I Write To Understand. I Write To Stop Time
In preparation for the upcoming St. Louis Ren Fair and my stint as Avis McGregor, I’m borrowing my mother’s sewing machine to make my garb. I brought it home and started looking at the piles of cloth I have that are waiting to be hand stitched into something, and suddenly I’ve become like that guy in the meme, but only with:
SEW ALL THE THINGS!!!
Last week, I got married in Disney World, where Cohiba and I have had a lot of fun. Before we went, I looked up some new details I wanted to find, as a way to prolong the magic.
1. In Magic Kingdom, I read that something “unexpected” happened when you curtsy in front of the water fountain statue of Cinderella holding a bird behind her castle. I knew it wouldn’t be anything as unexpected as, say, fireworks going off, but I wondered if maybe the statue would transform into something, or I would hear the bird tweet.
I don’t know how that could have been engineered, but this is Disney World. It’s magic!
I have never forgiven my mother for this:
When I was in junior high, we went to church with a man who worked at one of the large event venues in downtown St. Louis. One year, I think in seventh grade, so 1991, my mother woke me up before school…
****wavy going-back-in-time window***
“Hey Sarie! You know Bill and how he works for the stadium? Well, he’s pulled some strings for us to go to the New Kids on the Block concert coming up.”
This is a weekly post I do to highlight blogs or bloggers who have inspired me in some way during this week.
1. Rituals from Ginger Sister. For me, rituals are powerful and even spiritual anchors in life. When was in college, when I went out with an Indian man and learned how to make masala tea, or chai. His sister sent me spices from India, so I didn’t have to depend on a weak stock of stale cinnamon and nutmeg. Every morning started with me over the stove, listening for the boil and smelling the increasingly fragrant steam that rose as the tea heated. Then, I moved away, we split up, and I stopped doing it regularly. I found I had a real gap where this ritual had been and felt adrift.
This post is about a beautiful way of transitioning into something new and using ritual to ease that.
3. Finally, there is a delightful blog I stumbled upon this week, Browsing the Atlas, and I found it through the recommendation of the travelogue Take a trip with Andrew McCarthy from the Comfort of Your Chair. I love a good travelogue and I love to find others with a love of traveling. Thank you!
Inspiration Engine is a weekly post I do about blogs that have inspired something in my this week. I normally do it on Thursdays, but am late (again) this week and am getting it out to day. Apologies. I will also skip next week because I’ll be on my wedding trip. It will pick up the following week.
1. This post, “Untitled,” from the Mindfulness Revolution. This is a very calming post for me, in that it helps me focus and center. It says, “Anything that comes in through the senses is also regarded as ‘food’ for the body and therefore affects one’s mental emotional, and physical health.” I don’t know about you but I have a tumultuous relationship with “food;” I imagine we all do, actually. Eating is quite an emotional experience, and the consequences of eating (or not) have such manifestations that we can’t help but have strong personal feelings about it. As I type this right now, I am watching what I eat so I can fit into my wedding dress. At the same time, I am feeling a headache coming on, a headache brought of not eating the right thing at the right time, {or not enough of it.) I’m also thinking about how to “maintain” dietary plans while at Disney World, a processed-food mecca. Therefore, the idea of nourishing myself through my eyes broadens my idea of “food” and consumption, sort of reframes it. Moreover, the overall message of mindfulness is a particularly poignant reminder during this time in my life, just before my wedding (in three days.) Thank you, Mindfulness.
I am getting married in Disney World (DW) in 5 days! Eee! I am so excited, of course for the wedding, but also for the week-long opportunity to explore Disney World! Cohiba and I always get so much joyful play-time out of it.
One thing that I really like about DW is that, each time, I have found new things to do, things that make it more special. These are some new things I hope to find this time:
In Magic Kingdom:
I’m getting married next Monday and I am So. Excited. This is the first (and only!) marriage that either of us have had, which is odd at our age (mid-30s). I think it’s because we were created for each other and we kind of knew it.
I have never been so excited for something, and I know this is going to be one of the happiest days of my life. I picked up my dress yesterday, our rings are coming in tonight… My coworkers gave me a beautiful card and a gift certificate to our favorite cigar bar. I feel so special.
So excited.
I have had this exact conversation. Multiple times.
He doesn’t hate women.
Above and beyond everything else, he wants you to know this: he does not hate women.
He has two daughters, for god’s sake, and a wife that he adores beyond anything else, and a sister that he texts every day and a mother who is the strongest person that he’s ever known – yes, stronger than any of the men he’s met. So don’t think that this is because he hates women.
If anything, his real problem is loving women too much.
See, he just wants his daughters to grow up safe and happy. And to be honest, some of the things that you’re saying – that these feminists are saying – are troubling to him.
He just wants to have a sort of academic chat. Peer to peer. Grownup to grownup. That’s all. He’s not saying you’re wrong – not by a long shot! He…
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This is a weekly post I do to highlight blogs or bloggers who have inspired me in some way during this week. I’m a little late finding posts for this, as my grandmother passed away last Friday and we were dealing with that this week. In the small amount of time, however, I did find something:
Is there anything like a funeral to put you in a contemplative mood? We buried my grandmother yesterday, and it’s kind of been a little hard for the past few days as we held the wake and the funeral.
Grandma had a complicated relationship with all three of her daughters and then, by extension, me. She could be a bitch on wheels and she drank way too much, which is probably why she could be so loose and cruel with her tongue. Then I remember my last phone call with her and how sweet it was. So that makes me think about love and different ways of showing it.
Continue reading “Nothing wrong with a little contemplation”
