Watching TV (after spending 20 minutes trying to figure out how to turn it on... technology these days.)

Let me just say, I really love the Olympics.

My earliest memory of the Olympics is of the summer games in 1996. We had just moved into the house on Enterprise, where my mom still lives, and I thought I was a gymnast.
At this time in my life, I thought I was an Indian who could sneak up on wolves in the wild and make arrows from rocks. Also, I was an expert teepee builder and Simba from The Lion King (as well as any other character from the Disney movie). Sometimes I could even walk on lava, but only for short periods of time.
I was not allowed to watch more than half an hour of TV every day, but during the Olympics I was glued to our old television set for hours. I would run around the living room and practice tumbling; more than anything, though, I was a balance beam star. Gold metal bound. When my name was announced, the crowds went wild, and when I stepped on my balance beam, everyone became quiet in anticipation of what trick I would perform. I was a natural. Which is why my dad found an old two by four to bring into the living room for me to practice on. I would watch the Olympians and prance on my wooden balance beam transforming myself into Shannon Miller and Lilia Podkopayeva. I would do flips and grand leaps, all of which landed in the splits, on the balance beam. I was a professional.
I was inspired.
During the winter Olympics, I always wanted to be a slalom skier. At one point I even made a workout schedule so I could make it to the 2012 Winter Olympics. Unfortunately I was not able to practice my skiing in the Midwest. And there is no slalom skiing in the 2012 Olympics… being that it will be the Summer Olympics and all.
I still secretly have dreams of grandeur. I think to myself “Whoa, that lady is thirty something! I can train for the next decade and make the Olympics!” but those are my private thoughts so don’t tell anyone. I might start running more in the next few weeks to train before I realize I don’t have the heart. But right now, I am in the moment. I am inspired.
So I CAN DO IT!
It is only the first day of the winter games and I am already both pumped and amazed. What has gotten me the most so far this year (besides Apolo Ohno gaining his sixth Olympic metal!!!) is the community among the athletes.
Yesterday Nodar Kumaritashvili, a Georgian luger, died in a practice run. He is an individual from a country that most Americans could not find on a map unless you were talkin’ about that southern state. Don’t they grow cotton down in Georgia? No…
Although Nodar is an individual from a nation most of us no very little about, his death is being mourned. His death is being felt across the world. The world! One man, one athlete. How often does the world come together to mourn an individual?
There is a community that goes beyond borders and language. This community is a beautiful thing. And that is why this year, yet again, the Olympics have captured my heart from day one.

I am looking forward to the next two weeks.

sun and snow

birds chirping
sun shining
warmth and memories of a spring that has yet to arrive.

snow floating like bubbles
round and slow
drifting across my window

a good book, a long weekend, a warm heater

and excitement for the olympics.

february 12 is a good day.

Snow Globes and Sharks or Childhood

Today is a very cold day.
Today was a very cold day, rather. But it is still cold, and it will continue to be frigged for the next too long.
Though I tend to complain about the cold, it is not so bad.
The wind is what is killer.
Today the killer wind and the cold combined to make a snow globe, which I like.
I am living in a snow globe.
And I was going to entertain you all with a lovely snowy photograph (that I did not take) to go along with this ever-so-short post, but I could not find one to my liking.
Instead I found this drawing of sharks. Which are like snow globes if you don't think about it for too long.



p.s. The shed is okay-warmish. It is not the normal 70+ degrees that it might be on average cold days, but it is not cold. In case you were wondering.

p.p.s. (I still like p.s.s. better.)
Another thought about snow globes: The wind is very bitter outside, but i guess there wouldn't really be wind in a snow globe...which leads me to one question.
What would the temperature be in a snow globe?
I bet it wouldn't be cold at all!
So, maybe i am living in a winter wonderland where the snow happens to be falling up from the ground instead of down from the sky and where the wind twirls in all directions to make a dance of ice on all sides of your face.
Jack frost is wearing his ice-skates again.

