ninety.seven.

Finally made it to the end of "An American Childhood." Too excellent for words. This goes somewhere in the top of my favorites.
[i love books.]

back to work at the coffee shop today.
surprise.
they have me working on the fish market side as well. guess who gets to learn how to cut meat & fish and serve them? me.
i'm a little intimidated.
and by a little, i mean a lot.
but hey. I learned how to make a mean latte. I think I can handle a sandwich.
[maybe.]

date with pappy today. it was wonderful, per usual. got some of the best pizza and then went for a walk in an enchanted forest. talked of life. reminisced. he doesn't like me growing up. sometimes i wonder if he really knows i'm 21 or just thinks that i'm joking.
i know he hopes i'm joking. that he'll blink and i'll be 6 again, swinging my legs on our dates & licking my lips & lisping when i talk. he hopes he'll wake up and see his kids playing outside already, dreaming up adventures for summer days, filling up autumn with making leaf piles, using leaves that we steal from our neighbors to make the piles extra large. he'd like to go back to when we didn't have one foot out the door, back to when life was simple & Daddy was the biggest, smartest, strongest man we knew.
but he also does want us to find fulfillment in leading rich & Godly lives, on our own, coming back to visit often with our kids.
he told me it was complicated.
i'm trying to keep up.
he's got a lot on his mind, lately.
he's trying to keep up.
he really is a dear.

ninety.six.

at times i am overwhelmed by the sheer mass of things i do not know in comparison with the things i do. 

or not even in comparison. 

just there, all by itself. 

i'm overwhelmed by the sheer mass of things i do not know.

at times the lines between the two blur so much that i forget what i do know and pretend to know things that i don't.

this is frustrating.

today was frustrating, in some ways.

also very good because i went to Wal-mart and spent 50 dollars on organization tools for the bedroom. YES. 

fact: fifty bucks does not actually buy a whole lot. 

but i did manage to score a closet organizer, hangers, some rubbermaid containers and 2 canvas...storage things. also, a bag of peanut m&m's. 

after two hours of work, the room is still a pit.

instead of cleaning i am blogging.

however, it does look a lot better than it did, and i spent a considerable amount of time in the closet. i got rid of a bunch of old clothes and COLOR COORDINATED the rest. that's right. it's amazing what a little color coordination can do. 

so i decided to take a break. blog. eat a ton of tuna and crackers. look up lyrics to a song i heard/liked today. i know you're interested. here's the last half [it's by joshua radin]:

it hasnt felt like this before 
it hasnt felt like home

before you 

And I know its easy to say, but its harder to feel this way 
And I miss you more than I should, than I thought I could, 
I can't get my mind off of you 

and I hate the phone, 
but I wish you'd call, 
thought being alone, 
was better than, was better than... 

And I know its easy to say, but its harder to feel this way 
And I miss you more than I should, than I thought I could, 
I can't get my mind off of you. 

it's a little cheesy. but also good. actually one of the only reasons i like it is because it says "i hate the phone." when i heard that i pressed it to play it from the top. fact: i hate the phone. also because, hello, i miss the fellow. any song that talks about missing someone i listen to again to hear if we are singing the same song. you know? 

anyways. don't laugh.

4 minutes until nine. i'm going to do some more productive work here. make some magic happen. 

wish me luck. :]]

ninety.five.

ever made a list of things you don't want to admit?
done.
a little bit therapeutic.
& sad.
& fun. in a dramatic sort of way.
try it.

today i got asked if i had ever considered being a model by a stranger lady. that was nice of her. 

just recently returned from a trip to Michigan. 

i think Michigan would make the list of my top 3 favorite places in the world. I haven't been to a whole lot of places, but still. I'd count it. 

While up there, I saw a young deer die while listening to Casimir Pulaski Day. traumatizing? maybe. i don't know what it is about animals dying, but it is honestly one of the most distressing things. especially when listening to that song, which at one point was one of my favorites but now holds haunting images.  

that aside, the rest of the time proved to be mostly fantastic. the fellow came down & surprised me on a day off, just came rolling around the corner to cherry republic in his huge truck. before i even saw it, i knew he was coming. I just heard the diesel round the corner and clutched my heart in a dramatic fashion. trust me, it was good. after a good deal of shaking and exclamations we got on with our bittersweet six hours. climbed a big dune. ate some pizza. said goodbye...again. only 46 days left. but today is almost tomorrow & then it'll be 45. 

On a whim we [the group, not Curt & I] decided to go and see 500 days of Summer at this random movie theater in Traverse City. Was it one of the best ideas the entire trip? Yes. Yes it was.

