah of the summer. Summer itself is supposed to be low pressure: long meals on the balcony on long, humid evenings, long runs in the the early morning relative cool, long walks with friends, long afternoons reading in the sun.

The last thing Labor Day needed was a long to-do list, so I had my Labor Day Thoughts. Showering was one {and something I could definitely achieve during the day}, so after lunch of leftover eggplant gratin, I was in the shower, thinking a little bit about my love of to-do lists and projects, a little bit of my schedule for the week, and a little bit of how I wish it were fall already.

While shaving my legs, I was thinking about a possible fall project {note: someone who loves to-do lists, projects, and schedules will definitely have seasonal projects}: sprucing up my bathroom.

Maybe some paint? Maybe update the shower, which has frosted glass sliding doors and cream tiles from when the condo was built?

Maybe some earth-tone tiles in the shower like in the bathroom at the Pines Lodge in Beaver Creek, Colorado? {When thinking about updating your home, by the way, it's always entirely realistic to plan to mimic fancy ski lodges that market themselves as a "luxury resort." Man, my demonstrations of logic today are way off; you might be very concerned about my thinking abilities. If I followed this Pines Lodge plan, I would need to have soap shaped like little rocks and fluffy robes out for every guest.}

It was just the beginning of thinking about this bathroom plan, and at that moment, with the razor poised over my knee, my vanity mirror fell off the wall, crashed into the sink, knocked over everything on the vanity, and then crashed to the floor, smashing a bottle of Tresor {this perfume I used to wear} in the process.

It's a sign. It must be a sign. It's as if the vanity mirror was saying, "Take me now! I don't want to be here anymore! Fix this bathroom!"

And that is how I decided to re-do my bathroom.

In related news: How long do you think my bathroom will smell like Tresor? Feel free to place bets.



*"Entire" meaning "all the parts I was interested in." Sorry, Sports section; I don't think you're part of the whole paper, but I did glance at you.

jane austen, i disagree with you

A quote from Jane Austen: "Why not seize the pleasure at once? How often is happiness destroyed by preparation, foolish preparation."

More correctly, it's a quote from Emma, my least favorite Jane Austen book because I can't work up much sympathy to someone who meddles so much in other people's lives.

So Jane Austen via Emma, I disagree with you.

I realize this is an atypical thing for me to say. Me, the girl who proclaims to have learned lots of things from Jane Austen. Me, the girl who takes it as the highest compliment possible to be told that I'm like Elizabeth Bennet. {Other high compliments include Audrey Hepburn and, of course, Mary Tyler Moore.}

But Jane Austen—in this quote—is not teaching me about planning ahead and careful organization, and I'm a little disappointed in her because of it.

I want to say to her: Why not spread out the pleasure over a long planning period? How often is happiness increased by preparation, glorious preparation.

But maybe that's just me and my attachment to my planner speaking.

Maybe I'll schedule in some journalling time to work through that attachment. And to work through how I'm disappointed in a dead woman and wanting to argue with a fictional character.

I'll schedule it for a long time from now so that I have much happiness and pleasure to look forward to.

today, i'm grateful for...

I sporadically keep a Gratitude Journal, and judging from how it brings up my overall attitude, I think I should un-sporadically keep it.

Such a simple thing to do, really. In my planner on those weekly pages that Franklin-Covey tells me I'm supposed to use for prioritizing daily tasks—

Have you ever read the Franklin-Covey instructions for prioritizing tasks? No? It involves letters and numbers and a sorting system that makes even me a little overwhelmed, probably because it's a system I didn't come up with. My little/large independent streak comes out when someone tries to explain to me how to organize my life, so I read the Franklin-Covey explanation and say, "You think you're good, don't you? Well, just you watch what I do with your A1, B2, C-whatever system: I disregard it. Take that, F-C."

—So in the section for prioritizing daily tasks {and when I'm in a Gratitude Journal phase}, I write two kinds of things:

1. What I tres really want to accomplish that day: This I do in the morning after I've run {thinking time} and after I've walked baby pug {brain organization time, which includes the time for deciding what I'm going to wear to work that day}. I try to narrow down what would make me feel accomplished that day.
   
   Is it getting done that nagging life admin task, such as getting more stamps at the Post Office? {When it comes to managing your life, don't you find that it's the small tasks that can pester the most? Why is that? And then when you do them, you feel such relief and like you could take on the world. I know I'm not alone in this: read this post over at Pink of Perfection, this blog I stalk/read because I'm convinced the girl and I are kindred spirits.}
   
   Or maybe what I really want to accomplish is finishing a book or that big project at work. Whatever it is, I write it down in the morning to help focus my day.
2. Five things I'm grateful for: The next morning, I think back on the day before and write down five things that I'm glad happened.
   
