Holding a Moment

I had the pleasure to be a part of Kate and Kaitlyn's wedding recently.  

It was a long but wonderful weekend, helping all of those last minute details pull together into a lovely ceremony and a great party.  I reconnected with some people and had the pleasure of meeting a good few more.

And helped make a LEGION of cupcakes.  This is about a quarter of them.

Emotions were running all over the place, from panic to joy to anger to relief and everything in between.  There's a lot going together in the planning of a wedding, if you've not gone through it yourself.  

However, I have a very specific moment held perfectly in my mind.  There were many that I could have picked--when the brides first saw each other, Kaitlyn's bouncy excitement right before the wedding, Kate and her mother sitting next to each other waiting to line up, their first kiss as a married couple, the list goes on.  But for some reason, the moment that is sticking with me most was Kaitlyn and her father in the daddy-daughter dance.  From where I was sitting, I had a clear view of his face, watching the resolution crumple into joyful tears as they held each other close.  There was something so beautiful and untainted about that moment.  

I don't know why, but I find that I don't cry nearly so easily as when I see someone else crying.  Again, many good moments that I could have teared up, but when I had that perfect vantage point of watching someone fight tears and ultimately give in, well, I was with the two of them emotionally in that private but public moment.  

As I've thought about that moment, I've also been trying to pinpoint what my triggers might be.  I always cry at those video compilations where soldiers are returning home to their families.  I'll sometimes cry at weddings.  I sometimes cry at funerals.  Sometimes happy tears move me more than sad tears and sometimes it's the other way around.  I'm sure I could find the source, find a correlation over time, but I don't feel that it is really worth the effort at the moment.  Sometimes, it's better just to hold the experience.

I'm so very happy for you both, Kate and Kaitlyn.

The Beginning of the Holidays

Well, the holidays have swung around again.  Honestly, they snuck up on me this year.  I could have marked Thanksgiving as my official start day, but Andy and I have started taking the day before off, just to have some us-time before all of our family and friend obligations during the holiday season.  Even before that, though, is of course the Festival of Trees.  I have a few of my favorites below.  Enjoy!

An elegant example

Whimsical snowman design

"Are there brakes on this thing..?"

And, yes, it is that skirt

A beautiful gingerbread house

Waiting for a Package

I went in for some retail therapy the other day, and I bought a skirt from ModCloth.  It's adorable.  I will be a little upset if it doesn't wear as well on me as I'd like.  So, I've been keeping one tab open on the top of my screen at work that has the tracking information.  Randomly throughout the workweek, I've been returning to the screen to see if the truck/plane/carrier pigeon has stopped somewhere else yet.  

Come on, REFRESH. REFRESH.

What is it about expecting a package that can suddenly make you feel that you have purpose in the world?  

And yet, I know that when the package finally arrives, that I will be excited to rip it open, and yet there will be another part of me that is a little bit depressed that I am no longer waiting on something.  It's the same kind of depression that happens when I finish a book that I've thoroughly enjoyed or a season of something on Netflix that had me excited.  I've been trying to find if there is a word for this, specifically, but have come up dry so far, other than "post-book depression."  

Or perhaps, I could just parse it down to the idea that now I have nothing to look forward to. 

That's not to say that I no longer have any desire to keep on living, but that thing that I was really anticipating--either wanting to get back to my book or know that my package had arrived--is now not there anymore.  The anticipation is over.   And now begins the search for something to fill that gap again.

The anticipation is why we tend to like Christmas.  A lot of those Christmas activities are all about preparing for that day, including but not limited to:

1. Baking
2. Decorating cookies
3. Gift shopping
4. Gift wrapping
5. Creating your own gift list
6. Decorating the house
7. Advent Calendars
8. Preparing a meal
9. Getting a fresh pine tree or your artificial one out of storage
10. Readying the house for incoming family/friends

For me, my real "it's really the Christmas Season again" marker is the Festival of Trees.  And this year, I'm already really looking forward to it.  I'm specifically planning to wear this skirt to said event.  So in waiting for this package, I'm preparing to prepare to prepare, oddly enough.  That anticipation can be stressful (waiting for test results, waiting to hear from a loved one that hasn't checked in, etc.), and there are many that find that anticipation to be more of a dread, depending on what kind of weight this holiday season means specifically to you.  

But so far, this year, it's sending me back to a pleasantly nostalgic place.  All entirely triggered by a package coming in the mail.

And it might have arrived today!

Initial Thoughts from November 9th, 2016

You know, I had a couple of cute, quippy entries I was going to put on next--short observations about the world, fun experiences, thoughts, etc.  

But it doesn't seem to fit right now.  There's a lot to process at the moment.  Writing, though, helps me process.  

Right now, I'm trying very hard to keep myself from making gross generalizations.  Rationally, I know that I cannot make assumptions about the people that voted for Trump (though I can make statistical ones), but at the moment I just want to be angry.  I need to mourn.  I need to work through my acceptance of this new dystopian reality lead by Cheeto McSmall-Hands.  That I still chose to include the previous sentence is evidence itself that I want to throw my fists in the ring and start with the name calling, too, revert back to the childhood self-righteous "It's not fair" or "He started it!" as though that would magically make a difference.  

So right now, I don't know what to say.  But I know I have to say something, if only to let these feelings out so I can move on.  You see my conundrum.  

As such, I'm only going to pull out a few main points that I keep coming back around to.  I'm sure that when I've had a little more time to work through the rest, I'll have some different things to say and a different approach, but (other than disbelief and some anger) this is what I have now.

I think we have a lack of empathy as a country:  We fail to see each other as people and instead see people as "other."  This makes it easier to dehumanize them, through bullying, intimidation, unjust legal practices, profiling, etc.  The more we dehumanize someone, the more we become certain that they just "deserve" to be treated that way.  No one group is to blame for all of our problems, not even Trump Supporters.  It's not about democrats being the devil or republicans being the devil--these are REAL people who have reasons for why they think differently.  Demonizing someone might make you feel temporarily superior, but you can't hold someone down in a ditch without being the in ditch yourself.  We need to remember our collective humanity in order to really listen to each other.

What we do affects the world:  Our economy will have an effect on other countries.  We cannot play King of the Playground to the point where everyone else decides they don't want to play with us and makes a new playground.  We share the same space and there are some points where we have to work together.  Additionally, with the internet, now, it's too late to make isolationism happen.  Again, remembering that collective humanity in order to find the best way to move forward for all peoples.

I think we collectively refuse to take culpability:  I'm trying to quash thoughts where I'm placing blame on a group of people, because they're definitely popping my head whenever I let my mind drift.  There's going to be a LOT of finger-pointing for the next while, here.  The problem is much more complex than 59 million people collectively on a whim deciding to vote for a man that is a bully (to say the very least--I have many, many more things I could say here).  For better or worse (whichever your opinion is), we made this possible.  We created an environment where political discourse broke down to a schoolyard fight.  

The world is going to keep turning:  Despite our best efforts, so far tomorrow keeps coming.  And it will continue to do so.  When it stops, it won't matter to us anyway.  We are a fleck of dust in the ocean.  Take a deep breath.  Whether or not you are pleased with the election results, take the time to celebrate or mourn appropriately and then, well, tomorrow will still come--work toward making it the tomorrow you want.  Or better yet, work on making it a tomorrow that helps us all.