one step closer...

MOVING...

2006-03-22T22:50:00.000-06:00

I've decided to leave blogger and move to my new site at Wordpress. I hope you will all please update your links and keep reading me at my more personalized, prettier site. Thanks for sticking with me.

a potential new blog-home

2006-03-20T23:00:00.000-06:00

hey friends! I have been looking around for a new blog site. Nothing against blogger, but I am tired of all the themes and when I tried to change it with a customized theme, neither I nor my brother could figure out how to make it work. I played around with wordpress tonight.. so check out my potential new site there please. Leave a comment if you like it. Click here to see it.

Joe moment

2006-03-19T22:36:00.000-06:00

A freak thing happened in my restaurant starting about two months ago. This man came in on my assistant manager Joe's shift. He ordered food, and Joe, being who he is, provided exceptional customer service, above and beyond what this particular individual expected of his fast-casual experience. The man sits down to eat, but before he leaves, he slips Joe a piece of paper, with his name, title and phone number. He tells Joe something about the company where he is a VP and states that they are looking for good people to train for management positions.

Joe and I are friends, we worked together at the store we were both at previously, and he had recently been transferred to be my assistant manager. He was not looking for another job, but was disappointed with his current pay. So after the customer talks to Joe briefly about his company, Joe is pretty skeptical. I mean really, who does that? Nevertheless, there is no harm in calling, talking to the guy, seeing what this is all about. So he calls, sets up a time to talk to this customer/company VP, and discovers that the guy is legit. He is really a vice president for a high-end equipment support and maintenance company that is currently led by a select group of near-retirees. The customer/VP is looking for energetic, young leaders with great people skills. Joe has a degree in education and a few years experience in day care and restaurant management. No business experience in sight. Nevertheless, they love him, and after several weeks of interviews and meetings, they hire him to do sales and marketing with the intent to train him into a future VP.

This is a true story, and when Joe gave his two weeks notice last month and told me this story, I was disappointed, but so happy for him. Joe is a great guy, something great happened to him, and he deserved it. He got lucky because he happened to make this guy's burrito. I hope in ten years he will tell his kids this crazy story about how he got started a company he's then helping run. I have to say though, that I was also uite a bit jealous. I had been the one wanting to leave my job, and had been starting to look around a bit, and then found out Joe was leaving. I wondered why some people got so lucky in life and why it wasn't me. I felt a bit sorry for myself here and there, wondering why no one ever offered me a job after I rolled their burritos. I'm pretty much over it now, but I talked to Joe the other day and he said that he's excited to go to work in the morning, and when he leaves, he thinks, "wow, that was a great day." No late-night phone calls, no wierd hours, no food prep, no cleaning. Sounds amazing.

I have spent my last few years as a restaurant manager, and though there are many things I love about it, I don't feel like it's possible to sustain the energy level needed with the amount of stress that it puts on all areas of one's life. I'm starting to understand why some of the people I see in the restaurant industry seem bitter and burned out and hating their jobs. Maybe they started out really intent on doing something good and meaningful for their employees and customer. I don't want to be 30 and feeling stuck in my career and totally burned out. And that's really where I am heading. So U-turn, interviews coming my way, I hope something works out soon. I wanted to tell the Joe story because I think it's pretty amazing, and speaks to the idea that there still are people taking chances on people for reasons other than their resumes. And for a neat little conclusion....

Friday a late-20s prefessional woman came into the restaurant. It was not busy and I noticed she went straight to pick up a catering menu. I went to see if she had questions and explained our options, showed her the correct store phone number and chatted with her for a minute. She introduced herself, asked for my name, and thanked me for the information. A little while later, there was a phone call for me, and it was Crystal on the phone, explaining that she was the person who had just been in to inquire about catering. I said of course I remembered her and she thanked me again for being so friendly and helpful when she had stopped in. She said I had gone out of my way to help her and the reason she had thought about it was that her company was going through an aggressive expansion and seeking "sharp" people to join them. I actually almost laughed, but instead responded that was was defintely "keeping my options" open and interested in speaking with her about a job. I actually don't think it's going to be something I am seriously interested in, but how could I pass up reacting to my own Joe moment?

2006-03-16T20:41:00.000-06:00

Some of you have expressed some interest in my job search - probably in order to avoid more ranting posts about the restaurant industry. Believe me, I understand; I'm way tired of talking about it. Anyway, my interview the other day went great. I got to meet with the customer service supervisor, as well as the other women who have the same position I am applying for, as well as some other people at the company. They were all great. I still don't want to go into lots of details in case I don't get it and then feel dumb and more disappointed that I blogged in detail about it... but, I did get a call back today, and next Wednesday I am going to meet with one of the owners who deals with their international business side (where I would be working). Very exciting. For now, I'm sitting down with some lava cake (first time, so delicious!!!) from my husband's restaurant, a glass of riesling (not my first time) and Breakfast at Tiffany's (the movie, first time). Thanks for all your good thoughts this week.

nuggets of confusion

2006-03-14T19:20:00.000-06:00

I want to first direct you all to Matt's most recent post. Done reading? A few years ago, Matt, his wife Sara, as well as fellow blog-friends Mary, Jon, Cory and others were all students in Madison. At some point in all of our college careers, we were part of a large evangelical campus Christian group. This group's main goal was to evangelize (convert) people on campus, and then disciple (train) them to become good Christians. I credit this group with a lot of stuff in my life. It helped me grow. It tore me down. It built me up. It produced severe doubts about my faith.

Here's what I am really trying to express in this post -- contradiction, confusion, a sense of no longer knowing what is right and wrong. A few years ago I was a person who fiercely defended what I believed to be right. I hope I was never a mean person, but I used to debate my newspaper friends about their lifestyles, beliefs, approaches to faith, etc. I would say things like, "God loves you infinitely and perfectly, but He doesn't love that you underage drink." And today, in March of 2006, I believe little of what I did back then to be important. I still believe in God, but probably not in the Bible the way many Christians do, as an inerrant document from which you can pick and choose phrases as they suit your arguments.

My relationship to faith and religion in the past few years is love-hate, black and white, completely gray and confusing as hell. I grew up in a world where discussing issues of the soul, faith, politics, inner issues wasn't exactly the norm. I went to college and things changed a lot. Perhaps the world changed, people changed, but I can't view things as black and white as before. I used to be so sure, perhaps because I was taught in church that it was very important to be sure about things of faith. Occasionally someone would speak in a positive light about "doubting" Thomas, but usually it seemed we were supposed to be take the Bible at what it said, love God, and do what was right. Perhaps I thought that if I had doubts that I would be that wierd person who didn't fit in in church and therefore didn't make friends with the cool church people.

What I have noticed lately is that a lot of people seem to be having a struggle related to Matt's. So many people take issues with bits and pieces or big chunks of what they were taught as a child, yet still want an experience like church in their life. We want community, we want discussion, we want companionship, perhaps worship. But if the chuch is not a place where like-minded people with similar if not nearly identical beliefs gather, then what is it? Is it possible for the church to gather in all these stragglers, who can't say they believe that the Bible is word-for-word true, or that all Hindus and Muslims are going to hell, but still want to be in that place? I understand completely that I could go to church. I am never going to be a "seeker" as we call people checking out the faith, and always somewhat of a cynic, but then I think, why go? If all I am going to do is judge everything that seems fundamentalist, why should I show up just to be disappointed? Then I think, maybe if I were to find a church with a lot of people like me, but that doesn't exist, so I need to stop looking.

I grew up in a mega-church where there are a lot of amazing people and a lot of good things happening. I believe their priorities are generally in the right spot. There are many well-meaning, intelligent people there. However, I don't really believe the same doctrine as their statement of faith. I crave authenticity and am not sure I want to involve myself in a place where I cannot express my real doubts about our society, the world, the church, the Bible without having people ridicule and disregard me. The ironic reason that I believe this will happen is because I know back a few years when I was quite zealous and caught up in "being a Christian," that's what I would have done with myself. I would have met me, figured out I had some issues with Christianity, and probably considered me someone not to be involved with. I know how judgemental I was (am?). I know that it's hypocritical to say what I am saying, but I don't know how the church works filled with people who believe their way is God's way (the right way) and mix in a few people like me. If a church has a statement of faith and doctrines and things that they hold to that hold it together, how do you dissent from that and remain part of it?

a light?

2006-03-12T20:22:00.000-06:00

I keep using my blog to complain about work, and even I am getting really tired of hearing myself complain about it. I am sick of sending resumes, re-writing objective statements and customizing my cover letter for the umpteenth time. I've almost given up. I think I am a qualified person with many good skills, but I think most employers just want to find someone with the same exact experience they are looking to plug said employee in, and therefore aren't looking for career-changers like myself. I do have a fairly promising interview Wednesday that I am pretty excited about, but no details lest I jinx it. Okay, I don't believe in "jinxing" at all, but I still think it's not helpful for me to think about the ramifications of actually getting a different job right now.

I have thought extensively about the general situation of leaving my current job, and that's unfortunate for a few reasons but great for others. I would really be leaving my immediate supervisor in a jam, and I respect her and like her immensely. We have a lot in common and would be very good friends if we met in other circumstances. I would also be sad to leave a lot of my staff in my store, but there's lots of turnover in restaurants, and few of my employees likely feel as loyal to me as I feel to them, so that can't be a concern. All I know is, I am burned out, and days off and the odd three-day weekend are not helping, so its time to go. I really want out of the food industry, because I think I would be good at many other things, but I've got to convince someone of that. Think positive thoughts for me on Wednesday morning.

keep score

2006-03-06T16:23:00.000-06:00

By the way, with regards to the Oscars, I had to post my favorite Jon Stewart comment from the night. It went something like this:

"For those of you keeping score at home: Martin Scorsese, no Oscars... (thoughtful pause) Three 6 Mafia, one Oscar..." referring to the rap group who won the award for best original song

(The song was called "It's Hard Out Here For a Pimp," by the way.)

Interesting....

a culture-ful weekend

2006-03-05T22:32:00.000-06:00

I had dinner with my wonderful college friend Rachel Beck the other night, and we got to see "Dave Chappelle's Block Party" on the tab of MKE magazine because I do short movie reviews for their Threeview pieces. Anyway, I have had very little exposure to Dave Chappelle, but I have to say I was definitely a fan after seeing the movie. It's part documentary, part concert film, part stand-up routine, featuring Chappelle, who it seems one day decided to throw a huge hip-hop party in Brooklyn. He invited some of black music's most talented and socially conscious performers, and managed to stage a reunion of the Fugees.

Chappelle lives in a small town in Ohio and wanders around the town a few days before the show gathering up some interesting characters to take the bus to New York City, apparently to add some midwestern flair to the urban party. It seems that the whole town loves him, one elderly man politely declining the invitation stating his hearing isn't good enough for him to understand the lyrics in rap music. I hadn't heard of this movie beforehand, and I'm not sure I would have paid $8 to see it in the theater, but I would have definitely rented it. Today I decided to download the Inside the Actor's Studio episode featuring Chappelle, which was at times touching and sad, and other times hilarious. I love Kanye West, Wyclef Jean, and Lauryn Hill, and after seeing the block party I decided to download a few songs by Jill Scott, Common and the Roots.

I also saw "Brokeback Mountain" a few weeks ago, also for the Threeview (I rarely go to the movies normally, we're a renting couple) which was wonderful. I just finished watching the Oscars and was a bit surprised that they didn't win many of the awards, including Best Picture, that they were expected to. However, it seems many of those awards went to "Crash," which I thought was a fantastic, important movie, so that's okay.

I've also been reading a great book by Zadie Smith lately, called "White Teeth." It's quite a wild ride of a book, depicting the intersecting lives of people from Bangladesh, Great Britain, and Jamaica living in suburban London. The storytelling is unique, ambitious and hilarious in my opinion, featuring clashing cultures, personalities, generations, races and religions.

Anyway, I haven't done too thrilling lately, other than consuming words and pictures through media, and working.

I've got to get out more often.

the 'sha

2006-02-28T17:08:00.000-06:00

When I first started managing my current Qdoba store on the outskirts of Waukesha, I quickly had to become acclimated to the downtown in order to deliver catering and accomplish other business. I'm not sure how old Waukesha is as its own city, but it's safe to say that at one time it was very separate from the city of Milwaukee, about 20 miles away, downtown to downtown. In 2006, Waukesha is one suburb at the western side of a line of development that runs about 30 miles along I-94, from Lake Michigan to Delafield, and heading farther west every day. Milwaukeeans have few reasons to head to Waukesha, and my experience with people at my job tells me that many people from Waukesha only go to Milwaukee for special events.

I, however, drive the 18 miles from my house on the Western edge of the city of Milwaukee to Waukesha five or six days a week. The occasional conversation with a customer sometimes evokes surprise when I reveal I am from (surprise) Milwaukee, like it's a distant land of urban hipsters and skyscrapers.

Today I landed on young Milwaukee blogger Mandy Jenkin's site. It's not the deepest or most thoughtful writing, but it's pretty amusing. I was scrolling through her observations of life downtown, people watching, bar-hopping, and restaurant visiting, when I came across a funny description of what it's like to be a Milwaukeean driving around Waukesha. It very aptly described the frustration I experienced when I first toured around Waukesha. Read on and laugh:

If you've never really explored Waukesha - make sure you have a detailed map and a long fuse when you go (you’ll need it).

Before yesterday, I was convinced nobody actually lived in Waukesha – unless they happened to live inside superstores and chain restaurants. But while making a trip to our Waukesha bureau, I found that not only are there homes out there, but they are located on streets with no apparent directional course.

When traveling on West Broadway, for instance, one moment you’re actually going west... and the next thing you know you’re suddenly headed south. Turn left or right and expect to find another road running parallel? No dice. Honestly, it’s as if a drunken monkey laid out the city’s grid. (It’s actually very reminiscent of the country roads where I grew up – only with a lot more traffic)

Not to mention that so many streets don’t seem to have identifying signage. I suppose the residents know where they are going and we out-of-towners are supposed to identify streets by their shopping centers (when you pass your third Taco Bell - take a right at Talbot's...).

What’s worse, when I stopped to ask a guy at a gas station on Bluemound for directions, he seemed just a little too amused at my plight.

“Yeah, you Milwaukee drivers always seem to get turned around out here,” he remarked. “This isn’t downtown, sweetheart.”

Yeah, yeah. Next time I'll be ready

weekend getaway

2006-02-27T22:25:00.000-06:00

I have been having a helluva time at work the last few weeks, safe to say my stress level has been skyrocketing. All this means decreased hand-eye coordination (ie. dropping things, lots of thing), poor eating (work 10-12 hours with one quick meal break and then stop for junk food before going home at 8:00 pm) and less time doing things I enjoy. I am seriously looking for another job and not finding anything. I have had some interviews but although I think my experience is somewhat significant, it doesn't exactly qualify me for anything non-restaurant-related. I really, really want to get away from food and low-wage workers and really demanding corporate rules for a while.

