Daily Archives: March 16, 2012

If you really knew me: a list of 31 things

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If you really knew me, you would know that:

I struggle with trusting myself, caring for and loving myself, and I have a bad habit of trying to please and take care of everyone else even if it means I am being hurt or suffering.

I act tough but I am incredibly sensitive.

I seem like an extrovert but am really an introvert who’s curious, who wants approval and appreciation.

I suffer from poverty mentality, don’t think I am enough or believe there will be enough for me.

I have all of these surface level issues, blockages that cause me so much suffering, but underneath, I am wise and compassionate and powerful.

I love big, a love that is unbound, a love that breaks my heart wide open.

I hold a grudge, am judgmental and critical, but I would never hurt anyone intentionally.

I’m glad that dogs can’t talk because if they could, I might find out they don’t love me as much as I think they do, and I couldn’t bear that.

I am obsessed with anything about the Holocaust, went to Amsterdam just to be able to see the Anne Frank House.

I can’t swim very well because I am afraid of drowning, which makes me tense up and start to sink.

I have dreams about being able to fly fight like in The Matrix or Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.

The only “make-up” I wear is moisturizer and Strawberry Chapstick.

I prefer flip-flops, clogs, or boots to heels or sandals, but I’d rather not wear shoes at all.

I like doing laundry.

Lilacs are my favorite flowers.

I couldn’t live without music—well, I could, but I wouldn’t be as happy.

This is my second marriage.

My two favorite and most read authors are Stephen King and Margaret Atwood, and my favorite poet is Mary Oliver.

I was in theater and two different choirs in high school. I miss it.

I dream about learning to play the ukulele I already own and taking singing lessons so that someday I can be in a band.

I have two tattoos.

I want to be in a flash mob.

I lived in the same house for the first 18 years of my life, and the house I live in now, have for 12 years, has the exact same floor plan and was built around the same time.

I was scared of the dark and being alone until I was 31 years old, the same year I got my first dog.

Letting go of that dog, my Obi, was the most difficult and most loving thing I have ever done.

I prefer mending and keeping old things over buying new ones.

I have two places I consider “home.”

My favorite pastry is a maple bar (unfilled), my favorite ice cream is maple nut, and I love any breakfast eaten with maple syrup.

I would almost always choose staying home in my pajamas and reading a good book over dressing up and going to a concert.

I have Ménière’s disease and Hypothyroidism.

I have wanted to be a writer since I was in the second grade, when I first realized writing was an occupation and therefore a possibility for me. It’s still the thing I want most.

Joy Jam + Little Bliss List = Gratitude Friday

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Typically, I do the Joy Jam on Friday, but lately, my friend and fellow blogger Lindsay seems to be the only one jamming with me, so I am going to add my list to Liv Lane’s “Little Bliss List,” and do like Lindsay has and just call the whole thing “Gratitude Friday.”

Liv describes her list this way: “Every Friday, the Little Bliss List provides a chance for us to celebrate the little things that brought us hope and happiness this week. I do believe when we focus on the sweet stuff of life, the sweet stuff multiplies. And by sharing those small gifts in our lives, we help others notice the gifts in theirs.”

What I was grateful for this week:

1. Downton Abbey. If you haven’t heard of this show, you are living under a rock. People in my neck of the woods haven’t been able to stop talking about it, so this week I finally started watching it, and oh how the nerd girl in me loves it, the one who devours period novels and loves the theater. I can’t help thinking as I watch it, however, that if I had been alive during that time, I would have been of the class that worked in a factory or on a farm, and my life would have been so much harder.

2. The weather. Blah, blah, Jill, you’ve said it before, BUT: what was special about this week is that I had my first, official “sit in the backyard in a lawn chair with the dogs and read a book” session! This is one of my most favorite things to do, and for the first time, because the weather was warm but not too hot, I could lazily and easily sit, read and dream and stare at my toes, and watch my dogs relax and roll in the grass.

3. Clean bill of health for the dogs. We went to the vet yesterday and Sam let himself be handled and prodded and shot, without a single growl or any rude behavior, and the vet, rather than remarking on how old Dexter was getting, described him as being in shape “like an athlete.” Healthy and happy all around.

4. “I trust the power of my true self.” This guided meditation, read by the open-hearted, wise and generous Julia at Painted Path, was such a gift, she is such a gift.

5. Blogging from the Heart. We are only two weeks in to the class, and it has exceeded every expectation I had. I have the biggest girl crush ever on Susannah Conway right now. Registration for her “Unravelling: Ways of Seeing Myself” class opens on Saturday, March 17th.

Bonus Joy: Music. I have been listening a lot to dreamy boy singers like Bon Iver, Alexi Murdoch, and Ben Howard. Two heartbreakingly beautiful songs I’ve listened to over and over this week are these:

May the Grace of God be with you always, in your heart
May you know the truth inside you from the start
May you find the strength to know that you are a
Part of something beautiful…

And this next one isn’t a dreamy boy, but a girl, and it’s sad, heartbreaking, but if you’ve ever felt loss or grief, you will recognize that it’s true, true, true.

Nothing comes easily
Fill this empty space
Nothing is like it was
Turn my grief to grace

Oh, dear reader: Life is messy. Hard. And beautiful.