Friendship

Last night I had one of the most unpleasant experiences that I have had since high school...maybe even middle school. I had a very unfortunate finish to a friendship right before we moved to Seattle that was not my doing or choice. It had been 9 months since I'd seen her when she walked into a party I was at this week while staying with my in-laws. My physical reaction completely surprised me.

First, I was unable to make eye contact with her or even look in her general direction. Did I think if I couldn't see her she couldn't see me? I don't know what I was thinking, but this was a truly odd thing for me to do. Next, my heart was racing. It felt as if it would jump out of my chest or at least travel up by throat and out of my mouth! It was terrible. I'm sure someone in the room could have heard my heart beating.

Hopefully this type of ending to a friendship will never happen to me again. It is another thing that I would like to add to the list of things that I thought would discontinue as an adult. I'm going to try to stop thinking about this long enough to fall asleep. I tend to obsess about something like this, but I need to let it go because there is nothing that I can do to change the situation or correct something that someone else has done to hurt me.

I think in the future I will just trust my instincts at the beginning of a friendship and not ignore my gut feelings. I'm not sure if it would have helped in this situation, but maybe something good will come of this. I'll let you know if I ever figure it out.

Damn, good friends are hard to find! I appreciate those of you that are out there ;-)

As I sit in Wisconsin on my last night, I realize that we belong in Seattle. Ok, I really miss friends and family here, but the muggy weather, flat landscape, and ghetto are not things that I miss. I can deal with the weather and landscape, but the poverty and crime issues in Milwaukee really have gotten to me.

Last night Brian and I drove through our old neighborhood and realized what a shit hole we lived in. Not our condo (because that puts our current home to shame), but the area surrounding our condo is not just dumpy, but dangerous! I think it regestered at the time that it was dangerous, but I don't think that it really occured to me that I, Brian and/or Nora could have really been hurt there. Milwaukee is again on its way to having a 150 murder count this year. Murders in Seattle are VERY big news and are talked about for weeks. The evening news in Milwaukee always starts out with the run down of the recent murders as if it was a simple car accident or a thunder storm.

Perspective is everything. What's 150 murders in a year, right? That's 1,500 people in 10 years, 15,000 people in 100 years. How can this be happening? What can be so wrong that it will make you feel better (or you think it will) if you take another human life? It is outside my ability to think about or understand where you must be in your life to see this as a possibility or a necessity.

The Wonders of Nature

Tonight we went blackberry picking. Blackberries grow wild here on the side of the road and just about anywhere they aren't controlled. Amber, Brian, Nora and I went to the bike path just north of here and looked for blackberry briars. The scary part about blackberries is that not only do they have thorns on the stem of the plant, but the leaves are also covered with tiny thorns! For a little more than three pounds of free blackberries, we braved the thorns and weathered a few sticks and pricks. I think we may have brought home closer to four pounds except for the fact that Nora was pretty hungry ;-)

Aren't I too old for these?

Zits... at 30? I just got the biggest zit I've had in probably a year this morning. I was under the impression that the only good thing about turning 30 (except your car insurance going down) was that the zits would subside. To my dismay, this must be an urban legend because it is obvioulsy not true for me.

After I finished my last session of tutoring today (YEAH!) I went to Sur la Table to get a popcorn popper...hand crank. It was very difficult to have a conversation with the people that worked there because I was sure they were staring at my enormous zit. It was the only think I could think about...could they tell? I was trying very hard to ask about an attachment for my stand mixer, but in my head I was screaming, "Look at my zit! Don't you see the cavernous monstrosity that is a zit on my chin? How can you talk to me about anything else? Aren't you going to offer me some cover-up or a scarf or something?" But instead, the woman acted as if she didn't even notice and continued to make eye-contact with me. Unbelievable. What a kind woman to ignore all my crazy thoughts and my chin as well.

After having to clean the bathroom mirror, I hope to not get another one of these for at least another year.

Bike Rides and the Northwest

My sister and I just went on a two hour bike ride. It was probably the longest ride I've ever been on without feeling like I was going to die by the time we got home. I even got to wear some of her padded butt/cheech biker shorts for the trip!

I have briefly seen the a world of a biker, sorry cyclist. (Brian is a biker, Pea is a cyclist. I always get those two mixed up.) I think my expectations were much greater in respect to how the cyclists treat each other when meeting on the trail. No head nod, smile, or hellos. Bikers have a strange wave where they point their left hand index finger out at a 45 degree angle to every biker that passes. Nothing of the sort exists among cyclists. Funny, even though they all dress the same and are doing the same activity in a confined space, they don't acknowledge each other.

Is that just the way of the Northwest? I have noticed that cashiers, coffee shack workers, clerks, etc. are extremely overly friendly, while in most other situations, people are very guarded. Maybe it is my small-town upbringing that is making it difficult for me to understand, but this behavior seems quite opposite from what I am used to. Unless you know someone, you don't ask them how their day is going or what their plans are for the weekend. These are common questions asked by my coffee shack man or the checkout lady at Walgreens. Why would I want to converse with someone I don't know and that really doesn't care about what I'm doing or how my day is going? On the other hand, people in the work place or in other social situations seem leary of asking these simple questions. Odd. Is it just me or the Northwest?

First Time For Everything

After blogging about my daughter for the last year and a half, I have decided that I need a place to vent my thoughts that aren't centered around her. Welp, here I am and thinking aloud to whom ever feels to urge to listen. Here goes!