Last week I joked that I was going crazy a lot. I'm probably not really, but the stress was really getting to me. Luckily my friends were unknowingly to the rescue, unearthing an old plan to have a weekend away this past. Brilliant idea ladies. First I thought I had to work Saturday, so we were going to hang out in Milwaukee, but stay in a hotel instead of at mine or Jen's house. Then, Mary found this fabulous deal at the swanky Osthoff Resort in Elkhart Lake, Wisconsin, and I got permission to take Saturday off. We had a two-bedroom, two-bathroom suite complete with balcony and lake view (far too cold to enjoy but worth mentioning), whirlpool tub, kitchen and access to a nice pool and hot tub.

Basically, we did nothing all weekend but hang out, eat, read, talk and enjoy the occasional cocktail, but it was perfect. I tried to make all the jittery, stressed-out parts of myself calm down with reading, relaxing and being away. More than ever I have the feeling that I am far too selfish and uncaring of a person to have friends like I have. With all my cynicism, I struggled this weekend to have much good to say about life, even though I would be quite happy save my job, and that's a huge part of my life. Anyway Erin, Mary and Jen listened like always they do.

I spent some time this weekend analyzing why I might be having all these issues. Am I incompetent to do my job without being in a constant state of high-stress, or are there some expectations that the average person cannot live up to at work? I'll have to save that for another post. I have another stress headache after a not terrible but not good day at work. Here's to another week.

Cheney-gate

2006-02-21T09:53:00.000-06:00

I know this is totally overblown and this isn't what a blog is for, but my dad sent me these jokes from the late-night hosts regarding the Cheney shooting, and some of them are hilarious. Here are my favorites:

"I have to admit that I turned away from the Olympics yesterday. Fox had a more exciting sporting event on: Softball with Dick Cheney and Britt Hume."
--Jay Leno

"Dick Cheney gave an interview to Fox News. I don't want to say Fox News was lenient, but the first question they asked was, 'Who do you like in American Idol?'" --Jay Leno

"Here's my favorite part of this whole incident. After Cheney shot the guy, the police later showed up at the ranch where Cheney was staying and wanted to talk to him, but was told to come back the next morning. And that's what they did, they came back the next morning. Kev, that ever happen in the hood?"-- Jay Leno

"Over the weekend while on a hunting trip down in Texas, Vice President Dick Cheney accidentally shot a member of his hunting party. He apologized. In fact, he told Brit Hume that he was actually trying to hit Cindy Sheehan." --Jay Leno

"Hillary Clinton blasted the vice president today for failing to disclose all the facts. She wants Dick Cheney to give exact details. You know like, "How do you shoot someone and make it look like an accident?" --Jay Leno

"Evil Democrat Empire? I got news for you, if we're going to do the Star Wars analogy, the Democrats are, at best, Ewoks." --Jon Stewart, on a Republican spoof video comparing Democrats to the evil Empire in Star Wars "The comic book makers of 'Batman' have announced that Batman will go after Osama bin Laden. So you see Bush does have a plan." --David Letterman

"Rumors are that the reason Dick Cheney didn't say anything about the hunting accident for about 24 hours was because he had been drinking. And I'm thinking, well jeez, he was probably drinking when we planned the invasion of Iraq." --David Letterman

"Dick Cheney and his buddies go down there hunting in Texas, and Dick Cheney guns down a guy. And they're hunting quail, and the quail disappeared. They vanished. And reports now that they're hiding in the mountainous area near Pakistan" --David Letterman

"Today, President Bush says he is standing behind the vice president. Way behind him." --Jay Leno

"America remaining obsessed, fascinated, appalled, by what is being called 'Dick Cheney Shot A Guy In The Face-Gate.'" --Jon Stewart

"He sat down for a one-on-one with Fox News. Very bold choice. Dick Cheney sitting down with Fox News is like Mrs. Butterworth sitting down with the Pancake Channel." --Jimmy Kimmel

"Cheney says he feels terrible about what happened. The man he shot was his friend and if he could, he'd give him the central processing unit right out of his own heart to make up for it." --Jimmy Kimmel

There was some talk that the vice president had been drinking before he went out to shoot and it turns out that was true. Cheney said he did have a beer during lunch. One beer, and the only reason he even drank it was to wash down the three hits of ecstasy." --Jimmy Kimmel

"Everybody is in the Valentine's mood. For example, earlier today Dick Cheney shot his buddy in the ass with an arrow." --David Letterman

"If this story gets any bigger, pretty soon they're going to have to tell the president." --David Letterman

"You can't blame [Cheney]. Bush says you can spy on people without warrants, you can torture people, you can hold people without a trial, so Dick Cheney thinks, 'Oh what the hell, I can shoot a few guys.'" --Jay Leno

"I'm surprised Dick Cheney loves to hunt so much. The five times the government tried to give him a gun, he got a deferment." --Jay Leno

"What a nightmare I had last night. I dreamed I was at a Washington party and I had to choose between Dick Cheney taking me on a hunting trip or Ted Kennedy driving me home." --Jay Leno

"The rumor is that Cheney may have been drinking and he wanted to wait until he sobered up. So he may have been drinking and then he shot a guy. And you know what's really scary about all of this -- what if it turns out all this time Bush was the smart one?"--Jay Leno

"The guy Cheney shot is a Texas lawyer. While he was lying there on the ground he actually handed himself his own business card." --Jay Leno

"After Whittington had a heart attack, Cheney said, "You big baby. I get those all the time. Walk it off." --Jay Leno

"Mr. Whittington is doing fine, but based on this development, we're going to downgrade the condition of this story from 'Incredibly Hilarious' to 'Still funny, but, mmm, now a little sad.'" --Jon Stewart, on the heart attack Harry Whittington suffered

"It turns out now that Dick Cheney did not have a license to hunt, and coincidentally, turns out we didn't have a license to go into Iraq." --David Letterman

"Kind of a sad study out today that single women over the age of 35 are more likely to be shot by the vice president than to find a husband." --Jimmy Kimmel

"The guy who got gunned down, he is a Republican lawyer and a big Republican donor and fortunately the buck shot was deflected by wads of laundered cash. So he's fine. He took a little in the wallet." --David Letterman

"I think Cheney is starting to lose it. After he shot the guy he screamed, 'Anyone else want to call domestic wiretapping illegal?'" --Jay Leno

"When the ambulance got there, out of force of habit they put Cheney on the stretcher. No, the other guy!" --Jay Leno

"Vice President Dick Cheney accidentally shot a man during a quail hunt ... making 78-year-old Harry Whittington the first person shot by a sitting veep since Alexander Hamilton. Hamilton, of course, (was) shot in a duel with Aaron Burr over issues of honor, integrity and political maneuvering. Whittington? Mistaken for a bird." --Jon Stewart "Now, this story certainly has its humorous aspects. ... But it also raises
a serious issue, one which I feel very strongly about. ... moms, dads, if you're watching right now, I can't emphasize this enough: Do not let your kids go on hunting trips with the vice president. I don't care what kind of lucrative contracts they're trying to land, or energy regulations they're trying to get lifted -- it's just not worth it." --Jon Stewart

"The Vice President is standing by his decision to shoot Harry Whittington. Now, according to the best intelligence available, there were quail hidden in the brush. Everyone believed at the time there were quail in the brush. And while the quail turned out to be a 78- year-old man, even knowing that today, Mr. Cheney insists he still would have shot Mr. Whittington in the face. He believes the world is a better place for his spreading buckshot throughout the entire region of Mr. Wittington's face." --"Daily Show" correspondent Rob Corddry

"This is a great story. You've got the Vice President, a shotgun, a bunch of rich guys hunting tiny little birds. The only thing that could possibly make this story better is if he shot Michael Jackson." --Jimmy Kimmel

"The man who was shot is named Harry Whittington. He's a high powered Republican lawyer, he was very lucky. They say the only reason that he wasn't killed is he was wearing the body armor that never got shipped to our troops." --Jimmy Kimmel

100 Things

2006-02-12T21:54:00.000-06:00

I have been working on this for a while….

I am 5’5” and wish I were about 2” taller. However, my husband is 5’9” so in that way my height is just fine. I would just like to be a bit taller, I think it would bring me a bit more respect.

I have a total of three brothers and one sister, only one of those brothers, however, is a “whole” brother.

My parents are divorced. My dad is remarried, buy my mom is still single.

I really love U2. I know a lot of people say that, but for me they are amazing musicians with amazing, relevant lyrics and on top of all that, Bono does amazing things for the poor and underprivileged in our world.

There are songs that remind me of times in my life. For some reason, there are a few that really stick with me. I bought an illegal copy of “All that you can’t leave behind” by U2 in a backpacking town in the south of China in 2000. I listened to that CD as we traveled all around China, and every time I listen to it brings me back to those great times.

The smell of certain Bath and Body Works products brings back vivid memories of junior high and high school church trips for me.

I am a pretty level-headed, logical, undramatic person, but I have a soft spot for a good soap opera.

I can watch television in Spanish now and understand at least 60 percent of what’s going on thanks to watching the telenovela “La Madrastra” for three or four months a few hours a week.

I dislike cartoons, pretty much across the board. I can enjoy the Simpsons, but if I haven’t watched it for a while, I really have to struggle to get back into it.

I used to be very Conservative, but I think I just didn’t know any other option.

Because of a good friendship with a Madison-raised son of environmentalist parents, I slowly became something of a liberal.

I loved Supersize Me! and Fahrenheit 911.

I subscribe to Michael Moore’s e-mail newsletter; he’s sort of a crazy, but he’s also very thought provoking.

I read Sojourners, Sun, Ode, Relevant and occasionally Time magazine.

I didn’t vote in 2000. I was in China and too lazy to get an absentee ballot mailed to me. In addition, I wasn’t sure I would vote for Bush, and pretty sure that my colleagues in China would be shocked if they found out.

I lived in Beijing for one year during college. I was there on a college missions trip, although now I see that time as the most formative in my life, for many non-spiritual reasons.

I learned a ton about myself, about accepting people the way they are, about cultural nuances and getting to know a place as home.

My friends are amazing. I don’t know why they are friends with me.

I can remember being three or four and “helping” my mom cook in our blue and cream kitchen. She was asking me to watch the second-hand on the clock for something and I couldn’t see it. She realized it and took me to the eye doctor, where they realized I had terrible vision for such a small child.

I got glasses when I was four years old. One of my earliest memories was in pre-school, walking alone into class with glasses on, and the teacher explaining to the rest of the kids what I was wearing on my face. At that time, it was very rare for such a small child to wear glasses, so I think my teachers were feeling a bit sorry for me.

I now wonder if the reason I have few memories pre-glasses is because I couldn’t really see anything. It’s probably true.

As many of my old, old friends will attest, I did, in fact, wear powder blue glasses as a child through middle school when I got contacts. They actually had some pink on them too.

I played soccer as a kid, and perhaps because of that, when I was angry at a friend or my brother, I sometimes would kick them.

I was sort of a dork in high school. I tried to dress well and look sort of cool, but I wasn’t so successful.

I have many high-school aged employees and they see me as sort of a cool adult, and I have to admit, I kind of enjoy it.

I bought my first new car in 2004. I bought a new Toyota Corolla because I was so tired of the hassle of car repairs on an old car. Two months later I was rear-ended and my new car was totaled. I later bought a second new car, but I lost $1500 between the deductible and the gap between the car’s actual value and what I still owed.

I am a very good sleeper. I can sleep for 10 or even 12 hours at a time if I don’t set an alarm.

This talent for sleeping actually turns out to be something of a curse, because it’s really hard for me to get out of bed in the morning unless I have something really exciting to do. Work, however, does not qualify as exciting.

I love reading. I started when I was four years old, and never really stopped.

My (current) favorite books about China are China Wakes by Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn and Foreign Babes in Beijing by Rachel DeWoskin.

Ever since I went to China for the first time I have loved tea. Someone there told me that drinking tea with a meal aids digestion, and by experience I’ve found this to be true. I drink many kinds of tea, but favorite is homemade chai and an African Red Tea made by the Republic of Tea.

I used to unconsciously whistle when I was a kid. My dad used to get irritated because it was a reedy sounding weak whistle and I never had any melody going, just random noise. Sometimes my dad would tell me to stop from the other room and a few minutes later I would start up again without even realizing it. When I am really pensive I occasionally start whistling again.

I prefer Borders to Barnes and Noble.

I LOVE Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, TLC’s What Not to Wear and most recently Bravo’s Project Runway.

I am currently addicted to watching the past seasons of the WB’s Smallville. Apparently the show is really popular (dubbed in Spanish) in Mexico, and when my brother-in-law brought home season one, my husband and I started watching it. Now we’re both hooked.

My favorite store-bought cookie is the fig newton. I recently found out that they make whole-wheat varieties. They are very tasty!

One of my favorite places to hang out is any bookstore. My usual pick is Harry Schwartz (a Milwaukee original), Borders or Half-Price Books. I can spend hours and hours browsing in bookstores.

I have a bit of shopaholic in me.

I am terrible at saving money. If I could change one thing about myself, I would become more frugal.

I have a strange capability to remember obscure numbers. For example, I could tell you several of the phone numbers of my friends when they were in high school, and a few from elementary school, even though I haven’t used them in years.

I am a Capricorn, born just two weeks after Christmas, which is a terrible time for a birthday. My brother was born June 25. This is a perfect birthday, ensuring gifts and celebration every half year.

I really enjoy going to pick out a Christmas tree every year. I also really enjoy putting up the lights and decorating it.

I have a persistent “what am I going to do with my life” line of thought going through my head.

I am not unhappy with my life, but neither am I content with it. I am always looking for change, fulfillment and happiness.

I used to think that one important qualification for me in a husband would be that he was smarter than me. I like to debate/argue and I know I am not right a lot of the time, so it was important that he would be able to put me in my place sometimes, I need that.

My husband is actually ridiculously smart. He possibly thinks more intensely than I do about life. In addition, he was the math star of his schools growing up and can do large multiplications very quickly in his head.

I am not a morning person. I inherited this curse from my mother, who once told me that well into her 40s she had trouble getting up for work. Boo.

My dad, on the other hand, gets up before 6 every day. I cannot think of a time he ever was still in bed when I woke up.

I have watched the TV show ER since it started (save the one year I spent in China). I am a little embarrassed by the fact that in college I would watch with friends and start to describe in detail the background stories for the character when plot questions arose.

I spent two weeks in India working at a school for underprivileged children in 2003.

When I was in kindergarden I had a classmate who had the same birthday as I. I believed that made us twins.

One of my earliest memories is of myself holed up in by brother’s room singing: “Fame! I wanna live forever, I’m gonna learn how to fly” at the top of my lungs. I’m no longer sure why I did this, but I still remember it very well.

As I recall it, my dad walked in on me, but I don’t remember being embarrassed, I assume he didn’t know what to say.

