Happy? Content...

I'm currently reading a book. About marriage so far, (which is totally beside the point of this post). And though I'm only 55 pages in, so far it's about this chick who enters marriage hoping for a strawberries and cream life, where everything's rosy and idyllic; moonlit sonnets on the balcony and lovin' in the garden. But she is completely disappointed and thus far spends her time dreaming of being elsewhere, all the while trying to convince herself she's content and that her life could be in perfect harmony with her dreams if only she thinks it to be as such. It ain't happening for her, big surprise.

I'm forced to analyze such emotions and can only hope in complete futility that the number of people living this way is fewer than I know it to be. Too many people romanticize life. They still cling to the idea that their childhood dreams are going to come true; they will be wealthy and in love and live in a castle on a lake, and they will never be discontent and fury and uneasiness will never knock at their door, and god forbid these things enter into their soul. It's a rather happy little scenario and theoretically a gorgeous little fantasy...and in a way I envy the people who think this very way, because somewhere in the 20 years of my life, I threw this ridiculous possibility out the kitchen window.

And for that I am actually pretty glad, because while they may enjoy fooling themselves now, these people are going to wake up 5, 10, 37 years from now and realize that this dream fizzled out a long time ago. That their life didn't go as planned---they saw strife and they felt grief and they felt anger and disappointment and hate. And they fell out of love and learned to detest the world. They were led to settle, dashing their dreams to broken bits of glass akin to Kristallnacht. They work a 9-5 job, drink the same dull cup of coffee every morning, skimp on luxury to pay the daycare bills, live in a suburb, and never have sex anymore. Which happens to a lot of people, let's face it. But it's far worse when you hoped for so much more.

There are two things that could have happened along the way to this disappointing life: they fully acknowledged they were losing their lovely mirage of a life as it was happening, which would be devastating. Or---they literally wake up and recall that dream existence, one they had forgotten due to all the shit in their life. This is equally dismal of a revelation. What a drag.

But here I propose a third happening: how about you come to your senses early in life, don't make unrealistic dumb plans that are set up for failure, let come what may, and thus guarantee a happier end result? I retract that....happier, no (at best, maybe).  More content, though---now, you can hang your hat on that for sure. And isn't contentment better than a fleeting happiness, which is a shallow emotion as it is? Stop grasping for things that aren't going to happen for anyone. Even the people who seem to have it all rarely do. Don't strive for anything---keep it simple. Enjoy the journey, good and bad. Love and lose, live and grieve, laugh and cry. Just don't build up hopes or lies in your brain that are going to be the end to your contentment. Even lives stricken with the worst happenings imaginable can be fulfilling---most of the time they prove to be more satisfying!

I know, I know....I'm just soooo depressing. But quite honestly, life isn't a pristine and sentimental manufactured Hallmark card sitting in a store, all white and shiny, with a bouquet of flowers on it...a card that's never been touched and yet the heart-warming message inside is predictable by even a blind man; and I personally wouldn't want it to be. I'd rather have a hand-made, imperfect, stained-with-tears card, one that's been put through a lot and is from someone who traveled that journey with me. I'd rather not know what the card is going to say, and I'd rather it be something that doesn't sound like it came from a Disney movie. In my life's card....I hope the message is in hand-written scrawl and I hope it's lopsided and it's cheery and sarcastic and sad all at the same time. Most of all, I want the card to be something totally unpredictable, something I had never thought of or seen and am therefore completely content with. Satisfaction.

