Nostalgia 2

So I went to the grad ceremony. It was... tiring. Both in the sleep aspect (I went in to work extra early so I could get off early) and in the social aspect (a crowd full of near-strangers). Actually, it kind of felt like an emotional roller coaster.

It began with a choir concert. Being there for that was almost as important to me as being there for the commencement. I want to be supportive of my ex-choir and I want to encourage the members by attending their concerts. Though I haven't made it to all their concerts this year, I've made it to several. This time they invited choir alumni up to join them for several songs! It was really neat to join them again. I've missed singing. My range has definitely shrunk, though - I couldn't hit the high notes anymore! And I had a hard time finding my part! Still, I really enjoyed being up there with them again - almost every time I go to one of their concerts I articulate that it's much more fun being up on the risers than down on the audience. During the first few songs I even found myself considering joining them again next year. But I also realized that my heart's not really in the right place for that, and when we got to the songs that I thought I knew but didn't my heart sunk as it remembered the hard times of choir.

Still, seeing the choir was nostalgic. They have been together all year now and bonded and become close as they've shared many experiences together. And I'm no longer a part of it. That's the way it needs to be, but I still feel the weight of that. They are leaving for tour this weekend. I know what that is like. I wrote Evy a note expressing my hopes that she has a great tour with a great bus buddy - last year that was me. Remembering. (I almost cried when I gave this note to her later. I think she did too.)

As for the actual graduation ceremony, I didn't realize so many people I knew were graduating this year! I knew about the one person from my major, but many other people I cared about walked across that stage. I remember what that was like - the celebration tinged bittersweet by the fact that what is being celebrated is a parting. For me, to see them graduate this year felt like I was losing them. Not that I've talked to them in the past year, but as long as they were at school I would always have a hope of getting in touch with them. Now they'll go off and live their lives, and I hope with all my heart that they'll be happy, but I don't expect to see them again. Farewell... It also kind of ached to even remember these people I have cared about. Caring means giving a piece of yourself away, and that kinda seems to hurt forever afterwards.

Being a Christian college, my school's graduation ceremony was even more religiously focused than most. It was awkward being in a context where they praised Jesus. I'm not there. A speaker challenged the grads to let God fill their entire vision while I considered how my life is essentially egocentric rather than theocentric. I kinda feel like I have let my school down: they have invested into me and conferred upon me a degree, and I have given up on God. If they knew, what would they say?

All the clapping and caring and hoping and remembering made an exhausting combination by the end of the ceremony. I just wanted to get out of there, but I had written notes to several of the grads so I had to wait until they were done their pictures to hand them out. That was probably a good thing - to congratulate people in person - but it was hard. When I was finally able to leave it was a relief, and I texted Justin: "I escaped!" All night, and even the next day, I just felt so drained.

=~=~=~=~=~=

Tonight was the dinner celebrating Diane's graduation from our major. I was so tired, from a social exhausting event the day before, a lack of sleep, and an early morning to get in six plus hours of work before heading out early to attend this dinner. (It was a potluck but I didn't have the energy or motivation to cook anything so I cheated and brought a box of two-bite brownies. Really, I should be able to do better than that. It's not like I just wrote finals or papers or anything like most of them did.)

I wasn't expecting much from this event - encounters with my major usually leave me feeling deeply and inexplicably unsettled. But this time was great! By the time I left I felt more energized and okay than I did on my way out there, with a warmth in my heart. I'm not sure what made the difference... Good conversations? Smaller conversations, instead of just one big group? The absence of certain people? The presence of others?

It was a grace to be invited to this, and Amanda and I talked about how glad we were to be included. Technically we're not in the major anymore since we're finished school, so at anytime they could start leaving us out. None of the other people previously a part of this group were there. Amanda and I are still very good friends with someone in the major though; maybe we are welcome there as long as our connections last. Tonight we got preemptively invited to the Christmas dinner.

