Shout-Out to the Lurkers

I know you're out there.

Yes, you.  

I know that there are more of you than I even realize, you, my silent readers.  

It's possible that you haven't missed a single posting since I started this blog last year, or maybe you catch up sporadically.  Perhaps you don't like to comment because you don't know what to say or you would rather have a conversation about it in person (which then may or may not happen because life happens in the midst of all else).  

All I really have to go off of are the view counts on my page, and sometimes, that's really enough.  And I want to let you know that you don't have to feel guilty about not liking a post on Facebook or not mentioning something about it to me in person.  It's okay.  I feel that support anyway.  And I appreciate you. 

It just might mean that I tell you the same story that you've already read once until you tell me otherwise-- it does make me smile to be able to put faces to those numbers. 

But you can also remain where you are.  Thank you for reading.  Thank you for sharing this space with me.

Thoughts on the Road

Smells that have filled the car while just driving along on the road:

1. Onion
2. Pencil shavings
3. Cat food
4. Basil
5. Chicken
6. Grease, as in from an unknown deep fried glory
7. Fresh asphalt (that one make sense, at least)

And sometimes, I happen to be close to some crazy characters, where other adventures just seem to happen.

At first, we were just trying to move the elephant

But he was only interested in investigating Dad, apparently,
having dispatched of me and, very soon, Mike

On a tricycle built for...four.

Being on the road really does have its ups and downs.  (Sometimes, the internet in my hotel is LAME.)  I enjoy working with our people in person, walking them through what they'll need to know for their jobs in their territory and quickly see either lightbulbs or blank stares, encouraging them along.  Once I've clocked out for the day, my night is mine to invent.  I've had all kinds of random conversations in the whirlpool at the hotel.  I went to a movie one night, walked in a park another, and manage to get a bit of writing in here and there.  I like finding new, local places to eat, including such oddities as deep-fried Oreos in Freeport and a restaurant in Quincy called Tiramisu where I literally would have been happy to eat a bowl full of the sauce itself from the dish I had there.  Being on the road changes everything up, which in and of itself can be a welcome thing.  

However, I've reaching the point of exhaustion, where my body is starting to wear down with the stress of the season, small pieces crumbling away.  I look forward to September, when things begin to slow back down at least a little bit.  I want to start eating well again, get the right amount of sleep, and actually relax long enough to carry that peace of mind for longer than a day.  I'm officially to the point where I need to start eliminating extra activities out of my schedule, and any time Andy innocently suggests adding a small task to my time home, I bristle internally.  

I've lost the ability to balance my work schedule, my personal goals, and, to a point, my relationships.  I cannot juggle the details anymore, starting to drop details, and my body is suffering.  I don't feel like myself right now.  

Can't exactly pull back from the work part at this point of year, and that part of my life will get better soon anyway.  I'm pulling back on some of my goals and especially my guilt on not meeting them.  I'm saying no to spending time with people.  And I'm taking time to fall asleep on the couch.  I need to remember how to feel like me again.

The good news is this is a temporary state.  And I know that; it's what is giving me that little last push through.  On the one hand, I know that where I am at in this point this year as opposed to last year is a considerable improvement, so part of me demands that the tired part suck it up and deal.  But, just how my experiences with sickness don't invalidate someone else feeling ill today, I can still recognize that things are tough for myself even if they're not as bad as my lowest point--that's how I got to this terribly skewed version of "normal" in the first place, by smiling through suckage that still wasn't good even if it wasn't wretched.

In any case, I'm at another onsite this week for the full week and have unpacked, since I tend to believe that if I'm staying anywhere for more than one night, I feel better if I unpack.  Next week, I have the last major onsite for a little while, capping off the season by heading out to Providence, Rhode Island, this being the first time that I have flown for work.  I'm certain that this is going to be a great adventure, at least in part for the sheer relief of making it through the summer.  

Labels and Sides

The Fourth of July is about as important to my mother's side of the family as Christmas is--in fact, there are some family members that can make it to the Fourth that can't make it to Christmas.  For me, it's what we've always done for the Fourth:  go to Hopedale, spend time with family, eat too much good food, go down to the park to ride some rides, see the parade, and have a chance to catch up.  It doesn't have the presents, but it also doesn't have the stress of needing to be six other places.  

Now this year, Andy, David, and I all opted to show our holiday spirit by wearing our Bernie shirts to the parade, and, well, you see our uncle's reaction.  

