Post #55: Letter Summer

I have decided to make this the long letter summer. (By which I mean the long email and Facebook message summer.)

It’s the first summer I’m spending in Burlington, away from home, and living with two fantastic roommates, Allyson and Connor, which means that every couple of days I find myself alone, sitting around in the apartment, looking for something to keep me entertained for another hour before Allyson gets back from work. I try to avoid turning on the tv whenever possible (especially when it’s still light outside,) but when I don’t feel like carrying my camera up and down the riverwalk and taking pictures of the Winooski River from every angle at every time of day, I write letters.

I started by emailing my sister, Rebecca. She lives in Beijing, so sometimes I talk to her on Skype and sometimes I send her an email from work, but it wasn’t consistent until a month ago. Now we write about once a week.

Writing someone a long letter for the first time is like planning to visit a friend you haven’t seen in years. It’s fun, but also makes you nervous and awkward, and there’s too many exclamation points because you’re trying to hard to brush together a quick collage of all the things that have happened to you that don’t require too long of an explanation.

Now my emails to Rebecca are much more fluid. A few weeks ago I sent her an entire email just about running a relay for the Vermont City Marathon and how I am thinking of running a full or half marathon next year. Like a long conversation, a series of long letters starts with the broadest stuff (job, family, romance, health) and moves to the much narrower details (i.e. the same topics with more interesting stories.)

I recommend writing a few long letters this summer. It’s a good way to reconnect with people before you visit them, because you will already be caught up on their lives, so when you get together, you can have more fun conversations. You will have already studied up on their daily routines, references to other people, and the details of their most recent life-changing events, so you can pick up in the middle of a conversation instead of starting a new one.

It doesn’t take long to write a good letter (about half an hour should do it) and the process is fun if you focus on writing what you want to write instead of what you what you think you should write. If you’d like to, you can write me a letter and I promise I will respond. Good luck!

Identical Strangers, A Mixed Review

photo from identicalstrangersbook.com

Identical Strangers: A Memoir of Twins Separated and Reunited

A few times while I was reading Identical Strangers, I tried googling a review of the book (with no luck in finding one), because I kept wondering if other people felt the same way as me. The story of how Elyse Schein and Paula Bernstein were separated as infants and reunited as adults is fascinating. They are a living example of how nature and nurture interact (and according to their experience, nature usually wins.)

However, the writing of this memoir (shared between the two sisters) was consistently melodramatic, and, at times, completely off-putting. I strongly considered not finishing the book several times because I was so annoyed with the twins’ constant complaints that they had not been raised together, that they had not been told by their adoption agency that they were twins, that they had unknowingly been a part of a twin study arranged by the adoption agency, etc.

Near the end of the book, when the women finally meet the scientist who conducted research on twins who had been purposely separated for study, I found myself siding with Dr. Neubauer, not the twins, because I was so fed up with their whining. Both women dealt with undeniable hardship in their lives, but unfortunately they used this novel as an opportunity to bask in cliché-ridden self-pity, instead of focusing all of their energy on how the interesting topic of nature vs. nurture played a significant role in their lives.

I wouldn’t say the book was a total loss, because it did help me form a more educated opinion on the matter of nature vs. nature, but I would say that if you want to read Identical Strangers for yourself, don’t buy the book, borrow it, because it isn’t something you’re going to want to read twice.

Magical Tricks with Food

Goal: Make the best lunch ever

Challenges: We haven’t gone grocery shopping this week

Advantages: Mass quantities of salad dressing, ketchup, and beef that we put an unfortunate flavor of chicken seasoning on two nights ago

Kitchen Status: 51% clean

Health Status: Hungry

Iron Chef Surprise Ingredient: Worcestershire sauce (we bought it to make Chex mix last winter and there’s tons leftover, so whenever Allyson isn’t looking I put some in whatever I am cooking to use it up)

Ingredients List: Weird ground beef, 1 can tomato sauce, steak seasoning, a few squirts of Ketchup, Worcestershire sauce, carrots (chopped tiny, so that roommates don’t notice the imposter veggies), and curly-shaped spaghetti.

Directions: Put weird beef, tomato sauce steak seasoning, ketchup, Worcestershire sauce, and carrots in a pot and cook them up! Make spaghetti. Eat them together.

Anticipated Outcome: Spaghetti and meaty tomato sauce.

Actual Outcome: I don’t know how or why, but I seemed to have recreated the exact sloppy joe recipe that I was served as a 6 year old at St. Augustine’s School cafeteria.

Results: It tasted good, actually, but not on pasta. I ate it on a toasted hamburger bun the next day and it was MUCH more delicious.

Findings: If you throw all your leftovers in a pot and let them simmer long enough, they will turn into food.

Unanswered question: Why is the pasta shaped like a bobby pin for giants?

Fancy & Russian

photo of Dumbledore (the light grey one) and Twitch (the black one) by Rachel Salois


When Allyson brought home a pair of fancy Russian hamsters (that’s actually what they’re called) last week, I was able to reaffirm my belief that I have no soul when it comes to cute animals.

