He Ain't Heavy, He's My Brother

A lot of thought went into whether or not I should post this information to the internet, but sometimes emotions are just too big to keep bottled up inside.  I am worried about my little brother and I feel guilty for not being in Florida with my family right now.  Sometimes it's enough just to be thinking about the person, right?

For those of you who don't know, my brother (we'll call him Andy because he hates it) has been dealing with some difficult medical issues recently.  Last week he underwent surgery to have a medium-sized tumor removed from his stomach. On Monday he'll be meeting with his surgeon to receive a referral to a cancer specialist.  We don't yet know whether the tumor is benign or malignant, but we're all keeping our fingers crossed and our hopes high.  He's only 25 years old.

It's funny, my whole life I've had the possibility of cancer in the back of my head.  I realize that this contradicts my generally cheery disposition, as it sounds incredibly morbid, but it's true.  Within my lifetime I've had a handful of relatives suffer, and in most cases die, from it.  I often 'joke' that if I can make it past 35 I'll live to be 100.  Realistically, that trend tends to be true on both sides of the tree.

I love living in Portland, and moving across the country has done wonders for my sanity and general well-being, but it is both emotionally and mentally stressful to be so far away from everyone right now.  I want to be there to talk to the doctors because I know what questions to ask and what information to provide.  I want to cook meals for my brother and his fiance, and take them both out for a little rest and relaxation. Mostly, I want to be the big sister.

That being said, it seems as though I have no choice but to come to Florida for Christmas this year. I don't know how long I'll be there or what I'll be able to accomplish, but just seeing my family and knowing they're okay will be nice.  Plus, I like seeing the look on my mom's face when I hoist my 50-pound suitcase full of rice pasta into the car.

Please send good joo-joo Andy's way, if you are so inclined.  Thank you.

Come On-A My House

Have you ever heard the phrase "too many chefs in the kitchen"? Well, my life right now is an exact representation of that saying.  I'm not at all complaining. Heck no.  Honestly, I find it kind of fun and exciting! I know that phrase is supposed to have a negative connotation, but to me where food is concerned the more good cooks you can have around the better.

Allow me to start from the beginning.  In order for Chris and I to move into our fabulous new house we had to find roommates.  Fortunately for us two of our best friends from Florida, Alan and Martha, were looking to relocate out here around the same time our lease was up on the old place.  You've got to love serendipity!  Anyway, both of them are professional chefs - meat-loving, whole spice-using, Americana-appreciating, Emeril-fearing chefs.

Now, I don't know if I've told you this before but Christopher and I love to cook, and I don't want to toot my own horn but we're pretty dang good at it. However, he and I are more of the gluten-fearing, tofu-loving, thai/indian fusion-cooking, vegetarian type of people. In fact, whereas most new roommates focus on the financial details and chore distribution charts prior to cohabitation, the bulk of our conversations focused around the kitchen: how to properly separate meat and bread/flour tools from vegetarian and gluten free tools, what types of mushrooms would be in season upon their arrival, what recipes we had to make together, etc.  I mean finances are important, but food equals life!

I come from a southern family, and by southern I mean the orange groves of Florida and cotton fields of Alabama. Family gatherings were almost always focused around the meal which was usually a combination of traditional plates, each prepared by a different member of the family who specialized in that particular dish.  Gram (great grandma Laura) always made sweet potatoes slathered in toasted marshmallows, Grandma Helen spent all day working on her fried chicken, my mom made squash casserole and her "special salad"... Everybody pitched in to create the perfect, scrumptious family meal.

I find it extremely comforting that my new Portland family is working very much the same way.  We've cooked multiple fabulously scrumptious meals together!  My favorite, so far, was 'breakfast for dinner' night, when Alan and I teamed up to make GF pancakes with homemade huckleberry syrup, hashbrowns with cheese, my famous tofu-style bacon, fried cheese grit cakes, and fresh-cut real bacon (for the meaties in the house).  When dinner was ready we all sat down at the table together and enjoyed an old-fashioned, family-style meal. It was absolutely wonderful!

