Goodbye, 27!

An open letter to my 27th year:

Dear 27,

When I started thinking about you, I had mixed feelings. On the one hand, I thought you brought me a husband, but really, I was 26 when I got married. So...never mind. I also thought you brought me a new job, but once again, I was 26 when I started my new job. What the heck did you do for me, I wonder! I'm beginning to think 27 was just sort of average...

Well...what happened was, I celebrated my first year of being married to someone who makes time feel like it's going by so quickly, but who also makes me want to slow it down. You also gave my husband a job, which lead to financial stability, which lead to signing up for a better apartment and a general feeling of being better prepared for most things. I saw dozens of bands, some plays, some art, spent time with my family who loves me, and went to Scotland for a wedding in a castle. I got snow shoes, did yoga, had brunches, had a wedding party, ran 10 miles, met new friends, saw old friends, spent time at the lake, and went to baseball games. If this was an average year for me, I want every year to be average.

So, goodbye, 27! You were good, but I think 28 is going to be great!

Yours (for 7 hours more),
Christina

A Year of...Something

I just finished reading a book about a guy in New York who decided to live an entire year of his life trying to follow every single rule of the Bible. We're not talking just the 10 Commandments, but all of the little, silly rules that are everywhere in there, from not touching a woman during her 'time of the month' to not wearing clothing made of mixed fibers. He wrote about all of his experiences with required animal sacrifices, his requisite trip to the Holy Land, his year of unleavened bread and no fruit from trees younger than 5 years old. He really made the effort, let me assure you.

In any case, the combination of reading this book and just passing over to the new year has made me think about what I can do with 2011. I'm not going to sit here and list resolutions or anything like that, although I have made some (1. To be more creative, 2. To do lots of yoga, 3. To choose to be positive when I have a choice), but rather, I'd like to make a theme for the year. Like...this is the Year of Writing. Or, the Year of Focusing on My Education. Or, the Year of Volunteering.

In a way, 2010 was all about getting married and getting Chris his Green Card. Now that those things are checked off, I feel like we've really got a clean slate here. And, in some ways, that means I have a new slate too. A whole year to do...something. Something good. Something big. Something unique.

Sorry, that's all I have. I really don't know what this year is going to be about. Let me tell you, it will be about something!

In any case, I've been very lucky this Christmas and New Year's. I've had time off as needed, been able to see most of the people I've wanted to see (some of them, I've been able to see via Skype only, sadly), and it's been nice to have my first married Christmas with someone I love a little more every day. We've been lucky enough to have gotten approved for a new apartment, lucky that it has a little porch, lucky that it has two bedrooms and more space in general, and lucky to have enough of everything we need.

I hope 2011 is kind to all of you! Happy New Year!
xo

I'll Never Tell You My Secrets!

Last weekend, Minnesota was hit with one of the worst winter storms we've ever had. We all woke up on Saturday to a thick, drift-y blanket of soft powder that swallowed up cars and consumed city streets. Minnesotans are a tough breed, but this tested us. The snow storm was immediately followed by sub-zero temperatures. Mother nature is a real bitch sometimes.

That night, a friend of mine who lives 5 blocks away invited me over to have some wine and cheese and to just generally hunker down. 'Hunkering down', for those of you who may not be native Minnesotans, is what we call being inside during a storm. You can hunker down by yourself, but it's more fun to hunker down with others. It creates the illusion of having a good time while the weather spews its evil outside.

In any case, I bundled up, packed a bottle of wine into my bag, and headed out the door. The sidewalks weren't shoveled, and there was thigh-deep snow there and in the streets. It took me almost 30 minutes to walk the 5 blocks to her house.

This storm got me thinking about what it's like to grow up Minnesotan. For one thing, it makes you physically tough. Your blood becomes a little thicker, your skin a little rougher. The weather is something to survive, not enjoy. When non-Minnesotans talk of being cold, you scoff at them. Cold? You think you're cold? It's -30 in Minnesota! Now that's cold! Choosing to live in this weather, to endure its cold hell every year, is a badge of honor. Yes, sir, I am that tough.