We walk in after paying the student price of six dollars [not bad]. The seats are plush and reclining. The ceiling is a starry sky, a perfect replica of the August night sky, done by a local star-gazer [what is that profession called? it escapes me...]. We have a formal greeting by some theater employee. A short clip of a movie begins to play, it looks like some random indie local film. SURPRISE. it's a proposal video. the couple is in the theater. It's a two for one, we see a movie, we're part of a proposal, the evening ends famously. The movie was great. 

The trip also included drinking way too many cherry Arnold Palmer's, sleeping on the hammock one night [divine] and a 3 hour lazy river trip where we played movie trivia the entire time. 

and lots of eating. 

some shopping, i bought a random tapestry from a random hippie shop. i figure one day i'll hang it somewhere. i'm going to regard it as a smart buy, rather than a foolish impulse buy. 

on the way home we all answered some survey questions and ended up shedding a few layers of skin. 

it's good for friends to do that, sometimes. probably more often than we tend to. 

i learned a lot about the people i've known for years. just want to hold onto them a little more now, stay a little closer, 

even though we all seem to be flying away in separate directions. 

back in the real world now, dragging my feet about jumping into fall [ha. jumping into fall]. 

i still have a job, so that's a huge relief. i'll be keeping relatively busy, even while trying to simplify. 

my autumn goal: cook. 

just cook some more and cook good. i've gotten more and more on this healthy, good living kick. Not just eating right or working out, but stressing less and simplifying. 

Purging. 

Anyhow, I figure I should learn how to cook. It's just a good thing to learn, regardless of how well I follow through with the other things. 

3 minutes until tomorrow. I should head to bed. Had a long day in the city breaking in my new shoes and being told I should look into modeling. Difficult times. 

ninety.four.

to do:

make ipod playlist of upbeat songs for car ride to michigan

make ipod playlist of chill songs for car ride to michigan

pack

finish making hat with ambitious knit edge

re-evaluate packing job

unpack unnecessary items

repack

charge camera batteries

mow lawn

make 12 pounds of ground beef for taco meat/sloppy joe meat for trip

make something sweet or just dig into the nutella

workout

shower

re-evaluate packing job and pack one more sweatshirt

stay off computer

can't get enough of "Elephants" by Rachael Yamagata right now. 

what a sadlovely song.

going to go & eat some raisin toast & forget about my to do list for another hour.

ninety.three.

Finally sitting at home again. It's been a long time.
But good. It's been grand.
How has your summer been?

After a blissful 6 weeks of camp which I could not begin to cover, I came home [somewhat ambivalent].
Slept in my own bed for one night, then off again to Myrtle Beach for a family reunion.
It began as I think all family reunions do: people that i've never met hugged me and started to assign various features on my face as being passed down from other people i've never met.
I love history in things, things with a story. Like antiques. Something passed down, held on to. So even though it's a little funny, I like hearing about where my face is from, the kind of people who've had my strange toes. I like having a history.
Lots of stories. we heard a lot of stories at the family reunion. sometimes i can get so caught up in myself, in the day-to-day that i forget to realize other stories. another day-to-day. when i remember that, it just makes things so much more interesting. lots of great stories and observations about a family, about love and acceptance and living together and fighting together.

while down there, my great-grandparents [who got married when she was 16 and he 17] renewed their vows on the beach. 60 years of marriage and he can't stop telling her how pretty she looks and she can't stop picking up after him and bringing him whatever he needs. it's an amazing legacy.

leaving Myrtle Beach we stopped off to visit some other family in Tennessee. Went to bed late and woke up at 6 to go for a 12 mile bike ride in the mountains. You would not believe how lovely that was. Really and truly.

10 or 11 hours later we found ourselves back home.
It might be nice to settle back into the swing of things. We have one more vacation up to Michigan and then routine happens again.

Some things have changed.
I'm 21.
Not really feeling 21. I always thought 21 was old, that by 21 I'd have everything figured out.
I don't feel that way at all. But it's ok. I feel good feeling 11 at 21.
Some things stay the same.
I still am fighting a nail-biting habit.
And still conquering the i-should-work-out battle.
I don't feel much different.
Always just little shifts, you know? Little things move and alter me and i hardly notice along the way. Then I look back and i feel much different than a year ago but no different than yesterday.

I'm reading "An American Childhood" by Annie Dillard and can't even tell you how much I like it. Excellent read. I feel more alive at every chapter, at every uncanny anecdote.

The fellow isn't coming home for another long while, something like 70 days? More like 60 now, I suppose. It's rough. I know time will fly, even though 10 days has felt like 100. He'll be home in no time and I'll be able to stop thinking of sappy parting song lyrics to fill my time [sad but true].

Later than I thought. Must be off to bed.