Wednesday (Friday) Hodgpoge

This week has been a little bit exhausting.  I thought I'd take yet another page out of Nonnie's blog-book and post a Friday version of the Wednesday hodgepodge. Just so you know, Nonnie is a friend of my sweet MIL and she took the Hodgepoge from "Joyce From This Side of The Pond "  So there you go.

Feel free to read and comment- and if you re-blog, just give credit to the original poster, Joyce.

1.  According to Oxford Dictionaries, the 2013 word of the year is 'selfie'. Your thoughts? When did you last take a selfie? Do you post them online somewhere? Do you prefer to be in front of the camera or behind the lens?

I take selfie's mostly to see if my makeup/hair/clothing looks ok.  It's my 21st century mirror.  I post them infrequently, but I do post them. Mostly on my Instagram.  I'm way more comfortable behind the camera, though I'm sure people get tired of my landscape/cat/handsome husband pictures. 

My sister and I last summer, out on the boat. I just noticed we have the same crookedness to our smiles! 

2.  Will you send out Christmas Cards this year? If so, are they ready to go? If not, are you glad or sad about leaving that tradition behind?

I hope to get my ducks in a row and send more Christmas cards this year.  My problem is that school gets cra-zzzy until the end of the term, then it's all over.  However, it's all over around December 19th.  Cum-see, cum-saw.  

3.  Do you trust easily?

That would be no. Not at all.  It's probably just my nature.  I didn't grow up with a whole lot of cushion and while I like to be trustworthy,  it's not something I bestow lightly.  That said, if I trust you, I trust you with everything.  Lots of people are trustworthy; some just aren't. 

4. Pine-cinnamon-peppermint-vanilla (as in sugar cookie)...of those listed, which one is your favorite December scent?

Pine. I love pine trees.  They're not just for Christmas in our neck of the woods! I remember these pine trees my grandpa planted when I was little.  My cousin Ryan was just a bit taller than the tree when she was 6.  They had to cut both of them down 25 years later because of the roots growing under the house.  The trees had grown to over 30 feet tall.

Pine trees AND G! 

Pine trees + sunshine

The top of the world

Meandering canyon

5.  Did you do more talking or more listening yesterday?  Was that by choice or by necessity?

I did a lot more listening than talking.  It was a non-teaching day yesterday.  It's almost always my choice to not talk overly much.  Talking too much to others makes me tired. Especially in groups.  Man, I must sound like an old grumpy lady, but I promise I do like people. Just not in groups. 

6.  What's the last song that got stuck in your head?  Sorry if it's back there now :  )

Something by MIA.  I love the Arabic sounds mixed with rap.  I'm not a rap fan; I'm an MIA fan. 

7.  Which world explorer (in the whole history of the world) would you most like to have traveled with, and why?

I think I'd like to travel with the Vikings.  I guess they ate pretty well.  For me, good travel is all about good food. 

8.  Insert your own random thought here.

It's been a rough week.  G and I just have a lot going on and some realities we don't like dealing with. I'm really glad it's Friday and we can spend the very windy and cold weekend snuggled in our little house.  Maybe we'll write out some Christmas cards or finish our Christmas shopping!  Tonight we're heading out to see a movie- Catching Fire.  Something you may not know about me: I was given a 35# recurve bow when I was 11 years old.  I used that thing for a long, long time, bruising the snot out of my left arm, shooting into hay bales and generally being wild.  I don't know what happened to it but it was a good part of my childhood.  Also, I'm glad I never had to enter a Hunger Games. :) If I did, I'd win. 

Political

I'm not sure when politics became part of my everyday life.  One day I'm climbing a tree, desperately trying to deny that despite my most fervent prayers, breasts had traitorously sprouted on my chest. The next day it's all mortgages, teaching, loving, family and politics. Here are some ways that politics affect my life- whether or not I want them to.

I am bothered by oppression.  Any oppression.  Oppression of teachers by districts under the control of legislators in the pockets of testing companies. I am bothered by this especially because children lose. When you spend more on prisons than education *cough*OklahomaTexas*cough*, your state is in ideological trouble.

I am bothered by legislature affecting marginalized groups. I'm glad that DOMA was struck down. You can't legislate against something because you think it's yucky.  I think lots of things are yucky- eating meat, living beyond ones means, and snorting cocaine off of a hot guy's backside. But I avoid those things.. I don't try to pass laws about it.

I am bothered by misogyny. As the Texas state legislature has demonstrated by killing their 500th inmate, a woman by the name of Kimberly McCarthy, they don't like women.  There are few enough women in politics as it is, and as Wendy Davis filibustered a restrictive and breathtaking law to shut down most of the abortion clinics in Texas, that hatred showed itself again and again.  Over 600 bills were introduced in 2013 to regulate a woman's body in Texas.  It's only June, people. How many have ever been introduced to regulate men's bodies? Oh yeah, zero.

It bothers me even more when women participate in this perpetuation of misogynist culture. Because it wouldn't exist if women didn't somehow get duped into falling for it and being "good" women. I'd rather laugh with the sinners than cry with the saints anyway.