I thought you might like a picture (not by me) of Jack Frost himself. But, again, I could not find one to my liking. Except for the one of Bob Dylan that came up in the search. He is not really like Jack Frost at all, though.
But Peter Pan is. He and Jack Frost are friends.

ups, downs, highs, and lows; or my boring life.

returning home from adventuring was hard, but going back to school has turned out to be even more difficult. studying, writing papers, and working have taken over most of my "free time" making the little time i have left for other activities quite precious. the school year is going well so far, it has just been difficult getting use to being in university after time off. as i sit down to write a paper, or as i begin to study for upcoming exams, i can always think of about a million places i would rather be and a billion things i would rather be doing. but now is not the time for those other things, now is the time for school. so, each morning i wake up with the rising sun and hop on my bicycle to ride to campus (unless it is raining, which it seems like it has been every day for the last three weeks...)
even though i spend all my free time doing less than freeing things and am not super thrilled yet about school, i do quite enjoy my job. this is my third year working for holiday decor hanging christmas lights, and i must say this year has been the most fun so far. i just love running around on roofs and being outside, even if the weather is rather crummy. it is nice. it gets me moving and rejuvenates my body and mind.
so, despite all the studying and working i have been doing, it is not all bad. it has been rainy, but the rain just makes the sunshine all the brighter and the autumn leaves more brilliant.

westward. with my foot on the pedal.

i am packing my bags for colorado. it feels so good to know i will be heading west again, even though colorado feels so close. after driving to california several times, colorado seems no distance at all.
i am looking forward to being in the mountains one last time before winter. it will be nice to visit with my friends and my uncle. i am also going to go to moab to visit and get my climbing on. it should be nice.
it is hard to not just drive to the sierra's. once i am in moab, they seem no distance at all. but that is not for this trip. another time.
so, off i go. westward once again. where my heart rests.

sometimes i wish i could have a book filled with my favorite things and moments i love. i don't want it to be an ordinary book, filled with photos, writing, and scraps i find here or there, i want it to be like watching an old 8mm film on a projection screen or like a hologram. i want it to show the moment so each time i look through the book i can relive the memory. it would be filled with all sorts of moments, from extremely simple things like the phone message my nine year old nephew left me about the fungus my peach tree has "Hi Aunt Chels, I just wanted to warn you that if the peach scab gets to bad that your peach tree could die." to things like a robin landing next to another robin on a tree branch and giving it a worm. or the way my dog looks at me when i get home, with a content face and a slowly waging tail. some pages would open and have dialogue and sound, like my nephew talking or the sound the rain makes on the roof of my shed. other pages would have short film clips, like of my uncle playing the guitar or my friends sitting around a campfire together. others might have holograms, to show really simple things like birds flying or a flower growing. it would be my book and it would be extremely unique to me. it would document all the things that make me smile or make my boots lighter. it would record my life story, in a sense.
it would be beautiful.

shooting stars and fireflies. or coming home.

sometimes it is really hard coming back to springfield. it no longer feels like home or it feels like my community of friends have spread out and disappeared. it can be a lonely place, a place where i have to fight to be something different or where i am only what people see in my appearance. sometimes missouri is the last place i want to be.
but not this time.
as karlei and i drove back into missouri, marking the last five hours of our road trip, we sang our traditional 'going home' song...
misery, misery, the worst place i'll ever beeee.
it is a lovely song that really shows how much we love our state, or returning there from adventures abroad. as we were loathing in our misery of being in missouri (not two minutes after crossing the state line) we remembered why Missouri is not such a bad place, and i began to feel better about coming home.
lightening bugs. we began to see the dark fields flash with little yellow lights. glowing. beautiful. karlei had been reading me peter pan, but now we sat in silence. listening to the weeerrrrr and tititititit of my car and the passing vehicles, the silent crickets chirping outside. and watching. straining to not miss a single flash. a single glowing bug.
smiling with content. i was ready to be home. i began to realize that the time has come for me to stay (relatively) in one place for a while. that doesn't mean i won't be leaving town every chance i get, rather that i will be content to sit in my shed (my little house) and read and go out with my old friends and build stronger connections with new friends. i am ready to go back to school. i noticed when we were in portland all the books i bought were boring latin american studies books, but, somehow, i am still really looking forward to reading them. i am looking forward to studying and taking classes that help me to learn new things and expand my horizons. it will be good.
i am feeling positive about being back this time. it is home.
when we were just an hour out of city limits, we pulled over to stare in awe at the glowing stars in the sky. it was 2am and we had been driving for too long without sleep. we had driven all night the night before and then all day. but we pulled over, cranked open my sunroof so we could sit on top of the car, and we just watched. we let the fireflies fool us into thinking they were shooting stars when they flashed in the corner of our eyes. we silently counted satellites and listened to the cicadas chirp along with the frogs. the sound of our backwater.
it was a perfect coming home song with the most wonderful view to go with it. stars and fireflies.

welcome home.

now i have been home for a week. i have been spending time with my friends that i have neglected for so long and have been trying (in my own shy manner) to make new friends and to remember all that i have learned while traveling this last year. i feel like i am where i am suppose to be, like i am just who i need to be right now. and that feels good.