I remember very few of my dreams, but I have one that I have remember since I had it when I was a kid. All I know is that my aunt Diane, myself and a gorilla were in a room that had some sort of obstacle course and was decorated in the hip pink and sea green motif of the ‘80s. Any interpretations?

I can’t decide if I want to write non-fiction or fiction for a career (or at least just a really serious hobby).

If I could start life over again I might become a photographer.

I would like to retire to a foreign country, but not until I am about 75.

I have never broken a bone, or been to the hospital for really anything.

I did, however, have to be put under to get my wisdom teeth taken out, after which I don’t remember anything for like two days, including apparently walking out of the clinic.

When I was in sixth grade I wrote a story for school and I remember the two teachers coming up to me after it was turned in and saying “well, Laura may turn out to be something of a writer.” That was one of my favorite compliments ever.

I spend too much money on fast food, coffee, and anything sold at Target.

I have been teaching myself to garden since we bought our house. I have one year of experience under my belt now.

One of the success stories of my garden were my 10-foot high sunflowers. Unfortunately I planted them in such a spot that they shaded some of my veggies. Nonetheless, I produced at least 10 pounds of jalapenos this year from about five plants I bought at the farmers market.

I live with my husband and five of his family members. His sister and husband have a three-month old baby, and oh my god, he’s the cutest thing in the world.

The baby’s name is Carlos, my first nephew-in-law, and he smiles all the time.

Advice to newlywed women who start yearning for children but feel they shouldn’t really start a family yet: move in with someone who has a really nice baby – you can get your fix and not have all the responsibility.

I enjoy watching thought-provoking movies, so I watch a lot of independent and foreign films. I would highly recommend the recent “Born into Brothels,” and 2000’s “City of God.”

I really enjoy navigating on road trips.

I currently work for Qdoba Mexican Grill, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. I am a General Manager.

My job has many facets. I am responsible for hiring/firing, running shifts, maintaining cleanliness, food quality, store financials and profits, managing labor, repairs and maintenance and the list goes on. It’s not a difficult job per se, but it involves really good time management and keen multi-tasking skills.

I think I was a better Assistant Manager than I am a General Manager. I don’t enjoy disciplining people and I get very frustrated and passive-aggressive when people don’t do things the right way after I have told them once or twice.

I have a great boss. She is very intelligent, has a lot of integrity, and is a very interesting person. Unfortunately, I don’t like a lot of other things about my job right now.

I don’t love confrontation, although it’s a really important part of my job, and I suppose I am learning to be better at it.

In the past, when a friend, family member or co-worker would confront me about something in the past, I would occasionally laugh. It was very inappropriate, and I knew it, but I guess it was a coping mechanism.

I love Thai, Indian, Chinese, Korean, Mexican, Italian and Cuban food. There are many other nations that I need to try, and I am guessing I will like those too.

I have the unfortunate tendency to look down upon those who don’t like onions, spicy food or anything that isn’t “American.” I need to stop that.

I enjoy trying to convince people to eat things they normally wouldn’t. This also gets me into trouble.

I once ate some dog stir-fry in China. Contrary to popular belief, dog is not part of typical Chinese cuisine, however, it is eaten regularly in Korea, and therefore some restaurants in Beijing (and I am sure many other places in China) serve it.

I love maps, mapquest.com, atlases, etc. I always have a Milwaukee and Waukesha county map as well as a U.S. atlas in my car for emergency situations. Because of this, I almost never get lost.

I have never had a cavity, which is a testament to having strong teeth, not because I avoid sweets.

I am quite competitive, but only in a few areas. Those include any games I play with family and friend, ie. Monopoly, euchre, spades, etc.

I have severe devil’s advocate syndrome. I tend to immediately comment on the negative possibilities of any idea presented, in just about any situation. I mean, it’s nice to have a devil’s advocate. I provide reason and balance, but I think I also bring annoyance and irritation to my husband or my boss at times.

I almost never drank alcohol in all the typical “sow the wild oats” time of one’s life (late high school, college, and immediately after). However, now I enjoy a glass of wine some nights and going out for margaritas every once in a while with Fermin.

I have been drunk exactly once, at my company holiday party in 2004.

I met Fermin one month after I graduated college. He was one of the first Mexican people I met in a restaurant. I was a shift supervisor and he was a cook at a new restaurant opening in Brookfield, Wisconsin.

The first memory I have of Fermin was thinking he was a bit intimidating and scary, because for a few weeks during the opening of the restaurant, he rarely spoke and never smiled.

We became friends and started seeing each other while I was the assistant manager and technically his boss. We kept it a secret for a while, and it truly didn’t interfere with our jobs.

In May of 2004 we got married at the Milwaukee County Courthouse.

I never envisioned myself in a big princess wedding, although my parents probably would have preferred it. But hey, it’s my life, right? I have no regrets about it. It would have been terribly awkward to plan an American wedding with Fermin.

I feel a bit embarrassed when I am forced to display any cultural ignorance. Today, for example, someone at work started talking about some musical (I guess) called “The Producers,” and I felt myself trying to make agreeable sounds and nods while not furthering the conversation so that I didn’t have to reveal my ignorance.

In certain social situations I feel awkward about my relative naiveté regarding drinking and “the bar scene.” I am glad to have been saved from all the negative consequences of this lifestyle, but I wish I could go to a bar with friends and know what to order. Because of this, I sometimes pick the brains of my friends for good drinks to order in certain situations.

I was lucky enough to have Spanish classes beginning in kindergarten at my elementary school. I credit this for my aptness with learning languages. I studied Spanish until the start of college, then switched to Chinese for a few years. After college I started working with Mexican immigrants and the Spanish came back. Now I would say I am fairly proficient in Spanish.

Sometimes, when I am tired, especially at work, I have a tendency to mumble.

Like my father, I sometimes learn a new hobby or craft and go totally gung-ho about it. Examples include scrapbooking, gardening, photography, and lately, baking bread.

Some of those hobbies stick, others fall to the wayside after I have invested maybe $100 and 15-20 hours.

I once spent a day learning to bake bread from my grandma, who makes great homemade bread. Then I came home and made my first 2 loaves of bread, which miraculously, turned out.

The second loaf of bread I tried to make, which included some interesting organic flours, did not turn out. But I think it’s because I killed the yeast. So sad.

Sometimes, when I am crabby, I am not so nice to my husband. Later on, however, I will deny that I was a bitch, and then still later, I will feel badly about it.

I love coffee – my favorite beverage is an amaretto latte. Alterra Coffee in Milwaukee makes the best one.

This list took me five months to complete.

the real world

2006-02-10T23:42:00.000-06:00

Thanks to everyone for your great comments on my writings from the last post. I've been writing so many cover letters and resume objectives in the past two weeks I haven't even been able to stomach the idea of posting blog entries. It's funny, I have days when I love my job and others when I completely hate it, and this week I've been on the upswing. I guess it's more that I really like my boss and I've seen more of her lately and that keeps me a bit more grounded.

Besides that, I am pretty sure that if I take a different job right now, it's probably going to involve a pay cut, and I guess for the right job that would be totally fine, but I haven't found anything that seems right yet. But this process has really made me think about the tension between loving what you do and having the resources to do all the things you really love and want to do. For example, I have a friend who is a pharmacist and quite young and successful. She has a good job probably making twice what I do after 6 years of school. In high school I thought she was nuts for choosing pharmacy school, because how boring would counting pills and understanding medications be for an entire life? Now I admire her and envy her a bit for making as much as she does, basically never facing a life where money will be an issue. If she is smart with her money, which I know she is, she should have the resources to buy a nice house at her leisure, and do most of the traveling and other activities she wants in life. Maybe she doesn't have the most exciting job ever, but it's good and she's comfortable. There's nothing wrong with that.

On the other hand, say I had gone to pharmacy school, or pursued law or nursing or something like that, I likely would never have had the cross-cultural experiences that make me who I am. I would never have met my husband, or any number of amazing people I have met in my short but scattered about life.

I certainly don't regret my choices, but I wish I had had a bit more foresight when I was about 18 years old to analyze my options. What I really wish, is that I was indifferent to money. I hate to say it, but I like money. I like being able to buy things, even though I hate to say that. I wish I didn't like money, I wish I wasn't interested in fashion and food and books and gardening and home improvement, but I am, and I haven't figured out how to really save money very well. The more money I make, the more I have been able to spend. Of course, we have a house and I have a newish car and student loans, so maybe I am doing alright, but my husband has legendary Mexican saving ability. I wish I had that sort of discipline, and that I could innoculate myself with a bit of perspective, so the next time I am about to binge on unnecessary cosmetics and home goods at Target, I could think, this is my lodging for one night in China next year, and put away the debit card.

something I wrote

2006-01-29T18:48:00.000-06:00

I was recently looking through the writings on my computer and found a piece of a memoir that I wrote for a class my last semester in school. I really liked some pieces of it, so I decided to brush it up. For now it’s going here, but I would really appreciate comments, editing, etc, because I think I am going to try and submit it to Sun Magazine. Why not, right?? I know it’s long… but I hope you like it.

It’s rush hour and I’m riding the loop of the Beijing subway during my spring break in 2002, two months before I will graduate from the University of Wisconsin, nine months since I left this pulsating organism of a city last. The recorded announcement tells me first in Chinese, then in English, what the next stop is. I remember the first time I rode the subway recognizing just a few words of the woman’s destination description. Now, with 14 months as a resident alien and two years of language classes in Madison trailing me, I have it nearly memorized. It doesn’t even sound like a foreign language anymore.

Heading south, between Chaoyangmen and Jianguomen, the subway car is especially crowded. Loads of people have piled on at the last few stops, heading to the interchange station at the next stop. I am the only non-Asian, and almost certainly the only non-Chinese in this car, probably on the whole train. I do my best, as always, to appear as comfortable and nonchalant as every other person in the car. Occasionally I catch the eye of a curious person interested in checking out a real, live foreigner. A map on the space above the door shows the route of the subway. I reread the names of the stops in Chinese characters and their romanized pronunciation for probably the hundredth time.

Based on tanned, leathery skin and a faded blue worker suit, I observe that a nearby man is probably from a rural area, one of hundreds of thousands of migrant workers in Beijing looking for gainful employment. He sees me and manages to maneuver into a space about three feet away, directly in front of me. He proceeds to stare, unabashedly, mouth gaping, at me, the white girl. I try desperately not to laugh, then realizing that he might have a mental disability. I gaze casually at the advertisements and then look out the window as the walls of the underside of this sprawling Asian metropolis pass by. At Jianguomen, most of us get off the car. I lose my fascinated staring man in the crowd.

On this my third trip here, I affectionately call Beijing—with all its crowds and dust and air pollution—my third home. I really feel like I’ve come home. It’s inexplicable how a place so strange and dirty and at times unfriendly to foreigners could be my self-proclaimed third home. I’m a neat freak from the scarcely diverse Milwaukee suburbs and had never been out of the country before my first trip to China in 1999. Although I study journalism and worked for a year as the opinion editor at a campus newspaper, I wouldn’t have qualified in anyone’s book as “worldly.” Like most of my peers, I apathetically studied Spanish in high school, never really taking the time to learn to speak it well. Traveling always sounded like fun to me, but I didn’t have the money or desire to really pursue it. I remember studying Asian history and culture in 7th grade—and hating it passionately.

I’ve changed trains. I now head east, away from the center of the city. I always stand on the train, rarely taking a seat. Being surrounded by the people, conversations and culture of Beijing invigorates me. I can’t be sitting down for these moments, however mundane for everyone surrounding me. The train speeds up, rocks a bit, and the subway woman’s voice breaks through my focus on remaining upright. Yonganli, dao le. Eternal Peace Road stop—The site of Beijing’s foreign embassies, and a popular shopping district catering to foreigners.

In July 1999, during my first trip to Beijing and my first bargaining experience at the famed “Silk Alley” market, a shirt that read: “Never Forget May 8, 1999,” caught my attention. I thoughtlessly stared at the shirt, deciding this was the perfect time to try out my four-week-old Chinese. With false confidence, I tried to ask the vendor, a young man, what it meant. I was surprised that my harmless inquiry sparked agitation and the question “Ni shi na guo ren?”—What country are you from? Still clueless, I answered back, “Meiguo”—America, “beautiful land,” literally translated. My pride at understanding one sentence turned to complete confusion as he spouted off, now angrily, in rapid-fire Chinese. Realizing my inability to actually communicate, he switched to the universal language—hand signals. He made bomb gestures and noises and pointed back to the shirt. I remembered two months before in early May, when my mom had told me she didn’t want me to go to China this summer, because of the U.S.’ bombing of the Chinese embassy in Yugoslavia, the protests at the embassy in Beijing. I suddenly wanted to disappear, apologize, proclaim my stupidity and ignorance. Unfortunately my baby Chinese now completely failed me. I mumbled “Excuse me, sorry” in both languages and left quickly. I had lost face, embarrassed myself, committed a large cultural error and angered a common person by my insensitivity. I had become the dense, ignorant American foreigner I never wanted to be.

Three years later, I meander the path of Silk Alley, observing and remembering. I quickly remember my distaste for the ignorant tourists – waving cash around, speaking far too loudly, and treating the shopkeepers like servants. From the fall of 2000 to the summer of 2001, when I studied in Beijing, this was generally a place I felt welcome to experiment with my budding Chinese skills. A foreigner who speaks Chinese here can get goods priced almost at what a Chinese would pay, brand-name parkas for $20, Gap sweaters for $5, Abercrombie khakis for $8. After my embarrassing incident in 1999, I never wanted to be that ignorant tourist again. I wanted to fit in as much as possible in my white skin, although my light hair and large nose would always give me away. I buy almost nothing on this trip. I’ve bought all the souvenirs I can manage in China. There’s nothing else I want, other than more time here, to exist, to understand why this place has me so bewitched.

Back on the train, this time headed back west, to the center of the city, in order to complete a full-circle around Beijing in my 10-day trip here. Tiananmen, dao le. I’ve arrived at the Gate of Heavenly Peace, Tiananmen Square to the rest of the world. It had been 12 years since the democracy protests, when hope, pain, crackdown and death had filled one of the world’s largest public squares. On any given day, police vans wait near the perimeter of the world’s largest urban square, waiting for the Falun Gong demonstrators to take their places, first in Tai chi-like positions, meditating and practicing special breathing, then, in the paddy wagon, arrested for their faith, taken away to who knows where.