Normality

I find it peculiar when mundane things define my life. When the crossword is replaced by a stupid SuDoku in the newspaper...when I have to stoop to eating plain English muffins because the plaza cafe closed before I could get butter or peanut butter or jam...when the lack of notifications on facebook infuriates me...
BUT THEN: when something exciting happens, such as putting on a animal print dress to attend a ritzy event by default, getting picked up over tomato cheese soup in a cup, and thought of something less that straight for the third time in one week, then I am happy.
I hate to be forced to ponder the lame-ness of my life. This over-analysis is such a flaw in myself; but I find I only ponder the lame-ness when my life is indeed lame, and actually, when a broader perspective is taken, my life is not lame at all. So as long as semi-entertaining things happen, or as long as I make them happen (i.e. frequenting a parlor on West Leonard, buying a Woodstock T-shirt, pretending to be British...) I'm a pretty damn content person.
On the ironic flip side...when these 'exciting' events do occur, sometimes I miss the routine things. I miss my morning coffee from the Keurig, I miss my large double bed all to myself, I long for a day full of nothing. And visa versa. It's this horrible circular pattern that I maintain: either catastrophic events or simple pleasures make life all worth it to me. I don't know if this is due to my particular frame of mind and mood on any given day. But.
There are days I want to lie in a bed that's not my own; to have a totally irregular weekend, full of both nothing and everything, back and forth; where I eat at strange times and sleep at even more odd intervals; where I meet people I don't know, and can say and do whatever I want.
And then there are days when I want to wake up at 7:35am, dry off from the steamy shower with my yellow towels, wear the jeans I've had since sophomore year of high school, go to work and do absolutely nothing productive, not pay attention in class, and then go home, eat a toasted cheese, fiddle around of stumbleupon, hardly talk to anyone, and go to bed between the green jersey sheets of my double bed, the venice canal poster not even catching my eye.
And then there are days when I want to GO out and DO things and SEE things and be someone totally new; someone full of hot air, vibrant and self secure and strangely friendly yet standoffish...and I want to be alone and with others all at the same time.
I think. I might be like....tri-polar.

Well this is new

Grand Rapids. It's been a hypothetical eye sore imposing on my life all the time I've lived here. The dread that ensued when school started back up again, or even just returning after a weekend from home...dirty, corporate, dull. So many times I've said "I'll be ok as long as I don't end up in Grand Rapids..."

But..............

Artists preparing for Art Prize in the crispy autumnal atmosphere. Hispanic Festivals where man-ish Che Guevara bracelets were purchased. Parking garages and steam curling out of man holes, the homeless man who smokes and holds a conversation with the friend only he can see; the white-haired parking lot attendant who knows and waves at me every day with a jolly smile but I've never talked to; chalk art under the bridge; swing dancing in Rosa Parks, amidst the beams of light that pop out from the Circle's holes; a man in the river creating a heart out of mere rocks; a man smoking a pipe, blazered and be-wrinkled, watching the man in the river; a indistinguishable figure playing guitar on the side of the river; profs at the janky Burger King who know the burger-flippers; bus drivers who hit on the cashier girls at said BK; the Varnum building, the shiny DeVos Perfromance Hall; Sanchez tapas and MoJos dueling piano bar; crosswalks and irate drivers; rows of hot cars parked along the side of the road; college kids who look like they're lost in Costco, trying to find their mother without looking like losers; women who take their lunch break to walk together, wearing tennis shoes with their business casual attire; the 1913 room waiter, debonair as hell, giving directions to a smiling middle aged blonde, who's obviously late for something; a random band and potential birthday party gone sour at Rosa Parks; couples dressed to the 9s, holding hands, in love beneath the brick and glass sided sky; never-ending Fulton street, loitered by white trash bag-holding pedestrians; the Bitter End manager, black and rotund, kicking out unwanted customers at 2am; the run-down gas stations converted into free parking; the austerity of the river....the bridges....the buildings......

The distaste that's festered in my very soul for you, Grand Rapids, somehow is being pushed aside. It's been replaced by a black hole of adoration and appreciation for you---something that must have been there alongside the hate for you all along, but is only now surfacing, coming on stronger than anticipated, arising as the most surprising of feelings.

Somewhere along the way, I've fallen into deep like with you.

There's a lake here? What?

I went to the beach the other day. Never in my life have I lived somewhere in which I had to drive 2 horrible hours to get to a beach, where said beach is only accessed by descending a flight of 100 jankity stairs.

Living in Leelanau county nearly my whole life, beaches are on the same level as the rest of the world. You can park and walk directly onto sand. There's no risk of falling on to the beach from a cliff above; there isn't the wind tunnel created by the barren surroundings.
You drive along and look out at eye level and AHHHH there's a beach! A wavy watery entity skid upon by Hobie Cats and water skiers and seagulls. There's a downtown directly across from many beaches, complete with speedo-wearers and ice cream eaters. You can't get this when you gotta travel ages to get to the middle of nowhere before going to the beach.........
I prefer my northern Michigan beaches to your Western Michigan ones any day....

