Consequences

I wrote a song! Finally!!!

It just came out of me, in five minutes, Taylor Swift style. It's in the Sunrises, Sunsets, and Other Inspiration section if you want to check it out.

I am not sure what chords I am playing in, nor what key I am singing in, if any, but I enjoy it a lot. And don't worry, it sounds all dark, but it is just about the fierce urgency of now (channeling Barack Obama) and how in life we're constantly going one way or another, and never standing still (even when chosing to stand still). That kind of realization creeps me out, and it was the first thing that came to my mind when I got out my guitar tonight.

I think the instrumental and vocal inspiration also came from this song a bit. You'll have to hear me wailing to get what I mean, but all in good time...

Greenie, greenie jelly beanie

We had a blast in Vermont. 

When I think of Vermont now, I will think of four things:

1) Green 

There are hippies. There are leaves. There is recycling.

2) Mountains

I do not think anyone in living in the valleys of Mt. Mansfield or anywhere else in Vermont would stand  a chance against a zombie invasion. I imagine the zombies would be like a stampede of wildebeests over those mountains.

3) Water

Even the lake seemed too wet. Hence the green.

4) Dairy

Cabot cheese. Ben & Jerry's. Cows. Chocolate. Overload.

Once again, S and I packed a week-long vacation into a 22-hour period of time, and we managed to be well-fed, well-rested and eager for more at the end of it. Well, given the threat of zombies, maybe not too much more, yet. We'll wait until it's winter and we are strapped into our snowboards for the quick get-away.

Like I need another reason

To go to Vermont.

Spring fever

Is it too late to catch spring fever? Because I think I've got it.

The sound of birds chirping in my ears, sunshine in the first time for forever, and the inexplicable urge to jump up and down, outside, all day, even though its a work day. This is what happens in New England when spring doesn't show up until summer. Spring fever hits late.

I almost entitled this post "Karma" though, because today it feels like there is some good chi floating around. Here are some examples:

1) S got to test drive a GT premium. And got the dealer to lower it's price to the cost of a regular GT!! We'll see...

2) S also has a working computer again for the first time in two weeks, and he has the day off after having to work overtime this past weekend. So the mood of S (and therefore the mood of D) is at a near all time high.

3) D found a discounted room in Stowe, Vermont for Memorial Day Weekend. What's so great about Stowe? It was one of the first east coast areas to let boarders on the mountain. And it's beautiful this time of year too!

4) D and S are going to explore Stowe and Burlington in four days, in addition to visiting the Burton Flagship store, where there will be S and D's favorite things - free food, drink, and snowboards! Ah.

5) Free substance abuse webinar tomorrow on a really interesting topic (I know - "I am nerd, here me roar!"). But this also means that I get to get my geek on while working at home tomorrow. There's almost nothing better than that.

6) I got treated to lunch and complimented on my proposal (for a conference, not a marriage, mind you!) by my boss and his wife.

Need I go on?

Today is a good day. A funky day. A day I hope extends at least until this long weekend I hear we are having to celebrate the start of summer!

Hammer

It dawned on me that I want to be here:

Only problem?

There looks like here...

...right now.

Yikes.

But I'm stubborn. So I went there anyway.

Every once in a while I get fixated on something and can't let it go. Snowboarding is like that for me right now. I'm serious. I have flashcards about halfpipe tricks, and I know the seasonal geography of most places on earth according to when you can snowboard there. I might go crazy from now until December. Just might.

I think it started when I wasn't terrible. I guess I assumed because I run into walls in everday life that I wouldn't stand a chance on a snowboard. I gambled paying for a weekend pass last year before setting foot on a board. I earned the nickname "snowbunny" from a colleague at work who could not believe I was even trying this.

But then one day, S and I decided to go up the mountain, after zero-to-ten-percent success in the beginner's area. I realized that day, already on the mountain, that I was supposed to be riding goofy. Too bad the board I'd rented for the season was set up for a regular rider. So it was another uphill battle, which lasted half of the season, for me to stop riding fakie (backwards) and actually look where I was going. Though I must say, during that time, I learned a mean toe edge that S is still jealous of, and I learned how to properly fall on my butt (the trick is to fall and roll, fall and roll.)

Next big trick was going from beginner to intermediate. I had a moment of truth when I looked down Big Blue and could not see the bottom of the mountain. I felt like I might as well be orbitting the earth, ready to drop, and I thought I was going to die before I got down that thing. But in time, Big Blue gave me the chance to get my heel edge down, and by the time I switched back to the beginner slope, I was carving and accelerating on purpose. It was a turning point.

Now I just want to be back there. I've heard that the best thing for new riders is to ride in any and every condition, and I just want to have at it.

Until then, ugh, there's so much time, but there's also - hey - summer. Summer's good too.