Strolling Tiananmen Square the memories and experiences submerge my psyche like flood waters. My first time here, as a student-tourist, taking far too many pictures of my friends and I, Mao portrait in the background, the smoggy Beijing sky so pale a blue it was almost gray. As a student, biking past Tiananmen become a regular occurrence, but despite the frequency of passing, I never stopped feeling an emotional tug, imagining what had happened on these streets, years ago. One late night in 2001, as the end of the school year neared, my fellow ex-pat friends and I decided to bike to Tiananmen. It had to be at least midnight, extremely late in Beijing time. The streets were eerily empty, all the taxis and Volkswagen Santanas hidden away for the night. It was probably the least-populated version of Beijing any of us had experienced. We abandoned the bike lane for the middle of the road, some of the girls sidesaddle on the rack over the back wheel behind one of the guys, just like millions of Chinese girls rode every day. My roommate and close friend was mourning her father, whose death had brought her suddenly back to the States a few weeks before. She had returned to Beijing for a few days to pack her things and say goodbye to life in Beijing. Arriving at Tiananmen, we realized the square was literally closed for the evening. The 2760-meter perimeter was literally roped off and guarded by security. But we had gone to Tiananmen that night for the journey, to feel the breeze as we rode through the calm streets, enjoying one another’s company, not to see the landmarks for the umpteenth time.

Jishuitan, dao le. The stop for the university where I had studied, socialized, lived and experienced China. The campus hasn’t changed much since I left, except for the construction. Some buildings have been finished and opened, other ones are being torn down and rebuilt. Cheap laborers from the countryside climb all over the scaffolding, working behind the translucent green mesh put up to hide the progress. This mossy green fabric is ubiquitous in a Beijing that barely stays the same for five minutes. Construction goes on day and night in China. The sounds of hammers and cranes pierce the eerie quiet after the students’ strict 11:00 p.m. curfew. Floodlights, used to illuminate the emerging structure for the workers, shine into my hotel window several hundred yards away.

On foot now, I take the long walk from the subway stop to the alley that leads from campus to my old apartment. I come to an open lot just behind my building and am thankful to find things much the same. The couple that use this spot to sell fruits and vegetables out of a pick-up truck greet me, somewhat surprised by my return. Next to the truck, a dozen or so retired men have gathered, as usual, to play cards and talk. The vendor and his wife explain who I am, saying I studied at the university the year before, and then some of the card players recognize me too. I am touched. I head to buy my favorite iced tea from another neighborhood vendor who I had been friendly with. The woman greets me, excited, and offers me the usual without asking if it’s what I want. I smile, feeling very much at home.

northern room

2006-01-24T21:12:00.000-06:00

Friends, I don't have anything new to report tonight, but I do have some cool news about an old K-12 schoolmate of mine. Milwaukee's 94 WKTI recently staged a contest for a local band to win the chance to open for Bon Jovi in their Jan. 28th concert at the Bradley Center. I found out today, that my elementary school crush and high school/college friend's new band won that contest - they will be playing in front of Bon Jovi in a week - so fabulous. Anyway, Andrew Jonathan (he apparently scrapped his youthful nickname A.J.) is the lead singer of
Northern Room and their first EP comes out in a week. If you link to their site it will automatically play some of their stuff. I think they sound fabulous.

I just remembered something funny. When we were in high school I remember being in Spanish class and A.J. was talking to this goofy, class-clown sort about starting a band they were going to call Glass Rose. It was pretty funny. Later A.J. started a band (whose original name I shamefully cannot remember right now) that later morphed into Jacobstone, who I always thought were quite good. Now there is Northern Room. I also remember thinking in high school that one day when A.J. was famous I was going to get to claim that I had known him when he was a kid. I think I'm one step closer to having that dream come true.

the shining

2006-01-22T13:40:00.000-06:00

So it's my day off, and I started watching "The Shining" on A&E this morning at 11:30 and now it's 1:44 and I can't turn if off. Have you guys seen this movie?!? It's creepy as hell. I've never seen it. Shelly Duvall just locked Jack in the cooler after she knocked him down the stairs when he said he was going to kill her. SO CREEPY! I haven't seen a movie this creepy in a long time, maybe ever. Maybe that's why it's a classic.

I am going to make bread today, but it's hard to make bread and watch "The Shining" (3.5 hours with the commercials!) so I guess I'll have to wait until 2:30. While I am sitting here on the ball trying to correct my posture while watching a thriller, I think I will scan some photos so that my old friend Angie who lives in China can see me. I love reconnecting with old friends. It's a great thing.

I feel like my blog is getting lame lately, but I will be back with more meaningful, interesting posts soon. I am currently reading Rob Bell's Velvet Elvis and Kathryn Harrison's Seeking Rapture, both of which are very thought-provoking. Velvet Elvis goes along with Blue Like Jazz and other recent takes on a "repainted" Christianity from a slightly new perspective.

For the moment I have exhausted my ability to discuss my current issues/perspective on faith, so I am leaving these conversations to Jon, Cory and Sara & Matt's pages, enjoying chewing on the thoughts rather than producing them.

Well, time to watch the remaining thrilling minutes of my movie, and then bread and laundry await.

look I'm famous and I should be exercising

2006-01-19T21:20:00.000-06:00

So, I should not be blogging right now. I worked 11-8 today (and it wasn't horrible, perhaps because I got a call from a recruiter from acompany that I am somewhat interested in this morning) and at about 6 pm consumed the first caffeine of my day, making me very awake right now. My house is a mess, there is nothing on tv to even slightly capture my interest, and I should not be sitting on the couch with laptop on lap, writing.

But just give me five minutes to chat. I made it, terrible photo and all, into MKE magazine again, however, I am a movie reviewer this time. This weekend I went to see "Brokeback Mountain" for my first assignment. I headed down to the Oriental Theatre on the east side by myself as I had to work immediately afterwards and didn't really have anyone to go with anyway. It was a great movie.

It was fun to go to a Sunday matinee on the east side by myself. There were lots of loners like me there, and I got to eat a $3.00 bag of popcorn all by myself. Thrills. But besides that I really do enjoy going to movies, and all the better when I don't have to pay for the ticket.

My husband got me an exercise ball for my birthday, which I totally wanted. I've decided that some of my favorite exercises will be sitting on the ball eating pitas with hummus (or other snacks) and sitting on the ball watching Mexican telenovelas. No, really, I am really going to try and exercise more.

Well, this is more randomness than I have posted for a while, so I think I'll straighten up all of my crap now, perhaps fold the laundry that's been sitting in the basket for three days and then maybe I'll sit on that ball while I drink some tea and chat with Fermin.

no more complaining

2006-01-19T09:53:00.000-06:00

I am getting the feeling that everyone is really sick about me talking about my job, as my rantings on this topic rarely elicit any responses. I guess I will have to stop that for now, which I will attempt this evening after said “work” is over. In the meantime, for some light-hearted hilarity, check out Jen’s newest post (link to the left). It’s really funny.

my own personal office space

2006-01-13T23:40:00.000-06:00

There are too many days lately when I get so stressed, even angry at my job, that I wonder why I am doing it. I am not a particularly angry person. I definitely have my gossipy side, and I know that I can get easily irritated at times, but I’m not an easily angered person. Lately, however, I can measure the level of dissatisfaction with my job in how easily I am bothered by things that go wrong. Lately there is so much pressure on us as managers that it seems impossible to focus on all the things I care about in my job in favor of taking care of all the little things I am “supposed” to do in the eyes of the new upper-management regime.

When I took this job, I was really excited to be working for this particular company and really hoped it would be a good fit for years. I don’t want to be the person who changes jobs every three years, but I also know that my current state of mind and spirit right now is not healthy for myself, my husband, or the rest of my personal life.

On one hand, I know that all the changes that are going on at my workplace are about them taking their success to the next level. They want to grow and compete and thrive and grow some more, but I guess my level of interest about success, especially at the cost of my own and my colleagues’ quality of life, has waned. I know it’s important to follow particular standards and procedures in order to maintain quality, but I’m driving myself crazy spending my days concerned about things that really don’t matter.

Rules and regulations designed in large part by (I imagine) WASP-y men in suits in offices who have rarely seen the back of a restaurant. Maybe I am totally wrong, but some of the things they expect of us lately are insane, even to the average person who has a reasonable level of concern about sanitation. I had to cook for a while tonight, and even knowing all the standards as well as I know them, and being very conscientious about following them, it was impossible for me to do it all. I couldn’t do everything necessary and still produce enough product. If I can’t do it, how can I make my cooks do it? I just feel like it’s becoming too much insanity. It’s so bad that for days turning into weeks on end I’ve felt like there was no way I can stay in this environment, where one mistake with one stupid plastic glove or apron means failing a corporate inspection. Maybe there are other better people to do this sort of job I guess I’m just not one of them.

I enjoy being a restaurant manager for all the wrong reasons I guess. I just want to produce good food, please customers, create a staff dedicated to teamwork where friends are made and skills are developed. I care about being profitable and successful and want to run a clean, well-organized store. But lately the corporate focus is so much on enforcing strict adhesion to a plethora of very difficult and very extreme sanitation policies. On top of that the new expectation is that general managers work the sort of hours that managers in full-service concepts work, and those people make significantly more money than we do. I realize this is all getting very technical and restaurant-speak laden, but I am really frustrated with my job, and I don’t really know what to do.

Today I thought about walking out – the ultimate reckless, irresponsible act, only pulled off by those who are truly detached from the consequences of such a thing. I couldn’t do it, although it might have forced me to really find a job that I can do that doesn’t make me insane. Well, I am too irritated to be writing right now, so I’ll try sleeping, and tomorrow I’ll get up and go back, and then afterwards I’ll go to the holiday party. Let’s toast to me not having so much to drink that I spew any of this in front of my boss tomorrow evening.

Four things for my birthday...

2006-01-12T23:33:00.000-06:00

I wasn’t tagged either, but I like these games.
Four jobs you’ve had in your life:

McDonalds cashier, cook, drive-thru worker.

Elderly (and lazy person’s) transport via golf cart at the 1996 Parade of Homes

College newspaper Opinion Editor

Mexican Grill chain General Manager

Four movies to watch over and over:

“Office Space”

Harry Potter (any of them)

Artsy Chinese Kung Fu movies like “Hero” and “Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon”

“Les Miserables” with Liam Neeson

Four TV shows you love to watch:

Grey’s Anatomy

What Not To Wear

Project Runway (a recent fave)

Places you’ve went on vacation:

Eagle River, Wisconsin (aka “up North”)

Ko Phi Phi, Thailand (the perfect dream island, now being rebuilt post-Tsunami)

Myrtle Beach, South Carolina

Puebla, Mexico

Four websites you visit daily:

Blogs of Mary, Jon, Jennie, Rachel, Sara/Matt and a few others

New York Times

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Qdobanet (work-related clearly)

Four of your favorite foods:

Chinese: Spicy green beans and kung pao chicken in Biejing

Mexican: mole with chicken a la my mother-in-law

Thai: Curry noodles with veggies from Singha-Thai of West Allis

Indian: almost anything involving yellow to orange curry sauce, some sort of protein, saffron rice and flatbread

Four things you would change about your house:

Carpet in our upstairs den

Paint the walls in the downstairs living room, something I have talked about since we moved in 1.5 years ago

Strip the flowery wallpaper in the kitchen and replace with bright, bold paint colors

Grow better, more mature and attractive landscaping

Four bloggers you are tagging:

Mary

Sara and Matt

Allan

Counterpoint: my take on Milwaukee

2006-01-09T20:58:00.000-06:00

Please check out Mary's current entry for a great description of a fantastic evening with friends Rachel and Joe of Bayview and Mary and Kat of Chicago. We had amazing fish tacos, mole and fajitas at one of Milwaukee's premier Mexican joints - Taqueria Azteca, where diners order off a specials board that is occasionally moved to other parts of the room so new guests can check out what's on.

After some food and a pitcher of margaritas we tried to figure out what to do. The five-person group wasn't going to work for our original euchre-playing plan, but suddenly Rachel had an epiphany, asking Joe in an excited voice if they should take us to someplace called "At Random." Now, I am from Milwaukee and still live in Milwaukee, but I had never heard of At Random, a 41-year-old cocktail lounge featuring a wide array of interesting sweet drinks on an extensize laminated menu that was a treat just to page through. The specialty of this dim, vinyl-clad, orange-lit, 60's lounge is the Tikki Love Potion, a mega-glass of fruity rum mixture lit on fire when delivered to the table of some lucky couple. The tables are set up in a winding pattern around the room, where some couples sit side-by-side and others across from each other. Because of this odd but cozy formation, we felt almost a part of one couple's Tikki experience, eavesdropping as the waitress explained the trick to making the potion work (making a wish and blowing out the little flame at the same time). The bathroom sported the usual plumbing and amenities as well as a complimentary bottle of Rave hairspray that must have been 20 years old (I realize this doesn't add to the atmosphere I am trying to create, but I have to add the detail anyway). I imagined some woman fixing her tall blonde bangs in 1987 with the same Rave that I might also (but did not) apply in 2006.

To be honest, this is the sort of place I would expect Mary to take us in Chicago. I don't expect places this old and cool to exist in Milwaukee, which I think demonstrates the lack of respect I sometimes have for my hometown. Rachel and I have eaten at some great restaurants in Milwaukee in the past few months, and it would only take me a minute to come up with five very unique places I would like to try in the coming months, but sometimes I just see Milwaukee for all it's negatives. I see that I have to drive everywhere even though I live in the city, I see the undeveloped Menomonee Valley that divides the city almost like a line of segregation, the failing inner city, the absence of a truly thriving downtown. But visiting At Random and realizing that such a unique cool place exists under my nose, practically in my own neighborhood, was a great discovery, breathing a bit of life into my care and affection for Milwaukee.

intro into a new sporting world, and New Year's

2006-01-05T23:30:00.000-06:00

Last weekend was great. I spent a full two days in Chicago with family, then friends, and got to relax and hang out and enjoy life for a bit. Friday morning I drove to Chicago's McCormick Center to watch my younger brother play table tennis in a national tournament. Unbeknownst to me (and the rest of our family) Adam has been playing in a table tennis league for some time near Platteville, where he's been at college. He's played in a few tournaments, learned some really good skills from some friends he has made there and now he plays in tournaments.

So midday Friday I showed up at the tournament to find an extremely diverse group of people playing "table tennis" (the word ping-pong is not allowed) in a huge room at the McCormick Center. They were young and old, extremely fit and a bit fat, Chinese, Polish and American. It was actually one of the most interesting mixes of people I have ever been exposed to.

Adam played well. He beat an 11-year old girl for the title of the under 1100-rated trophy, advanced past an 80-year old man to reach the third round of the under 1300 group, and gave an initially bored-looking Chinese man an exciting run for his money by beating him one game in the 1500 league. It was a long day for Adam, who played on and off from 9 am until 6 pm in more than 10 best of five matches. He took home a trophy and a lot of welcome but uninvited nuggets of wisdom from some of his older opponents. The greatest thing about the tournament was a great sense of good sportsmanship, etiquette and comraderie among the players. Many of them played in small leagues in the Midwest, or met at other tournaments and became friends. Whenever the little white balls flew into another pair's court or rolled into their paths, they stopped their games, picked up the ball and politely tossed the ball to the other player. The atmosphere was relaxed and happy, competitive but fun.