You'd think working in a spa, I'd have exquisitely manicured hands and feet, smell like lavender and mint all the time, and just really really love the simplicity of the job.
Apparently, this romantic picture of the spa atmosphere is a crock to the highest extreme. No, not apparently. It IS. That one day of spa management study in Commercial Recreation really screwed me over. Sure, a spa is idyllic if you're the once participating, and not the one running the damn thing. It offers relaxation and pampering solely if you're the one putting up the insane amounts of cash to do it.
Don't get me wrong...this summer hasn't been ruined by the spa...the stupid stupid spa. But it sure opened my eyes to what I DON'T want to do with my life. The artificiality, the customer service, the monotony and the upset customers---get me outta there.
I want to sit in a room. Preferably alone, or with maybe one person, since I might get lonely, but that person would have to be really really really quiet...like a sleeping ninja. A room with chic furniture that no one ever sees but me and the ninja, and stacks and stacks of papers that need editing and proofreading. Stacks that I can liberally throw on the cutting room floor; things I can mutate and criticize and change as I wish. Then when the bloodbath of words is over, I can go home to my quiet house in the middle of nowhere but next to somewhere, with a lake view and gorgeous sunsets and a heated infinity pool...and not think about my job at all, except when I see my finished work in publication.
So long spa. We had a good run, but it's time for me to break up with you.

Some decisions...

There are some situations in which a lot of thought it required. Research, comparative or not, plus much contemplation and assessment---like if you're going to buy a BMW, or a Nook, or even Crocs online.
But other decisions don't require much thought. A comforter for your new apartment...a vegetable peeler...a room fan. Just buy it already. Don't listen to raving customers, or ones who bash the very existence of the product. Do you like how it looks? Is it well-priced? Does it say it'll do what you want? Good. Buy it, dammit.

Warts, shots, and latex gloves...

Have you ever analyzed a word to the point it sounds like a non-word? You say and think and ponder it as a word apart from its definition so darn much that it sounds like foreign jibberish.
Some words are just gross in nature without over-analysis. Like wart. It just sounds nasty the first time. It sounds even nastier when combined with its meaning. Grotesque beings have warts. Toads sport warts. Diseased unhygenic people are covered in warts. Little kids who pick noses have warts.
Worse than having a wart is having a wart frozen off. They tell you it'll hurt, and it does, and they tell you it'll blister, and it does. They don't tell you how big the blisters will get or how much they'll hurt or how disgustingly they will ruin your aesthetics. They don't tell you you'll feel like someone who got in a fight with a rabid feline, only satiated by your hand flesh. They don't tell you people will look at you like you're a leper. But in 2 to 3 weeks, you may or may not have any warts left.
To top off the wart removal situation, which topped the having warts situation, working at a bakery with bandaged hands raw from recent removal is just about as fun as eating sandpaper with no hands. Especially when the raw flesh is present on parts of the hands that bend a lot...and have a lot of pressure applied to them...and are easy to knock on things. This is just the best experience ever. You should try it yourself.
To make it all even more enjoyable, the tetanus shot on your arm in fine now, but they tell you it'll make you wish you were armless tomorrow, and your blisters from the warts probably will be worse and Tylenol will be your main source of comfort.
They just don't tell you. That it'll hurt to even type this out.

Coconut...

Have you ever had coconut water?
Sounds delicious, does it not?
Associated with coconut are things like macaroons, pina coladas, and a romanticized desire to stick a hot pink straw into a coconut directly as to suck the sweet milk out, while lying on a sugar sand beach somewhere.
Well...
Coconut water is super nasty. Despite all the vitamins it provides and the deceivingly adventurous and exotic idealistic images it demonically plants in minds of those who have not fallen to it's grotesque-ness, coconut water is more or less like drinking unfiltered, cloudy city water from a run down rusty faucet in the Bronx. And if you're lucky, they'll have tried to mask the flavor with artificial and hardly sweet pineapple and citrus flavors that taste like candles. MMMM.
So the next time you see coconut water on the Target shelf market down to $2.08---there was a reason for the discount, and please forgo the temptation to live on the wild side and stick with a Sobe.