We just want to give you free healthcare, Uncle Rick!

We've known for a long time that we have some different political opinions than our uncle, but that's really okay.  In separate pieces, we all had discussions with him, coming at the same serious of problems with different solutions.  We could recognize that we had our own biases.  We found that we were angry about a lot of the same things.

What I really appreciated was the reminder that everyone has reasons for thinking the way they do--not excuses, but reasons.  And there are places where we still had a lot of important common ground.  But most importantly, I had a person in front of me, not a caricature.  This was a person that I trusted and respected that had these ideas, not just some faceless "other."  

Both sides seem to forget that the person who thinks with a different opinion isn't automatically stupid or naive.  They are a person with history and reasons.  There is a person on the other side of the internet that can be hurt by your words.  There is a person on the other end of the internet that can be persuaded, perhaps much more so if we try to phrase an actual argument instead of blanket insults.  Additionally, there are people on the other side of the internet that might be hell bent on not being persuaded, and that is a reality, too.  

In short, we need to all come to the table with an open and empathetic mind, and we need to not get suckered into this idea that there are only ever two options; the world is full of grey instead of a projected false duality.  

Portland=Fairlyland?

Andy and I had an adventure recently to a strange, mythical place.  I do not know at which point our plane crossed into a new dimension, but it did seem rather appropriate in retrospect to be flying Spirit airlines.  

I mentioned to Andy a couple of times that now I understood why "Oregon" is usually accompanied by pine trees.  Very soon, we started compiling pieces of evidence for why we thought maybe we were in a fairyland instead of a real place.  

Look!  Hills with pine trees behind us!

Actual topography!

We were walking around a neighborhood and saw recycling on the corner and a bin out for a compost service.  

There was a store dedicated to socks and clearly doing well.

There was a farm to table restaurant in the airport that even cured their own bacon in house.

Downtown had so many mature trees, where parts felt more like a forest than they did a city. 

Apparently, Portland is in a Temperate Rain Forest Biome.  This fact was related to us casually, but what this means is basically everything can grow here.  No, really.  Just walking around in a neighborhood, we saw succulent desert plants, then a palm tree, a Japanese Maple, a White Oak, and this huge pine (below) within a few blocks of each other.

This was just a random tree in someone's yard.

There were bike paths even on the major highways.  One particular sir had EPIC leg muscles and clearly biked everywhere.  

In addition to hills, we also saw a view of a snow-capped mountain driving along.  This is still a highly unusual sight for me, considering that I've only otherwise seen mountains once in my life (spring break trip to Colorado).  

When we went to fill up the rental car, there was a gas station attendant who met us there and filled up the car himself for us.  Evidently, Oregon is one of two states left that does this.  

Walking around, there was a lot of diversity in people--not just different racial backgrounds, but ages, too.  

We were told upon arrival that one of the main things we should see, one of the places that people would ask if we visited while we were in Portland, was Powell's Bookstore.  It was huge.  It was glorious.  And it was hella busy.  As Andy put it, it was throwing elbows trying to get around kind of busy.  AND they had a shelf (only a shelf, but a whole shelf) of books in Norwegian.  

The area, too, seems to reflect a lot of progressive ideals that are important to the both of us.  
One of the real kickers for me, too, came from a discussion with friends, that teachers in the area are similar to doctors, in the capacity that they are treated as professionals, as compared to the attitude that if a student is doing poorly then clearly it is the teacher's fault.  I know, crazy, right?  

So Andy and I still are not completely sure whether Portland is real or just a figment of our imaginations, but to be fair, we only had about 36 hours there.  Truly, this added to the whole surrealism of the experience, that we barreled in and barreled out in the course of a weekend.  Why take the time to go and come back, without a ton of time to explore?  We are still storing our time off for our Norway trip in February.  But we weren't going to miss it.  

Because of these two beautiful people here (the beautiful ones in the middle, I mean).

So glad that we could make it out for Nolan and Laura's wedding that weekend.  We got to catch up with some friends, the ceremony and venue were lovely, the bride was glamorous, and the groom was pleased as anything.  We would have done it again in a heartbeat.  

Had a fantastic time.  Getting home was a bit of a struggle, but that's because Fairyland wanted to keep us there longer.  We got back home at 2 am Monday morning and still went to work.  Would still do it again.  

This is our "Holy crap, we made it back alive" face.