That was just a part of my weekend, the rest was spent catching up, chatting and celebrating with many close and distant friends from college. It was wonderful, and I wish I could say that my mood for the past few days at work had been relaxed and happy and a bit competitive but fun, but unfortunately, I cannot say that. Maybe tomorrow.

the mystery and peace of not knowing

2005-12-23T22:57:00.000-06:00

I've been reading some amazing blog posts lately. I wonder at how different people living in different places having different life experiences manage to have strikingly similar lines of thought, movings of spirit and emotion. Here are a few of the posts that might flesh out what I am talking about:

Questions of heaven (by my great friend Sara Finesilver), and hell, (by her husband Matt), complications of questioning the faith within the church with the witty and thoughtful Jon Anderson, and recently another perspective on Jon's thoughts presented by fellow UW alum Cory. Then there is Mary's response to all of this discussion in the form of a prayer. It's all so interesting, and how I wish I could have been a part of a discussion like this two years ago.

You see, I don't struggle with basic theological questions like the existence of heaven or hell. I don't need to know answers about how heaven works. I don't care whether I will have my own mansion, or live in a gigantic mansion with everyone else, or whether God will be the large, bearded, white grandfatherly figure that I imagined in my youth. What I am stuck on, is the question of everyone else. I am immensely priviliged and have been lucky to grow up in a place where it would have been hard to never encounter God and where I have always had the luxury of good parents, good education, loads of extra-curricular activities to enlighten myself with, etc.

I also know that I use my time badly, I often eat poorly, I am selfish, immature, I crave attention but hate to be put on the spot. So if I am lucky but basically a sinner like everyone else, does that entitle me to something that someone with the same basic human traits (a mix of good and evil) does not deserve? Because person X (just like me, but from another time/country/race/culture) has grown up in the Chinese countryside or next to a Hindu temple in urban India or as a devout Muslim in Saudi Arabia, does that void them from the hopes of salvation?

My answer to this question (back when I was a Campus Crusader) would have been something along the lines of "God is in control, he knows everyone's hearts and he can speak to those who don't have the opportunity to hear, but Jesus is the only way to heavan." I realize that many people still claim a similar (albeit more polished) argument along these lines.

Here's my problem: I've seen China, I've traveled in India, and I'm not saying God isn't in control, but if God was really revealing Christ to these people there would be a lot more Christians in these places. If this was the case then the students that I knew whose parents grew up in the Cultural Revolution when there was no religion to speak of allowed anywhere, would have heard God speak to them and would have passed the knowledge of God down to them. And if God speaks to a person directly about Jesus, once, how is that a fair shot, considering many in America would say it took them years to come to the church, to accept Jesus for who he is and to follow him.

I realize these questions are stemming from a place where my understanding of what it meant to be saved was extremely evangelical, but there is so much in the Bible that taken literally, can be turned into doctrine that engenders fear and hate and justifies terrible things, and on the other hand are the teachings that focus on pure love and acceptance.

When I started dealing with all these doubts, I was totally lost. I really didn't know what to do. I had surrounded myself almost exclusively with friends who were similar to me in our ways of understanding Christianity, and my spare time was spent almost exclusively involved in church or religious organization. I didn't know where to go with my questions. I was a member of my church, which meant I had signed a covenant saying I believed these things "til death do us part" and I didn't feel most of my friends would understand where I was coming from and was pretty sure a few of them would just dismiss my questions or use the biblical arguments I knew so well against me. I was probably wrong about the judgement of some of my friends, but I think I was right that the only answers I would get from the church would be directly out of the Bible, picked out for their choice words that would swiftly kick me back into place.

I am not trying to mock the Bible, but I knew all of those arguments. But what I felt, it was deep in my soul. It's a feeling that if God really is good, better than anything that exists, He doesn't create people that will go to hell. He doesn't create beautiful people with brilliant minds and peaceful spirits who will die and realize that even though they didn't so much as pass by a Christian church in all their life, would now be spending eternity burning for the crime of ignorance. Maybe the way I see things is too black and white. Maybe I shouldn't worry about what my inner voice tells me, because of course, it's sinful, and not from God, right? But other times, when it's telling me to give money to the church, it's my conscience, telling me to abide by the rules of the Bible. I realize I sound cynical and bitter, but the thing is, I have had these ideas and feelings for years now, and I'm neither. I'm just thinking about it.

I read a book a while back by Phillip Gulley and James Mulholland, called If Grace is True, Why God Will Save Every Person. This book is not particularly scholarly. It doesn't provide a Biblical basis for universalism (the idea that everyone will be saved) but it does explain how these authors made a journey toward accepting this idea. They argue from the basis of their experience with God. They write that they had never sinned and turned to God to find his wrath, or his fury. They had never experienced anything from God that didn't embody love, empathy, forgiveness and patience. If these things are true about God, how can everything change in the afterlife, how can he forgive people anytime in their lives, up to the last minute for a killer on death row, but not accept people who went their whole lives unaware of his son?

These are my questions. I don't think there are any answers anymore, but I'm increasingly okay with that. Like my friend Sara said, it's about "learning not to know, to celebrate the mystery, to rejoice in the tensions of the unknown and contradictions of so many things," can I have an amen for that?

car jamming

2005-12-20T20:17:00.000-06:00

I've really been in the doldrums lately. I guess it's less like depressed and more like apathy, but I haven't felt like writing, and that signals to me that my thoughts, emotions and experiences are not clicking into anything meaningful.

Today, on my way to work, I popped in a new live cd from U2's Vertigo Tour concert in Milan, which I received for joining the U2.com fan club. It was 10 am, I was driving my regular route from I-94 in Milwaukee west toward Waukesha, and Bono was singing the best song ever, "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For."

I have heard that songs hundreds of time, and at any stage I am in life, particularly related to spirituality, it just always rings true.

I have climbed the highest mountains
I have run through the fields
Only to be with you
Only to be with you.

I have run, I have crawled
I have scaled these city walls
These city walls
Only to be with you.

But I still haven't found what I'm looking for.
But I still haven't found what I'm looking for.

I have kissed honey lips
Felt the healing in her finger tips
It burned like fire
(I was) burning inside her.

I have spoke with the tongue of angels
I have held the hand of a devil
It was warm in the night
I was cold as a stone.

But I still haven't found what I'm looking for.
But I still haven't found what I'm looking for.

I believe in the Kingdom Come
Then all the colours will bleed into one
Bleed into one.
But yes, I'm still running.

You broke the bonds
And you loosed the chains
Carried the cross of my shame
Oh my shame, you know I believe it.

But I still haven't found what I'm looking for.
But I still haven't found what I'm looking for.

These are words that so many people know by heart, sometimes in their subconscious, just like people know the words to Coldplay's "Don't Panic" and Sarah McLachlan's "Possession," because they are so ubiquitous. They play in their real and elevator versions in restaurants, stores, random public places, everywhere. But these particular words still hold so much meaning for me, they can never go cliche.

So driving west in my salt and sand-caked car, warm inside the heated bubble, I sang at the top of my lungs, to this song, one of my five favorites in the world, like I have many times before. There's something about belting out fabulous lyrics with one of the greatest rock stars of all times, in your car. No one hears, and who cares if anyone sees? It makes me feel alive.

And this morning, it was extra-exhilarating. I really needed some stimulation, something to wake up my soul and my emotions more than anything.

2005-12-18T22:18:00.000-06:00

I have not felt terribly like writing the last two weeks, as many of you can tell. I've been trying to maintain a reasonable level of busy-ness this holiday season, and overall it's been pretty good, but I just haven't had the mental energy to write. I have been trying to shop less, minimize the time I spend vulnerable to sales on cute clothes and things I don't really need for the house. I really want to save more money, just like I really want to go to the gym more often, but somehow it never really happens. There is a part of me that is really lazy. I mean, I'm a hard worker, but there are a lot of things I want to do and feel like I never have time for. Or maybe that's because my job totally consumes my life? I don't know. Would anything be different if I had a less stressful job? Or a job where I didn't have to be so responsible for so many things? I don't know. I want to spend time writing, taking a class here and there, and still have a decent amount of (the hated word) "balance" to take care of myself, my home, etc. It's just so hard, and I don't even have children. When I see mothers in the restaurant carrying, pulling, dragging children with them, it freaks me out. I am not ready for that kind of committment. Even married, I am very independent, and always have been. I can't imagine having to worry about a child when going about my daily doings. Not that I am particularly considering children, but lately I see more and more women who look my age or younger towing one or two kids. I don't know where I am going with this post at all, and this lame ending just illustrates how un-blogging my mood is. Alas..

my friend Jenny

2005-12-15T00:08:00.000-06:00

I got a strange e-mail the other day from my friend of nearly 15 years, Ms. Jennifer Janscha. The e-mail said that she had mistakenly received something that had belonged to me. It was quite mysterious, as Jenny and I had been roommates but that ended two years ago and it was quite odd that our addresses would somehow have gotten crossed now. Anyway, she said she might stop by my restaurant to bring the aforementioned item to me.

Most of you regular readers know that I won the MKE Online weekly blog contest a few weeks ago. No big deal, there was no prize or anything, perhaps just a few new readers and a little recognition.

Well, back to Jenny. She stopped in the other day to bring her the mysterious item that had been sent to her, which happened to be a red and gold trophy, much like the tens of soccer and bowling trophies belonging to my brother and father, respectively. But this trophy was topped with a gold-colored plastic figurine of a cowboy riding a bull, and the plaque at the botton read: "First Place Blog: Way To Tame The Competition - 2005." Jenny pulls this thing out and says she got it in the mail, and after a few probing questions, she is forced to say "well, I ordered it."

What a funny girl, who would go online and order a tacky trophy just for kicks and fun for a friend who won an inconsequential blog contest. This is just her style and wacky sense of humor though, and it never ceases to surprise me in the occasional quirky way.

What I need

2005-12-10T01:13:00.000-06:00

I got this quirky idea from Mary, who got the idea from Marko; (fun new blog) who apparently got it from his friend Claudia. Anyway, it’s kind of fun. Go to Google; and type in your name followed by “needs” and do a search to find out what sort of sentence finishers you will get. It’s a new kind of self-Googling I suppose. Here’s what mine came up with:

…what Laura needs to do is take better care of her own two kids. (Not yet…)

Laura needs help to obtain air transportation.

Laura needs advice on her combi boiler. (What?!)

Laura needs plastic surgery. (I hope it’s not that bad!)

Laura needs to return to the Shriners Childrens…

Laura needs to teach Jenna the proper way to sit with legs crossed. (I think this actually relates to an indiscreet photo of the first family.)

Laura needs to learn the importance of looking after injuries no matter how slight they might seem.

Laura needs a donation of blood stem cells in order to make a complete recovery. (Sad.)

Laura needs to learn a few things. (You think?)

Laura needs more fat, less carbs. (Jury’s still out on this one.)

And that’s ten, that was fun huh?

my old path

2005-12-08T21:33:00.000-06:00

The pressure's off, as I just found out I haven't won the MKE Blog of the Week contest, which is a let-down, but certainly not the end of the world. It's basically a random popularity contest, although, I admit, it would have been cool to win. But when I checked out the other winners, I didn't even feel they were exceptional company, so I feel okay about it.

--------------------------------

In my quest to remain the eternal "cool" sister, I took my sister shopping for Christmas today. I can remember more than a few gifted articles of clothing I received from well-meaning relatives over the years that collected significant dust before heading to the neighborhood thrift shop, so this year I offered to shop with my sister and let her pick out some things rather than just take random stabs at what she might like.

There was already an inch of fresh snow on the ground as I made my way to my parents' house to pick up Kayla. It had been falling lightly since after noon and had not yet created slippery roads and traffic jams, still remaining an element of that picturesque winter beauty. As I drove into my old neighborhood, I took note of "the path," as I used to frankly call it, something I have not only seen, but biked, walked, skipped and probably skinned my knee on since I was a small child.

Watertown Plank Road runs through Elm Grove, my "hometown" or home suburb, which butts up against the western edge of Milwaukee county. Because of its location, large lots and small-town feel, it's now a considerably wealthy and desirable suburb. There's still a little (albeit struggling) main street with a post office, ice cream parlor, one pub, boutique shopping and a few nice restaurants. Up until about five years ago there was an old pharmacy complete with an old-fashioned fountain where we used drink root beer floats or munch on french fries when we were kids. This place had been around many decades before I can remember, and when it closed, although many of its old patrons had long passed away, it still inspired a pang of nostalgia for my comparatively recent youth.

Elm Grove was my playground as a kid. I used to go to a neighborhood day care and the other kids and I would ride our bikes to the nearby Stop & Go (to buy candy bars) or to the Elm Grove Park to go swimming or explore the park. When we were a little older, we'd bike to "the Grove," meaning the little downtown, to get an ice cream or wander around Sentry foods or just ride around for the sake of riding around. Once we rode behind the Sentry and discovered there was a gravel path that meandered through a little woods behind the local theater and office buildings all the way to the PDQ out on Bluemound Road, the main highway that runs through Brookfield, our larger, more commercialized and typical suburban neighbor to the west.

I know most of Elm Grove like the back of my hand. When someone tears down one of the 1950's ranches or one of the older cape cods, I notice, and say things like "how can they build that monstrosity on that lot?" I sound, no offense to any of my elders, like an old person, lamenting my bygone youth and how much things have changed so quickly. A new trend in Elm Grove is the practice of the wealthy buying an older, usually unique and quaint home on one of the many large lots lush with big old trees, then tearing down the house and some of the trees to build a mega-house typical of the newer cookie-cutter subdivision houses that litter Brookfield and many neighboring suburbs. I would hate to come home to Elm Grove in 20 years to see that a majority of those older homes that fit into the landscape without seeming intrusive and extravagant would have turned into more big tan two-and-a-half story monstrosities that look remarkably like they came out of a catalog.

I digress, back to my path. As I mentioned before, I was driving in the snow today, and as I turned off Watertown Plank road onto Blue Ridge Boulevard, my old street, I noticed that my path had about an inch of snow on it, and it was yet untouched. It was 3:30 pm, kids were getting out of school. Had this been 15 years ago they would have been walking the path home, heading to their houses or to their friends houses, making snowballs along the way or just kicking their way along the little strip of blacktop that lies between the road and the yards. Elm Grove is actually the kind of place where kids could still reasonably walk to school, to the park, to go get an ice cream in summer. But what I increasingly observe, is that the path seems untouched, until 4 or 5 pm, when a dogwalking middle-aged couple might go out, but the kids, they get rides or take the bus and then, sit down for some snacks and tv, or snacks and computer games, or snacks and Playstation. Whatever it is, I certainly remember my childhood a lot differently.

more blog contest

2005-12-03T23:00:00.000-06:00

Just a reminder, please vote for me with any and all of your e-mail addresses at the MKE Online site. For some extra entertainment, I got a shout out on the blog of one of my competitors, an apparent food maniac from Milwaukee. If you link here you will have to scroll down two posts until you get to the blog of the week post where he reviews, in his own way, his competition. Again, please take a second and vote for me. Muchas Gracias!