What Allyson sees as cute companions requiring nurturing love, I see as living cotton balls that provide poop and a weird odor to the corner of our living room. I know it sounds harsh, but it’s part of my DNA to not enjoy the company of animals. My grandmother, Judy, hated pets, and my mom repeats the mantra “last cat, last dog,” anytime Milo or Fuzby acts out or pleads for food after she has already sat down to read the paper.

It’s not that I would neglect an animal or cause it physical harm; I just don’t see their point. I understand how a fancy Russian hamster can be cute, but not cute enough for me to want to pay $40 to enjoy its cuteness from the comfort of my own home. In fact, at this stage of my life, I can’t think of anything cute enough for me to be willing to pick up its poop.

It’s definitely the poop most of all that gets me. I sometimes lose my appetite when I eat too close to the hamsters, because I get a whiff of the sawdust from the bottom of their cage and can’t think about anything but tiny poop pellets. I am now paranoid of hamster poop being on the chair or coffee table from when Allyson takes them out to play.

I know I’m in the minority here. Most people have fond memories of childhood pets and many of my friends dream about one day being able to buy a dog for their apartment. But to all of the animal lovers in the world: know that just because I can stand your pet, doesn’t mean I love it. And just because I don’t love to spend time with hamsters doesn’t mean I’m not a nice person. Mostly I don’t want to be spending time with your pet because I would rather be spending time with you!

And to Allyson: thanks for cleaning the hamster cage. You have no idea how much I love to not smell those guys.

Scariest Thing Ever

I have discovered the scariest thing ever. Take this short quiz to see if you have what it takes to write a horror film script that will instantly make you millions of dollars.


Pop quiz:

1. What is the scariest thing ever?
a. Identity theft
b. Nuclear war
c. Clowns

2. What is most likely to kill you?
a. Cancer
b. Gun
c. Possessed devil child who lives in your mirror

3. What thoughts keep you awake at night?

a. Visions of rainforest deforestation
b. Visions of a pale child singing nursery rhymes without smiling


4. What would be the creepiest thing to have you staring you in the eyes when you wake up?
a. Chucky doll
b. Sid’s doll head with spider legs (from Toy Story)
c. Dora the Explorer
d. ____________ (write-in answer)

5. What would be the worst thing to be locked in a dark room with?
a. Bernie Madoff
b. The demon inside Bernie Madoff
c. A marionette doll of Bernie Madoff

Answers:
1. C
2. C
3. B
4. D: You wake up and the Chucky doll is lying next to you, and Dora is staring him in the eyes.
5. Trick question: It’s all of them in the room with you and they are wearing birthday party hats.


Did you get them all right? If so, you have realized that kids and their kid paraphernalia is our country’s worst nightmare. I challenge you to think of anything scarier. That is why I won't be going to see Splice when it comes out this summer.

Nature shots

Nature shots are so fun to take, but what do you do with them once you have them? Nobody wants to look at pictures with no people in them unless it's freaky deep sea animals or puppies. Regardless, we force our friends and family to admire them, as though a 5 by 7 photograph will give them any sense of what it was like to be there. Let's face it-when you're there in person, nature is magical and muddy and fun. When you're not there, it's boring and muddy and forgettable. That's why I have to go outside everyday. To remind myself.

My Kitchen is a Grocery Store

Some of our scavenges: a mirror, chair, table, box of tissues, and princess trash can. Photo by Rachel Salois


One week ago, Allyson made a Facebook event called “Give us your leftovers” in which, people would give us all their food when they moved out, and, in turn, we would give a coupon for a free hug (expires June 1st). We were clear about what we wanted: everything except used toilet paper, moldy things, pet fish, and Cheese Wiz.

We had no idea that by making this event, Allyson and I would be the proud owners of 9 salad dressings, 3 jars of peanut butter, 4 containers of salt, a princess trash can, a multi-colored Christmas lights rope, a television, and 3 mega-boxes of instant mashed potatoes. Our cupboards and fridge are literally exploding with food. (No joke: a stick of butter just dove for Allyson’s foot when she tried to put away the pasta salad a few minutes ago. We were able to subdue it and get it back in the shelf with some effort.)

Clearly this is a tribute to the generosity of our friends, and to their love of buying mashed potato flakes and not eating them (perhaps a wise choice—what are they made of?). Thank you!

Dogs in Rain Jackets Driving Dirt Bikes

Photo by Rachel Salois










You know those crazy people who dress up their dogs in rain jackets, and think that dogs can actually taste the difference between name-brand and store-brand kibbles, and refer to other people’s dogs by family relation, (such as, “Isn’t this dog Snuggie adorable? I just bought it for my step-grand-dog, Poochie.”)

I realized a few days ago I am one of them. Sort of.

Last summer I got a plant named Shorty. Shorty is a six-inch tall fir tree with three branches. He lives in a terra cotta pot with his companion, a plastic penguin. He is easy going, reliable, and doesn’t make a fuss if you don’t water him over the weekend.

After Shorty, there were more: an orchid, a Chinese elm bonsai, two grapefruit trees, and “the salad bar” which is the windowsill garden in our apartment. Over the past nine months I have collected nine plants.

