A field guide to growing up without growing apart
Hello again! So as you know from reading my last post, I spent last week visiting my high school friends in California. It had its ups and downs like any vacation, and I’m really, really glad I went, but while spending the first weekend in […]
On Saturday I went to a Mormon Wedding. Okay so that is a lie. I’m not a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints so I am not physically allowed in the temple to watch the secret ‘sealing’ service that magically […]
My name is Sleeping Booty and I’m a hoarder. Well, sort of. I like to think of myself more as a memory preserver than a junk collector, more like an information database than a maggot infested trash dump. I’m a keeper of records and saver of moments, a reminder of truths and cataloger of thoughts. I like to imagine I’m a historian, that maybe one day when my friends are famous I’ll get to help to write their biographies. But now that the day has come to organize a bit of it, I’ve realized I’m in a bit over my head.
I’ve always had trouble with my memory. For as long as I can remember (which isn’t that long) I’ve had to ask people to remind me about their stories, remind me of mine, forgive me for reintroducing myself and congratulate me for remembering a detail or two. It’s frustrating at times, and I don’t claim to be particularly worse or better than any specific person, I just know that on the spectrum of human memory capabilities I land somewhat lower than I would like.
So, in order to compensate for my less than ideal brain power, I began documenting. It started with journals, continued to pictures and video and took off from there. Now some ten odd years later I’ve amassed hard drives full of data, ranging from ranting word documents to AOL Instant Message transcripts to long winded emails to video diaries to school papers to voice mails to text messages (I’ve typed out every relevant text message I’ve sent or received since 2006). Add Facebook wall posts, wall to wall conversations, personal messages, group messages, thousands of photos and comments from hundreds of relevant friends and you can see how it becomes overwhelming. And that isn’t even counting the hand written journals, letters, notes, cards, brochures, newspapers and ticket stubs I’ve got stashed in shoe boxes around my room.
I work hard to keep it organized, spending hours each week cataloguing photos and cleaning up my document folders. This past month I even consolidated three boxes of magazine clippings into folders that fit into one box and threw out two garbage bags of high school ‘memories.’ But I enjoy going through the piles, every few years I work my way back around to something and reassess what it means to me, remind myself what happened, decide if it’s still worth keeping and maybe start a project to ‘use it up’. This fall I finally started making a t-shirt quilt out of the boatloads of clothing I’d saved from high school and before that I chose 50 out of thousands of photos to have printed in a book.
So last week when I stumbled across some old freshman year documents detailing a certain massive crush I had on a certain fellow, the project wheels started turning. Wouldn’t it feel good to have all of this into one place? Maybe it will be good for me? The thing is going through word documents about a boy I loved isn’t exactly the same as throwing out some old macaroni art projects.
REALLY LONG story short is I crushed hard on my good friend Quyen for two years, we got together the week before I left for the summer and after a slew of dramatic and misinformed decisions we stopped speaking before I got back. Things between us haven’t been great since, and though it’s been almost 4 years I still can’t quite bring myself to let go completely. So when I saw his photo last week and it only felt like I was only being punched in the thigh instead of the gut, I decided it was finally time to work through the whole story. Maybe if I confronted it head on and compiled a finished product that could incorporate all the media into one complete story I’d finally be able to see it clearly, to really, truly, move, the, fuck, on.
A week later and I’m almost in over my head. It’s been emotionally draining, but not in a negative way; it’s like that burn you feel while exercising (or exorcising…) – you know the toxicants are leaving your system. And it’s been eye-opening; moments that I forgot had happened were waiting for me only a few levels away from the folders in my computer that I use every day; it’s nice to be reminded of the beauty life can hold. But it’s also been terrifying, because I’ve been reminded of the hurtful things I’ve done, the ignorant mistakes I’ve made and the humiliation I let myself think I deserved.
Everything has gone mostly well so far though, so as difficult as it is to revisit, I’m glad I am; I know I’ll be the better for it. But what I don’t know is how on earth I’m going to actually accomplish a final manifesto. So far I’ve only semi-organized half of it into a timeline-like word document that spans 400+ pages. It’s going to take me another solid week to fold the rest of the information in and who knows how long after that to read through all of it and write out our story in an eloquent and enlightened letter that I may or may not be considering sending his way. This is a big project, one I’m not sure my present day self can survive undertaking. But for the sake of my future I’m going to try, because I know once it’s done I’ll finally be able to let it go.
p.s. Any organizational (or personal? ) advice would be greatly appreciated.