In other news, just below is a pretty new post. More when I get some sleep.

it is what it is

2005-12-03T00:00:00.000-06:00

Sometimes things just don’t turn out how you want. Today was supposed to be a regular day at work, followed by a third attempt at making bread. I failed last night, my little ball of dough never really raised and after using all the tricks I know (not so many) I had to toss it in the garbage. It was so sad having to throw it out, like I was killing a small animal.

One of the shift managers at my store is very ill. It seems she may have type-1 diabetes, the kind that can surface when you are an adolescent or a younger adult. I have a friend who almost went into a diabetic coma and could have died when they found out he had diabetes, and the girl I work with has been sick for a while with all the symptoms. Today she went to the emergency room after being close to blacking out every time she stood up.

Unfortunately, she doesn’t have a lot of money, good insurance or the luxury of missing a lot of work for doctors’ appointments. She supports her 3-year-old son and lives on her own. She’s been working toward becoming a salaried manager for about six month and has been passed up for reasons mostly unknown and seemingly unfair, in my opinion.

Anyway, this morning I found out she was in the hospital, which was terrible, but in a way a blessing because she was pushing herself really hard to keep working and try to feel better. It also meant my evening of relaxing and bread making would have to be postponed in favor of working 13 hours. And it also means tomorrow I will have to work 12 hours, followed by working on Sunday (supposed to be my day off) and probably six or seven days next week.

It seems horrible to complain considering the circumstances, but if this had happened a few weeks back, I know I would have had the total support of my ex-assistant manager, who was very dedicated, almost to a fault. Not to say that my new assistant isn’t dedicated, but he has a wife and kids and a life, frankly, which is good, but it also means the burden of covering the shifts falls a bit more on me. It’s my job, it is what it is, as my boss might say.

Another contest....

2005-12-01T19:20:00.000-06:00

I hate to do this again, but there is now a semi-final blog contest, which in a few weeks will lead up to the blog of the year award on the MKEonline web site. I know you all went and voted for me and I know now you have to go do it again, but I would appreciate your support here. Well, it's time to take a stab at making some more bread. More entries of substance later.

today

2005-11-30T14:55:00.000-06:00

Cold day, sleeping in, not showering, hot tea, baking squash, listening to instrumental holiday music, surfing blogs, writing Christmas cards. I'm imagining in a few days there might be a tall, tastefully decorated, white-lighted Christmas tree in our front windows. It's almost December, the end of the year, time for celebration. I don't know how it can already be December, but it's here, time to enjoy it.

winning

2005-11-28T17:03:00.000-06:00

Ahh.. the joy of winning something, especially after a delay, where I felt hurt that the blog contest didn't mean enough to anyone have the results posted correctly. Alas, I was pacified today with a very nice e-mail from the person who runs MKE's blog contest, who informed that she really enjoyed reading my blog and also, that I had won.

Well, I am actually on a work errand at Kinko's and definitely should not be using this design computer ($0.49 per minute) to update my blog, which I could wait to get home to do, but, I am anyway.

You all must have voted for me, so click here
to see my blog in the lights and here to read the thoughtful description they wrote for my site.

Tonight I get to have dinner with one of my favorite people in the world, and then tomorrow I get to sleep in! (Some days I love my restaurant job).

Adventures in breadmaking: FINAL

2005-11-27T19:38:00.000-06:00

So, amazingly, my bread turned out. I probably didn't knead it enough and/or let it raise enough the second time around, but it still looks and tastes unmistakably like bread. (Yeah!) Even better, I really enjoyed the breadmaking process, which involves some level of coordination, skill and experience, but nothing that any jack of all trades like me couldn't do, at least with a little practice.

So, the successful bread got me pretty inspired to make more bread. There's always someone who wants homemade bread, and it's a cheap pastime that brings great satisfaction. So, I looked through a bread book that a friend lent me and picked some things I'd like to try. I researched interesting techniques, breads of the world, recipe sites and healthier flours.

When I was with my grandma, she was telling me a story about how her father used to go really gung-ho on things, and later another story came up about my father (her son) goes really gung-ho on things, and then I realized that's where my capricious passions come from. I usually don't follow through, but I frequently find that I am capable (not proficient mind you) at something, and then for some variable amount of time, I get really excited about that thing and put a lot of time, energy, and usually money into it.

Examples would be gardening (although I think that's a keeper), photography (I do it, but I've never taken the classes that I've said I would), cooking Indian and Thai food, scrapbooking, making my own greeting cards, exercising and going to the gym (I'm still working on keeping that one up), and now, perhaps, baking bread. As I analyze breadmaking, however, I think this one might be sustainable for me. There's plenty of people to eat my bread, and if I make big batches, we could stop buying store bread. It's a good place for the herbs from my garden, and I can always give it away. I am imagining bread becoming my contribution to holiday parties and an inexpensive, healthy, homemade gift for birthdays.

Well, stay tuned for updates.

adventures in breadmaking

2005-11-26T18:08:00.000-06:00

PRIMERO: WAITING FOR THE YEAST TO RISE

I'm really nervous, but excited. I went to my grandma's house today to learn how to bake bread, and while it's still fresh in my mind, I'm attempting a small batch for the first time tonight. My grandma's bread is famous in my family, and probably among her circle of family and friends. It's buttery and the texture is perfect, and since all the Bruss' seem to be toast addicts, nothing beats simple toast with butter with my grandma's bread.

So here, I am, surfing epicurious.com for info on bread baking, coffee mug full of yeast, sugar and warm water at my side. This post will have to end when the yeast mixture reaches the top of the cup, because it'll be go time. We'll see what my first attempt at kneading, waiting and baking yields. I'm ready for a letdown, because as my grandma said, you'll learn from your mistakes. A bread recipe looks simple, with less than 10 ingredients, all of them found in most kitchens. I learned today, however, that it's not that simple, and there are many tricks and pieces of bread-baking wisdom to be gleaned from someone with a lot more experience than me.

I tell you all what, yeast rising is really cool. There's only a half an inch until it reaches the top of the cup and I wish I had a digital camera so I could have taken a photo five minutes ago, when the yeast, water and sugar pooled at the bottom of the cup, and another in about one minute. Then I could post them here so you could see it for yourself.

Well, I've lost the race against time in attempting to say something meaningful in this 7 minutes, so you'll just have to wait until the dough is rising.

SEGUNDO: RISEN

So, the first time around, the dough rose. The kneading went well, although it seemed too easy. I wonder if I had put too much flour in. Jury's still out on that. I've put my little babies in their pans now and they're sitting in front of the radiator, hopefully rising again, and then, there's just the baking.

extra fun

2005-11-20T13:54:00.000-06:00

Please vote for my blog for MKE Online's blog of the week
here. You only have until Nov. 23rd! Thanks! There's a new post just below.
Laura

friend, colleagues, and the passage of time

2005-11-20T12:35:00.000-06:00

I can't believe it's November 20th, I just can't. I remember my dad told me in high school (when I felt time was dragging me through class after class after getting up early and going to band and soccer and chorus practice) that college would be great and then after that, time would start flying by with work, relationships and other activities filling up the time.

When I think about graduating from college three and a half years ago, it does seem like someone vacuumed up some of the time from under my feet. I have great memories from these years, but I feel like I just finished college, even high school doesn't seem so far away. But I'm more than "becoming" a real adult now. I really am one.

And although the time feels short, my life has changed very dramatically in the last few years. This period can be marked by the amazing people I have been so lucky to work with in the past few years. This week my assistant manager is leaving for another store where he will become an interim general manager for a few months. Last night, after the last shift that I would work with him, I couldn't help thinking back a bit on some of the great working relationships I've been lucky to have, so here's a bit of a tribute.

My first job out of college was at a brand-new fast-casual Asian restaurant in my old stomping grounds in the Milwaukee 'burbs. It was my first interaction with Mexican immigrants, my second language of choice slowly turned from Chinese (ironically in the Asian restaurant) to Spanish, and I met the man who would become my husband. I also developed as a leader and an individual in ways I would not have thought possible in a restaurant. After a few months there I got the position of assistant manager working under Paul, a great manager with years of full-service experience in Florida and Wisconsin. Paul took my experience, willingness to learn, and natural talents and taught me all the fundamentals of running a good restaurant. I was immature and overly interested in playing investigative reporter, revelling in all the amazing stories I got from the immigrants who staffed our kitchen. But Paul always respected me and treated me like his equal. I learned the most from Paul.

Time passed and I decided to take a position with the company I am still with today, a local franchise of a large "fresh-Mexican" type chain. I was so optimistic and excited when I took the job. I had gotten really lucky in the negotiation process, and was excited to work for a place that seemed a little less corporate my previous company had been. After a month of training with a great GM in Milwaukee, I was sent to a great location at a busy intersection between Milwaukee, Wauwatosa, West Allis and Brookfield. I found out the weekend before I went that I would be working with Roxy, a woman about the same age as me who had just been promoted to general manager. We got along very well immediately. She had been with the company a long time, working her way up from being a line server in college. She had great interpersonal skills and literally, never broke a sweat, as our boss once commented to me. She was always calm, even in situations where I might have freaked out. In a social context, we were probably pretty different, but inside the company at the time, we were viewed as something like twin 20-something girls running a big store. She graciously allowed me to learn from her as she took on the role of GM and amazingly, it never felt like we were competing. Later she moved to California about the same time I was transferred to my current location to be a GM.

And that brings me to Adam. I have always seen myself, a bit arrogantly I suppose, as an ideal employee. I have been loyal to a tee to my employers, hard-working, panned up a lot of corporate BS (that I don't believe in) with a smile, and always tried to improve whatever situation I happened to find myself in. I definitely have my flaws, but I have seen a lot of people who work in the restaurant industry by default, as something to fall back on, and I always wanted to be better than that.

I have to admit however, that Adam, in the ways stated above, put even me to shame. Adam is also mid-20s, like me and had been with this company a few years. We had never really met before, but there was a bit of a legend around Adam, who had run one of the busiest stores in the company with very little support during a time of double-digit growth in sales. In the four days I had to prepare for becoming a GM (when I found out Adam would be my assistant), people described him to me as "golden" and said "he'll volunteer to come in on any day off to deliver a taco bar." Wow, this sounded pretty good.

The store I was going to take over was in the midst of a meltdown. It had been open just two months and had a a few good line servers, but a terrible kitchen staff and no shift supervisors. It was ridiculously dirty, had very poor operations, and had screwed up some great catering oportunities. Adam had been there a few weeks before me, and the weekend I found out about my transfer, I spent one late night after my shift at the other store helping them bail out after a cook walked out in the middle of his shift and they ran out of most of what we serve during lunch. Frankly, I had never dealt with a disaster quite like this as a leader, but I was damn excited to give it a try.

I have to admit, the burrito gods knew what they were doing putting Adam and I together, because after a few months, a ton of hours and hard work, we had that place running as well or better than many stores in the company. Adam is cynical and hilarious, to use the first two words that come to mind. He's a workoholic but does it because he cares. My Mexican cooks wrote in their goodbye notes to him that he was a great worker and should keep it up. This is significant because Mexicans are legendary hard workers, and typically do not have a lot of respect for the work ethic of the "guero" (American). I haven't met my new assistant manager yet, but Adam is a tough act to follow for anyone, and our staff will miss him a lot.

Congratulations if you have actually read all this. I've been writing for an hour, but I felt last night that I had to give a little tribute to some of my favorite people. You see, work has always been important to me, and I have always had great relationships at work, but writing this has given me the opportunity to ponder how these people have affected me and made my life better, and I'm grateful for that.

An interactive trip with me on vacation

2005-11-12T19:28:00.000-06:00

I'm going to write my blog with pictures tonight, to describe my relaxing weekend in Newark, DE, home of the University of Delaware, home of the Blue Hens (isn't that the silliest mascot you've ever heard??!) I was visiting my old friend Lulu (who I met my first time in China) and her husband Magnus.

We went to Georgetown, Delaware on Friday,

which was unfortunately Veterans' Day, so none of the government buildings were open, but this was the original courthouse built in 1791 and is still occasionally in use today. Georgetown is an old county seat, in the southern part of Delaware, and a very quaint place to walk around and get a glimpse of colonial America.
I can't stop talking about the "old" buildings I see around me this weekend. Ironically, Magnus is from Lulea, Sweden and when I mentioned that my first impression of Newark was that all the buildings looked sort of old and colonial, he looked at me a bit strangely and said one of his first impressions of this town was that everything looks so new. Many places in Europe, of course, were developed long before many places in America, but for a Midwesterner like myself, the Eastern side of America strikes me as well-preserved and antique.

We went to the Atlantic Ocean at Rehoboth Beach,

which would be a lovely place to visit in the summer time I am sure. There was a definitely an overly commercialized Myrtle Beach feeling to it as we were driving in, but then there is a long strip of small, mostly independently owned shops leading up to a wide boardwalk overlooking the beach. We picked up smooth rocks, checked out a Scandinavian gift store and observed a few groups of people bundled up in winter coats reclining in wooden beach chairs, perhaps catching some November rays.

We visited a great botanical garden and conservatory called the Longwood Gardens in Eastern Pennsylvania.

I was excited to find that one of the largest places of its kind in the world was very near to Newark since my newfound love of plants and gardening has led me to love touring such places. The photo above was actually a bit funny because these people offered to take it for us and then spent five minutes taking this terrible picture. Anyway, it's amusing now.
They had topiaries

a few beautiful roses left (this is mid-November),

fall colors, lakes and gazebos

and the most magnificent chrysanthemum display I have ever seen.

I've also enjoyed some great food cooked by Lulu and Magnus (a combination of Chinese, Indian with hints of Sweden and the U.S.) and got to sleep in three days in a row! Tomorrow I drive back to D.C. and then fly back to Chicago. I'm glad to get back to Fermin and home but I had a great time here and look forward to the next time we can visit.

leaving on an airplane

2005-11-09T21:44:00.000-06:00

Sunday my husband's relatives had a big Mexican baptism party at our house. Baptism is a big deal for Catholics, and throughout the day there were probably 60 people at our house. The festivities started on Saturday, when they purchased two freshly slaughtered lambs and made a tripe stew/soup sort of thing, that I have to admit, was pretty good. That night I made three cheesecakes (my American contribution) and Sunday morning Fermin cooked a big lamb feast - very tasty.

The party was really nice. My mom commented that Mexicans seem to be more laid back and secure with themselves. She also said that the kids seem more content. This was an interesting thought. I have learned a few really good things from watching my sister-in-law raise her now 3-month-old baby across the hall in my house. Carlos is accustomed to many people holding him and taking care of him (because there are always people around) and therefore is very comfortable being around lots of different people. He also has learned to sleep with noise since he was born. He doesn't wake up from the vacuum, music, or regular conversation just a few feet away because he's always had to sleep through this stuff, and so he does so without issue. He's also freaking adorable and rarely cries, so that's alway good, but I think cultures could learn a lot from each other if we understood eachother's customs better.

