Dos

Woke-up to my dearest friend and colleague calling my cellphone at 7:21 a.m., which is exactly one hour and 21 minutes past when I need to drag my lazy self out of bed to be to work on time. My iphone decided it is taking a brief hibernation, I suppose, since it completely neglected to sound the three (3!!!!!) different alarms I had set to jolt me out of my holiday bliss.

Jen calls. I literally levitate into my bathroom, where I disenrobe, brush my hair and my teeth and re-clothe myself in approximately 5 seconds. And after glancing into a shiny surface today, I can honestly say it shows. Nice.

I grab my two bags full of school-ish crap and load into my ever frosted over car. I'm driving down the road pondering my extremely bad vision, all the while blaming it on the frost. But when I waltz into school and my vision doesn't clear, I realize I've left my stinking glasses at home!!! So now I'm late and blind. Great way to start the day. At least my generally insane classroom of 7 year olds was actually very well behaved today. It made me proud that they could keep it together better than I could on the first day back. But heck, to keep it together better than me isn't really sayin' much.

I'm not much for resolutions for a variety of reasons. Namely, that no one ever follows them. Ever. But in the interest of finding meaning for my life, I've resigned to setting a few goals for this year...

1) I'm going to read more and talk less. (doubtful. If you know me at all you know I'm an avid talker. But I really want to try to read more, thus I must in fact talk less)
2) I'm going to do nice things everyday with no hope or need for reciprocation. (I'm actually pretty good at this most of the time, but I want to expand my current niceness level at least two fold)
3) I'm going to learn how to live in balance. (This is my real resolution. I can't balance my checkbook, let alone my life. This will be the one that gets me in the throat.)
4) I'm going to run and become as healthy as I can. (Which means I must live on more than Nutella and toast. Frig.)
5) I'm going to travel frequently. (I want to explore my surrounds in a radiating pattern from the core, ie. central ky, to the extreme most ends of the earth. And I want to photograph it all.)

My life is one giant, sarcastic contradiction. I already know this and hence this blog will feature that concept primarily. When I was a child, I wanted to be a ballet dancing, archeologist. I wanted to awe spectators with my grace and then own them with my knowledge of the world both past and present. These passions are the cornerstones of my internal conflict: in one regard I wanted to be elegant, whimsical, pure and in the other a dirty, rough, boot-wearing, unmanicured scientist. This self-inflicted argument continues in the depths of my very existence, taking root in different colors and shapes than in my younger years. I envy those who know what they want and do it, no matter the repercussions. I wish I had their ca-hones. My issues don't lie in the knowing what I want, but rather in manifesting the confidence to actually go for it heart and soul. I'm always afraid of failure and defeat. And most of all, of letting others down. However, in actualization I am always letting someone down just simply by trying so hard not to let anyone down. 

Photos of my favorite things, cliche yes!!!

From a family of gardeners...thank goodness I got my granny's thumb and not my mom's!

The ring I wear everyday. Was once told the fleur de lis was historically the symbol of murderers and thieves, I've never looked it up for verification, but I liked it. I can empathize with the outcasts.   

The place where I love to be the most. With my books and my glasses and the people I love the most. Yes, people depression hurts. Get help. 

I shot with a lens I have actually never used. Nothing pultizer prize winning, but that isn't really my point.