   Could be a long talk with a friend or making a delicious eggplant dinner.
   
   Could be getting done that life admin task.
   
   Could be getting to bed early.
   
   Could be whatever, but it's the moments and interactions that made the day special and right.

The whole process, the thinking ahead to the day in front of me and the thinking back on the day behind me, takes about five minutes.

And what a difference it makes. Even if I had a very bad, no good, horrible, rotten day, I can usually find five bright spots, and that helps keep life in perspective.

Nothing is all bad. Bright spots count no matter how small they are. This five minute exercise brings calm to my day before it even begins.

So I'm going to jump ahead a bit here and list my five things for today here, right now. {Because I'm me, I'll probably copy them into my planner later.}

Today, I'm grateful for:

1. a fast morning run
2. the little desk fan I bought at Walgreen's: no air circulation, AC that I'm convinced in broken, and a heat wave outside pushing up against the windows makes for an uncomfortable work environment. I'd consider worshiping this little fan, with its white noise and steady stream of cool, if I believed in idol worship.
3. an email from a friend who lives far, far away
4. listening to my musicals playlist that right now involves selections from White Christmas, just so that I remember that it's not always this hot. {I talk about the heat a lot recently, don't I?}
5. cupcakes—frosted with leftover vanilla buttercream from the gateau a l'orange—for dessert after dinner {okay, I haven't had dinner yet, so I'm being pre-emptively grateful for these because I'm sure they'll be good. And I'll be eating them with a friend, so that makes them doubly good.}
   

flight delay

Sunday night, I spent four hours at the Raleigh-Durham airport, waiting and hoping for my flight to take off.

I am well-practiced at pausing in situations like this, at using what time I've been given to read or reflect or talk—but that doesn't mean I am very good at it.

This unexpected pause often comes at airports because more often than not, flights are delayed these days. At least mine are, a side effect, perhaps of flying into Chicago. The weather map on Sunday night at the Durham airport showed an icy blue gash over Chicago. One weather glitch like that&mash;apparently visibility was low at O'Hare and I do believe pilots need to see where they're landing—and the airport is set back hours.

In situations like that—unasked for changes that can be major and inconvenient—we have two basic choices: accept it or get upset.

That getting upset choice has many possible sub-choices: throw a fit that something didn't go your way. Worry about what this will do to your day, your week. Take it as an insult from the airline industry, the weather, and possibly God.

I'm not saying that flight delays aren't major inconveniences. They are. People miss weddings, bedtimes, meetings, dinners, and just time at home, which is something I crave.

All I "lost" by this four-hour delay was an early bedtime and those extra few hours at home, quiet downtime in my own space, unpacking and drinking coffee from my own mug. Compared to the people who were trying to get connecting flights home or to vacation or to a little getaway that already felt too short, my inconvenience was conveniently easy.

But disappointing as a flight delay is, you can't do anything to change it. You can't change Air Traffic Control, and I doubt you'll have much of an effect on freezing rain icing the runways, no matter how fiercely you glare at the weather map.

I've learned that you must accept these schedule changes, and I try to see them as opportunities for rest separate from the rest I get at home. I'm stuck in an airport, an in-between sort of place, neither here nor there, and I can, for example, do the chunk of reading I feel guilty about doing at home, when I think I should be vacuuming instead.

Yes, I am practiced at pausing, but no, I am still not good at it. Is this because we live in a society that values the go-go-go? Is this because I value it more than I'd care to admit?

I ask these questions for three reasons:

1. I was sick last week, and I felt like a slacker, a weak person, a disappointment for needing to take two days off. Never in five years of working have I had to do that, and so when I didn't go to work on Friday—after not going to work on Thursday—I immediately began to doubt that decision. Was I really all that sick?
   
   My cough disagreed, but I kept doing this self-check in. Can you stand for more than five minutes? Then you're not that sick! Can you get food down? Then you're not that sick! Could you pull it together enough to sit at a computer, something that isn't all that physically challenging? Then you're not that sick!
   
   Why couldn't I just let myself be? Instead, as I laid in bed, I saw this stack of photo albums next to the chair in my bedroom, and I thought—well, I've been meaning to fill in the picture info for awhile; now could be the perfect time!
   
   I couldn't even lay there quietly. I couldn't even rest. I had to be doing something and I wonder: Did I want to do something so that I felt like the day was worth something? But isn't a day always worth something, just for the fact that you're in it?
2. I'm reading The Contented Soul, and it has a whole chapter on accepting limits. On making time for rest. On being okay with not doing it all simply because it's all available. This is an excellent lesson for me, and I underlined with force in that chapter.
   
   Especially underlined is: "When we allow ourselves to nap when we are weary, to stay home when we are ill, to be less productive than is possible, we are respecting our human limitations."
   