I am obsessed with them. I graze them with my fingers every day, checking for dead leaves. I buy them fancy soil. I tell people long stories about them. I bring them with me when I travel. And if they all died, I might cry.

When my fish, Ramone, died last year, I didn’t cry. When we thought my cat, Milo, died I didn’t cry, (which is good because she had actually just run away for a few weeks.) So what is it about plants that makes me in love with them?

Most of the reason is their personality. Most pets are needy and expensive: food, haircuts, liver medicine. But plants are practical. All of their necessities cost approximately $0. Like me, plants are quiet and methodical in the morning when I water them. They grow in funny and unexpected ways. Sometimes they spurt up quick and sometimes they lose all their leaves in a week.

My plants make me who I am. They’re not very valuable and I have about 12 years to wait until I pick my first fresh grapefruit, but I wouldn’t be the same without them.

When you think about it, everyone has an obsession. My dad is obsessed with dirt bikes. Normally, he is a very frugal spender. He only buys jeans if they cost less than $20. But every year when we ask him what he would like for his birthday he says, “oh, don’t worry about it. I’ve already ordered an exhaust pipe from Motor World.”

My sister spends her money on plane tickets. My best friend, Allyson, is a crazy dog person. (The difference between rain-jacket-dog-people and Allyson, though, is that Allyson doesn’t like dogs because they give her an excuse to buy dog-purses. She likes them because they offer her an uncomplicated type of companionship that people simply can’t replicate.)

In reality, we all have our obsessions. They’re ridiculous and illogical and they’re frustrating when no one else truly understands them, but they make us happy. And since they are so misunderstood by the rest of the world, they depend on us to defend them.

Volunteer Wal-Mart Employees Wanted

I refuse to use self-check out. When I first saw cashier registers being replaced at Wal-Mart, Home Depot, and Shaw’s, I thought, “Brilliant! I can run into a store and buy stuff without human interaction. The days of making embarrassing Home Depot purchases and shuffling up to the counter while trying not to make eye contact with the cashier are over!”

Then I tried to buy gum and a headband using self-check out at Wal-Mart. First, the computer rejected my bagging technique, and the machine jammed up and asked me to seek the assistance of a Wal-Mart employee, which I did for about the amount of time that it would have taken for a cashier to scan my goods and send me on my way. By the time that was settled, I opened my purse to pay and somehow spilled all of my change across the Wal-Mart supercenter. I left the store embarrassed and confused, and assumed all guilt in the matter.

In the few similar experiences that I had with self-check out, I slowly got better at using the machine, but then about a year ago I realized something: I was in Wal-Mart employee training. Actually, I was a volunteer Wal-Mart employee. In fact, every consumer who had ever used self-check out was in training to be a self-sufficient buyer. Corporate America has just pinched our cheeks and told us that we were old enough to do the big-kid chores, and we, glowing with pride, dashed out the kitchen door to get started.

Now that I’m looking for a summer job, I like the self-check out concept even less. It is another machine that is replacing the need for human labor, which is good for the bottom line of the corporation, and bad for the displaced employee looking for a job. If an ideal corporation is a self-sufficient machine that turns all profit for no cost, where will potential customers go to earn money to pay for its products?

Currently, we are in an unfair bargain with the corporations we buy from. The only way to stop them from telling us what to buy and how much to pay for it is to put our money where our loyalties lie. That means buying from the people we know and respect most. It means waiting in line for one extra minute, so that a cashier can say “hello” to us, and scan our items, and bag our goods, and help us feel unflustered enough to not empty our change purses onto the floor, and say “thank you for shopping at Wal-Mart” as a paid employee should.

Little Love

You are so

Tiny
My little

Tiny house.

But still you


Beguile,
You

Sweet domicile.

I know these

Words are
To you

Short-selling,

My XS dwelling,

But know that you


Could not be improved

As a petit abode,
Unless you were

served

A la mode.




Photo by Rachel Salois

The Wednesday Post

I—self appointed Tiny House guru of Champlain College—am finally building a house on campus, which is cool, but harder than I could have imagined when we started this project (if I even could have imagined anything about what it is like to build a Tiny House) . Being a student activist who wants to help other people become student activists, I’m going to tell you what it is like to stand in the culmination of all the work I have put into planning this sustainability week. It is a complicated place, because it is the intersection of my two lives: the “college student doing finals and making summer plans” life, and the “eco-hero of the week “life.