I have now been married to a wonderful guy for ONE WHOLE YEAR. **silent cheer** And in that time, I have stumbled upon the key to a happy marriage. Since you can probably barely contain your excitement right now, I’ll just say it. The secret […]
Don’t get me wrong, I love Easy A. Emma Stone was spot on and everything her parents say makes me happier than a baby monkey riding on a pig, but when my dad and I came across the movie while flipping channels this weekend he […]
So I’m from Washington. The state. And no, it is not very sunny there, at least in the Western half of the state (which is the cool one). And yes, it rains a lot. Stephanie Meyer got that part right. But does the gray, gloomy weather really affect my mood? That’s what people with Seasonal Affective Disorder claim to suffer from. I first heard of SAD (see, even the acronym is depressing!) several years ago when some acquaintances of mine decided to move from Seattle to Southern California. One of the reasons they gave was that the wife had SAD, that is, she often got depressed during the winter months. At the time I thought it was beyond silly. Really? You’re blaming the weather for your foul mood? More recently, some expat friends of mine remarked that they planned to retire to Colorado specifically because it gets 300+ days of sunshine a year, and after living in the Middle East for so many years, they just can’t live without plenty of sun.
When they said that, I felt defensive. I mean, sure, sun is great. It’s warm and happy and makes you feel like you’re on vacation, but to say you can’t live in a cloudy state because you need the sun? It struck me as weird, and, frankly, a little SAD. I think the notion of one’s mood being affected by the weather didn’t sit well with me because I like to believe I’m in control of myself. Mind over matter. I’ve never suffered from any kind of real depression, even if I did spend the first 22 years of my life in a state that is rainy and dreary 9 months out of the year. So if it doesn’t affect me, why should it affect you? I was a skeptic, as I often am when it comes to the innumerable syndromes and disorders you can be diagnosed with these days—the alphabet soup of the psychology world. I like to see the world in more simple terms. So if you want to be happy, just…be happier. And don’t blame the clouds for making you sad.
For me, SAD just sounded like an excuse, just like PMS. That’s right, for most of my life I have not been a big believer in PMS (and I don’t believe anything unusual lives in Loch Ness, either. Can you see a pattern here?) I just never seemed to experience it much. I considered myself a very even-keeled, low-maintenance kind of girl. A sudden bitchy outburst was rare for me, and spontaneous tears? Unheard of. I was not overly emotional. Not wildly hormonal. Completely rational, like a man, right? But in the last few months I’ve noticed a disturbing trend…about once a month I have a day when I’m just not happy. I might snap at my students or pick a fight with my husband. I don’t know whether it’s my birth control, getting older, or maybe that I have finally noticed a phenomenon that has been happening all along, but I finally had to admit: I was PMS-ing. Just yesterday I found myself inwardly stewing because I’d done all the dinner dishes by myself, and my husband hadn’t thanked me. But even after he did finally notice and thank me, I still felt depressed. I wracked my brain. Was I over-worked? No, in fact that particular week I had finished my Master’s coursework and paper-grading early. Was I dreading something coming up? No, it was almost the weekend, and spring break and vacation with my parents was just two weeks away. Suddenly, it hit me. There was no reason for me to feel upset in that moment. No reason at all except the fact that I was due to start my period in a couple of days.
It seems PMS, that oft-blamed hallmark of womanhood, is actually a real thing.
It’s kind of like how I didn’t use to believe that alcohol would affect me (and then I went out on my 21st birthday, and…well, that was the end of that theory). I’m skeptical until it happens to me personally. And I dislike excuses. I do believe that I’m ruled by my mind more than my body, and I don’t like it when that mental control is overpowered or written off. PMS specifically has been used as a trump card against women so often that it makes me sick. And the disturbing part is that it’s often women themselves who use it as an excuse to be crazy. When I first heard about SAD, I felt the same way. Why blame something you can’t control instead of looking to yourself to ensure your own happiness? It seemed like a cop-out for the weak. You know, the types that just can’t hack it in an awesome place like Seattle.
But then I got to thinking. Like I said, I’ve never been really depressed, which means I must have been pretty happy my whole life. But the last year of my life, I’ve been…ecstatic. Like totally loving life, enjoying my work, reveling in my marriage, jumping at every chance to explore the world, and appreciating the crap out of all my blessings (except for that one day every month). I have also been living in the middle of a scorching, sunny desert. It got me to thinking: could there be a correlation? Am I happier now than I was a year ago because of my new, sunnier, surroundings? To find out I consulted WebMD, the hypochondriac’s home page. And, I found that SAD must be medically legit, because sure enough, it has a page on WedMD! There it lists the risk factors: living in a place where there is a big variation in the amount of sun from season to season, being between the ages of 15 and 55, and being a woman. Well, frick. That’s a check, check, and check. I must have been SAD before, and now I’m happy, because I live in a land of sunshine.