Snap

There comes a time when things just change. It's not something traceable, not something clear, not something controllable at all. Without warrant: feelings, thoughts, and emotions just *snap* from what they were to the polar opposite. Whether it's realizing you all of a sudden can't stand liverwurst, that you have a insatiable taste for cottage cheese, or even that you actually detest someone you used to even...love.
These changes go unnoticed in humans, and are therefore unconscious changes that don't affect one's life at all. However, if the individual experiencing said changes is so in tune with the changes that they do in fact recognize them, there can be some odd consequences. Knowing you are changing and there is not a motion you can partake in to stop it can/must be an disconcerting and alarming occurrence.
That's all a part of life. If we all stayed the same person we were at age six, how immature and dull the human race would end up being.

Passenger

I have a high aversion to riding in cars. Preferably, I am the one in control, the road ruler, the driver. When you're the passenger...
you're jostled and
lurched &
tossed
and unexpectedly made tense
by a turn in the road, a lead foot, a sudden brake employment, a raged driver pulling in front of you, a sighting of a cop car, a fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants ice cream pit stop, a urgent need for a bathroom or puking site.
I'd much rather be the driver without passengers.

The Cow with the Wow!

The 2nd Annual Dairy Festival was held today in the Village at the Commons, by the old State Hospital in Traverse City. There were at least a few hundred in attendance on this sunny yet cool Sunday. The festival can only get bigger and better!
I arrived around 1pm, missing the parade and the walk out to the prized dairy cow's grave site. However, the vendors were varied, from recycled glass jewelry and hardware, to natural pumpkin seed butter, to martial artist schools, and even falafel and pita. There was a live band, someone and the True Falsettos, none of which sang falsetto...either way, we set up our folding chairs and swatted away the flies, watching kids run around with Moomer's Blue Moon, witnessed a raffle for Doo Dairy Compost, and drinking free un-homogenized chocolate milk.
At 3pm, 5 restaurants competed in a Grilled Cheese Grill-Off. We sampled 4 out of 6 for $5, and picked and voted for our two favorites (spinach and pesto on Bay Bread & The Underground Cheesecake Company's smoked gouda---we also got a slice of their Blueberry Swirl Cheesecake--my oh my). There were coffee sack races, a variety of baby goats and chickens to pet, and a calf named Oscar who sat docile in the shade, having photo after photo being taken of him. The aromas of pulled pork, hot dogs, and waffles cones tempted attendants as they made their way to the various craft tables, demonstrations, and into the wine tasting building.
All in all, this Festival, despite the ill-planned belly dancing with warranted our departure, is one that will hopefully grow and attract more locals and visitors! Maybe it'll rival the Cherry Fest one day.

Sometimes I tend to think ultra-grammatically, just for fun. Today, it was alliterations.

Toby lays like a lion lounging lazily late on the lawn.
Thor throws thrilling things thoroughly throughout Thursdays.
Hannah heats hamburgers handily hereto hasten hankerings.
Mom must meander meaningfully amidst millions of mindless, much-money, Michigan mansions.
Summer squelches squash sewn sadly in soppy, stinky, sub-par sandy squares.

This is how my brain works...bizarre,  I know~

ode to an old pj shirt

PJ shirt, oh PJ shirt, how we have grown together---you stretched, and ripped, and grew holes like Swiss cheese, and I grew taller and out of the child's section at Old Navy, where we first met. At first you were not a PJ shirt, no; rather, you were a lavender, or maybe lilac (which is more pink that purple) camisole I wore under sweaters, black sweaters; a shirt my sister once was envious of, or maybe mocking, but one she inquired about our relationship standing outside in the driveway, as we were ready to board the car on the way to a dinner party. I paired you with a hideous cool-hued scarf, though I'm not sure where this was on my body, but I know I wore it along with you.
Oh PJ shirt. When was it that you were dubbed no longer fit for everyday clothes and dubbed a sleeping article? Do you remember? I do not. Your twin, in pink, is still lost at sea (or at Lindsay Little's house), and you are soon to be thrown away. You've seen my tears, and felt my sweat; your tender, thin straps dug into my shoulders in restless nights of non-sleep once they rid themselves of thread and strangely did not disintegrate. You bear the marks of fabric well washed----fading, thin patches, drooping thread count. Alas, we shall not be together much longer, for you embarrass me with your XL girls' section tag and your failure to match any pajama pants I own.
We've been through much, old PJ shirt. You're destined for the dump....but maybe I'll fold you into a box and refer to this ode once a year.