I would love to start posting recipes on this site, but I need some feedback from you first.  Would you, my bloggy friends, like to see that sort of content on this blog regularly?  If so, I'll start taking pictures and writing down ingredients more often.  All four of us tend to make recipes up as we go so it'll take some extra effort to figure out measurements, but it's well worth the effort if you are interested.  It's up to you; speak now or [don't] forever hold your peace!

Until next time, sia nara!

You Say It Best When You Say Nothing At All

Well, hello there!  I know, I'm sorry.  I've been neglecting you, my beloved blog. Once upon a time (in my first blog post) I promised to write something in you every day.  Eh, so that didn't quite work out.  Se la vie!

The reality is things have been rather hectic these past few months. I moved, started a new job and a new school semester, registered for the GRE (yikes!), revitalized my other blog (Life Beyond Gluten), and (dun, dun, dunnnnn) started a twitter account.  Okay, so the twitter account took about five seconds to create, but everything else has been very time intensive.  I promise!  Anyway, things have gotten a little crazy over here, and by 'over here' I mean in my brain.  I seriously might be losing it.  I just don't have the same chutzpah anymore.

I have two theories as to why my energy/dedication/sanity may be wavering:

1. I feel completely overwhelmed by the fact that I am going to school AND working AND studying for a test that will ultimately decide whether I get into grad school next year or take a year off to twiddle my thumbs for a while (melodramatic much?).
2. For the first time in a long time I am living somewhere that I don't hate, that isn't tiny, and that has built in friends, fun, and relaxation.  For the past two years Christopher and I have been cohabiting in a terrifically small studio apartment, which I was more than willing to escape from to work in the school computer labs every available moment.  Now, that extra push of external motivation is gone.  I didn't realize how much of my success was relying on that.

I have a sneaking suspicion that rather than choose one of the two theories to blame for my recent academic and blogging torpor (GRE word alert!), I should just throw my arms in the air and admit that the correct answer is all of the above.  My cup doth overfloweth with crap, yo! 

That having been said, I really do enjoy blogging.  It's relaxing and fun, and provides me with a place to expel my inner thoughts out into the universe. I've said it before and I'll say it again: I am going to start blogging more often.  At least once per month, for the love of Pete!

I realize this wasn't much of an update, so I will write more tomorrow.  No really, I will.  Seriously.

Lindsey out!


 

Lost in the Supermarket

Every woman has some sort of ridiculous activity they like to engage in when they're alone.  In fact, Sex and the City devoted an entire episode to this exact phenomenon and affectionately named it "Secret Single Behavior (SSB)." Well, I am no exception.  In fact, I have many SSBs, but none please me more than fantasy online shopping. That's right, when I'm feeling funky or particularly independent I'll devote hours of my day to filling up online shopping carts at a variety of stores with no intention of ever buying. Don't judge me! Today I spent close to $600 imaginary dollars at Macy's, 6pm (thanks Lori!), REI, and Victoria's Secret.  I know, I know... $600 seems a little excessive, but I'm worth it, right?

It's funny, in real life I have absolutely no fashion sense.  I live in ratty, borderline 'Mom' jeans and plain colored tee shirts. Sometimes I'll throw in a button-up shirt just to shake things up a bit.  I own one skirt, which I refuse to give up as it is the only item of clothing I own that isn't completely androgynous. Online, however, I own lots of dresses and skirts, flowy peasant blouses, camisoles, adorable sandals, and ultra-sexy tops. Indeed, my alter ego is uber-chicktastic to the max. Someday, I'll have the time, money, energy, and confidence to actually buy myself some of my fantasy items.  Until then, I'll keep on keeping on with my SSB and you guys can submit my name to What Not to Wear.  Yeah, that sounds good. I'm sure Stacy and Clinton would have a field day with me.

Holiday

Jiminey Cricket, I need a vacation!  These five days of semi-freedom just aren't doing it for me.  I am super excited about the coming internship and my class next week, but I feel like I haven't had enough 'me' time in between.  Hence why I am writing this stupid blog instead of doing the necessary prep work for my conference call tomorrow morning.  Must... stop... stalling!  BLARGH!!!