Well, I am leaving in about 6 hours to go to the airport to fly to D.C., where I will rent a car and drive to Newark, DE to visit my old friend Lulu from China and her Swedish husband Magnus, who I have never met. Lulu is a dear old friend of mine who I met on my first trip there. She's brilliant and speaks brilliant English, and it's a travesty that I haven't made it out to see her in her year in the States. Back before life became complicated (job, marriage, house) I swore I would welcome her at the airport wherever that was when she eventually arrived in America. Anyway, I am so excited to see her and see what sort of advantures we can have this weekend.

joys of the DMV

2005-10-28T22:31:00.000-05:00

Today I took a friend of my husband's to the Wisconsin DMV to get his state ID. Fermin asked me to go with him because despite having the appropriate paperwork before, he had been denied an ID twice. It didn't make any sense. Let me also state that Wisconsin does not have a law requiring proof of legal residence as a prerequisite for getting a state ID.

You need three pieces of paperwork for a new ID - one proof of identification and one proof of residence, and then a third of either. Last time he brought three, one of which being his paycheck, which had his name and address printed on it. I sat and read the document list while we waited, verifying that last time they definitely should have given him an ID. Fermin said the woman had taken one look at them, his birth certificate (from Mexico) and his Voter's Registration Card (from Mexico, but specifically stated on the Wisconsin documents list as acceptable) and then tossed the check back at them saying "I'm not familiar with this," referring to his employer, a five-location chain of frozen custard places rather popular in Milwaukee. (Side note: Never toss, slide or throw anything at or toward a Mexican, even in a playful, casual way, it's very rude).

I conveniently had to renew my license and change my address so I went first at the window. Oddly, when I said I needed to change my address, I didn't need a single piece of proof of my new address - nothing! After I was done I told the agent (coincidentally he was bilingual and had turned down our friend before) that our friend had been there three times and had been treated badly and not gotten his ID. The agent looked at the papers - basically the same ones he had had before - made a joke with our friend in Spanish and assured me that I could go down to get my new photo taken because everything was in order.

After my terrible, unexpected photo was taken and we got our IDs, we discussed why this time it had been so simple, although virtually nothing had changed. There really was nothing to conclude except that my comments or presence deflected any potential bull@#%* from occurring. I was also amazed that at this DMV, where a good third of the people there appeared to be Spanish-speaking, there was one bilingual agent (out of thirteen) and no one available at the information area who spoke Spanish.

I suppose there are still people who believe that if you are in America you should speak English, but getting a legal state ID is one of the first things someone needs when they arrive here, in order to get a job. Later, an immigrant usually learns English. Other human rights issues aside, our economy needs these immigrants, and those who think we should discourage immigration do not understand who cooks the food in our restaurants, pick our fresh fruit, stock our big Walmarts and do all the other menial tasks that Americans find ourselves above. It's just infuriating to see people treated badly simply for the fact that they are Hispanic, or foreign, or don't speak English.

In other news, I've been downloading music into my iPod all day. So exciting.

language barrier

2005-10-27T22:00:00.000-05:00

I've been a little intense and deep with my blog lately, so much so that a close family member said reading my blog is akin to reading my diary. I guess that's somewhat true, this is a little like my diary, and that comment doesn't bother me in the least. Anyway, onto some lighter material for the night.

I was thinking about how often I come upon something that I want to express that just doesn't work right in English. I speak so much Spanish during the day that there are lots of colloquial phrases that I use that just work better for certain situations. Obviously, there are many times that I also don't know how to translate an English expression into Spanish, but I always find it interesting when I find someting that I can't express as well or at all in English.

I had the same experience when I was studying Chinese. After a while living there with some other Americans, we had our own mix of language that we used to communicate, English peppered with key Chinese expressions that just couldn't be translated. It was great, and when I came back I had a hard time expressing those things purely in English with everyone here (who obviously didn't speak Chinese).

In other news, I got an iPod tonight - so exciting. I love everything about it -- the tiny, efficient packaging, the size, the look of it, the simple usage, everything. The only thing I don't love is that I got six error messages in a row when I tried to download the software onto my computer, confirming the fact that there is something seriously wrong with my computer. A virus? Almost every time I try to download or install anything I get error messages and lately about every other time I shut down or start up the computer I either get an error message or it needs to be forced to shut down. My record with pieces of technology is not good. Anyway, I'll have to call Apple tech support in the morning, and hopefully they can help me get the software loaded. It's too bad, because I could have had half my cds downloaded by now. Oh well, tomorrow is another day off, and for that, I am happy.

By the way, Mary has a really great post on her blog right now, if any of you have not seen it yet, check it out. I couldn't have written these thoughts and frustrations (which I share) better myself.

it's my one-year blogging anniversary - a tribute to inheritance

2005-10-23T15:46:00.000-05:00

I've just spent a frustrating hour trying to connect to the internet at my favorite coffee spot in Milwaukee. The tribal hold music was stirring my insides into a fury as I thought about my relaxing evening being wasted waiting for a support tech to help me connect my practically-new "wireless-ready" laptop to the internet. I was thinking how much I wished I had convinved my dad that the mac was right for me (sorry dad) and how much time I have lost trouble-shooting my internet connection at any number of wireless hotspots and rebooting my computer at home since every time it goes on standby I lose my connection. Oh well, maybe the mac would do the same thing, and it just goes to show that stubbornness runs in the family.

The funny thing is, I wasn't planning to spend my evening surfing the web, or even blogging. I bought this writing guide the other week and have decided to go through it, working on the exercises and learning something about my future career(!?). But approaching the lake on my way here there was this big, bright full moon hanging right over Lake Michigan, peeking out from behind the skyline as I drove east on I-94. I had all these beautiful thoughts that I wanted to blog when I got here, but instead I killed it with minute after long minute of technical frustration.

Oh well, I mention the family stubbornness for a reason. I had a brief conversation with my dad recently--I don't actually even remember how this came up--but he mentioned his tendency to not change his mind or behavior when he knows others may be watching. For example, he said that after living in Indiana moving houses (literally, like on those giant trailers) for a few years after college, he came back to Milwaukee deciding to be much more assertive in his life. I am not sure exactly what he was referring to, and I forget what exactly we had been talking about, but I realized I have this exact same tendency. I have a history of being ridiculously concerned about what people who know me think. I know I still do it at work, but I think I have partially cured myself of it in my personal life.

Example: When I was in high school I was dead set against going to UW-Madison because I figured everyone who went there had to be a crazy drunk and I didn't want any part of that scene. For many good reasons (one of which being it’s his alma mater), my dad wanted me to go, and when I visited the campus I totally fell in love with it. I waited, however, for six months to tell anyone that I had decided to go there.

I had been so vocal among my family and friends about not going to UW that when I realized I wanted to go there, it was embarrassing. I especially didn't want my dad to know I had changed my mind and that he was right. It's so insane I laugh about it now. By now I have done enough surprising things with my life now that my parents and friends expect about anything, and I feel very free and good about that. But I could still name 10 times at work when a policy has changed or I have had to confront people about a new way of doing something (that involved more work/time/energy) and I have hated doing it or just not done it at all.

Sometimes the motive behind this madness is not about rocking someone's boat. Like tonight with the internet, I could have just done something else, but I couldn't. It bothered me so bad that it didn't work that I sat through that horrible music just to prove a point that I should be able to get on the internet. And with this computer, (which really is a nice computer by the way), but when my dad had suggested buying me a new laptop for a wedding present, I had wanted an iMac. He had his reasons (he uses and loves PCs) and I had mine (I have used and prefer Macs). It mirrored our ongoing political tension where his Republican views battle my liberal views for correctness, both of us feeling firmly superior in our arguments. The discussion went on and on until the older generation won out I guess.

Anyway, it was funny, the other night we were at my cousin’s wedding and my husband Fermin and I were sitting with my family, and my dad and I started to get into one of our mini-discussion/arguments about something stupid, and Fermin said something like he guesses if my dad argues like that that’s where I get it from. Ha! How true, how true.

waiting on today...

2005-10-19T00:16:00.000-05:00

This is my favorite title submission by far, although now that he mentions it, I really like "less crazy than the day before" too, which was the title of my last post, like Allan suggested. However, (and I am apparently going to lose Allan as a reader altogether now?) this week I was inspired by some U2 lyrics that have become my new title. I don't know if it's perfect, but it definitely sums up a lot of stuff that I struggle, live, think about, deal with, rejoice in, etc.

I was listening to U2's How to Dismantle and Atomic Bomb the other day and the start of one song goes:

"The more you see the less you know,
the less you find out as you go,
I knew much more then,
than I do now."

This very much expresses how I relate to religion, faith and life in general right now. I was something of a fundamentalist for a time and really thought I had life figured out. I believed I understood Christianity and its place and meaning in my life. I had certain views about God, right and wrong, and the world and those views shaped the way I lived my life almost to a tee. The problem was, the world began to open up to me through places and people and emotions and just life, and things became so much more complicated.

I realized that the more things I learned, the more I realized I didn't know, and that back when I knew a little, I thought I knew it all. It's ironic, but I think many people would agree. There are still ragged strings of faith left, but only the really strong, ingrained deep-seeded ones of the human heart survive. The rest I ponder and wonder about and sometimes try to talk to the God I once felt I was "close to" about.

--------------

This is a rather profound post considering I have just finished a 10-hour shift at work and am sitting at the computer in the office, 20 minutes from home and a good, long sleep. I thought I would take a minute to read blogs and then Mary and Allan spurred me to write. I have another almost-finished post on my computer at home that will have to wait another few days for posting I guess.

less crazy than the day before

2005-10-09T20:44:00.000-05:00

So, I want a new blog title, and the current one, which I started using last week, isn't doing it for me either. If anyone has a new title for me, or really likes "where to begin?" - let me know. I am open to suggestions, inspiration, prophecy.

My brain has been working overtime in the last week trying to make some plans for the next few months. The travel bug has totally taken over my thoughts since I finished a great book strangely titled Foreign Babes in Beijing. It's actually the story of a young American woman's life in Beijing in the '90s and nothing has made me miss China more than this book. It's very insightful, funny, and well-written, and she shares a lot of things that embody why I love Beijing so much.

Anyway, with the frustration at my job I've really been thinking about trying to do something else, and maybe I should give writing a shot. I'm young and have few things to tie me down, I should at least give it a try, right? So I'm thinking to go to China for a week or two, use up my vacation, take some time to think, write, get inspired maybe. When I come back I'll think of what I might write about, think about how that's going to work, take a class, read some books, give it a go. All this sounds just slightly less like crazy talk than it did yesterday, but that's still a great distance from sanity.

Then I started thinking about what I might do to make a little money while I try out this writing thing. And I have to say, the thought of having a job with little or no responsibility makes my heart race with excitement. I can think of so many things that I would love (and be great at) part time. I could waitress, I could be a shift supervisor at Qdoba, I could work in retail, I could work at the post office for God's sake. It's amazing! I know I sound insane, but the parts of my job that make me feel like "the man" (see Restless below, from 9/21) really make me want to be an employee, or just stop working for a corporation altogether, but being an employee is much more realistic. Of course, I am an employee now, but I also have employees, and that's the part that's stealing my soul.

So, we'll see what happens, but I have the feeling that if I do a little traveling, take some classes, give it a shot, I will never regret it. Worst case scenario I'm a total failure and I look for a new job in the restaurant or some other industry after a while. What is there to lose? I know I can't think of anything, can anyone else? Fermin would love to see a less stressed-out version of myself, and he's even offered to pay my part of the bills would I want to go to China for a month or two. I actually just want to go for two weeks, and still figure out a way to go to Mexico, but we'll figure that out later.

So, ideas and ideas, anyone have any for me to rename my blog?

I'm waiting for comments on life and blogging.

a drive to the country

2005-10-05T22:33:00.000-05:00

So I sit here, enjoying the wind blowing my hair around, making swishing noises among the leaves below, as I try to forget my so-far disappointing day. A welcome peace awaits inside the aged brick tower, 1768 steps up, 1350 feet above sea level.

I've been to Holy Hill many times before, with my mom, when I was a kid. I remembered how they charge $0.50 to climb the tower by placing an unattended post with a slot for money at the bottom of the steps. When I was a kid, I wondered if people would really pay if no one was watching. I put in a dollar this time. It's a good thing that I had stopped at the ATM because in my everyday life I always use a card, and they definitely don't take debit here.

I'm alone at the top, in the little room at the top of the tower, listening to the wind. There's a sign at the botom of the tower that wishes good luck with the stairs. As a kid I remember feeling the time it took to get up the stairs was an eternity. It really only took me about 10 minutes this time. Every few flights of wrought-iron steps there's a landing room leading to another flight of stairs. All these rooms contain different colors or bricks, peeling paint, and beautiful old doors leading to forbidden closed-off areas. I am reminded of my love of exploring; unfortunately these doors are locked. As you reach the top the stairs spiral; open air windows would allow a clumsy person to fall to their death but provide the fantastic views that draw non-Catholics like me to this place. There is a creepy, homey feeling about the solitary climb, not unlike being home alone at night feeling comfortable but irrationally scared that an intruder could be in the next room.

It's windy, which throws off my balance as I climb, and I feel a twinge of fear. As I reach the top though, it's totally worth it. The solid brick structure reaching into the sky as the wind rips around it feels wonderfully solid, reassuring. I am reminded that some things endure -- autumn leaves changing, the wind, the setting sun as well as some man-made things -- old brick churches, some relationships, maybe dreams, if you're lucky.

tv time

2005-10-02T19:43:00.000-05:00

Seriously, what is wrong with me? Every time I watch Extreme Makeover: Home Edition I start to cry. I mean, even at the start of the show when they talk about these amazing families I get all emotional. Am I a nut or what?

Okay, part deux: I am thinking of getting some sort of iPod. I couldn't think of a good reason to get one before but if I am really going to spend two months in Mexico, I would really like a soundtrack. I recently learned you can get an adaptor and use it in the car too, so that's another selling point. I was thinking about a nano, but then I saw the U2 edition regular iPod and sort of liked that. Okay, any iPod users have any suggestions for me? Thoughts? Recomendations?

seasons change

2005-09-30T00:14:00.000-05:00

Mary is right, it's gorgeous out lately. The sky is that fabulous blue that only God can create, the air is crisp, so much fresher than the humid summer air, and it's finally time for hooded sweatshirts, jeans and boots and long sleeves. I think, as a Midwestern American my "grass is always greener on the other side" mentality comes from growing up with the changing of the seasons.