Twenty years have gone by. Granted, I hardly remember the dewy, young, soft-skinned days of my first 5 or so years. Flashes of birthday parties and scrunchies and ill-applied costume makeup and confetti cakes and costume jewelry and torn pink gowns and bead kits spring into my old mature twenty year old as of sometime between 9pm and 11:59 brain.
I think I'm rather the same person as that twiggy, verbose, shy fresh red head. My likes are still highly in line with that young thing. My wants and visions may have changed drastically, just about as drastically as the chemical change from liquid water to steam.
I'm still me----Hannah, the gingery, pale-skinned, dancer-esque, contemplative, monotonal-at-times girl. but clearly stature and mind set have developed immensely, and though I am young and directionless in moments, I do know a few things about myself that I find as giant stepping stones to who I want to be and who I know I can become. These are mine, and mine alone, and don't need to be publicized (oh the secrecy).
I simply know that I am proud of me, not vain, but truly proud of the place I am in life and the sheer knowledge and awareness of myself I've come to grasp.

The yellow glow of the bulb lights on the State Theatre.

The gads of T-shirted kids and their parents crowding in the waiting area of a pizza joint.

Toned bodies showing off their athleticism despite the cool blast of the not-yet-summer Lake Michigan breeze.

Bittersweet chocolate gelato from American Spoon; more frozen liquid chocolate bar than iced cream concoction.

The sunroof down, bad radio music blaring, throwback sunglasses jauntily perched on nose, hair whirling.

                              THIS IS MEMORIAL DAY WEEKEND IN TRAVERSE CITY.

It wasn't the first time. That this idea had occurred to me. It was not the first passing of this observation through my overly-spa'd, muddle-with-sleeplessness, summer vacation brain. It had happened before, countless times, and is not anything but a small notice of a common and shared and accepted idea.
Everyone's mind is like a series of wheels and tines, much like that of a music box or any machine, really. Not two people alive are 'wired' the same way. All of us have wheels of different sizes, tines in varying locales, and a generally unique method to the madness of the human mind, all jumbled, complex, and on information overload!!! No human being will ever again be formulated with the same brain as Einstein was, therefore comparison of intelligencia and gifts, so to speak, are intensely futile and nothing but nonsense.
This is clearly why we are not all talented in the same way; therefore, we cannot all be neuro-surgeons, cannot all be accountants, and cannot all be rock stars. This has nothing to do with IQ, nor does it have to do with brain capacity. The tines in our brain are where things 'click'. For me, I like words and I like stats---I don't have a tine where my brother does for accounting, nor a tine where my mother does for genuine friendliness. I'd rather work in a room alone with a box chalk full of words than to be put in any sort of compromising teamwork-oriented or socially awkward setting. But what is awkward and compromising for me probably isn't for outgoing, lime-light-loving people like JLo or Muse.
All I'm saying is we all have out knacks. One should never put another down for not getting something or not being comfortable with something: just because a human can't figure out standard deviation is no reason to dis their intelligence. Some of us have waffle brains, some spaghetti, some like words, and some like letters.
The fact is you have a brain. Use it.

I know it's a normal experience, but it still gets me every time.
I crave something alllllllll day, or alllllll week or even for months, and after I satisfy my appetite for it, the mere bubble-thought of it repulses me such as milk turns away a lactose intolerant man who's eaten 14 pints of ice cream
For instance, our town got a Jimmy John's not long ago, and I'd been saving the french bread and sprouts experience for the exactly opportune time, which I concluded to be my birthday week. Well, I got insatiably hungry in stats today, and concluded I could have a birthday double-week; therefore I went to the place of free smells directly from class---meaning I shot out of my class, into my car, and one measly 1/2 block down the road in about 1 minute.
I ate my JJ's, a #6, while driving, in roughly 6 minutes, probably amusing one too many drivers, seeing a ginger nomming un-ladylike on a gourmet sub sandwich with '80s inspired sunglasses on, listening to Real Rock. It was quite delicious, till about half way through; then it got rather a chore to eat this monotonous card and veggie loaf.
I don't want Jimmy John's again for an eon. My throat feels like mayonnaise is coating it like pipe cleaner to a cruddy shower drain. When I think 'alfalfa sprouts', my gelatinous-encompassed throat closes up and my stomach churns like an old milk maids butter maker.
I don't want any more gourmet subs for a while. I'll be ok with the Free Smells, as they advertise.