I know that is an over-simplification. Obviously a lot has changed in my life, not just the weather, but I have to say I do believe the extra sunny days have helped. Like when I am seeing status updates all winter long from my friends back home complaining about wet feet, umbrellas, wind, cold, and cabin fever, while I can kick back with some lemonade and watch my garden grow any day of the week? Yeah, that makes me smile and appreciate what I have. And therefore, it makes me happier.
So I give in. Seasonal Affective Disorder is legit, at least a little. And PMS too. My mind cannot overcome every external factor it has to face, no matter how hard I try. But does that mean when I go back to Seattle I should just curl up in a ball and listen to emo music all day? Do I have an excuse to be mean once a month? No. Because when it comes to the question of mind and matter, you have to fight to find the balance.
When fellow 20something David asked if we’d contribute our stories to his blog, 20somethings in 2013, of course we obliged. How AWESOME is it that we can all connect like this?! We’re all so different and yet all exactly the freakin’ same. I love it. Maybe […]
So I’ve faced mortality this week. A whole boatload of it. And to be honest I’m not sure what I’ve learned. Or how I feel. Hopefully we’ll figure something out together. It began with putting our family dog down on Saturday. Rhoda is (was) our […]
So this whole working for my dad thing is complicated.
The major things are great. We get along ridiculously well and when we get home we don’t bolt to opposite corners of the house. My mom isn’t too jealous of the time we spend together and I even have someone to gossip with about my ridiculous coworkers. So what’s the problem? Allow me to explain in basketball metaphors.
Let’s say I’m a freshman college basketball player and my dad is my coach. He takes me on knowing this will only be temporary until I manage to transfer to D1, but we’ll agree that it was the best thing for me. On the first day of practice I might feel a little inadequate, like the only reason I made the team is because he knows me. Sure he’s seen me practicing when none of the other scouts were looking, but still, I bet the rest of the team is pretty skeptical of what I can do. I know I’ll have to work harder to prove I belong, but it’s fine, I’m ready.
A few days later I’ll be in charge of analyzing the stats and setting up the court for practice. Yeah, he should have hired an assistant to do it but it teaches me more about the game and makes me feel useful. He’ll even give me the passwords to his scouting reports because he already knows he can trust me. Usually only seniors are allowed to help with that.
I’ll get a few minutes of playing time the first game and be thrilled that I didn’t mess anything up. I might even make a block or two. It will feel like I’m settling into my place and I’ll start to realize I’m just as good as everyone else, albeit majorly inexperienced playing in games like this.
One of the other freshmen will grow to trust me and tell me she doesn’t like to play point guard. On the way home from practice it will come up in conversation and I won’t think twice about telling my dad about her aversion. I’ll feel guilty when she sits the bench most of the next game.
A few weeks into the season there will be a snow storm that makes it difficult to get to practice. My dad will trust me to work out at home while the rest of the team braves the storm to get to practice. I won’t enjoy my commute-free day because I’ll be worried the rest of the team thinks I’m taking advantage.
The other freshmen will start to see me as a leader and the seniors will invite me to lunch. I’ll sort of try to invite the other freshmen along but I’ll end up hanging with the seniors alone.
My dad will have no problem putting me in for any player at any position. Everyone else will only play one position.
I’ll stop trying to force myself to call him coach around my other teammates and resign to calling him dad. My teammates will follow suit when they talk about him with me.
I’ll practice really hard to be ready for an important game and my dad won’t play me at all. I’ll feel overlooked and unjustly set aside. I think to myself I’d be getting more playing time with another team.
I play terribly during the next practice, even the other freshmen are more on top of it than I am. He never tells me off in front of the others but once we’re at home he’ll make sure I bring it next time.
The next game he won’t play me at all again and I’ll be fine with it. That is until it’s tied with 4 seconds left on the clock and he calls my name. I won’t feel ready or deserving to sub a senior out, but he’ll put me in anyway. I’ll make the game winning shot. The crowd will go wild.
With the championship coming up my dad will start losing focus. I’ll put things I would usually ask for one on one help with aside and figure them out myself to not distract him. I’ll take the lead at a few practices saying Coach told me you should practice zone defense when really he just forgot to make a practice plan at all.