   To stay home when we are ill: are you listening, Kamiah?
3. A new friend emailed last week because she'd heard I was sick. How kind of her, and then she ended her email with, "When your schedule slows down a bit, perhaps we can get together!"
   
   Not: "When you're feeling better" but specifically about my schedule.
   
   She may not have been my friend very long, but she's aware of THE SCHEDULE.
   
   Her words made me want more space in my schedule—more spontaneity in there. I like everything that fills my days, but the combination of sickness (and guilty days at home) and a book on contentment have made me feel held hostage by my own planner, a feeling I'm not used to, and I'm reminded of a line from a poem I'll paraphrase here:
   
   "What is this world if, full of care, we have no time to stop and stare?"

I think these are all good and worthy considerations. How much to schedule? How much to leave open? How many hours to fill? What will really bring rest? How can you balance community time, which is important, with reflection and rest time, which I desperately need to be able to enjoy community time?

How much?

I don't know.

the one date i can't find in my planner

One Friday night, I could've done anything, but I chose—instead of baking or sewing or reading or making anything more complicated than a grilled cheese for dinner—I chose to watch a movie I knew would simultaneously comfort and hurt me.

27 Dresses.  The first time I saw it, I was with a good friend at this old movie theater in my town, the kind with just a few screens and where the ticket and the popcorn are the same price:  cheap.

The movie made us both giddy when we saw it in the theater.  Pretty dresses!  Living in NYC!  Adorable apartment!

For girls who live in the suburbs but feel that deep down inside we're urban chic, 27 Dresses made us forget that just outside the movie theater were SUVs packed with soccer cleats, hockey sticks, trombones, and all the other paraphernalia that comes with having 2.5 children in suburbia.

But the movie also made us upset that the straight-laced girl has to get drunk in order to finally become crooked-laced {or whatever the opposite of straight-laced is}.

They always do that in movies, you know.  There's always the girl who's too attached to her planner and her immaculate order, and there's always the moment she finally lets her guard down and allows Prince Charmant in.  That moment always involves alcohol.

Always.

Ok, maybe it's just always in romantic comedies.  I'll try to be more accurate with my blanket statements, but I’ll back up my blanket with examples.
 

27 Dresses

Guys and Dolls

10 Things I Hate about You

Never Been Kissed {technically, this one involves marijuana, not drinking}

As a tiny side note—hence the tiny font size—I realize that my theory doesn’t exactly hold up.  I can disprove myself simply by saying Meg Ryan.  And I bet there are plenty of other ways to disprove me, so why don’t we move beyond this side note and return to that Friday night when I changed into my flannel pajamas at 7:30.  Yeah, let’s focus on how cool/social I am.

That Friday night when I watched 27 Dresses alone, it comforted me because it's a love story.  It's someone I don't know, and they're having adorable moments in beautiful clothes.  I don't have to deal with jealousy when it's Katherine Heigl.

But the movie hurts because of course it's just a movie and it must end well.  {Unless it's a French movie.}

The girl may be single and denying it hurts in the opening scene {generally takes place at a publishing house in New York}, but by that last scene, she's kissing someone perfect for her.

Someone who gets her.

Someone who cares more about her than he does about himself.

And in between those scenes, she gets drunk and the story turns.

After watching movies like 27 Dresses, I don’t start plotting how to create this shiny, perfect hair, perfect vintage apartment, white teeth world.

It’s not even that I want that life to replace my life.

My life is shiny, too, and while I may not have perfect hair, I have some charming vintage furniture, a closet full of sassy skirts, and very healthy teeth {never a cavity!}.

Movies like 27 Dresses do make me wistful, though.

And then I roll my eyes at myself {a tricky thing to do—try it} because I don’t like this pining after a life that isn’t real.  I don’t like that part of me, even the smallest part, finds comfort in these movies.

I seriously get hopeful when I notice similarities between fictional characters and me.

I have an over-stuffed planner!

I do crazy things such as scrub the stove when I can’t sleep!

I like to cook when I’m angry!

I…well, I don’t actually live in New York, but I like the idea of living in NYC, and I’m sure if I were there, I’d live in a brownstone on the Upper West Side!

I don’t want to admit this, but I must:  movies like 27 Dresses give me hope that I won’t be alone for ever.  If the crazy, planner-obsessed girl on the big screen can find the right man, then maybe this planner-obsessed girl will eventually have a wedding date to put in that planner.

I know it’s silly to take hope from Hollywood.  I know my hope rests in God alone and that he has a much bigger plan{ner} than mine.  I know that I should hold all my dreams loosely as I lift my hands to God.

But that’s the practical side of me.  For the emotional side of me, I sometimes need a Friday night alone, an unexpected one, where I take a little eye-candy comfort from 27 Dresses.