Toilet Texting

You know what makes me mad? There you are in a public restroom, minding your own business, and all you can hear coming from the next stall is 'click click click clickity clikity click'. Ugh. Someone is toilet texting.

I have thought about toilet texting before: I'll be having a perfectly pleasant conversation with someone, and then just as I am headed for the restroom, they send me something hilarious that I desperately want to text back to---HOWEVER, I then remember the cardinal rule: do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Have you ever thought that the text you received 4 minutes ago originated on the john? Has it ever crossed your mind that someone might be conversing with while they are in a dirty, dingy-white, stanky bathroom in Walmart in the dicey part of San Diego, with a dripping sludgy mop in the corner and Bubba waiting outside in a wife beater? Have you ever thought that your conversation about your plans next week might be coming from the french-fry scented depths of a McDonald's men's room?
There is just one thing I ask of you all. Don't ever toilet text me. Don't toilet text a single soul. The next time you're tempted to whip that phone out while you're doing your thing, don't. Just don't.

Now don't even get me started on Toilet Phone Call. If you can hear a flush in the background, yell at the person calling you, hang up, and don't talk to them until they regain the decency every human being should possess.

Graduation Glasses

There is a concept that I was recently introduced to by a dear friend: she called it 'Graduation Glasses'. When you 'graduate' from a situation, you tend to want to be in that particular situation once again, even though while you were in the situation itself, you were clearly unhappy. You look back and remember the good before the bad, even though you recognize that the bad existed.
This is a fascinating theory to me, and I realize I choose to wear these glasses a lot. I regret they way I've acted in the past, and wish I could go back and change things---however, upon further consideration, I realize I'm probably going to regret my regret, and consequently the cycle will continue until I am regretting regretting the regret that I once had, and will no longer have any sense of living in the present at all.
In conclusion, I know I'm not perfect: I am going to act how I act, and if it causes regret, there's not much I can do. But I'm not going to analyze my every current mood and position in hopes to cancel any regret I may have in the future, for that is not living---that is robbing yourself of a life.

Resort-ee

I've never thought of myself as a person particularly gifted towards solicitousness. That is, I haven't ever been a people person. I think this is linked with the fact that as a young girl my mother set me alone in a play pen to entertain myself---she said it was to protect me from my siblings. That's whack. Or maybe it's true. Either way, I think this planted a loner seed in my being, and that's why I don't mind eating alone, driving myself to far off places alone, or really spending a whole day without human interaction.
So I find it quite ironic that the only jobs I've ever held have been in customer service, or at least dealing with people. Working as a till girl at a specialty food shoppe...cleaning rooms at a B & B...being a nanny...a student worker in an office building...and soon to be spa attendant and bus girl.
I can't say I hate dealing with perfect strangers in a money-gaining setting, but it sure isn't my favorite thing. *Sometimes I regret wishing away my nanny job in Florida, where I watched Regis and Kelly every morning and rocked out to Alt Nation in my bikini; where I nearly beat Mario Brothers and got to see a baby learn to crawl & see her smile as I blew bubbles into the 90 degree sun-scented air. Quite bluntly...I miss Madison. And I miss Lindsey. And gosh darn it, I even miss my big ol' brother, Nate. Those are the kind of people I don't mind dealing with. *

Time is a peculiar concept...Father Time, 'Give it some time', 'Only time will tell', 'This time around...' Even the word is odd. Say it enough times and you begin to question the English language, and the person who invented words at all. Think of it conceptually and your brain become muddled with the absurdity that time really is: The indefinite continued progress of existence and events in the past, present, and future regarded as a whole...a non spatial continuum...a measurable period of action or non-action. Time~ can be bittersweet.

People you were close with at one time move on.
What seems abominable at present is just a faint memory after some time...
You live and you love, but sometimes it's not enough. Sometimes it is.
The future seems so bright and far off, but given some time, it's here and now; the things you want to stay the same change, and the ones you long to change stay the same.
Time is supposed to heal, but sometimes it creates a gaping void that cannot be filled in with anything at all.

