Have you ever played matchmaker? How did it go?
I helped. At my cousin's high school graduation Open House, I started talking to one of her friends. She complained of how hard it was to meet smart (and hopefully cute) boys with decent personalities... and I of course had to mention my brother. He met all of her criteria... I really talked him up. I gave her our phone number and told her to call. Far-fetched, right?
My cousin actually took her in to my brother's work to introduce them... but I laid that beginning footwork.
Eleven or twelve years later... she still has that little scrap of paper with our old phone number on it. May will be six years of marriage for them.
My sister-in-law is one of the best additions to my extended family... my other sister-in-law of course qualifies in that category too - but she needs her own entry. :)
I had another Pampered Chef show today. Not as big as my first one, but still very respectable. It was really fun, and laid-back. If they were all like that, I'd be thrilled.
One more show, and I'm officially a qualified consultant. I still don't know if I'll manage to make this a big enough success that I can count on the income, rather than a little hobby thing with a bit of money here and there. It's fun, and I'm learning more about cooking, and more about interacting with people... I tend to be very outgoing, but also very shy. Don't ask me how I make that work, because I don't know. I *have* to be outgoing, and approach people, and ask them things I'm not always comfortable doing, even after 11 years of retail sales. It's all a good thing - if I can make money at it too, all the better.
What is one of your favorite poems?
Submitted by marvel is my pen name.
My all-time favorite is Renascence, by Edna St. Vincent Millay. I keep re-reading this poem, thinking I'll just post an excerpt, rather than the entire long poem, but I can't decided where to cut it off, so here it is in all its glory.
All I could see from where I stood
Was three long mountains and a wood;
I turned and looked another way,
And saw three islands in a bay.
So with my eyes I traced the line
Of the horizon, thin and fine,
Straight around till I was come
Back to where I'd started from;
And all I saw from where I stood
Was three long mountains and a wood.
Over these things I could not see;
These were the things that bounded me;
And I could touch them with my hand,
Almost, I thought, from where I stand.
And all at once things seemed so small
My breath came short, and scarce at all.
But, sure, the sky is big, I said;
Miles and miles above my head;
So here upon my back I'll lie
And look my fill into the sky.
And so I looked, and, after all,
The sky was not so very tall.
The sky, I said, must somewhere stop,
And -- sure enough! -- I see the top!
The sky, I thought, is not so grand;
I 'most could touch it with my hand!
And reaching up my hand to try,
I screamed to feel it touch the sky.
I screamed, and -- lo! -- Infinity
Came down and settled over me;
Forced back my scream into my chest,
Bent back my arm upon my breast,
And, pressing of the Undefined
The definition on my mind,
Held up before my eyes a glass
Through which my shrinking sight did pass
Until it seemed I must behold
Immensity made manifold;
Whispered to me a word whose sound
Deafened the air for worlds around,
And brought unmuffled to my ears
The gossiping of friendly spheres,
The creaking of the tented sky,
The ticking of Eternity.
I saw and heard, and knew at last
The How and Why of all things, past,
And present, and forevermore.
The Universe, cleft to the core,
Lay open to my probing sense
That, sick'ning, I would fain pluck thence
But could not, -- nay! But needs must suck
At the great wound, and could not pluck
My lips away till I had drawn
All venom out. -- Ah, fearful pawn!
For my omniscience paid I toll
In infinite remorse of soul.
All sin was of my sinning, all
Atoning mine, and mine the gall
Of all regret. Mine was the weight
Of every brooded wrong, the hate
That stood behind each envious thrust,
Mine every greed, mine every lust.
And all the while for every grief,
Each suffering, I craved relief
With individual desire, --
Craved all in vain! And felt fierce fire
About a thousand people crawl;
Perished with each, -- then mourned for all!
A man was starving in Capri;
He moved his eyes and looked at me;
I felt his gaze, I heard his moan,
And knew his hunger as my own.
I saw at sea a great fog bank
Between two ships that struck and sank;
A thousand screams the heavens smote;
And every scream tore through my throat.
No hurt I did not feel, no death
That was not mine; mine each last breath
That, crying, met an answering cry
From the compassion that was I.
All suffering mine, and mine its rod;
Mine, pity like the pity of God.
Ah, awful weight! Infinity
Pressed down upon the finite Me!
My anguished spirit, like a bird,
Beating against my lips I heard;
Yet lay the weight so close about
There was no room for it without.