I am so glad to still have friends from school a year later. That doesn't happen to everyone; you graduate and lose what you had in common and grow apart and become too busy to spend time together. And I knew that many of my acquaintances from school, no matter how much I valued them in that role, would turn out that way. It's just nice to know for sure that a few of these relationships are not just "school friends" but "real friends." Thank you Friends. I am so grateful for you.

Snippets of the conversation over the dinner table included a discussion of who all was part of the major and who was a guest. Luke's wife, they said, married into the major. I thought that was a funny way to put it - like marrying into a family. Later Danaya came and laid on the couch, putting her head in my lap, and when we talked about that and I told her she is welcome to lay her head on my lap anytime, we identified that as a family sort of thing. She said that this group is a family to her. I used to call them my "community," which is a loose family-type word. A variety of people gathering together to celebrate certain occasions. You don't always like them, but you've got something in common. Family.

A new girl, Tina, just joined our major. She's not new to me though - she was in our small group last year! (Actually, she kinda was our small group last year - attendance got a little sparse, which made us appreciate her all the more.) It was really great to see her again and to know that we still have something connecting us. I really enjoyed having her there and welcoming her into the group tonight.

Fay, the member of the group who hosted the dinner, gave me her phone number and email address as I left, and invited me to call her to go out for coffee sometime. I was so honored by that - she didn't do that for anyone else. I feel shined on. And she is someone I really admire for her warmth. I wonder if I will actually take her up on this though...

Nostalgia

Graduation ceremonies tomorrow. A year ago I was the one walking across that stage. The day after tomorrow, a dinner celebrating the woman graduating from our major. Last year that dinner was for me.

Remembering grad... I never got around to blogging about it - things were so busy then, and I left the next morning on choir tour which restricted my internet access as well as provided its own topics for blogging. But looking back, I remember... How Mara was here and we cooked turkey that week. How a lady at work hooked me up with my grad dress. How my family came and Mom brought Inid. How my brother functioned as my own personal photographer. ("Now come and take a picture of me and this person!") How I got to be the center of attention. How many of my profs said, either to me or to my Mom, that it was an honor for them to teach me. How I looked down the line of profs and identified how much so many of them had meant to me over the years.

So much has changed since then. At work, I got a full time supervisor position and I've learned to work in payroll and the vault. Religiously, I've stopped trying to consider God and I friends - I guess I've given up, like for so long I wanted to but wasn't sure what that meant. Relationally, a year ago I was still opposed to getting into a relationship and I hadn't yet met Justin, and now we've been together for nearly six months.

The dinner my major had in our honor last year meant a lot to me. I was given a chance to explain my thesis to my friends, and in so doing, to explain my life, what lies beneath the surface, and how I'd grown over my years in school. I feel quite disconnected from all that now. I should go back and read my thesis. I wonder what I'll think.

Time for a Change

I need a new voicemail message. Mine is from five years ago, several months before I moved back to Calgary, right when I first got my cell phone. I have changed since then, and it is appropriate for my voicemail greeting change too.

But I have no idea what to say. I want a little more than, "Hi, leave a message." I don't want it to assure people that I'll call them back, though, because most of us know that's not a promise I'll keep every time. I want to be a little bit original, a little bit witty, but concise, not longwinded.

Hmm... Suggestions?

Barbeque!

I bought a barbeque! And I'm so excited!


I've never had a barbeque before. I've never really even cooked on one before - that task has always been delegated to someone else. But I saw a cheap one in an ad, and all the sudden I figured I needed a barbeque. Not that it was an impulse purchase - I thought about it for about a week before I decided to go for it. I got a fantastic deal, and that also excites me.

It came in 40 little pieces (plus screws - but it also came with a free screwdriver and mini wrench!). Justin helped me put it together, and then we cooked steak.

I fee like there are so many more options for me now that I have a barbeque. I guess these new options are limited to the cooking realm, but that spills over into my view of everything. Now that I have another way to cook meat, life is more exciting.