6:45 AM: My alarm goes off in the middle of one of those dead sleeps where I realize later that I may not have moved (even a little) for the whole night.
7:00 AM: A bowl of Kix and a bowl of Frosted Cheerios for breakfast. Yessss…
7:13 AM: Shit! I have to leave. Must catch the 7:25 bus, but my teeth aren’t brushed and my backpack isn’t packed.
7:17 AM: Teeth briefly brushed. Backpack packed.
7:20 AM: At the bus stop in record time.
7:21 AM: Oh. Actually the bus doesn't come until 7:35. No matter, I’ll do my homework while I wait…
7:30 AM: (on the bus) Can’t read with angry republican financial radio talk show in my ear. Oh well. 2/52 pages of reading complete.
7:45 AM: Arrive at Little House worksite in Hauke Courtyard. Randy (the carpenter helping us this week) works hard pounding nails, making measurements, and cutting wood with power tools. I stand around watching him, because I am unqualified to operate all tools in the world.
8:30 AM: Randy gives me a job to do!
8:31 AM: Job is hammering nails into wood.
8:32 AM: Randy chuckles while I hammer away (generally) in the direction of the nail and manage to pound it in about 1/8th inch with about 12 strikes from the hammer. This is the hardest wood I have ever pounded a nail into.
8:33 AM: Randy leaves me to struggle in privacy, which I prefer.
8:45 AM: Have learned to fear nails, because if you hit them at a weird angle when you first start pounding them in, they ping off in crazy angles at 1,000 times the speed of light.
8:46 AM: Ask Randy for safety glasses, which pleases him immensely, because he is the safety inspector on the construction site where he normally works.
9:00 AM: Every nail I hammer in brings me closer to safety.
9:30 AM: Caity arrives and is equally unskilled at hammers, which means it is funny instead of life threatening now.
10:00 AM: It’s funny, but still impossibly hard. I have lost about 20 nails to lightspeed pinging now.
11:00 AM: Have gone back to observing work instead of participating in it, which is where I feel most comfortable at the moment.
12:00 PM: Etc.

INTERMISSION

1:00 PM: Eating Yak meat at Rob William’s Vermont Yak Company presentation. The sun is shining and I am eating free food.
1:15 PM: Time to get to my class that started at 12:30…
1:25 PM: (In journalism class) Being asked questions about the student newspaper. I feel proud but also nervous and defensive about answering them.
1:26 PM: Come off sounding more defensive than proud.
1:30 PM: Class gets out early.
2:00 PM Another class.

INTERMISSION PART II: ATTACK OF THE ZOMBIES

3:08 PM: Class is not boring, I manage to sound intelligent after only reading two pages of homework, and we get out early. Yesss…
3:10 PM: Work at the seed-planting table. I love plants, so feel happy about helping people plant seeds in the sunshine.
3:30 PM: Asked by Chris Yoon and Connor to be in their Zombie movie.
3:31 PM: Get filmed walking into an elevator and screaming at Chris Yoon’s dead body. (No Chris Yoons were injured in the making of this movie.)
3:50 PM: Clean up and prepare to job search downtown.
4:10 PM: Inquire about summer work at Old Navy, Gap, Aeropostal, Bath and Body Works, and Famous Footware.
4:45 PM: Inquire about work at a little gift shop downtown where the girl at the counter says, “Let me get you an application,” and then proceeds to pull out a stack of 50 already filled out applications. Unable to find me a clean one, she prints another off and sends me on my way feeling less confident about the prospect of finding a summer job.
5:00 PM: Call mom to tell her about my job search.
5:15 PM: Bust out in tears on the phone over my nervousness about finding a job and guilt of wanting to pay to live in Burlington for the summer even though I don’t have a job yet. My deposit is due in two days if I decide to stay.
5:20 PM: Mom is calm and reassuring.
5:25 PM: Am all snuffly and puffy red-eyed in public, looking like an ultra-stupid idiot, but have at least stopped crying.
5:30 PM: Hang up the phone and decide to discreetly walk to the locker room to pick up my backpack, even though I look like a hurricane just hit my face.
5:31 PM: Run into my boss on the sidewalk. He is a very nice person, but I would rather not have run into him so shortly after the tear-busting incident.
5:32 PM: Escape by saying I had to go apply for a summer job. I hope he thought it was for a job as an actress in the crying scene of a Zombie video.
5:35 PM: See Lorelei with her shirt half on (everything was covered) in the locker room and run into her arms.
5:45 PM: Tell her my whole story. She cheers me up by telling me jokes and talking about this kid in a totally worse situation. I feel better.
6:25 PM: Get on the bus and go home.
6:45 PM: Get home and none of my roommates are there to greet me.
6:55 PM: Grab a fresh Pillsbury Homestyle Biscuit and my Spanish book and go next door.
7:00 PM: Tucker makes tacos while we discuss jobs, summer, and whether or not Peeps (like wine) get better with age. I also am semi-barely studying Spanish.
7:30 PM: Go back home and eat cod and carrots for dinner.
8:00 PM: Tell my roommates, Allyson, Carl, and Scott about how I won’t find a summer job and will die.
8:15 PM: Allyson finds me an ideal summer job about WRITING about TINY HOUSES, which are the two things I love most (not including any people who I love.)
8:15 and half a minute PM: Scream and kick the yoga ball hard because I am so happy.
9:00 PM: Start writing this blog.

19 Songs to Listen to Every Day and Never Get Tired Of

Everyone knows that the three keys to happiness are food, nature, and cute animals, so please use this list of fun songs to make sure you get your fix every day.