But I think it does something else to a person. I think it makes people mentally tough, too. I was thinking that surviving a Minnesota winter is sort of like being a captured spy, and winter is the enemy. It pushes the envelope when it comes to testing your will. No, not with bamboo shoots under fingernails, but with icy winds and dark mornings scraping a layer of ice from your car, only to find it is too cold to start. Not with sleep deprivation and water torture, but with frostbite on the skin between the cuff of your coat and your mitten. And the thing is, we don't have the option to say 'Enough! I'll tell you the location of the uranium!' or whatever. It's something we have to endure, every year, for the rest of our time here. And if you're a real Minnesotan, you must endure it with a big smile on your face.

On Sunday, I went out to shovel my car from its icy tomb. I shoveled for over an hour and a half, and then decided to take a break. As I turned to go back inside, one of my neighbors stopped shoveling, too. At the same time, we looked at each other, gave each other the exact same 'Do you believe this?' look, and started laughing in unison.

And I think that's why we all stay in Minnesota.
xo

On the 16th Day of Christmas

This Christmas season has been drastically different for me than others in the recent past. See, I used to be one of those people who loved Christmas and felt really Christmas-y for the 6 or so weeks preceding Christmas. When I was little, we'd always light candles on an Advent wreath, one candle for each of the weeks, and it was really special to mark the time and get excited. My family would get together and have little rituals--opening presents in order by age, reading the Christmas story, singing song, looking in our stockings and eating cookies and meatballs and the Russell Stover's candy assortment.
But something happened--I can't say exactly when--and all my warm feelings about Christmas went away. I think it was around the time I began to realize how much stress Christmas can induce. After all, until I was about 12, all I had to do was enjoy the holiday--to eat the meatballs and open my presents. Sometimes I was called upon to read the Christmas story aloud, but it was a small price to pay for the fun of the day.
One year, I noticed that I really didn't feel any differently on Christmas than I did on any other day. In fact, I felt kind of sad, as though I'd outgrown something really special and important to me. There was pressure to buy the 'perfect' presents for people, pressure to impress my family at our get-togethers, pressure to be appropriately grateful, pressures that I had never noticed before because I had been too busy enjoying the day. I tried everything, but I couldn't make myself feel that special Christmas feeling. This has sort of been the theme of Christmases since for me. It's nice to see my family, nice to get and give presents, nice to eat special things, but I've missed that unique, awesome, happy, Christmas feeling.

Well, this year, I think I have it again. I have been listening to non-stop Christmas music for over a week--I'm talking non-stop, 8 hours a day here--and I still love it. Every time that little tinkly piano starts at the beginning of that song from A Charlie Brown Christmas (you know... the 'Christmas tiiiime is heeeere' one), I get excited. The first few notes of any version of Jingle Bells makes me grin. I want to bake gingerbread cookies, drink warm, adult beverages, put up a tree, hang a wreath, and listen to Burl Ives ALL THE TIME. It's fantastic! We'll...it's fantastic for me. I'm pretty sure my co-workers want to kill me.

In any case, I hope your Christmas season is equally Christmas-y! Happy holidays!
xoxo

While the Cat is Away, the Mouse Will Miss Him

Hey all! I know that some of you really depend on this blog to get you through your monotonous jobs or to break up your weekend or generally to keep you entertained during times of desperate boredom, and that I've let you down by not writing very often. While I'd like to promise you I'll write more, the fact is that I probably won't. If anything, the frequency might go down as the holidays approach. On the other hand, Chris has been in Alabama since November second for work and will return there after Thanksgiving for some undefined amount of time, leaving me with hours of uninterrupted time at home after work, so we'll see.

Yes, that's right, Chris is in the South. He's being treated to all the fried-food buffets and right wing politics he can handle! Actually, he's moved on from Alabama and is now in Florida, staying in a beach side hotel and eating sea food. That's how I like to think of it. The reality of the situation is that he is working 70+ hours a week and coming home to watch hotel cable. I want him home. I want him home with me right now.