I suppose all those cliches are true---Time really can tell, and it certainly alters ones perspective. Things change with time, and so do people.   
Time can be a positive passing of existence, or it can simply cause us to look back at what we wish we still had, or long for what we hope to have in some far off place.

Men in Boots

There is one, an only one, sort of boot I approve of men wearing; a kind of footwear that I'd see on a guy, and think "I could marry you solely for you boot choice".
I dislike all snow boots. I know they are practical, but give it up. You like to ski, that's cool, and you hit the slopes with your homeboys and your hot pink board, that's acceptable. But your boots are not. They're ugly, make you walk like a knee-less jamoke, and don't make me want to marry you.
Work boots: now, here is another practical boot. I don't totally dis the tan hiker type boot, and sometimes I think they are rather attractive, especially on the Brawny man or unlaced while you are smoking a nice pipe on a porch somewhere, but let's face it. If you wear work boots....fine fine fine, they're not that bad, I'll forgive this and marry you. 
I also loathe any type of leather boots, especially if they have heels, are made out of dead boa constrictors, or have plastic, metal, or pletal zippers. These are tacky. You're Mick Jagger, that's sweet. You're crusty and old and when I see your too-tiny T's and jeans, I do not think "You're smokin', let's elope".

I lied. I don't like any boots on men. Stick to white loafers, sleek dress shoes, and sneakers...not running shoes. Or boots. Of any kind.

I lied again. I don't give a crap what shoes you wear. This is not pertinent to our relationship at all. Wear what you want and I'll do the same and we can live happily ever after. 

I've got one. final. left. It's accounting. I really dislike accounting, and no matter what anyone says, managerial is not easier than financial. These courses are equally aggravating, useless, and a detriment to my glorious GPA. When it's all said and done, though, I don't really give a crap about this exam. No matter that I need an 82.5% to get a decent finishing grade; no matter that it's at 2pm and I have to make a flight at 5pm; no matter that I've been up since 6:30am, got 5 hours of sleep, and even the coffee isn't helping to pop my peepers open.

What can I do? It's accounting. It's an exam. It's an accounting exam---the last one I'll ever take (SCORE!)

I Love Exam Week!

Exam week is the best one of the year. Honestly. I get to work extra hours where all I do it study, I take exams in my PJs, and notes become obsolete, so I can clear my notebooks of all that debris.
Here's how I 'study' for exams:
A day in advance, at most, I look at my notes for, let's say, 10 minutes. I do this potentially 3 times that day. Before bed, the evening previous to the exam day, I browse my well-taken notes, powerpoint slides, and I might even crack the book open. If it is an early exam, I wake up, pop my spectacles on, grab some pencils, look at my notes once again, and arrive at the exam location. I throw everything I know into essay questions and do everything else rather quickly as not to forget what I crammed into my brain.
If it is at a decent time of day, I sleep in, drink excessive amounts of coffee (which is an every-day activity, not partial to exam week), do some yoga, and study study study (for 10 minutes). I dress nicely, eat regularly, and ease into the classroom, face the exam the same way I would if it were before 9am, as mentioned in the above paragraph, and after all is said and done, I let all that information escape out the back of my brain and sit in angst waiting for my score to come back (mostly 'angst' consists of eating cookies and blaring celebratory songs).

Garage man

I've developed an uncanny friendship with one of the security guards at the parking garage downtown. Before you get too creeped out and wonder what kind of person even would think about having such a relationship, don't. It's rather simple.
There is an old man. He wears a dark blue collar-less coat all year round and he dons a white moustache. He's probably in his early 70s. He used to walk around the parking garage, checking for pass-less cars, but I believe he gave that up, unless he does this job while I am not watching...not that I watch him all the time, I don't, I'm just saying I haven't seen him roam the cold concrete garage in the near past.
He sits in the booth by the entrance to a certain lot, and one day I started waving to him. It may have been my red hair or my white coat that made me recognizable to him, but whatever it was, he started waving back.
Now every day I look for him in that booth...sometimes he is replaced by a younger person doing homework. Sometimes I pass him walking, though this is rare. I did pass him today, and I said hello. He has a wonderfully rich voice, lower and younger than I anticipated.
I hope he doesn't keel over and kick the can before I graduate, for my day would not be complete without a sighting of the Garage Man.