Songs Regarding Animals:

Hummingbird by Wilco
Three Little Birds by Bob Marley
The Pink Panther by pretty much every jazz band ever
The Chicken by Jaco Pastorius Big Band

Food:
Banana Pancakes by Jack Johnson
Whipped Cream by Herb Alpert & the Tijuana Brass
Sweet Tangerine by The Hush Sound
Pumpkin Soup by Kate Nash
Georgia Peaches by Lynrd Skynrd
Icecream by Lou Bega
Pour Some Sugar on Me by (a sweet remix) The Marginal Prophets
Whisky con Ron by Salsa Celtica
American Pie by Don McLean

Nature:
Island in the Sun by Weezer
Waterfalls by TLC
Sun Comes Up by John Legend
Monsoon by Jack Johnson
Food Chain by Eric Hutchinson
Sea of Love by Cat Power

A Better Way to Wait

This is me in my latest, almost-finished scarf project.


I never dream about being chased, or dying, or going to school naked. The only nightmares I have are about being late. I’m running to a bus for to a cross country meet or I’m a freshman in high school and my dad is driving me to piano lessons and I already know that I’ll never make it in time.

There’s no doubt that these dreams come from my obsession with time in real life. I like my schedule to fit neatly into boxes that can be stacked squarely atop one another. Unfortunately (or fortunately) real life is not an excel spreadsheet, so I have to wait 20 minutes for the bus on Tuesday nights and get up at 8:30 for meetings on Wednesday mornings even though my first class isn’t until 12:30.

That’s why I started knitting. Unless I have yarn and knitting needles, I can’t stop the TICK, TICK, TICK from going off in my head while I’m sitting at the bus stop. I consider myself a patient person, but even so, I can’t stand those boring parts of my day that are too short to start a project and too long to sit happily with my legs crossed and hands folded.

I’ve tried reading, but it doesn’t work as well. My stomach turns into smashed-up Jell-o for about three hours after trying to focus my eyes on a book for fifteen minutes in the car. My ipod does a slightly better job of entertaining me. I can listen to it for hours in the car without getting bored, but it only works when I’m in motion, because something is being accomplished just by me sitting on a pleather seat. When I’m waiting for the bus, I get frustrated and bored with my music much more easily.

Knitting though. On the car ride home from school last Saturday, I knitted for four hours straight. It also works in small doses, too. If I have five minutes to spare before I need to leave the house, I knit. If I’m not that interested in the television program I happen to be watching, I knit.

I still feel a little self-conscious about knitting before class because knitting has a lingering reputation of being a senior citizens-only activity, even though lots of young, hip people do it. Though from my experience, people tend to leave me alone with my needles and yarn without much comment when I knit in public.

I would recommend knitting to everyone, but I know that it wouldn’t be as satisfying an activity for some as it is for me. I will, however, prescribe this: a quiet, independent activity in which progress can be made. Even though knitting isn’t exciting, it does have a beginning, middle, and an end. The closer I get to finishing a scarf, the more furiously I work to complete it. This is why knitting is a better way to wait.

For some people, reading does the trick because every time they turn a page, they are getting closer to having mastered the story. In the car, an ipod helps me get restlessly to my destination, but when I’m not in motion it just doesn’t do enough.

I know that I spent less time being stressed this winter once I started knitting, and I would recommend that everyone find their own knitting equivalent. If you know you’re going to have to wait around at some point almost every day of your life, why not use the time to relax and feel accomplished instead of useless and stressed?

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Chic Eco Freak Seeks Equally Freaky; Superhero Capes Preferred

I used to be embarrassed about being tree hugger girl. Recycling girl. Compost girl. While standing in the dining hall during dinner hours and instructing people that they should compost their paper napkins I would think, “God, I look ridiculous. People must think I have no life.” Even though I knew that what I was doing was important, it seemed pretty boring and stupid at the time.

Then something occurred to me. Some people probably do think that I’m an annoying, plant-worshiping, environmental nerd. But a lot of people think it’s cool. It was pretty lonely standing next to a trash can of food slop in plastic gloves and an apron for a few hours, but in reality, I am one of over three million college students who volunteer (www.nationalservice.gov).

And there are so many activists in the world who are much more dedicated to their causes than me--Bono, Al Gore, Angelina Jolie. I’ve never thought, “Jeez, why can’t the Dahli Lama just give it a break for a second and play some Super Smash Brothers this weekend like a normal person?”

In fact, the only negative thought I can possibly have regarding other activists is guilt because they are much more generous with their time and resources than me. I discovered that there is no reason to be ashamed of being a passionate person. And as soon as I stopped being embarrassed about being an eco-freak, I was suddenly way more hip and interesting.
When I asked Ashley George, the coordinator for the Center for Service and Civic Engagement, one reason why someone should volunteer, she said, activism is “essential to the functioning of our communities and connect[s] us as human being to each other in a way that can’t happen in many other capacities.” Okay—so I didn’t feel particularly connected to humanity during my existence as compost girl, but that’s because I hadn’t found a type of service that could grab my attention. It turned out that environmental architecture was my thing.

With this in mind, I have an assignment for the semester: be a freak. Find an issue that gets you foaming at the mouth, (maybe Champlain being a dry campus, skateboard bans in your hometown, or littering,) and do something about it. Research it. Tell your friends about it. Write a letter to someone with power. Design a t-shirt about it. Meet other people who are interested in it. Bring it up in class discussions. Dress up as it for Halloween, and when people ask, tell them about it!

