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Lazy day.  (Fruma)

There's a really good chance I have done NOTHING today.  I worked remarkably hard yesterday, and then I just felt it was my due to sleep until 10:00, wash my face, brush my teeth, eat breakfast, and go back to sleep until 2.  I apparently also thought it was my due to do 2 hours of homework and then watch tv and play on the internet the rest of the day.  I was reading the link to the "oppression of introverts" on Fred's blog (he is a wealth of interesting distractions from my work), and I was really excited: apparently I'm more of an introvert than I knew!  I loved that article.  I have decided that my ratio is probably only 1-2 hours away from people for every hour with, versus the author's 3 to 1.  I was thinking with happiness that maybe it's an amoral issue (related to my personality) that I want people to go away or stop saying stupid things, and then, as I was swimming in warm, happy feelings about how I'm not actually a bitch for thinking bitchy things, suddenly your face came to me in a vision.  It said, "I'm an introvert. You are a wonderful person and I like you. But now please shush."  And then I thought that maybe the article was true, but I still wish people didn't sometimes think those things about me.  I'm fun all the time, you jerky introverts. 

I have also spent several hours reading PhD comics.  Ah, days like these are so strange.  I feel a compelling need to sit at home doing silly things all day at least once every two weeks.  It would be convenient if this could happen on weekends, but they're always so busy, what with homework due on Monday and all the little rituals of life that build up during the week (like doing my laundry, cleaning my bathroom, moving the dirty clothes from the bathroom floor to the washer, paying bills, taking my weekly shower, and all the other frivolities of life). 

I would like to make my Thanks Giving List also.  I am thankful for:

1. All the things in my life that are conspiring to help me through grad school this year.  Tom is really helpful, as are some of the other professors, and Tatiana is amazing.  My comfortable home is a cozy place to study, and the opportunity/support/interesting research at Minitab is motivating. 

2. My friends, who I am currently percieving as supportive but not overbearing.  So I am thankful for my friends, and I am also thankful for this generous perspective of them which has rested upon me.  And I am thankful for the myriad of them.  I think my next list tonight will be of the twelve "spots" in my life.  Obviously this will not be posted on the internet.

3. Flowers and other plants.  An odd thing to mention, I suppose, but I am very thankful that there are flowers and other plants out there.

4. Some of my clothes.  I really, really love being comfortable.  Just now, I feel completely satisfied, and it's largely because of how happy I am in these pajamas. 

5. How calm I am about "things" right now.  I am pretty stressed out about the one situation, but otherwise I feel remarkably not on pins and needles.  This is a state of being I have dreamed of since I was a little girl.  I never thought it would really happen, though, and then, in the last few years, I have felt that peaceful feeling more and more.  It's like I really don't need anyone else's approval.  Or like I am not constantly trying to make someone fall in love with me.  Like I'm just alive and living my life and I mostly like it, and there aren't things that I'm wishing I had--I'm rather content. 

Oh, I think you should look at this blog.  Okay, I'm going to write my 12 now.

Beck's Thanksgiving Placemat:

1.  That I am moving to Florida.  Because even though I love my family (which is really incredible because not everone gets that) I think it will be really (really) good to live far away from them again for a while.  Sometimes distance is good.  It gives you a chance to evaluate.  And make sure you're a grown-up.  Which is not always so clear when your mother takes your car to get its tire fixed while you sleep in.  Which happens because you live downstairs.  Which is not socially acceptable in this country.  And it's hard to pretend you're Guatemalan and that's what everybody does.

2.  That I finally have something I want to do (which is go to Seminary).  And that other people are also excited and supportive of me doing this.  And I'm not going to be quite so aimless again for a while.  Although I don't have a problem with aimlessness, to some extent, either. 

3.  That I still have art (which is the other thing I've been excited about since college, largely thanks to Sara Odam who is an amazing artist/painter and if I had a link to her stuff I would put it here) and even though I will never be a professional artist, I still plan on being a little artist for myself and it has been super dooper to be able to take classes and it's amazing how much I didn't used to know about art, and also how much I don't know now.  Here are some of my favorites:  Batiks and oil painting.  Although I just recently got excited about taking pictures again too.  With a not-digital camera.  And something else that I'm not sure if it counts as art yet (maybe it's a craft) is weaving.  I love that too. 

4.  That I have been able to do work this last year that has been exciting and stimulating and hard and learningish and energizing and fun and rewarding and stuff.  Which is also called working at the church with good people.  Who knew I would even be able to do something like that?  Or that I'd want to?  I am definately going to remember this year as the start of something in myself.  Because I don't know what I'm going to end up doing, but church is going to be a part of it. 

5.  That I like my life.  That I enjoy living.  That I have become a teeny bit more like the person I want to be this last year.  That I am understanding more who God is and living more. 

6.  That I have friends: like AmyRose and Molly who I met in/right after college and who are still my friends 5 years later.  Even though we don't live near each other and I'm terrible at communicating with people I don't live with.  They are the only people who I have stayed friends with that long.  But I also meet people I am glad to have known everywhere I live and I am thankful for Monica, and John Miller, and also I think Brian Wise from this past year.  (And I am glad I met/know Byron Borger who I work for.  He's more of an aquaintance than a friend.  But definately worth knowing.) 

7.  That I have gotten to work at Hearts and Minds for the past year.  It is largely BORING to wrap and ship books, but has been totally worth doing because of all the books and people I've been exposed to. 

Read Fred's Nov. 21 blog.  Very good. 

Also, go forward a couple and go to the snow link.  Also very good.

Last night I packed more. (booper) 

I am starting to get a little panicky about moving (due solely to the fact that I don't actually have a job yet).  But Mom emailed Penny yesterday, and Penny wrote back and said something about how she thought they were definitely interested...or something along those lines that sounded good.  So maybe it will be ok.  I hope so.  It's a little hard to know when you're supposed to just trust God; as opposed to when you're supposed to get off your ass and do something.  In other words, do I just calmly wait, certain that everything will work out in the end?  Or do I just wait in a state of turmoil, unable to eat, because I don't know what the heck else I can do anyway?? 

I just checked Mol, Rose, and Freddo's blogs.  Fred asked a question about what Christian bands there are that would not embarrass one.  The only two he (or anyone else) listed were OTR and Sufjan.  I would concur with that.  But I couldn't think of anyone else.  Are there more?  Or are there only two?  Actually, some girl listed some other stuff, so maybe they would be ok, but I'm not sure.  Forgot about her when I said only two were listed.  I wonder if U2 would count?  Does pop count under good bands?  Or is it not cool enough for the cultured?  I have gained an appreciation for U2 because of Jono, and I really do like some of their songs.  Dang.  I wonder if I just got less cool? 

You could get me a Sufjan or another OTR CD for christmas, if you wanted.  That would be lovely.