The Birthday Song

Oh my gosh... I just bought Christopher the coolest birthday present ever!  Granted, he asked for a ukulele (he never requests gifts, so I jumped at the chance to fulfill his wish), but he wasn't expecting to get one of the most beautiful, well designed ukuleles on the market!  Don't worry, he doesn't read my blog, so my secret is safe with you.  Allow me to introduce you to the Oscar Schmidt OU7T Tenor Ukulele:

It comes with the best strings on the market (so say the enthusiasts), is handmade from the wood of a Spalted Mango tree, has ebony buttons, and is bound with abalone. I can't wait to get my hands... uh, Christopher's hands... on this thing! 


Chris's birthday is fast approaching - June 27 - and I have been wracking my brain, trying to think of amazing ideas for his party.  Ideally, we would have a barbecue in the park, but we are lacking in one essential element: a grill.  There goes that plan.  Idea number two involves a bunch of good friends, alcoholic beverages, and an open, well-lit setting where we could all hang out for a few hours.  I've got a couple of places in mind, but nothing perfect yet.  He's turning 33 this year, which means he's (thankfully) over the initial shock of being in his 30s, but still needs to feel energetic and fun.  I, being the birthday nut, am more excited about having a party than he is.  ;)


All of this talk about birthdays has got me thinking about my own.  In a few short months I'll be 28 years old!  I love aging.  There's something so refreshing about constantly changing, maturing, and learning. I finally got my first wrinkle a few weeks ago, and am super excited despite the fact that my husband and friends keep assuring me it doesn't count.  I can't wait to see what I look like as a white haired, shriveled up old lady!  It's going to be awesome!


I usually throw myself a birthday party every year, but this year I'm feeling particularly nostalgic and adventurous.  I want to go to New York City.  I haven't been since I moved back to Florida, and I miss it terribly.  I have a love/hate relationship with that place, and I could never have lived there on a long term basis, but there is something about it that makes me feel completely connected with the world and myself.  It's hard to describe unless you've been there, and if you haven't yet then you are absolutely invited to come with me in September!  I'm making some money from my summer internship, and I have a few friends with whom we can stay.  Seriously, I desperately need a vacation full of friends, strangers, food, and shopping.  The time is now!

Don't Stop Believing

It is a bittersweet pill to take, realizing that you are no longer who you were. In fact, the me of two years ago probably wouldn't recognize who I am now. Not that I'm saying there was anything wrong with who I was then, but I had no idea what I was capable of.  I didn't consider myself the academic/college type.  I took my retail jobs WAY too seriously, because I genuinely thought I had no other career options. I was still desperately clinging to my single self, afraid to fully embrace my marriage. And I had surrounded myself with people who were exactly like me, to validate the person I thought I was. Something about completely separating myself from my home town and starting over really changed my perceptions regarding life, love, and possibilities. I have come a long way in a short amount of time, and I do love the person (student, wife, woman, and professional) that I have become.

Last week a friend from back home stayed with us, and it was wonderful spending time with her.  We laughed, drank, and ate until our stomaches and wallets couldn't take it anymore.  But, despite the fun and games, I found myself struggling to relate to her the same way I used to.  It was like, she was exactly the girl I remembered, but I wasn't the person she expected me to be.  I couldn't, in good conscience, bitch about the man in my life, or complain about the "joys" of working retail.  Most importantly, I couldn't pretend to be the ditzy, clumsy, bubbly girl that she remembered.  In fact, one night we went out for drinks, and the next morning she said something like, "I'm really surprised you didn't get sicker last night!  I was expecting to have to carry you home like usual." Just hearing that made me shudder a little bit. Is that who I was?  Sadly, yes, but we were all young and stupid once. Gladly, I feel like I've finally become the mature adult I always wanted to be, but was too afraid to admit.

I feel like, despite these realizations and monumental shifts in priorities, I still have no idea how to bring who I am now to who I knew then.  When I go home for the holidays or friends come out here, I incur a huge amount of cognitive dissonance.  I literally don't know how to act.  I know who my family and friends expect me to be, and I know enough psychological theory to realize that they will perceive me in that way forever no matter how I behave. However, I still want to express who I really am in a way that they will see and understand.

