you know what i really miss

about Italy right now?

Having big hair.

My hair could be an afro poof and no one would look twice.  It wouldn't phase them.  If they looked at me, they would probably think, "Dang, that girl's hair looks sorta flat," except that they're Italians, so it would go through their brain something more like, "THE HAIR!  MY MOTHER!  THAT: WHAT IS THAT?  HAIR?  NO.  NOT HAIR.  MY MOTHER.  THE FLATNESS, THE LACK OF BODY, THE LIMP STRAGLEY LOCKS FLOWING DOWN FROM HER FACE, HER UNFRAMED FACE, CHE MANAGIA, THE HAIR NOT GOOD STRAGLEY FLAT CHE MANAGIA MY MOTHER BAD HAIR."

So I don't miss everything about Italy.

But anyways, for real, I could walk out with curls streaming out to Asia and up to Pluto and it would be totally cool.

See Exhibit A.  Here I am in my old computer lab at that smelled really, really bad.  Behind me is a diagram similar to what our teacher would use to somehow demonstrate some sort of churchy communications idea.  He always used sports diagrams, although I kind of got the impression that he didn't really know what he was talking about when it came to basketball.  Our teacher did not draw the diagram behind me; we (myself and my class buddy who kept me sane) drew it ourselves to make fun of it.  Next to it is the word "Prudenza," which means Prudence, which was often repeated in our classes (the irony).  I wrote "Liberta" above it, to commemorate when Joseph and I got stuck on a bus for 7 hours from Fatima to Cordoba Spain and we had to watch Braveheart dubbed over in Italian with a minny-voiced (probably short little) Italian weakly saying (no shouting, emphasis, or extra emotion) "Liberta." instead of saying "FREEDOOOHHHHM!!!"  We were both commemorating the fact that after we completed our theses and got our degrees, we would be "Professore" and "Professoressa" and could supposedly teach in Pontifical Schools.  Which makes my current life and line of work really, really ironic.

But I digress.  So these were the days when hair could be big(ger) and it was ok.  Here, surrounded by plethoras of pale-faced blondes with ironed hair, I feel out of place.  I feel like I should try to fit in.  But I really hate that.  So my hair is long and perpetually in a pony tail.

So I'm getting a haircut this weekend.  I want something bohemian and thinned out (ok, I'll sell out a little) with side-swept bangs that says "I'm a put-together-and-adorable writer, respect me or move aside."  It's going to happen if I can drag myself out of bed on a Saturday morning (hard).  And it will be awesome if I can figure out what I want.  Pictures will come.  And now that I've published it, it has to come true.

this is to remind me

that I do love my job.

....................................

Blogger is no longer being retarded is now allowing me to upload photos.  But you can still get its backstory here.

simplicity

a dear friend of mine reminded me of its worth today.

Not everything has to be grand.  Or perfect or monumental and extraordinary.  Not everything should be.

A strong feeling that I've had the last few weeks has been: whelmed.  Not overwhelmed, not overwhelmed: just whelmed.  By the litany of things that I should be doing - could be doing - to make my life more interesting, meaningful, sparkly, or even just plain organized.

My laundry-list of reproach is long.  I have an embarrassingly lengthy list of e-mails that I've never returned.  A number of dear friends that I still haven't connected with (even though I've been back from Rome for ten months - jab jab jab).  Babies I haven't met (accompanied by baby cards I intended to send and never did).  A drawing kit I bought on Valentine's Day that I still haven't cracked.  Work assignments that I'm slow on.  A room that refuses to stay clean.  Deadlines I cheat on.  A heartache I should have unravelled by now.  A social life that I soak up one week and discard the next because I'm just so so incredibly tired from keeping "it" all in the air.

Single life is supposed to be so glamorous somehow.  Yeah.  Sometimes it is an absolute thrill to keep it all going.  And sometimes, its just a pile of stuff thrown at you and you're on your own.

Whelmed.  Whether it's by other people's expectations or my idea of how-it-should-be.

Both of them are so damn distracting.  Because neither of them is real.  I can't control what people think about me and I can only do so much to reach my ideals (are they even what I want anyways?).  But with either of them at the forefront, I turn away from the reality of what is happening before me.  Or even within me.