You might feel foolish and a little obsessed at first, but I think you’ll find that your friends respect you for not hiding the most interesting aspects of your personality from them. Yes, a few laugh and say, “dude, you’re wasting your time,” but in the end, other people will see that they are the absurd ones, not you. Especially for the guys, girls love it when you get worked up about animal abuse or homelessness or cancer research, so don’t be afraid to flout your cause. There are plenty of other bonuses to becoming an expert about an issue, too. You’ll have a subject to write your next research paper about. You’ll meet other people with the same interest as you. You’ll be able to volunteer your time for something that actually interests you. You’ll become aware of other related issues that may interest you even more. And you may find a career focus or lifelong hobby.

The only way to get motivated to do all these things, though, is to find an issue that gets you jazzed. So pick up a newspaper or watch the news--even the Daily Show can get you started. Once you get going, it won’t seem more like work any longer--more like a mission. Ever notice that Superman and Batman seem to be the most popular and lovable characters on their shows? It’s because everyone loves daring, generous, and optimistic people, so be the coolest person you know this year and do something BIG.

Caution: Snowmen Xing

It snowed for 24 hours straight in Burlington yesterday and I loved it. It’s not that I’m a snow connoisseur—I don’t ski or snowboard or enjoy stepping in slush puddles on the way to the bus—I just love emergencies. This isn’t the first time I’ve said it, either. I’ve admitted it for years.
Actually, I think almost everyone loves emergencies, but we don’t like to say it out loud. It seems mean-spirited to enjoy the panic of a snowstorm when you know someone is probably out there skidding into a telephone pole or worrying if their furnace will run out of fuel tonight. It’s not the pain and frustration that I like about emergencies, though. It’s the …(prepare yourself for gross, clichéd word)…freedom.
In everyday life, I’ve got about 5,000 activities going at once, and for the most part I’m just trying to do all of them well enough so that I don’t have to look at them ever again. I don’t go very far out of my way to help other people in normal life because I’ve got so much of my own jobs going on that I can’t be bothered with someone else’s. Also, on regular days, my “to do” list rules my life. If I’m not doing something productive, I start feeling guilty and force myself to do annoying and sometimes unnecessary work.
In emergencies, though, everything I do becomes more organic, and (for the most part) makes more sense. In out-of-the-ordinary days, I almost always naturally wake up early and have guilt-free time to sit in my bed staring at the wall for 20 minutes before I get up and have a bowl of cereal. (I have this sitting and staring into space problem that Allyson always makes fun of me about. I don’t notice that I do it, but apparently it happens a lot. I think it’s a writer thing.)
During emergencies, I can take the time help someone out, because the 5,000 “important” duties that I would normally have are cancelled or out of my control at the moment. From my window at Spinner I saw a woman offer to push some people out of their parking space because their Oldsmobile had gotten stuck in the snow, and the whole dilemma ended up taking about five minutes to fix (which I think is more time than the lady was bargaining for in her work clothes and ankle-deep slush) but she never let on that she was annoyed with these people for not getting their tires changed since 1981.
The best part about emergencies is that they’re really exciting, but also extremely boring at the same time. During my sophomore year of high school, someone called in a bomb threat every Wednesday morning for three months. We would all get shipped off to the Civic Center to wait for police to check the building, which meant that we had pretty much nothing to do for a few hours. The only way to know you have really, really bonded with people is to forced to be with them and have nothing do, but still have a hilarious time.
It finally stopped snowing this morning and everything seems to have gone back to normal. The only clues that yesterday had been out-of-the-ordinary were the four giant snowmen and one igloo that I saw from the bus on my way to class. It was good while it lasted. More snow this weekend?

Bobsled

This January I resolved to play outside more. It sounds like a lame challenge, I know. Actually, It sounds like I am trying to revert back to a childish behavior instead of pushing myself to be bigger and badder.

To be honest, I decided to play outside more because I needed more fresh air and exercise in my life than I was getting last fall, so I am now making time for aimless outdoor adventures.

Which is why I went bobsledding last weekend.

It sounded like a quaint Saturday afternoon activity until I saw a bobsled go by me at 80 miles per hour. Speed doesn’t seem that impressive when you’re in a car or train or plane because there’s no wind resistance, so it doesn’t feel that different whether you’re going 20 or 100 miles per hour. Not true with bobsledding.

Bobsleds do not have windshields. They also do not close in the back. They are not cushioned or equipped with airbags. You do not get strapped in to them. Overall, they have less safety features than a banana peel. What they do have is tracks on the bottom that look like wide, iron ice skate blades.

While waiting for my turn to get pushed onto an ice slope in a metal casket, I felt myself becoming my mom.
Mom doesn’t do things like bobsledding. She doesn’t go on theme-park rides. She does not jump off of cliffs into water. Besides cars, she does not drive motorized vehicles. She does not play contact sports. All in all, she does not get any thrill out of danger.

Since high school, I have slowly been collecting her fears. When I was nine, I would jump off of rock cliffs into water. Now, I don’t.

