good music

I have learned that an idle mind really is the devil's playground.  (Thank you, The Music Man.)

When I'm bored is usually when I notice things that I do "wrong," like not make dinner when I literally can't stand up my feet hurt so bad because I'm a good teacher, or get weeds in the lawn.  Because I'm bored or not doing anything, it's easy to fixate on those thoughts (because no other new ones are coming up).

Thankfully, I've also learned that, for me, the antidote is to be by myself in my craft room and work on some menial task (like hand stitching or cutting swirls out of felt to make a flower wreath) while listening to music.   It always works.  My mind has something new to think about, but I don't have to think hard, which means I kind of just melt away.  Then, when I'm done, I'm as good as new.

Sometimes people say that meaningful experiences are coincidences.

But then, sometimes you feel a little sad and turn on Pandora, and then songs like these come on:

(If you want a playlist instead of clicking on each song, by the way, click here.)

"The Middle" (Jimmy Eat World) - Hey, don't write yourself off / It's only in your head... / Just try your best...

"Wrapped Up in Love" (Marie Hines)

"Happy" - Jesse Palter & The Alter Ego - I used to feel that to be happy / everybody had to be so fond of me. / Now that just sounds silly...  / Things happen perfectly never... / Life is love and love is music. / You get one chance, so you can't abuse it. / I learned to simply smile through / and I'm so happy!

"Rich Girl" - Hall & Oates - This song has a swear word in it, but I didn't realize what they were saying, and it's the line "You know it doesn't matter anyway" that gets me, anyway. :)

"Everything's OK" - Lenka

"Golden Slumber" - Ben Folds - Do not cry / and I will sing a lullaby.

"To Make You Feel My Love" - Jon Peter Lewis

"Hallelujah" - KD Lang

And then, even though you really weren't feeling that bad to begin with, now you feel great.  And to people who call that a coincidence, you say, "Bah humbug."

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"We don't become good people.  We simply cease, slowly, to be deluded by the layers."  - Po Bronson, Why Do I Love These People?

fiestaaaaaaaaa!

I hosted 24 fiestas this week in a total of 12 hours.

And yet, I brought home extra chips and salsa.  I must be crazy person.  A crazy person whose feet hurt really bad and who is not making dinner tonight.

Actually, though, it really was fun.  Really fun.  And I was cleaning that room for the billionth time this afternoon, I realized that next week is my last week of the year with these kids, and genuinely felt sad.  I immediately thought, I can't believe that, just a couple weeks ago, I couldn't wait for this to be over!  I also remembered those people in elementary and middle school who assumed that, because I was good at school, I must also have loved it.  I always argued that being good at something doesn't necessarily mean you like it!  And I didn't, really.  So, for those of you  who just thought, Oh, she was one of those kids, I wasn't.  There were aspects of school I didn't mind, but overall I preferred to be at home.  

As a teacher, it's different.  Imagine this - you have your dream job! You love it and being at work.  It's a hard job, but it's fun and extremely fulfilling, plus your co-workers are some of your favorite people in the world and love you, too.  Then, imagine your boss came and told you you got / had to take a vacation for two and a half months.  How do you feel?  Well, excited, definitely.  Who doesn't like a long vacation?  But also sad.  First of all, this vacation isn't paid.  Second of all, for two and a half months, you can't go where you love to go, do what you love to do, or see who you love to see.  

Don't get me wrong - I am going to do stuff over the summer that I only wish I had time for now, and I am REALLY excited.  But I'm also excited to go back in the fall.  And, as a lot of students have been asking whether I'm coming back next year, it's also fun to know that they're excited to see me next fall, too.  

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"In that frightful moment I think his fierce heart broke."  - J.M. Barrie, Peter Pan

my favorite time-spenders

I would have called these "time-wasters," but not all of them are a waste of time. So there.

This is a list of what I do when I have 30 minutes to do something.

This is not a list of my hobbies or interests. 

My hobbies and interests are much more interesting than most of these. 

That list is for another day.

reading blogs / checking Feedly

reading The 100 Hour Board

seeing what's for sale today on PickYourPlum

checking Facebook

watching "What Not To Wear"

sitting on the porch

getting the mail

watering the berries

doing other small gardening tasks

checking Pinterest 

(but only if there's a variety of recent pins and they're not all on the same topic, 

unless that topic is Harry Potter and / or funny)

looking out the window

signing up for free samples online

checking my email

checking my school email

checking my "send me samples" email

cleaning to good music turned up too loud

walking around aimlessly deciding what to do

 looking at things that need to be done

deciding not to do the above-mentioned things

starting Christmas movies I recorded and still haven't watched

thinking about updating my blog

writing blog update ideas and / or actually updating the blog

putting my shoes on and my purse together, 

because my 30 minutes is probably over and it's time to go do something

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"'Proud and insolent youth,' said Hook, 'prepare to meet thy doom.'  'Dark and sinister man,' Peter answered,' have at thee.'  Without more words they fell to…"  - J.M. Barrie, Peter Pan

You have to wait!

When I was little and would tell my grandpa that I was so excited and "can't wait!" for something, he would always say, "You have to wait!"  I never liked that realization.  

I've realized something about myself since moving into our house.  I'm not a very patient person.