In other news, last night, a couple friends and I went to Hot Pants, an old-school music dance party which used to be in a legitimate bar but has since been relegated to abandoned warehouses and other venues. Last night, it was in a gutted building with a semi-working bathroom, no heat, no liquor license(obviously) but a table with beer for sale, and no cover charge. In the third level of the building, there was apparently some kind of 'water puppet show'. What does that mean? I honestly don't know. Wet hand puppets? A tank of water with weighted marionettes? I could continue to speculate but the images that come to mind when hearing 'water puppet show' are too vast and strange for this blog. Anyway, it was one of those nights that starts somewhere relatively sane (Dulono's pizza, in this instance) and ends up in an unheated basement, dancing in your winter jacket to funk and soul while an aquatic puppet show happens two stories above you. You know how it is...right?

So...Alison and I left the party to find that Minneapolis had been coated in a sheer layer of ice. I promptly fell on my face. We ice skated to the car--I required assistance from a large, possibly drunk guy getting up the slight hill, thanks to the slippery soles of my new suede boots--and made our way home through a parking lot of a highway, complete with 15 cars blinking their hazards on the shoulder. It took an hour to drive the 1.5 miles. Alison was a crafty and able navigator. I've rarely been so happy to be in my little, toasty-warm basement apartment.

Alright, that's it from me for a while. I will try to write more. I really will.

xoxo

Office Life

I've had the good fortune, up until now, to have been able to work in a field I really like. Most of my work and educational experience has involved a ton of hands-on work and patient care. Before I came to this office, I was working on an inpatient mental health unit. It was a fun, difficult, sometimes emotionally-demanding job, but it was the best job I could have ever imagined. There were many times when I would find myself doing something at work, or seeing something happening there, and it would make me feel so proud or happy or thankful to the universe for putting me there to be part of it. I left every day, even after double shifts, feeling thankful for the chance to have been there. It was the kind of job I'd still do if I won the lottery. I loved it.

For a bunch of reasons, I left that job to come here, to my little cubicle, which is filled with paperwork and things that need to be organized and flowcharts tacked to the walls.

*Side note: Flowcharts are the bane of my existence, except for this one: http://www.nytimes.com/images/blogs/laughlines/panflute-flowchart.jpg.*

About 2 days into my employment here, I had two thoughts. Thought One: Oh, my God...I'm trapped here. Thought Two: Why did they hire me for this kind of job?

It's difficult to explain what I do, but here's the boil-down: I cross-check a bunch of information with a log of information and make the necessary changes. Then I call people, often without result, in an attempt to offer to schedule therapy and other kinds of appointments. Yawn!

The thing is...I've started to shift my outlook on things as a result of working here. Little things really bug me--things I never expected to bother me, and probably shouldn't. Here is a Top Ten list of things that are bothersome in my office life:

10. They just told us we can't listen to the radio on our computers because it takes up too much bandwidth. The radio used to be the thing that kept me sane here. It's too quiet now!

9. The candy dish. My boss continually fills a little glass dish in our office with candy. No, it's not the temptation or anything that gets to me. I don't really have much of a sweet tooth, which is great because if I did, I'd have packed on about 20 pounds by now because it is always, always full. No, the thing that bugs me is my boss and the candy dish. She comes over and gets candy about 10-15 times a day, each time telling me how 'if the candy dish is far away from her desk, she at least has to get up to get some, which makes her eat less of it'. She also sings little songs about chocolate when she's over there. She's like a heroin addict, but her addiction is glucose.

8. The temperature. The office next door is affected by our thermostat, so there is a little, passive-aggressive war waged every time the heat is adjusted. Minutes after we turn up the heat, someone from the other office will slink over and make it look like they're using the fax machine. Then you hear that little 'hisss' noise of the thermostat being turned down. It is alternately hot, then freezing, then hot again, throughout the day. I don't know how to dress anymore.

7. The bathroom. I could write an entire book about the psychology of women in a shared bathroom, but I won't get into it too far. A few weeks ago, someone left a note that said, "I KNOW MOST OF YOU DON'T CARE ABOUT HOW CLEAN THIS BATHROOM IS BUT SOME PEOPLE DO SO WHY DON'T YOU RESPECT US AND CLEAN UP AFTER YOURSELVES!" I love the all-capital lettered, poorly-punctuated sentiment.