I also found myself thinking that I feel more like an adult now that I have a barbeque. It's strange how many ways there are to describe adulthood.

Already

So, I'm giving up on my other blog (the one for Mom) already. I haven't even gotten around to telling her about it, and having it and having to think about where to write what and how much to say where makes me feel quite divided and discourages me from writing at all. I need the simplicity and straightforwardness of one journal. Sorry, Mom. This window into my life will have to wait.

Dostoevsky's Idiot

An old, forgotten memory awoke in his brain, and suddenly burst into clearness and light. It was a recollection of Switzerland, during the first year of his cure, the very first months. At that time he had been pretty nearly an idiot still; he could not speak properly, and had difficulty in understanding when others spoke to him.
He climbed the mountain-side, one sunny morning, and wandered long and aimlessly, his mind possessed with an agonizing but unformulated idea. Above him was the blazing sky, below, the lake; all around was the horizon, clear and infinite. He gazed a long time in distress. He remembered how he had stretched out his arms towards the beautiful, boundless blue of the horizon, and wept, and wept. What had so tormented him was the idea that he was a stranger to all this, that he was outside this glorious festival. What was this universe? What was this grand, eternal pageant to which there was no end, to which he had always, from his earliest childhood, been drawn in and in which he could never take part? Every morning the same bright sun rises; every morning the same rainbow in the waterfall; every evening the same glow on the snow-mountains, with a flush of purple against the distant sky. Every little fly that buzzed in the sun's rays was a singer in the universal chorus, "knew its place, and was happy in it." Every blade of grass grew and was happy. Everything knew its path and loved it, went forth with a song and returned with a song; only he knew nothing, understood nothing, neither men nor words, nor any of nature's voices; he was outside it all, and an outcast.

Credits: "The Idiot" pg 388; The Literature Network

Sponge

I've noticed a lot of self-absorption in myself lately. I tend to be relatively aware of my experience of a situation, even if the situation itself is focused on another person. I often talk from an egocentric perspective and share particular views in situations where they have little positive value. I say some pretty shallow things. I've felt really distracted lately and it's been hard to listen to other people. And I'm not proud of this self-absorption. I want to try to be less self-focused. I want to have a generous heart.

But that endeavour kinda sucks because there's so much failure. Even acknowledging and monitoring the problem requires paying a lot of attention to myself. Sigh.

Disappointed Easter

I had Easter dinner with my extended family (from my Mom's side) tonight. It was good. The food was great, and the company was largely enjoyable. The little ones searched the house for Easter candy and the youngest showed off his noogie and wedgie skills. My cousin has a terrible mullet and we laughed at him. We went for cream slush and that was fantastic. I saw glimpses of good people. It all left me feeling a little socially awkward, though.

I was planning on spending the night at my Dad's house, and I emailed him a few days before to let him know. He is working out of town in the daytime these days, but he's home at night. Today he sent me a text message asking what time I was getting into town because he was planning to have supper ready. I felt really sad to have to say that I wasn't going to be there until much later in the evening. He said that was fine, he had some other friends he would spend time with, but I still felt bad.

I left my aunt's house early so that I would be at Dad's place in time to hang out with him for a bit before it got too late. But he wasn't home. I knew that he was going out with friends, but I thought that he would be home by the time I got there. Since he works early in the morning I expected he'd want to get to bed pretty early.

I didn't have a lot of time for him.
I guess its fair that he doesn't have a lot of time for me.
But I created some time for him.
But he doesn't know that.

My brother stayed to hang out with our cousins when I left. They are, I'm sure, having a great time, and it would have been nice to have some more time with them - I get up there so rarely - but this was important to me. But now I'm sitting at home, alone and lonely.

But... there are pictures of me all over the house. That makes me feel valued. And Dave came home an hour later (as I was preparing to go to bed), reporting that he left earlier than he otherwise would have saying, "I should go hang out with my sister - she's not here very often." That's nice.