It's good to remember that our goal in this life is simplicity, order, and love for the sake of the only One who matters.  That, as a dear friend once wrote to me in high school, "All that is gold does not glitter / Not all those who wander are lost."  We only have to find ourselves in Him.

That might be the hardest thing of all.  But it is simple.

thank you

for all of the prayers and good wishes that you've been sending my way.  The peace that I've had for the last three days could only be coming from that.  And it's literally keeping me going.

So it's a Saturday night . . .wait, early Sunday morning . . . and I logged in 73 hours at work this week, counting today.  I almost wish that Sunday counted as part of this week so that I could brag about a 80 hour week.  Yep.  I'm going in tomorrow.  Hopefully not for too long.

Whatever.  I'll be there for 10 hours.

I think it's criminal to work on a Sunday.  But then again, so is working 80 hours in a week.  Guess I might as well break all the rules in style.

Some fun goodness came at the end of the workweek that's left me looking forward to the next . . . :)   And yes, it shall stay as cryptic as that.

So please say a prayer that everything pulls together and I can make it out of work by 2:30 tomorrow so I can go to my nephew's play.  I can't stand the thought of missing it.  I moved back to this area so that I wouldn't miss moments like this.

And with this factual post coming to a conclusion, I say:  good night.

some of you remember me

when I had my first job.

I was green out of college with an English degree that left me dazed and helpless, staring at a long list of Washington Post career listings that didn't quite seem to apply.  I ended up as the executive assistant (translation: b-word number two) of a Washington big-whig, and I was a wreck.

12-hours days of constant multi-tasking and oh-crappity-crap situations arising with every ping in the inbox.  It's just not me.

It became me, but it wasn't me.  I didn't like the transformation.

I cried when I read the Devil Wears Prada because I related too much.  And I cried in front of a sandwich one day because I was too stressed to even do something that would make me feel better.  Like eat.

It didn't matter that I flew in a private jet once.  I didn't care that Sandra Day O'Connor signed my book. Or that I drank from a $300 bottle of wine.  I was too stressed out to care.

Look back through my journal of that year (which you never will, but it serves), and there is entry after entry of variations of this statement.  Every part of me is being pounded and molded into something that I don't fit into.  And the best parts of me are being stripped away.

When I look back on that year now, I like to think of it as character-building.  It pounding off a healthy layer of illusionment.  Toughened me up a bit . . . maybe too much.  And it taught me one very important thing.

The world doesn't actually end, even when it feels like it's going to.

Fast forward 3 1/2 years.

My Gchat buddies could tell you one thing about me these days, even though I rarely say hi to them.  I'm stressed out of my my mind.  I cannot actually scream out loud at work.  Clearly.  So I virtually scream in the little line of text box that Gmail provides me.  You know - it's all about the little things.

My poor friends.

I stayed at work until 9:30 on Monday.  10:00 Tuesday.  I finally gave up today and left at 7:30 with a pile of work to pick at when I got home . . . only to have a mental mutiny and resolve with defiance that I just wasn't going to do it.  The brain needs a break, right?  OF COURSE.

On the way to bed at 10:30, I reflected with fear on all of the things that had to get done tomorrow and I flew downstairs and started racing through the pile.  It's almost 2:00 AM and I knocked one huge thing off my list.  So why am I still awake?

To do something human.

Because writing on a blog is something that normal people with normal, unstressed lives (that allow you to go to the post office so you can buy stamps and actually pay your bills (sorry roommates)) do.

Because letting yourself think with your own thoughts, and not what has been drilled and twisted and configured into work-thoughts, is a pure and precious thing worth capturing.

Because I have cheese and crackers next to me?

I throw this question out into the void - how do you find the balance?  How do you mine out that sacred chamber that you can dip into and find peace in the midst of complete and utter crap and chaos?

I'm going to be searching for it these next two days . . . say a prayer that I don't lose it before then.

I have not laughed this hard . . .

. . . in months.  Click 'n enjoy.  :)

Open Letter to God

ashes, ashes . . .

At the risk of being irreverent.

The toddler grinning up at me on my way to get ashes had a smushed black smudge all over his forehead, on the right side of his nose, and between his fingers.  Then he tripped on the pew.

Ashes, ashes . . .

 . . . we all fall down.