The Motherland

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The Motherland

It's been a while since I posted much of anything. I still write for my company a lot, but that's hardly the stuff that I love to write. I mean, I'll tell you about Conversion Rate Optimization as much as you'd like to hear about it, but you know that I'd rather be pouring myself into my regular observational (and possibly over the top) blog posts. You know, something a bit deeper.

My biggest blogging time was when I was living in Russia. I bought my domain name months before, and put some things up, but my site was pretty much blank. Until I started writing weekly posts about my experiences in St. Petersburg. A lot of my memories in Russia were enhanced by the time I spent crafting these little moments and stories into a wordpress post. I'm sad that I lost most of those entries when I lost my site, but the whole experience made me love blogging.

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An Ode

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I think that this post will sound ridiculous to 90% of the people who read it. Maybe that's why I feel like I need to write it down, because I think that eventually I'll think it's ridiculous too.

I'm selling my car this weekend. It's been a bit of a process, but after washing and detailing and inspecting it, someone is interested in buying it, and we've agreed on a price that we're both happy with. Perfect, right?

Well, I probably should be happy with this outcome, but the whole thing has been emotionally tumultuous.

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Spread too thin.

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Sometimes I feel as though I like too many things. I want to play cello in a little alternative band. I'd like to take up watercolor, do more print making, create more ceramic pieces and become a better graphic designer. My archery skills are not yet where they should be, and I would really like to write more. Then there are the languages that I started and never finished: a bit of French, some more Russian, and 3 months of pretty solidly speaking Spanish.

In an ideal world I would like to pick up all of these skills and hone them to my satisfaction, yet when I get home from work I feel as though I barely have enough time to do my laundry and tidy up my room! Weekends are for events and family and church and whatever else comes up, not to mention catching up on sleep.

It makes me wonder what I should actually be spending my time on. Is it too grandiose of a goal to be accomplished in a handful of things, or is it better to put your efforts into one?

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Organizer

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At some point in my life I wouldn't mind being some sort of office manager. I really like to clean, straighten things up and arrange things in a way that makes sense. I have these bursts of organizational energy where I am obsessed with straightening up, whether it's making sure all the data for my music library is correct, or putting all the Wii games in alphabetical order.

Today I downloaded a new calendar app called "UpTo," which is an iOS calendar upgrade that also allows you to follow sports, TV shows or concert venues within your calendar. It's a neat idea, and I like that it allows you to add friends and share events with one another.

The problem with UpTo is that I've spent the last hour and a half updating my calendar with every event I can think of, just to make sure that it is as accurate as possible. There are brief moments of panic where I think: "I am forgetting something and I will miss it and my life will be ruined!" It's a ridiculous thought, but I'm not going to pretend that there is much sense to the girl who will spend days downloading album artwork for her iTunes library but can't seem to pick her pants up off the floor at the end of the day.

Is that something that I shouldn't admit? Oh well. It's out there.

Regardless of all that, you should install the UpTo app. It's really well done.

Spring is Here!

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This winter has been a hard and long one for me, despite it's identification as a relatively mild winter. I think it might have to do with the fact that I broke my foot in July, so my summer and autumn were robbed from me.

Because of all this, I am extremely excited for Spring. It's incredible to see all these tulips popping out of the ground, or running to your car in a rain shower or smelling all the blossoming trees on a walk. 

Christian and I starting planting a garden in our side yard. The whole process feels a bit magical to me: picking out the seeds, breaking up the ground and covering your hands in mud as you dig and drop a couple seeds in each finger sized hole.

It's incredible that something so small has so much potential. It can turn into a vegetable or bush or tree with just some good weather, time and care. Not all of them grow, and you never know what's going to happen, but you look over that garden bed and you just feel so proud. You want to watch it and make sure that they all have the best chance at success.

I imagine that's how God feels about us.