Update 04/12/09: I was asleep before Dad got home, and he was gone before I got up this morning. He called early-afternoon, saying he could be home from work in about an hour. But I was planning on leaving before that. And I felt emotionally unable to adjust my plans to spend time with him. Even the connection of a conversation really hurt, and put me in a miserable mood. Seriously not okay.

Problem

So I have a problem.
After I signed in to my email tonight,
instead of displaying my messages
it told me, "You don't have an inbox."
OF COURSE I HAVE AN INBOX!!!
I've had an inbox at this address
for ten freakin' years!
Where's my email!?!!

Update 04/10/09: It came back today. I'm relieved. Losing my email would be a really big hassle.

Diary

So, I'm starting another blog. You can find it at: http://diarymacaria.blogspot.com

Quick Q&A:
Why? For Mom.
Is that the end of this blog? No.

Several years ago, towards the end of our relationship, my ex intended to start a blog, and he told everyone about it, including my Mom. Later my Mom told me how excited she was about this idea because she figured that by reading what he was up to, she would be getting a picture of my life. (Unfortunately because he and I weren't doing well he rarely wrote about me, and instead of fulfilling her hopes his silence tipped her off to the fact that we were breaking up.) Her eagerness has stuck with me though, and made me think that perhaps I should let her into my life through my blog. There's no way I'm letting her read this one - it's way too personal, and there's way too much on here that I am not comfortable sharing with her. I'll start a new blog for her.

So the new blog will kinda cover the daily happenings of my life. It'll be kinda shallow, and it will have a happy kind of flavour to it. I will still post most of my significant thoughts on this blog, but I thought I'd invite you all to read that one too if you're interested in what I'm up to as well as what I'm thinking. (Let me know if it's just boring...) I haven't told Mom about it yet; I thought I'd make sure it really gets going (and make sure this is something I really want to do) first. At this point, it's going enough to give you access to it.

Work Update

So my crosstraining in Payroll is finished. The month passed quickly, but at the same time if feels like I've been there forever. I really enjoyed it. I learned a lot, and my trainer told me that he he was really impressed with me and I've raised the bar for anyone else he trains. (I tend to like things I do well at.) I even survived the mornings! And I was on time more often than my trainer was! (Eventually we began starting at seven instead of six because he was having such a problem being on time.) Now that I'm done my training I'll be covering days off (Fridays and Saturdays) and vacations in payroll. And right now the other girl is on a leave (and has been for a few weeks - although my crosstraining was supposed to last for a month, I needed to pull my own weight after a week and a half) so I'll mostly be staying in payroll for a while. That's a good thing - after two days back in my home department, today I found myself saying that I just wanted to be back in payroll. In general although I like learning other things and doing a variety of jobs I hesitate to commit to any other department - but maybe that is changing!

Allergic

So, I am not the only one who is allergic to bizarre things...
My plant is allergic to compliments.
Some friends came over a couple of weeks ago and commented on how great my plant was doing and how healthy it looked. It was big and bushy. And almost immediately after hearing this it started to die. Sad.This is what it looks like now. I don't have a "before" picture because I didn't see this coming, but I assure you that it looked way, way better than this.
I think it's going to make it though. It's out of the woods. I'll have to trim all the dead parts off, but there's that one stalk that's not wilted and dried out. Through that piece the plant will live on. I'm glad at least part of it survived. It was a birthday present.

When my plant started to look sick I didn't know what to do to help it. "It needs more water! That's not helping! Oh no, now that's too much water! More sunlight! Less sunlight! Nothing's working!" That's the thing: it's hard to know sometimes whether something is helping or harming, whether a result is because of or in spite of an action. Some people might say that the plant's problem was that I would occasionally water it with ginger ale or fruit punch, but I think that was the cause of its earlier success. I think the problem was the compliments.