Luck, obsession, and other things

I am a lucky girl. But I am fairly confident that if I want to get luckier, and I do, I need to:
   - complain less
   - work more
   - play more
   - love others for who they are without any sort of bounds

http://www.kristiecolon.com/

Letting go

Just this afternoon I was feeling pretty frustrated with my current situation of being "stuck" in life. Nothing's wrong with life, though some things could be better, but there is often, I have found in my 23rd-26th year, this feeling of a holding pattern, where I am waiting for life to be where I want it to be, though that place is never more than hypothetical.

I thought it was awesome, then, to happen upon this blog, where a guy 10 years my senior and a continent away feels like that too. In fact, I bet we all do, if we're honest. I liked how he described the tension of being happy and grateful for where he was is but still persistently seeking to do more and better.

I've been reading a book about women's rivalry this week too, that has me thinking this syndrome might be even worse for women, who are more concerned with facade and yet often feel less capable or willing to be assertive. It puts us in a double bind whereby we feeling too weak to take what we want at times, while maintaining this lie that we already have all that we want. That's blunt, but I think that about sums it up.

I was happy to see a dude putting this out there for the world, and I am happy to keep thinking about this stuff. I do not want to waste an iota of my potential, and that requires a fine balance of productivity without burnout, and assertiveness and ambition without losing compassion, creativity and integrity...And knowing that life is always, always a marathon run for a great cause above and beyond oneself.

Zwinn-zee

I admit I still have trouble saying it out loud correctly, but Quincy is one of our favorite Boston suburbs and places on the "south shore." It's where I practice yoga and where the closest free standing Chipotle is, so 'nough said. Also though, Quincy is just charming and old in a very good way, and we like that. Not to mention, its where the lab is that was oh so helpful to me pre-kidney surgery. So all around great place.

S and I visited Quincy this weekend in an effort to get to know our area a bit more, and for some free fun (usually our favorite kind). We ended up at the Dorothy Quincy Homestead, where the Quincy's of olden years were raised, most notably the wife of John Hancock. We didn't do the tour, but we did take our own path around the beautiful gardens of the property.

I love finding little places close by to escape the real world for a bit. I thought this set aside place was just lovely.

One day perhaps we'll come back and learn about the revolution and the Massachusetts government and Oliver Wendell Holmes, but for now we'll be content to know, in this old and charming place called Quincy, there's a pop of color in the midst of a tucked-away history.

Ptown Post #3 of 3: Reminiscing

So this is the post where I am actually supposed to say what happened. What a fun time we had. How it was freezing in my wool sweater after we got soaked by sea water on the whale watch and I was worried I'd never see a whale (and die cold, wet and salty).

A week away from the experience, I remember how we fought for this vacation. How with work pounding us week after week, we were tired and stressed and hadn't had an adventure in such a while. How we are so fortunate to do work that challenges us, and even more so to have time away from that challenge to just be.

And we choose the right place at the right time to enjoy. Our time at the inn was an absolute blast. We've always been fans of taking short vacations that we can luxriate in for a short time rather than longer ones that stretch our dollars, and this was no exception. We stayed for a night in the most fabulous place. We jumped on the bed, hung out in fluffly robes, and played Candy Land on the velour couch. We came as close to being grown up kids as it gets, sneaking in after curfew without the secret house code and breaking into the mini-fridge to grab some complementary sodas. All though in a perfect world, vacations would never end, be free, and you'd still get all your work done back home somehow, our mini-breaks strike such a good balance for us as young, thirfty, and eager to make the most of each moment.

Provincetown is a beautiful place. There is something about being by an unpretentious piece of coastline that makes me feel so at peace. Okay, so maybe there is some pretention there, but I mean that there is no boardwalk, just sandy cobblestone and sidewalk, that there are dogs and a rouge cat everywhere, and little houses inside of Holiday Inns right next to the water. I feel like we're going to need to visit so many more times to discover everything in this tiny little gem of culture, art, fun and fantasy. We'll definitely need to get back in the summertime, haha, when the social life of the place is in full swing and the true colors of the area are even brighter.

This time around after enjoying the hotel and our fellow guest there, we walked from the west to the east end of Commericial Street and decided that, it being Cinco de Mayo, we headed to the new American restaurant Lorraine's to celebrate. S had lemon chicken with spinach and I had a firey vegetable dish. The next day, before the infamous whale watch, we dined out for lunch at the Squealing Pig, where S grabbed the surf and turf and I got a veggie burger with tabasco and vinegar fries. Luckily after all this food and full tummies, where weren't ill on the whale watch.