Rephrase: I'm not a very patient person when it comes to big things.  I can wait for a long time in a grocery store line or to get into a building.  As long as I'm not freezing, stressed about time, or have to go to the bathroom, I can wait for a looooong time.  Getting to places early and waiting for them to start?  Great at that.

But... When it comes to our yard or our basement or other various projects, and I can envision how I want them to be, I just want them to be that way.  And it frustrates me when we don't have the time or resources to make them that way now.  Our yard is great but it's overgrown with weeds.  We don't have a ton of money for plants or special dirt, but when you rip out weeds, you have to replace them with plants and then maintain the area or the weeds just come back.  That's what happened last summer - we ripped it all out, couldn't replace it or improve the dirt, and now we have to rip it all out again.

Plus I have so many pretty organization ideas to help keep our house clean and pretty!  But everything costs money and we're using ours for something we want more right now, which is a finished basement.  

I'm trying to apply this quote I read in Why Do I Love These People?: 

…We generate excessive tension by worrying about whether our experience is abnormal [in this situation, whether our grass is less green than others' or our house less organized than we wish it were].  We beat ourselves up because we worry we're falling short of the ideal… We load ourselves up with guilt and consternation to the point of being frazzled, so much so that we are unable to enjoy our experience.

I love that way of saying it so much more than "Find joy in the journey."  :)

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"…We generate excessive tension by worrying about whether our experience is abnormal.  We beat ourselves up because we worry we're falling short of the ideal… We load ourselves up with guilt and consternation to the point of being frazzled, so much so that we are unable to enjoy our experience."  - Po Bronson, Why Do I Love These People?

running late

from http://www.forgottenbookmarks.com/2011/12/im-late.html

"It is the private glee of the man who, in his hurry to work,

has taken the wrong train and now surely will be late."

(left in a used copy of Madness & Civilization by Michael Foucault)

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"[The Jolly Roger] was the cannibal of the seas, and scarce needed that watchful eye, for she floated immune in the horror of her name."  - J.M. Barrie, Peter Pan

Why do I love these people?

This is the new book I've started.  Why Do I Love These People?: Honest and Amazing Stories of Real Families, by Po Bronson.  I found it at a thrift store today for $2 and thought, Hey, why not?  I don't usually read non-fiction books, but I'm ready for a new book and this one is written like a novel, so I thought I'd give it a go.  So far it's been really good!  Here's part of what it says on the jacket - it does a good job of explaining what the book is about. 

It begins on a river in Texas, where a mother gets trapped underwater and has to bargain for her own life and those of her kids.

Then, a father and his daughter return to their tiny rice-growing village in China, hoping to rekindle their love for each other inside the walls of his childhood home. 

Next, a son puts forth a riddle, asking us to understand what his first experience of God has to do with his Mexican American mother. 

Every step - and every family - on this journey is real. 

[This book contains] stories of people who have survived tremendous hardships in their families and who managed to create a better experience today... These stories show us something utterly profound and yet beautifully simple: what's really involved in loving someone.

I love that last part, even though I think it should've been written as a question:)  What's really involved in loving someone?  Each chapter in the book is about a different family.  It tells why they were struggling, what they did to overcome that struggle and better themselves, and then gets all wrapped up in a moral or a "how to apply this story to more than just this family" paragraph.  It's an encouraging look at the family (and other relationships, too), especially when a current fashion is to belittle the family.   (That idea, in and of itself, is an interesting one - the fashions surrounding families.  That's largely what the first chapter is about.)

I'll let you know how it goes!

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"Do not be fooled by those incredibly ordinary stretches [talking about sitting around in the living room together] into believing it is not something profound.  Do not be fooled into forgetting about the special moments."  - Po Bronson, Why Do I Love These People?

Boy, why are you crying?

Well, I finally finished it!  Yes, it did take me a despicable amount of time:) but I loved it!  It was really fun to reread this book.  It's so different than you expect it to be.  I'd even read it before and was surprised by a lot!  I remembered being surprised at how violent it was; I was surprised this time by how funny it was.  I also love when books' narrators are almost their own character, and there's a lot of that in Peter Pan.  It's really fun :) For example, towards the end, the narrator is talking about how maybe we should tell Mrs. Darling that the kids are coming back, but she'd ruin the fun, or maybe we could do this fun thing, but she'd ruin it, or maybe we could do that fun thing, but she'd suck the fun out, and then he says, 

You see, the woman [Mrs. Darling] had no proper spirit. I had meant to say extraordinarily nice things about her; but I despise her, and not one of them will I say now…. However, as we are here we may as well stay and look on.  That is all we are, lookers-on.  Nobody really wants us.  So let us watch and say jaggy things, in the hope that some of them will hurt.

AND THEN, two pages later, he's describing how she much she misses her children and says, 

...I find I won't be able to say nasty things about her after all.  If she was too fond of her rubbishy children she couldn't help it... Some like Peter best and some like Wendy best, but I like her [Mrs. Darling] best.  Suppose, to make her happy, we whisper to her in her sleep that the brats are coming back.

What in the world?  He goes from hating her to being her biggest fan - in two pages!  Hilarious.  I literally laughed out loud.

Anyway, I'll repeat what I've said before - if you've never read Peter Pan, you should give it a go.  I think you might love it.  :)

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"[Hook] was not wholly evil; he loved flowers (I have been told) and sweet music (he was himself no mean performer on the harpsichord);" - J.M. Barrie, Peter Pan