During a game I’ll make a stupid foul and when he calls me to the bench he’ll apologize for not explicitly explaining how to avoid that. I’ll know that another coach would have blamed me.
The next game I’ll be cocky, over playing and taking more shots than I should. One of the juniors will stop passing to me even when I’m open. I’ll back off and after a few more games the junior will start to trust me again.
We’ll win the championship because clearly we’re the best. I’ll feel like I’m part of something awesome, like maybe this could be where I stay my whole college career.
But a recruiter will catch my eye and suggest I take a look at their program. He won’t promise anything but I’ll be tempted anyway; his program is a better fit for me and in a better location. But I’ll say no out of loyalty; I can’t bail on the team that gave me a chance. I won’t bail on my dad even though I’d probably be more successful elsewhere.
We’ll have a few weeks off before we start training again. I’ll remember what it is like to not be a basketball player at all. I’ll stay out late and work on craft projects. I’ll almost convince myself that I’d be happier not playing anywhere, but I know I’d rather feel proud of my hard work than comfortable in monotony.
At the end of break I’ll find the courage to ask my dad how he’d feel if I transferred next season and he’ll tell me to do what I think is best. He knows it is my life. But he’ll be sad. He’ll say he thought we had another season together. I’ll seriously consider staying for good.
A few days ago my dad casually mentioned I’d get to be in charge of an awesome project IF I stayed through July. He sounded so cautious, like he didn’t want to scare me away with mention of the future. So even though I immediately assured him I really hope I get to do that too, I felt guilty for all the times I’d ranted to him about whether or not to work here. Yes, he is my dad and I should be able to take to him about the decisions of my life, but he is also the guy who worked really hard to build up this company I’m not always super kind to. So I’m working on it, working on the balance. And hopefully one of these days I’ll get it right. Blerg. That ended up sadder than I intended, but I guess that is because it is. I’m sad that I’m not somewhere else living in a big house with 20-something dancing on rooftops and taking over the world, but it also makes me sad to think about leaving my parents and this company which I know is really one of the good ones. I want to be everywhere all at once! Blerg. I know, I know it will be fine. My family will always love me and I’ll make the most of whatever I choose…
Naughty Princesses Assemble! We’ve been at this whole blogging thing for a few months now (so far so good??) and I figured it was time you folks learned a bit more about the four of us and why we go by the pseudonyms we do! […]
Confession: I love being put on hold. I know I know, the dreaded hold is the low of your day, the place you get sent when a company isn’t going to help you, the wasted time spent listening to overplayed Rascal Flatts, the costly minutes […]
Why hello there dearest friends, long time no see! I know it’s only been two weeks but doesn’t it feel like more? It’s like I don’t even know you anymore! So much has changed! Dare I say we live in a Whole New World?!
Okay, okay, so nothing has really changed. I’ve still got an office job, still living at home with my parents, still have no clue what to do with my life. Guns are still a hot topic, America is still overweight and airplanes are still a billion times safer than cars. But just because the big things haven’t changed doesn’t mean new and exciting things aren’t happening elsewhere! Like my brain! So to catch you up on the places my mind has been the last few weeks, here are
Ten Things I Think Are Awesome (lately) (in no particular order) (and including but not limited to):
Geology – Rocks rule. When I was younger, rocks were my number one interest; science projects and camping outings were all about rocks all the time. Over time I let my interest slip and now I know little to nothing about this giant pile of awesome we call home. But I want that to change. Doesn’t it sound amazing to be able to identify rock layers and travel around to collect the billions of specimens? I’d wear a big white hat and wander around the world breaking open geodes and analyzing dirt with magic science machines. If anyone wants to pay me to go back to college and/or grad school, I promise to send you samples.
Dame Maggie Smith – Oh my, I know my fellow naughty princesses haven’t been watching Downton Abbey but for those of you that have, can we just gush a little about the epicness that is Dame Maggie Smith?! She rocks those one liners out every time she is on screen and after all the melodramatic plot twists this season I can honestly say the only reason I’m still watching is her. She is the granny everyone wishes they had, the mother you want to impress and the young woman you would have been friends with. Sometimes she makes me laugh so hard I fall out of my seat. Miss Maggie lights up the silver screen as well in my all time favorite movies Hook and The Secret Garden, not to mention her expert turn as McGonagall while concurrently battling breast cancer and not ageing at all. I swear she is a super human who will live forever and continue saving the world one boring person at a time.