While I shivered in the cold at the “launching deck” for the bobsleds, I wished I had put my foot down (like mom would have) and refused to even consider going to an event like bobsledding.

When I got to the bottom, I was glad that I had done it. Picking up speed on a downward slope is always intoxicating. There’s no way to explain why going faster and faster and faster is fun. Also, I had conquered my fear of the bobsled. I had completed an outdoor activity that wasn’t physically straining, but still hard. I had overcome my mom instinct.

This post is not intended as an anti-mom. It’s an anti-irrational fear post. My mom has already made up her mind about activities she would like to do and activities she would not. There’s nothing wrong with that, and if you’ve ever met my mom, you would know that she’s not changing her mind anyways.

What I’m hoping to do is prevent myself from limiting the things I chose to do, so that I won’t have to fear bobsledding and contact sports in the future. Jumping off of high cliffs into water is already out of the question for me, so now is the window of time when I decide what it is I will do.

Thoughts for a Wednesday

I thought of this idea in about three minutes this morning while studying for my Capitalism and Democracy quiz. I blurted it all out on the page at once, and it happened to end up in poetry. I've never had this idea before, and I don't live up to any of what I am preaching here, but I think it makes sense for me to start trying.
* * *

Do not reward yourself for hard work.

Do not reward yourself for cynicism, or intelligence,
Or ingenuity, or optimism.
Do not reward yourself for social aptitude.

Do not reward yourself for individuality or rebellion.

Do not reward yourself for feats of manipulation, or humor,
Or romance, or efficiency.

Reward balance.

The Hut

FOUND (aka another post about the hobo hut, Darin, and my cell phone)

When we were walking down to check on the hobo hut yesterday, Darin said, “hey, maybe we’ll find your phone,” and I said I hope not, because finding your phone after going through all the trouble of getting a new one is like getting remarried after all the trouble of getting divorced. (I actually have no idea if that analogy works.)
But there it was -- glistening with water, smiling, and still (remarkably) turned on with (even more remarkably) full battery. It was hidden in about the most obvious place ever, a foot away from the entrance of the hobo hut, and about three feet away from where I realized I had lost it. Since the hobo hut seems to have turned into a place for hobos to sleep at night and college students to visit by day, I have no idea how the phone could have possibly stayed there for seven days without getting picked up or stepped on. My roommate Allyson thinks that the hobo must have charged the battery for me at some point during the week. I have trouble disagreeing with her. If someone wasn’t taking care of it, I can’t imagine how it could have survived a week of snow, freezing temperatures, and other people being down there. What I am certain of is that fate and hobos work in mysterious ways and that we should be kind to both of them. Last week I thought losing my cell phone was the worst thing that could have happened, but this week I’m weirdly glad that it did.

LOST

Day #1: In Denial

Last Sunday I put three things in my jacket pocket before I left the apartment: my camera, my keys, and my cell phone. I also poured myself a quick glass of orange soda before I headed out because it was the only beverage we had in the fridge besides Ketchup. I met Darin at the elevator. Our intention was to do something cool, like build a snow cave or something, but instead we ended up walking up to a large snow bank across the street, kicking it a few times, and giving up. We decided to walk down the trail by the Winooski River to see how Ian’s fort held up over Christmas vacation. Ian’s fort was built by my friend Ian. He made it a few months ago in the woods near our apartment building because we were going through this nature survival tv program phase (i.e. Bear Grylls.) Anyways, when we got there, I saw that someone (college students, a homeless person??) had tripled the size of the shelter with logs added across the front. This was exciting to me, and knew Ian would be thrilled about these developments, so I had to call him to discuss it. That’s when I discovered I had lost my cell phone – which is where I was going with this story.

I panicked when I realized it was gone, and began searching the ground around the hobo hut, thinking that it must have dropped out of my pocket. Darin came up with reasonable explanations for where it might be (at the apartment) and I – being quite flustered and certain that he was wrong – insisted that it could only be in unreasonable places (stolen by a hobo.) When I got back home, I swept over the apartment, but too much in despair to try that hard to look for it. I already knew I wouldn’t find it. It was on vibrate, which mean that if it was in the snow, I wouldn’t hear it, and if it was in my apartment, I would hear it (which I didn’t.)

Day #2: I wish everyone I knew would lose something valuable to them, so that they would understand my suffering.

I was angry at the world for swallowing up my two month old cell phone, and I couldn’t stop obsessing over how gone it was. It was hard to concentrate on homework that day because my thoughts would go, “Okay, I need to read page PHONE ten in this book and answer PHONE questions about PHONE PHONE PHONE it to post PHONE online.” My pocket felt empty. I kept wanting to call people to tell them that I lost my phone. I would be stabbed through the heart every time I realized how much that idea didn’t make sense. I also felt insanely jealous of anyone I saw operating a telephone that day, especially my friends. “Insensitive traitors!” I would think.

I also made a plan with my mom that if I didn’t find my phone by tomorrow, she would replace it, but it would have to be mailed to me, since U.S. Cellular doesn’t exist in Vermont. That meant it would arrive at the earliest on Friday. Friday seemed really far away.

Day #3: Ready to talk about it.