The first day at Ptown it was sprinkling on and off, and overcast. The sunset was quite striking with solid colors, if not brilliant. The second day, the day of the whale watch, thankfully, it was sunny and warmer. I was excited to see sea lions out in the wild, just lounging on the tip of the Cape, their fat bellies precluding them from keeping their fins on the sand. I got thrilled too to see beautiful dolphins swimming alongside the watch boat. They were marroon, cream, and navy, with their coloring horizontal, and they were always peeping through the water at us if not leaping in the air before us.

Of course the whales (when we finally saw them) were so cool. To see big creatures like that who previously I had held in memory as replicas, the model in the natural history museum that I'd gazed up at on the ceiling, in front of me, and in behind me, as a little girl who could not imagine a creature that very large.

I get very tickled by how free and beautiful animals are, or appear to me, even these animals who are being tracked, photographed and otherwise studied and followed by naturalists on a constnat basis. They flopped and flaunted while enjoying their meal in front of us. My favorite sight, while it was not the most dignified performance by the whales, was when they would come up out of the water face first and glump for their snacks, their bayleen mouths gaping in what looked like huge moom smiles of glee. I get a huge kick out of there apparent joy, and they fact that the largest creatures on our planet eat so many plants.

I think S had a great time too. He comes alive at surprising moments, like after we'd been soaked by the waves on this crazy watch and he still wanted to stand on the outer decks, getting pelted with water and be at one with the sea. Or when he one at Candy Land the first time around - beginner's luck! It's always a gift to see my hard working man take a break and laugh, smile, and do something new. It was a wonderful trip to enjoy with him, and we are lucky to have had it.

In closing - how formal for a blog! - I wanted to leave you with a quote by Abraham Lincoln that hangs in the inn where we stayed, and I have been loving ever since I saw it.

It reads, "I like to see a man proud of the place in which he lives. I like to see a man lives so that his place will be proud of him."

This world and our spot in it right now is a beautiful place to respect and revere, wherever that place is for us at this moment.

Ptown Post #2 of 3: Hotel tour

So we're head long into another work week, and I still haven't gotten around to these posts. I guess that goes to show just how needed and appreciated our mini-vacation was!

Next in line is the hotel tour.

The inn where we stayed in a lot of ways was really the highlight of our trip. We'd been planning to visit since this time last year, and just now got around to it. I was so excited when S suggested we stay there, after thinking he'd forgotten about the idea. For over a month, we enthused about the place, and what we'd find there.

We were not disappointed, in fact, we were elated. Everything on the outside of the inn was just so picturesque, and inside, it as soooo eccentric.

We're eccentric, sure, but this place was off the wall, and we loved it. It was like the sophisticated people's Papermoon, for all you Baltimore folks out there.

For instance here is the door to our "room," the Moroccan Tower. Oz anyone?

And here is the staircase…

…in our room.

We had fun on the throne chairs and posing by our favorite en suite artwork.

The most normal thing about the room was probably the bed.

Wait...

Okay, now it's normal.

While I've been pretty accustomed to decent hotels traveling for work, S was stoked about the robes and the "luxury" soap in the bathroom that he almost mistook for a wheel of cheese.

Oh yes, and the bathroom windows for site-seeing while you "go."

I was stoked that the place came with ocean front views of rainbows.

Giant, beautiful, across the world rainbows.

We were both stoked about the food. Wine and cheese. And crackers. And fruit.

And breakfast with other guests in their PJs. Gotta love it.

Ptown Post #1 of 3: Water, water everywhere

We're back from Provincetown. We're happy and tired. We have sea salt in our hair.

If you ever go on a whale watch and the naturalist suggests that there may be a "mist" or "spray" of water coming from the west, haul your bootie to the enclosed lower deck of the boat. Just a tip.

More on all of this later, but in the spirit of impatience, I am getting to the goods first. Da' whales.

Last point lighthouse. With seals. Fat seals.

"Viking" (humpback whale)

"Rapier" (humpback whale)

These are our favorites from the trip. S liked Viking best and I was all about Rapier (the biggest whale). I got all excited about this calf on the left side of the boat whenever I was on the right side, but it turned out that after you see Rapier, the calves, which I finally saw, just look like dinky mini-Rapiers - the big, presumably bad ones. But definitely more on this after a good night's sleep on shore!

Move your body!

I know someone who is a bona fide comedian. Someone who puts down his own brand of one liners like Jack Handey - absolutely my favorite kind of comedy.

And before I go on vacation (woo hoo!) to go whale watching (wooo HOOO!!!!) I had to share his humor with you.

He says:

"It's certain times or events that remind you that there is a black family in the White House. This would be one."

Thanks to all the funny folks in my life (and primarily the funny dude known as S with whom I am whale watching -- for our 5 year anniversary!) for convincing me that I may one day die of the giggles.

You make this already beautiful life so much brighter.