21 Day Grand Canyon Rafting Trip – River trips are nothing new for me. My family and friends have been going on week long trips every summer since before I can remember. We pack up all our gear and live off the boat for a week, camping and navigating the rapids with little more than a map and a groover (I dare you to click). But this year our friend has done the impossible and snagged a 21 day permit to raft the Grand Canyon in October. The Grand is a different beast, 3 times as long, rapids double the size and permits so rare that people wait their whole lives for the chance to raft it. So yes, I’m more than excited; I’m flerbbin’ flabbergasted. The problem is I’m not on the short list since I prefer NOT to be responsible for rowing my own raft through mile high rapids (though my brute strength, vast working knowledge and high caliber entertainment value places me solidly second tier). So I’ve got to plan my campaign for inclusion wisely and while October seems miles away, when it comes to the Grand I will get there by any means necessary.
Quilting – Have I told you about my quilting yet?! It’s been my major winter project to combine over 50 t-shirts into one giant king-size quilt. I’ve been saving t’s since I was a kid (hoarder in training) and when I moved home I knew this was my chance to capitalize on the time, space and my mother’s sewing machine. In my head this was going to be a two month project, though now it has turned into 4 months and counting. Last weekend I finally got all the squares sewn together and now I’m working on making the border out of the tiny logos. Who knew quilting was so involved?! But guess what, I LOVE IT. I learn something new every day and come sometime soon I’ll have a t-shirt quilt that will last…until it gets ripped or peed on.
The Dead Sea, Jordan – I know the Lumineers are big right now so forgive me for pretentiously name dropping a semi-less-known song off their album, but Dead Sea has completely taken over my life as of late. The lyric goes, “You’re like the dead sea, the nicest thing you ever said to me. I’ll never sink when you are with me, you’re like the dead sea.” And maybe it’s because I just saw a Sundance film about Jordan or maybe it’s because one of my closest friends grew up there or maybe it’s because Cinderslut has promised to meet me there sometime soon, but whatever the reason the Dead Sea and this song has fantastically rocked my world. It also doesn’t hurt that the song details the choices of the traveling girl I hope I can be.
Spiderman – Yup, officially not over this Andrew Garfield/Spiderman/Emma Stone/Gwen Stacey thing. I want to be and be with all of them all at once. Will real life ever match the magic that is that group’s awesomeness?!
Artsy Fartsy Film Making – So I was thinking the other day (I know, right?!), wouldn’t it be interesting to make a film where the actors never speak? There have been silent movies and subtitles and movies that don’t need a lot of dialogue, but lately I’ve been imagining a person telling a story, narrating it in a voice over, that is sort of watching the action unfold as they describe it. For example, when a narrator is talking about a conversation between two characters the film would show the emotions on the characters faces but wouldn’t show the actual dialogue. Neither actor would be mouthing words, but they would be demonstrating what their faces would be doing had they been speaking. We’d see shots of them looking at each other, looking down, looking back all as the narrator says, “he tried to explain but every time I looked at him I saw her face.” Or in a lighter scene a mother would be pointing to her son’s dinner plate with a stern look as the narrator said, “To her, watching me eat those peas was more satisfying than any straight A I could bring home.” It’s going to be a sensation. I know I’m a genius, one day the world will too.
Live music – I went to go watch my friend’s boyfriend play drums with his band Friday night and it was AWESOME. I forgot how much fun bars can be with good friends, good music and space to dance.
Les Miserables – So I finally saw the movie (I left work early on Friday to meet my large buttery popcorn bucket at the theatre). And like everyone else, I have quite a few things to say about it. But my story begins with my elementary school brain seeing the unforgettably amazing Les Mis poster and getting the impression the musical was a retelling of A Little Princess (It makes sense though a sad lonely girl being found by her father). The rest of my childhood is littered with magical appearances of this poster and convoluted explanations of plot and song, so unintelligible in fact that for a time I believed that the girl in the poster was me in another dimension, (really I did). It wasn’t until college when I stumbled upon the Liam Neeson film version at the library and realized that Victor Hugo had written a book which had become the musical which had repopularized the book which has .become countless film versions which has now finally become a musical film with super big name actors. My life was changed and after I bucked up and bought choice seats to the musical when it came to Seattle last year at long last I finally understood the show I’d grownup with but never known. Since then I’ve seen it all (haven’t read the book, but it will come) and am a self proclaimed expert. In the interest of keeping this short I’ll only say 3 things about this newest rendition:
And last but not least.. Who are we kidding THIS IS ALWAYS AWESOME