By now, I had realized that my phone was actually gone and I was ready to go public with the news. My Facebook message read: “LOST: 1 grey and orange phone yesterday (sunday) in spinner/skating rink/trail to Ian's fort. Responds by vibrating when called.”

I was also able to think practically about the matter at certain times throughout the day. I cleaned out my desk drawer in case it was buried in the clutter. I made a third trip out to the hobo hut but I didn’t really look for the phone, because it was clear that someone was sleeping in it at night, and I was afraid of being raped and murdered if I hung out there too long.

At other times throughout the day, I was still angry and unreasonable about my loss. I looked at some baby photos of myself on the computer to make my problem seem insignificant in the context of my entire life. It helped a little, but then I just felt stupid about looking at the pictures at all. Also, all of the stress made me want to call my mom a lot. Which reminded me that I didn’t have a phone a lot.

Day #4: Feeling like a pioneer, except instead of traversing the Great Plains in a wagon without getting dysentery, I have traversed 72 hours without instant connection to everyone I know.

I had a revelation about communication today: they way people solve (or try to solve) their problems in 2010 is by announcing them to the world. Think about how many “FML” Facebook statuses are out there. Every time something goes wrong, we whip out our cell phones and call someone for reassurance. It’s how we cope with scary and confusing. Last winter, when I got pulled over by a cop for the first time, I called my dad when I couldn’t find the car’s registration instead of continuing to look for it like a reasonable person would. I probably thought his voice would reassure me, but if he hadn’t picked up, I would or wouldn’t have figured out where the paper was, and either way, I’d have gotten through it.

After that thought, I felt much more Zen about the matter. I did start to feel pretty tough for spending a whole week of college without a cell phone, but then I started thinking about the guy in the hobo hut…

photo from:

http://www.aboutcellulars.com

10 Epiphanies I Remember Having in the Semi-Recent Past

1. Be upfront about your limitations.

2. You can condition without shampooing, but never shampoo without conditioning.

3. Have a plan that you can see yourself implementing.

4. Don’t rebel for the sake of rebellion. Do what’s right. It will undoubtedly be some type of rebellion.

5. Try to eat something from each of the 5 food groups every day.

6. Practice moderation.

7. Don’t be shy about shutting off the television.

8. Don’t brag. People will be more impressed if they figure you out on their own.

9. Only date someone whose company you could enjoy even if you weren’t dating him.

10. Remember that everyone has a story they aren’t telling you.

Filling Up the Days

From my house in small-town Maine, you can walk to Bailey’s Apple Orchard about half a mile down the street, and Varney’s gas station a little over half a mile up the street in the opposite direction. In about five minutes, you can drive from my house to St. Denis Church, Whitefield Elementary School, and the Windsor Fair. My nearest friend and the grocery store are in Augusta, a fifteen-minute drive away. Most of the other people and places I that want to get to, like the movie theater are about 12 miles away.

Whenever someone offers to meet me at the mall, or go out to eat, or get together at someone’s house, my first thoughts are parking, lane changing, merging onto the highway, driving in reverse, and navigating rotaries. Even though I’ve had my license for four years, I still haven’t gotten used to operating a vehicle. The only time I like driving is at night. In Augusta, most of the traffic (and by traffic I mean Maine quasi-traffic) has leaked out of the city (and by city I mean medium-sized town) by about 7:30, and that’s when I feel comfortable enough to relax my grip on the steering wheel and turn on the radio. During the day, I drive like an old lady with cataracts. Except that I really don’t because I’ve never been in an accident or close to an accident. I just think that I suck at driving, so I avoid it when I can.

With an isolated house and an aversion to escaping from it before 7:30, I have mastered the art of daytime solitude over school vacations. For those of you who are also two weeks in to winter break, and suffering from boredom/loneliness (even if you live in town and don’t mind driving), here is my advice: make a list and stay busy. Sleeping, watching tv, and going on Facebook will only get you so far, and they are an easy way to waste a week’s worth of time, so come up with an agenda of stuff you want to accomplish. Don’t write yourself a list of chores. Write yourself a dream list of everything you want to do to have a relaxing and productive week. Here is mine:

Work on blog

Knit

Spend time outside every day

Read book assigned for my new job next semester

Study Spanish flashcards to get ahead on Chapter 6

Buy music with itunes gift cards

Watch Bride of Frankenstein

Revive dead orchid plant

Work on logo for spring environmental project

I also have stuff that I don’t put on my list, but I do every day to fill up the time that I don’t have activities planned for myself, like helping to cook dinner, refilling the woodstove, and getting the mail. And, okay, it seems kind of stupid to have to make up little “jobs” to stay busy, but it does work. I never watch tv during the day, and I rarely find myself sitting on the couch without anything to do. When I think of new things that I want to accomplish, I add them to my list, and when I finish things I scribble them out. At the end of vacation, it’s rewarding to look over my crossed-out-and-written-on-in-four-varieties-of-pen-and-pencil scrap of paper, before throwing it in recycling. I admit, if anything about me is reminiscent of an old lady with cataracts, it’s probably more my obsessive list making and activity planning than my driving skills, but this is what gets me through vacations, so I’m sticking with it!