And so beneath the weight lay I
And suffered death, but could not die.Long had I lain thus, craving death,
When quietly the earth beneath
Gave way, and inch by inch, so great
At last had grown the crushing weight,
Into the earth I sank till I
Full six feet under ground did lie,
And sank no more, -- there is no weight
Can follow here, however great.
From off my breast I felt it roll,
And as it went my tortured soul
Burst forth and fled in such a gust
That all about me swirled the dust.Deep in the earth I rested now;
Cool is its hand upon the brow
And soft its breast beneath the head
Of one who is so gladly dead.
And all at once, and over all
The pitying rain began to fall;
I lay and heard each pattering hoof
Upon my lowly, thatched roof,
And seemed to love the sound far more
Than ever I had done before.
For rain it hath a friendly sound
To one who's six feet underground;
And scarce the friendly voice or face:
A grave is such a quiet place.The rain, I said, is kind to come
And speak to me in my new home.
I would I were alive again
To kiss the fingers of the rain,
To drink into my eyes the shine
Of every slanting silver line,
To catch the freshened, fragrant breeze
From drenched and dripping apple-trees.
For soon the shower will be done,
And then the broad face of the sun
Will laugh above the rain-soaked earth
Until the world with answering mirth
Shakes joyously, and each round drop
Rolls, twinkling, from its grass-blade top.
How can I bear it; buried here,
While overhead the sky grows clear
And blue again after the storm?
O, multi-colored, multiform,
Beloved beauty over me,
That I shall never, never see
Again! Spring-silver, autumn-gold,
That I shall never more behold!
Sleeping your myriad magics through,
Close-sepulchred away from you!
O God, I cried, give me new birth,
And put me back upon the earth!
Upset each cloud's gigantic gourd
And let the heavy rain, down-poured
In one big torrent, set me free,
Washing my grave away from me!I ceased; and through the breathless hush
That answered me, the far-off rush
Of herald wings came whispering
Like music down the vibrant string
Of my ascending prayer, and -- crash!
Before the wild wind's whistling lash
The startled storm-clouds reared on high
And plunged in terror down the sky,
And the big rain in one black wave
Fell from the sky and struck my grave.
I know not how such things can be;
I only know there came to me
A fragrance such as never clings
To aught save happy living things;
A sound as of some joyous elf
Singing sweet songs to please himself,
And, through and over everything,
A sense of glad awakening.
The grass, a-tiptoe at my ear,
Whispering to me I could hear;
I felt the rain's cool finger-tips
Brushed tenderly across my lips,
Laid gently on my sealed sight,
And all at once the heavy night
Fell from my eyes and I could see, --
A drenched and dripping apple-tree,
A last long line of silver rain,
A sky grown clear and blue again.
And as I looked a quickening gust
Of wind blew up to me and thrust
Into my face a miracle
Of orchard-breath, and with the smell, --
I know not how such things can be! --
I breathed my soul back into me.
Ah! Up then from the ground sprang I
And hailed the earth with such a cry
As is not heard save from a man
Who has been dead, and lives again.
About the trees my arms I wound;
Like one gone mad I hugged the ground;
I raised my quivering arms on high;
I laughed and laughed into the sky,
Till at my throat a strangling sob
Caught fiercely, and a great heart-throb
Sent instant tears into my eyes;
O God, I cried, no dark disguise
Can e'er hereafter hide from me
Thy radiant identity!
Thou canst not move across the grass
But my quick eyes will see Thee pass,
Nor speak, however silently,
But my hushed voice will answer Thee.
I know the path that tells Thy way
Through the cool eve of every day;
God, I can push the grass apart
And lay my finger on Thy heart!The world stands out on either side
No wider than the heart is wide;
Above the world is stretched the sky, --
No higher than the soul is high.
The heart can push the sea and land
Farther away on either hand;
The soul can split the sky in two,
And let the face of God shine through.
But East and West will pinch the heart
That can not keep them pushed apart;
And he whose soul is flat -- the sky
Will cave in on him by and by.
I reformatted my computer today. It was just getting cranky. I guess my exploration into alternative shells was my undoing.
So I double- and triple-checked that my backups were up-to-date, and wiped it all clean.
My backups were up-to-date, but I had neglected to update my backup set when I switched from online Gmail to downloading my mail into Thunderbird. I also set up a new domain around that time, and started switching all my mail to come through there. So everything since the switch - everything non-Gmail - is hosed.