Often times I think about the friends of mine who went off to college right out of high school and actually finished their degrees in a normal timeline.  Many of them are working on graduate school now and have fantastic jobs that they are proud of. I wonder if they thought about me the same way I'm thinking about my other friends now.  I genuinely ponder whether or not they had trouble relating to me, because I had no idea what they had been through and how capable they were. They must have, at least a little bit, because now I feel like they are some of my favorite people to talk to.  I finally get it, and can relate to them on a different level than before.

There is no real point to this blog (is there ever?), except to say that life is tough, and, at times, isolating. It is up to all of us to figure out who we really are, and keep that realization in our hearts and minds, despite how others might perceive us (or how we perceive them perceiving us). I could pull a Carrie Bradshaw and end with a semi-thoughtful question, but I think I've said it all. Love you guys!

We Belong

Phew!  This school term is finally over, and I could not be more relieved.  Don't get me wrong, it was great fun; I met a lot of new and interesting people and gained a lot of practical experience. However, there is one thing that regrettably took a back-burner over the past few months: my marriage. It is becoming increasingly more difficult to balance the different areas of my life, as I become more involved in school and make new friends.  This term alone I probably clocked about fifty hours per week on campus, working on projects and attending classes and meetings. When I was home I was usually in decompress mode, meaning that I would immediately veg out by tinkering around online or by watching movies/television (much like I'm doing now).

The truth is, marriage is work.  It's fun work, but work all the same. Christopher is a wonderful, supportive husband, and he does a great job of keeping me in check when I start to lose my mind, but I have to be careful not to take him for granted. There are things that I might not want to do, but that I have to do as a symbol of my commitment to making us work (i.e., doing the dishes, even when I'm exhausted; scooping the litterbox from time to time; and/or stepping away from an important email, because Christopher wants to tell me a story from his day). All of these things are, of course, totally worth it in the long run.  He and I are committed to each other forever, and, to quote one of my favorite movies, "forever is an awfully long time." Truth is, I love the guy. That's all I really need to remember. I'm happy when he's happy, and vise versa.

So, I fully intend on spending the next week and a half spending time with him. My hope is to do some serious hiking, cooking, and cleaning over the break, while simultaneously helping a good friend find a new "boy toy." Next term will come soon, so my time is limited to get my priorities back in check. Next term I am taking three courses, working as a peer advisor for the psychology department, acting as vice president for the psychology club, and hopefully working as a TA for one of my professors from this term. That being said, the end is in sight (I should graduate in December 2010), and Christopher will be around long after my career as a student has ended.  My marriage needs to be priority number one.  For those of you who know me, please make sure I remember that fact when my head starts spinning around from all of my other responsibilities. I thank you in advance.

Against All Odds

I never thought I would be the kind of person to come home at night, after a long day of work and stress, and pour myself a pinch of liqueur to ease my nerves. In fact, the first night I felt absolutely scandalous! Me?  Drink alone?  I mean, I could justify a glass of red wine (it's good for your heart right?!), but liqueur... that's a different bag altogether.  Well, friends, let me tell you, Chamomile liqueur is a godsend! The relaxing properties of the chamomile, mixed with the mulled-spice taste of Christmas... it's like a glass full (not full... barely full) of comfort.

Now, don't get me wrong. This term has been wonderful so far! I am working on a variety of highly educational, community interactive, experience-laden projects.  Case in point:

• I am working on a two-person research team that is responsible for coding 400 participant responses to the same complex math problem, in order to assess participants' levels of confirmation bias (people deciding what they think the answer should be, and then skewing their work to back-up that answer) and patterns of information "clumping" based on both their answers and their provided mathematical evidence.  
• I am also working as part of a consulting team for the Oregon Sexual Assault Resource Center (SARC). We are conducting research on the links between pornography and sexual aggression with the purpose of providing effective recommendations for an anti-pornography curriculum installment, which will potentially be implemented in high schools in the Portland Metro area next school year. 
• I am a member of a small consulting group (me and 2 ex-marines) that is working with the Vikings basketball team to assess current player motivation levels and coaching strategies, with the goal of making effective recommendations to the head coaches to improve players' motivation levels during practices and games next season. 
• And, last but not least, I am researching my passion: psychological studies on the effects of social support and dietary restrictions on the quality of life of people living with Celiac Disease. I have actually been researching this topic for months now, but, conveniently, the final project for my Health Psychology course is an annotated bibliography on a medically-relevant psychology topic of our choosing.  It is a nice excuse to gather information and create writing samples for my potential graduate school applications.