Emotions are running high lately, something I can't afford right now. I'm heading to a family reunion this weekend and thankfully, my husband has volunteered to go with me.  As my friend Cathy advised, he is offering a cocktail of wine, valium and chocolate.  Wish me luck.

I'm one of the three Independent/Freethinker/Democrats in the family.

Maybe we'll talk about politics.

No Man Is An Island

We all need other people in our lives. No man is an island, as John Donne would say.

I am someone who loves isolation. I am an introvert, though you can't tell when I'm teaching. It's been a theme in my life since I can remember. I liked my older siblings but they didn't always want to play with me, nor I with them. So when I didn't have another little friend, I was always just fine playing by myself. When we lived in Eureka, California when I was very little, I'd hide in the closet and hang out for hours. I've just always been very self-sufficient. I remember when I was in kindergarten. I overheard my mom talking to her husband and saying that there wasn't going to be anyone home when I got out of school the next day. I'm sure they worked out some arrangement, but I didn't hear that part. Instead, I got off two stops early from my normal bus stop, and checked myself into a daycare. That's where kids go when their parents aren't home, right?

When I got older, I became a latch-key kid in second grade. I got home from school before my sisters. I wore a key around my neck and let myself into the house, made a sandwich and watched television until someone else got there. And in high school I had my own car and we lived pretty far out of town.

As an adult, I moved from Washington to Las Vegas, and lived there for two years. We left, not because of the desert but for the teeming mass of people- people I never learned to trust. I don't think I made a single friend outside of my boyfriend in that time. So we moved to Oklahoma and I got married and divorced.

Norman became my home and I thought it would be much like all of the other places I've lived in my vagabond life- another stopping place on the way to somewhere else. I attended a dojo in Tulsa for 7 years and the Hargraves are some of the neatest people I've had the privilege of calling friends. I met Dr. Diane Holt-Reynolds there and she became my mentor. I met Janis Cramer and she helped me become a teacher. And I made friends at the College of Education and at OCCC. I mentored other teachers and taught students and bought a house. Cathy Klasek helped me move in. Hell, she picked it out and made me talk to the owner. I wouldn't have bought a house without her help.

It was my friends who sent me off to Washington with best wishes and welcomed me home with open arms. I remember when I went to tell my Grandma that I was going to move back to Oklahoma. She didn't even let me get that far. She said, "I know you are unhappy here. Go back home to Oklahoma where people love you." And then we both had a good cry.

It's people like Luke who pull me back from the ledge when I get all wound up about the state of the world today. I have to pull back and sometimes I can't do that on my own. Plus my friends make me laugh. We meet for coffee or conversation or class or what have you, maybe a dog walk. Usually one on one, because crowds aren't much of my thing. I have a couple of good friends that I have only known online. But that's why the telephone and internet were invented.

All of these people form my family unit. I rely on them to keep me sane and healthy. I do the same for them. I help when I can. It's not natural, though, to ask for emotional support from another person. When I was growing up, reliance on anyone but yourself wasn't such a good idea and it usually led to disappointment and disillusion. After awhile, you learn not to lean. But I can learn.

I'm not an island. You're not an island either. We need each other, even though we're not always at our best. In fact, that's when we need each other the most.

Pippi

Usually around my birthday I get depressed. The usual questions always pop up: What have I done with my life, really? Why am I not married? Why don't I have children? Where is all of this headed and will I ever be a grown up? All of these add up to me beating myself over the head for a couple of weeks, throwing myself into too much exercise and too little eating and generally being miserable.

This year, Luke has started moving into the house. There is stuff out of place. As a single woman of some years, I am used to having my stuff in my places and nothing else. I'm... particular. And I've asked for him to disrupt that by living here and really, really, living here with, you know, his stuff. But now his stuff is here. So I'm freaking out about that a little bit. Add to all of this my anxiety about House Bill 3284 having the veto overridden and a real possibility of it becoming law and you have a tense Mindie.

When I was a little girl, I was stressed from about 1973 until about 2009. Generally speaking, anyway. We moved a lot and there wasn't a whole lot of stability. I had three older sisters and just sort of hung out in the background. Sometimes I played in the closet. My favorite place to play was under the staircase in one of the houses we rented in California. It was close and easy to get to and safe. No grown ups allowed. And there were Disney movies that would come on television to help me escape. This was before I learned to read and drown myself in books. My favorite one was called "Pippi Longstockings", and the heroine was a little girl with freckles and long red braids and she was never afraid. She could do anything, defeat any enemy and sing while she did it. She made me happy and gave me hope that little girls could win.

Tomorrow is my birthday. Luke went with me to get my driver's license renewed, then to clean out my office at OU for the summer. Then we went by Target and for my birthday present, he bought me a bike. A beautiful bike, a Schwinn hybrid. Big handlebars. Big bike seat for my big butt. A place to carry stuff in the back. Oh yes, a happy bike. I wanted to sing and wear a long skirt so I could dance in it and throw confetti. So I named her Pippi. And when I get done writing this, we're going for a ride. But first, maybe I'll go paint some freckles and braid my hair.