I also have the heartburn from hell. It's a bad, bad combo. If I'd lost *all* my mail, I'd be throwing things right now. As it is, I've lost between two weeks and a month's worth of stuff... and most of it wasn't important.
My backup sets will be a *lot* more thorough this go-around.
Here's a great song for the Valentine's cynics among us:
Dearly Beloved (Faith Hill)
Good morning, dearly beloved
We are gathered here today
To watch two people we know make a big mistake
They'll stand up at the altar
And solemnly swear i do
They'll be together forever
'til they find somebody new
Her daddy's in the front row
Muttering oh no here we go again
They had a couple dates
Now she's three months late
And it's twenty buck a plate i spent, oh:
Good morning, dearly beloved
I'd like to welcome ya'll
To see the side-effects of sex and alcohol
Please bow your heads and join me
In a prayer for these two
Who'll be together forever
'til they find somebody new
The bride is a flirt and the groom is worse
As he's putting the ring on her
He's checking out the bridesmaids
Thinking that he might take
The maid of honor's honor, oh:
Welcome, dearly beloved
We are here this afternoon
To throw rice as these two
Drive down the road to ruin
With cans tied to the bumper
And a dragging muffler too
They'll be together forever
Until they find somebody new
So raise your glass and join me
Here's to the bride and groom
They'll be together forever
'til they find somebody new
I read an interesting article - and I wish I'd saved it! The author discussed letting go of things we don't need. I'm a packrat. Letting go is hard. She said the critical question in giving things up is "will I lack?" It was a breakthrough for me.
I have three glass measuring cups. I could give all but one away and not lack. The others come in handy, but will their absence cause me real discomfort, or make it harder on me in the kitchen? Nope. Will I tell my mother I'm giving away wedding gifts? Nope.
That's just a start - and actually, one or two of the measuring cups will go in my Pampered Chef crate. Some of my duplicates will make packing for shows easier if I already have those tools in my crate.
I need to find a big box and start filling it - once it's full, I'll list it on my local Freecycle list.
After work and lunch, I cleaned out two of my cupboards today. I suppose it's a sad thing that at 32, I'm excited about cleaning out my cupboards, but I know myself. I get very tense and irritable when things are a mess. I procrastinate, so things are a mess far more than they should be. I'm starting to feel better about my kitchen already. Plus, I can find things!
Do you buy products made locally? Is there anything made in your area that you love?
I don't right now, unless it's by accident. I'm heavily leaning toward buying a share of a CSA farm this summer. We're picky eaters, though - I'd almost have to be able to choose *which* veggies I received, or I know they just wouldn't get eaten.
It might be easier if I just hit up one of the area farmer's markets on a regular basis instead.
I read Pesky Apostrophe and she talks a lot about eating locally-grown and -raised food - and I mean everything. I live close enough to an awful lot of farmers, and a decent-sized city. Between the farmers, the food co-op, the farmer's markets, and the CSA farms... I probably could do it... especially if we stopped eating so much processed crap.
As part of my feeling-better-about-myself campaign, I cleaned the kitchen tonight. I never knew the sink drains could be anything but rust-colored! I really honestly thought that was just the color they were... but with a bit of "Bar Keeper's Friend" and a sponge, nearly all the rust color is gone and it's all shiny and pretty now.
Yes, I'm exciting because my sink is shiny.
Speaking of shiny sinks - I re-joined Flylady. Her web site is cheesy, and sometimes she's too annoying for words, but her house cleaning system works very, very well for me when I stick with it. It's very geared toward perfectionists... and I'm one of the worst kinds: I won't do something if I can't do it well. When it comes to basic home upkeep, that's a bad place to get to. Next thing I know, I'm up to my elbows in piles of clutter. So Flylady it is.
I'm trying to decide whether or not to join Curves. There's one in my teeny-tiny town. It's right across from work, actually. They have rather abysmal hours, as I think all of their small-town franchises do, but I work part-time. I should be able to drag my happy ass in there three times a week.
I don't have a good track record on these sorts of things. I'm worried about sticking with it. But it's so cold here it's progressed from "cold" to "oh my GOD I'm never leaving the house again!" - so walking is out. Exercise videos are an option. I have a bunch. Don't use 'em.
I guess it depends on if I have to sign a contract. If I can pay month-to-month and not have to promise anything... I'm in. That's probably too much to hope for.