So, in a nutshell, all of this work on top of my normal class reading assignments has me sort of frazzled.  I am fortunate to have such a loving, supportive, understanding husband right now.  I don't think that either of us were expecting me to work this hard until grad school.  However, my resume has quickly transitioned from retail to consultation/psychology, and I have met many new and interesting people outside of PSU during this process. And, honestly, just writing all of it out in this blog makes me feel better and instantly more organized.  After a while all of these groups and research projects meld into one big glob of mush in my brain. 

So, I deserve some liqueur every now and then, right?  Yeah, I thought so! 

Ain't No Sunshine

Okay, okay... I haven't posted anything in a long time.  I'm sorry!  I've never been one of those people who can keep a steady diary.  I haven't had that burning sensation to unleash my feelings in text since I was nineteen. In fact, that is the last time I had a consistent diary.  And thankfully for you, my dedicated blog audience, I hung on to that delightful piece of my past.  In traditional nineteen-year-old-just-graduated-high-school style, it is all about boys, friends, boyfriends, and "what the heck am I going to do with my life" passages.  Here are some of my favorite tidbits (those of you who knew me then might get a kick out of this):

January 13, 2001 - I don't think I've ever had so many guy-friends at one time, and not a decent boyfriend in the lot. I miss having a relationship.  I'm afraid that the more time I spend hanging out with boys and not kissing any of them, the less attractive I'm becoming as a girlfriend.  Ugh, I hate sounding lonely and desperate.

July 16, 2001 - Things I could do with my life: teacher (any level), movie critic, food critic, musician (singer), business manager, shop owner, party coordinator, caterer, artist, poet, or actress.  With a list like this, how am I ever going to decide?!

July 21, 2001 - Once upon a time, there was a girl who desperately wanted to leave the state she was born and raised in to pursue her education and start anew. Unfortunately, her mother strongly disagreed with the idea, calling it "stupid" and "unreasonable." So, the girl's dreams were crushed and she gave up all hope of ever discovering herself in the world.  The end.

August 11, 2001 - My birthday is three weeks from today!  I'll be 19!  Too old!  I'm not ready to grow up. The rest of my life scares me. I've decided to change my major to either music or art.

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In 2006, when I moved back from New York, I found this diary hiding in my old bedroom. It made me laugh to read all of my old dreams and ambitions (or lack thereof), and it was funny to think that I still had all of the same friends and feelings that I did five years prior. In September of 2006, I began writing in the diary again, and as I read those entries now (3+ years later) they remind me that keeping a journal is a wonderful way to store memories.  I wish that I could commit to writing in one again.  Maybe I will.

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September 22, 2006 - I have a date on Saturday night!  Can you believe it? It's the first time I've liked a guy in four years.  Or, rather, the first time I'm going on a real date in four years.  I've liked a few guys.  But I digress... His name is Christopher, and he's a 29 year old cameraman.  He has his own apartment, a job, and a cat. I think I might really like him, which is obvious because I'm breaking my "no dating until I move out of Florida" rule to go out with him. We'll just have to wait and see what happens.  My new rule is that I come first.  I am not allowed to abandon my life goals again for a guy, no matter what.

September 26, 2006 - I went on my second date with Chris last night, and it was fantastic.  I really like him.  It's hard not to fall too fast into this one.  He's so honest (albeit a little self-loathing), trustworthy, passionate, and intense.  Not to mention extremely sexy.  I think I am in way over my head here, and I'm enjoying every second of it.

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I totally need to start a new journal.  It's so fun walking down memory lane!  Thanks for letting me drag you alongside.  Sometimes it is fun to entertain company in Nostalgiaville.