6. My boss. My boss is oddly passive. As in, she'll send out an email to everyone that is not really directed at anyone, but is clearly aimed at one person in the office. She uses 'sandwiching', which is a Psych 101 classic. It's where you tell someone bad news, but cushion it on either side with good news. Like, "Hey, you're doing a great job here. We're going to have to let you go, though, because you really screwed the pooch on that report last week. Your hair has never looked better, though!"

5. The technology. I hate the copier and fax machine with most fibers of my being. Their beeping and malfunctioning may someday give me an ulcer.

4. Smokers. Why is it that this office rewards people for leaving their desk, going outside and standing there for 10 minutes every hour while polluting their bodies and my air? What if I took my cup of tea outside for 10 minutes on the hour, and then still took my lunch hour? Oh, that's not OK? Hmph.

3. My cubicle. It's like being in a small, cramped, messy shoebox full of post-it notes.

2. The fact that they're turning something as important and humane as mental health care into a money-making business, and I'm just sitting in my cubicle, along for the corporate ride.

1. It's not my other job.

With that said, I feel incredibly lucky to have a job. Maybe I shouldn't even post this....nah, I'm going to.

Hope you all are well!
xo

I'm Taking My Lunch Hour Back!

It's a little childish of me, but I'm writing this on company time. This is because yesterday, one of my co-workers was out and I ended up not only working late, but working through my lunch hour, and because they had me sit through an hour-long presentation about what my own department does, complete with statistics and facts, during today's lunch hour. Note to management: Giving me pizza does not affect my judgment. I'm not fooled into thinking I've had a break from work!

So, I've been doing a little looking around at what other people blog about, and it's come to my attention that I am in the minority as a blogger because I don't write about God or babies. Seriously, click through the 'Next Blog' feature at the top left. It is almost certain that you will run into a blog about people's babies or their opinion about God in less than 3 clicks. That got me thinking about who exactly reads people's blogs. I happen to know exactly who is reading this one (hello Chris, Mom, my father-in-law Peter, and Mary!). Maybe all blogs are limited to people's close friends and families, which explains all the baby news. But the God blogs? Who's reading those?

This blog won't venture into the topic of God or babies. Wait, I will mention that my mom did remind me to start taking Folic Acid if I want to have babies soon, and my dad recently bought a set of children's books 'for the future'. And while I'm sure that any babies Chris and I have will be quite literate, I'm also surprised that the biological clock's tick is loud enough for my parents to hear, too. That's all on that!

Since I last wrote, Chris and I have been out to Scotland for his sister, Alison's wedding. It was an incredibly beautiful ceremony and was a once-in-a-lifetime experience for me. I would post some pictures, but once again, I am at work. Alison was a beautiful bride and I'm pretty thrilled to have her husband, Martin, as my new brother-in-law.

Chris has kept his employment at Wunderlich-Malech. They like him a lot over there, and he doesn't hate it, so it's a win-win situation. I am also still employed, as you know (since I'm writing this from work) and it's pretty OK. Meh, I don't want to talk about work. Plus, what if they have some kind of 'Internet spyware thing' and they read this? Trust me, you're not missing anything interesting.

Chris, my mom and I ran a 10-mile race on Saturday! I keep thinking back to my college years when running 2 or 3 miles felt like a big deal. I also think back to my mom's first run, when she ran less than half a mile and announced she didn't want to run anymore, ever. We both kept going and then we did this, and it's pretty amazing. Also, I'm amazed at how awesome/unfair it is that Chris can just decide to run 10 miles and be done with it, while I have to really give it some effort and train for it for months. Lucky duck...I acquired some bruised toenails during the race, which I've been told are a badge of honor for distance runners, so I feel legitimate now. The day after the race, I managed to step on a rusty nail and had to get a tetanus shot. Between the nail mark and the toenails, I've had to accept the sad truth that I will never be a foot model. Sigh.

OK, that's it from me for now! I hope you're all doing well.
xo