You see, every spring I await the day the weather is nice enough to head to the lakefront, enjoy the warm weather and get a start of color to my skin. I'm aching to take off layers, wear sandals and play outside. But toward the end of summer, I'm sick of the heat, I want cool days, even rain, a break from the sun. I complain about the heat, the humidity, and plot my way from air-conditioned structure to next air-conditioned structure.

I know by November I will be complaining about the cold, plotting my way from heated building to heated building, bundling up, cursing snow and cursing having been born in Wisconsin. Really, how can I be so fickle? I do this every year?! While I am speaking in the first person here, I suspect many of my Midwest-born comrades can relate to this experience.

To be honest, this is all so mundane that I never gave it much thought until I started getting to know people from more homogeneous climates. I mean, some of my Mexican in-laws were asking me if I thought it was cold the other day when it was about 60. I tried to explain that I felt it was great because we had been through the hot summer and now we were ready for fall. They sort of laughed, but not being followers of the greenest grass, they didn't necessarily relate.

The more I get to know people from Mexico (and I used to analyze the same traits about Chinese I met), the more I ponder how different our cultures and backgrounds really do make us. Some people seem to really think that basically all humans are the same, but I think that's a little naive. Many Americans, for example, think that we are bettering the world by bringing our form of capitalism, democracy, and let's face it, consumerism to the world. But the combination of these principles done our way doesn't necessarily translate into good for other cultures. In developing countries like China and Mexico a growing "middle class" has more money, but kids are getting fatter and fatter as they devour convenience meals, chocolate and Coke that we market there. People who once lived simpler lives and were basically content with what they had now bear children who now long to live in big suburban houses and drive SUVs.

Last night I was listening to an American journalist who works for the New York Times in Iraq talk about how our government expected there to be some sense of a unified social framework underneath the regime of Saddam Hussein, but that wasn't true. Now we seem to have instigated a near-Civil War. We are trying to form a Western-style democracy there but the people there don't trust government, nor the U.S. nor their neighboring ethnic groups. Our way doesn't always work, and now we have to find something that does.

I'm not so sure where I am going with this, except trying not to be overly critical, but I no longer go through a day without wondering what we are doing to our world, our society and our environment. I can't listen to the radio without being a little depressed about what is happening in Iraq with the war, to the poor of New Orleans, to our nations slums, and in the budding capitalist societies all over the world. It sometimes strikes me that I should quit my job, leave everything behind and travel all over the world before it all becomes too much like the place I would have left behind.

Restless

2005-09-21T14:39:00.000-05:00

So, a few weeks ago I started having these mini-personal crises about my job. I used to be able to mask my true emotions about working in a corporate restaurant better, but I'm not so good at it any more. I used to be on my way up. I really wanted to be a General Manager 1) for the experience and 2) to be able to write that on my resume. In a way I have reached a short-term plateau in my job and have quickly become restless. I know in a way I am good at my job. I meet a lot of interesting people and I love my employees, I really do. But that's about all that's left of me enjoying my job these days. I was hoping that the personal crises would be a short-term thing, but they just keep coming back. I can see myself becoming cynical, and it's scary.

I would guess that many people spend their day doing things that they find utterly useless, but the amount of time I spend doing those things has increased since I started at my current company. There are many things that are not meaningless about running a restaurant -- customer service, hiring, most paparwork, inventories, ordering, customer service, cleanliness, training, etc. These are all things that can be done well and can improve the restaurant for the guests who visit it and make it a fun place to work. However, there are also many nitpicky, stupid things that the corporation makes us do that contribute to my waning sanity. I can't really give an example because they require some knowledge of the business and I think most of you would say, "who cares, just do it, it takes two seconds!?" But with these things multiplied many times a day and the expectation that a manager can somehow stay on top of all of them while still maintaining the important aspects that I listed above, is crazy.

I do think I could enjoy working in restaurants again if it was for a company that didn't allow men in suits with no practical experience to devise ways to make their employee's lives more difficult with no real benefit to the operation. I could also enjoy working in a non-corporate restaurant I'm sure. But I'm finding it more and more difficult to be a person of integrity in my job. I am starting to see why a great majority of the 30 and 40-something restaurant managers I know are either totally burned out, have some sort of drug habit, or are very cynical, bitter people. It's really hard, the hours are long, and the money's not that great.

With that, I hope my time working for "the man" is creeping to it's end. I am not quitting or looking for other jobs, but I really want to travel some more. Fermin needs to spend some time in Mexico this winter and I might just quit and go with him. I met a girl through work that is going to Mexico in December and asked me to go with her. I need to have some more adventures. I need some new writing material, some time outside of this insane country. I want to learn a new place, to explore and absorb. The conventional wisdom would say that I should think about my 401K and my retirement savings and my future, but I have no kids and little to really bind me here, and when have I ever cared about conventional wisdom?

I paged through the Lonely Planet guidebook for Beijing at Barnes and Noble today and almost started tearing up as I read the writer's "perfect day" in Beijing. It was strikingly like many of my best days in that fascinating city. Get a strong cup of coffee, jump on my bike and head to this great park where if you can't find someone practicing calligraphy with brush and water on the sidewalk, you will at least find a shady place to sit near the lake and read or watch people in peace. Do some shopping, stroll in Tiananmen Square, eat and have some drinks at Sanlitun. Ahh yes.. how I miss Beijing.

There are many places in Mexico I want to explore, and I bought the Mexico Lonely Planet guidebook today so that I would be reminded of the nagging tug I feel today.

By the way, if I go to Mexico for a few months this winter, I will be seeking some travel partners as some of the time Fermin will be doing other things while perhaps I go to different states to explore. Any takers?

a ranting bunny trail of opinion

2005-09-11T23:13:00.000-05:00

I just realized that I haven’t posted in a week. I actually thought I had posted something mid-week, but, it was just a draft and now I don’t really feel like finishing it. I was going to write something about the hurricane and add some links to some of the great journalism I have seen in the past two weeks, but instead I would just suggest that you all take a look at www.nytimes.com and especially check out the recent column on the hurricane by Nicholas Kristof, a great journalist and writer.

What else can I tell you, fine reader(s)? I’ve had a few nice days off, did some work around the house, stained my first cabinet (for our new bathroom) and planted some fall mums that I hope will actually live through the winter.

I just thought of a topic!

I feel, perhaps in the last three to five years, that I am becoming old enough to get a sense of a historical perspective on things. For example, I now hear myself making comments like “when I was in high school, everyone wore backpacks in the halls,” or “when I was a kid, we played in the park every day of summer...” I feel kind of old, not in a bad way; perhaps experienced is a better word. The thing is, I have a little crew of high schoolers that work for me, and while I don’t feel that much older than them, I do see that they think of me as an adult woman, which is amusing.

The reason I bring up the whole “historical perspective” thing, is that, in my short-ish life, I have noticed a few trends that I have this continuous Seinfeld-like desire to say “what’s the deal with ____?” about. Here goes:

What is the deal with food allergies? Seriously, when I was a kid at a normal-sized suburban school district, I never knew one kid with any sort of nut, wheat or seafood allergy. People – take a look at the fine print on almost any package of snacks nowadays and you will find some kind of nut disclaimer. “This product may have been produced in a facility that processes tree nuts.” As most of you know, I work in the restaurant industry, and we used peanuts in some of our food at the last restaurant I worked at. I can’t tell you how many parents needed their food to be made specially without peanuts so their kids wouldn't have a reaction.

So, this sort of strange phenomenon makes me think – what has happened in the last 20 years that has caused so many American children to develop all these strange allergies? Based on absolutely no scientific knowledge or research, I think it’s because of our anti-bacterial, germophobe, clean-freak culture. I mean honestly, Clorox wipes, air sanitizer, and parents freaking out when their children get dirty? Who are we? Just watching advertising for any number of cleaning products might lead a person to think it’s possible (an beneficial) to create a germ and bacteria-free environment. But really, it’s impossible, and no amount of food safety, sanitation and cleaning is going to stop that. Furthermore, we don’t want to raise our children in a sanitized environment, because when they do venture out into the real world, their immune systems can’t function correctly. Maybe this is an explanation for all these crazy allergies – undeveloped immune systems reacting badly to perfectly safe ingredients because they are so underused and out of whack. I think I may have read an article about this once, or maybe I just made it up, but I also think it makes a lot of sense. I guess I’ll do a little research and see if any scientists agree with my theory.

So, what is the deal with snow? People - where is the snow from my childhood? I live in Wisconsin, and I can honestly remember that most if not all of the winters of my childhood involved large amounts of snow. We had these mountains of plowed snow rimming the playground at my elementary school and we used to climb them and wander around on them. I remember how great it was to see things from an elevated view, feeling tall and like you had a view of everything going out on the playground. I never noticed it much when I was in college, but now that I am back in Milwaukee, it really seems like we never have the amount of snow we had in back in those years, when I was a wee lass. Ok, just kidding, but if that isn’t anecdotal proof of global warming, I don’t know what is. My parents swear that when they were kids there was even more snow.

I know there is a lot more proof for the effects of global warming, but I am just amazed that with all the climate change and the terrible effects humans have on the environment, that we never learn to live in a more conscious way. Everything seems to be about Americans getting their oil and continuing our “great” lifestyle. What is that? Just getting more stuff? We certainly aren’t a successful culture as far as family life goes, with our 50 percent divorce rate. We aren’t a successful culture as far as health goes, with 40 percent of our population overweight and more and more obese children every day. And as we have all read in the past few days, we clearly haven’t been successful at dealing with poverty. We are so selfish, myself completely included, and the more I live with people of another culture, the more I realize how ingrained our selfishness is. The average tv-watching American kid can be totally occupied in the hobby of accumulating stuff – toys, then clothes, then gadgets, cars, etc. We are taught by our modern media to want stuff as if that embodies the American dream. Mexicans, to use my familiar example, are so much more likely to make great sacrifices in their lives for the good of their extended families than modern Americans would. I’m not judging, I completely fit into this category, but I can’t help wondering where we went wrong, and how we might teach our children to be different.

news of the days

2005-09-07T10:01:00.000-05:00

I am definitely a news reader, but typically the big national stories, usually covered the same way over and over again, do not grab my interest. Too often they deal with celebrities or political maneuverings or sometimes, I just can't read about stuff because it makes me feel shameful to be a citizen of this country. How many suicide bombings in Iraq can we stand to see - knowing that without our presence there, these people would not have died. How much cronyism and conflict of interest leading to economic benefits for the rich in our country can we read without becoming cynical?

It's a much different story of course, but the hurricane has occupied a lot of my reading, radio listening, and tv watching time in the last week or so. It's devastating and emotional to see what's going on, but I also have enjoyed reading and watching the fruits of journalists doing real journalism - interviewing, investigating, commenting, experiencing and describing the events in the South. There's been so much good commentary on NPR and so many good articles on the New York Times and other papers, I thought I would post links to some of them here:

Breakdown

Putting down new roots on more solid ground

Nicholas Kristof on poverty and Katrina

a few days...

2005-09-02T19:19:00.000-05:00

I am about to enjoy an evening of comfort food (deluxe mac and cheese) and red wine mixed with cranberry juice (I had always been more of a wine cooler girl, despite my attempts to truly enjoy wine). Desperate times call for desperate measures. My last few days at work have been terrible. My assistant and I usually complement each other in the way that on his bad days, I am usually the encouraging, optimistic one, and vice versa for my really bad days.

But the last few days, having to fire our best potential shift supervisor, losing one long-term well-trained employee, a variety of personal objections about what I do coming to a head in my head, have led me to a general feeling of hopelessness about the future of our store. It's been four months since I was transferred there. Certainly, many things are a lot better, but I am still plagued with a situation where I have virtually no promotable employees, and therefore Adam, my assistant, and I are constantly so focused on just getting basic stuff done on our shifts that we never catch up. We never get to really be managers, do any long-term planning, nor train our employees to the degree necessary.

Furthermore, my moral obligations have really been weighing on me regarding my job. Here's what I mean: Last night I was listening to this discussion about the benefits and evils of Wal-mart moving into urban neighborhoods in Chicago. I meantion this because these discussions remind me that in theory I believe in paying people good, living wages with benefits and all the lik. I care about this, but in my job, I am not always able to do that. I am forced, by the constraints that are set at levels above me, to meet certain budgets for labor, and therefore I really only have certain limits to what I can pay people, and I don't generally feel very good about that. The other option, however, is to constantly struggle to make labor and therefore not do my job very well.

I was cynically joking about this with my boss today, and she joked that I was literally "the man," in the negative, oppressing and harassing the masses sense. I usually can remove the dramatic view of this from my daily perspective, but today I was just overwhelmed with the idea that I didn't want to do this anymore. In addition to the fact that despite my best efforts and he efforts of a really good assistant manager, things aren't going that well. Sometimes I just wonder why I am doing this. This morning I was really on the verge of just deciding to leave. I would probably never do that, but today I really wanted to, and I didn't even care anymore. Not caring really scares me, because it's important to me to like my job, but there are days when the working life is not all it's cracked up to be.

Time for wine and macaroni.

past, present and 5 things (a break from missing the point)

2005-08-29T20:52:00.000-05:00

10 Years Ago
10 years ago I was beginning my junior year at my very suburban high school. I had spent a good part of my summer driving around with my three best high school friends, Adrianne, Sara and Stephanie. We all worked at the same McDonalds at that time and I was the only one with both a license and a car, if I remember correctly. We named my car Ed, because he was a gray, 4-door, 1986 Pontiac 6000 that deserved a mundane, middle-aged sounding name. I believe the church trip of that summer was “A Ride with the Son,” a week-long bike and camping expedition around Wisconsin ending with a crazy whitewater rafting trip where “I totally swear, I like, almost died.” The biking, however, was great. I remember at certain difficult times, 40 or 50 miles into the day, really feeling a connection with nature, sparked by the physical labor it took me to pass by all that rolling Wisconsin scenery.

5 Years Ago
I had just gotten back from my first trip to China. It was the summer of my life, and pardon the drama, but it forever changed my life. I had just been overseas for the first time. I had seen the world, not in its entirety certainly, but I experienced the existence of a big, diverse, beautiful, fascinating world. I made many friends that summer, some American, some Chinese. There is one friendship that will always remain special to me. It was also the most unlikely. A brilliant English student from Qinghua University and I met when some of my American friends and I were hanging out outside the dorms on campus. She and I clicked right away, bonding over talks of politics, current events, the media, religion, the world. She later married a Swedish man and is currently studying on the East Coast. I am married to a Mexican man, and I sometimes wonder what our tri-Continental dinner party would look like. That summer I learned a love of diversity. I was fascinated by the oldness of China – architecture, ways of life, food traditions, language, while the newness seeped in. Millions of cars, American-style advertising filling the open skies, students flocking to learn English and study in the states. That summer began a near-obsession with China, I later spent a year there and dreamed of more. I’m not sure when that more will come now, but I know China hasn’t left my life forever.

Yesterday
I worked an incredibly slow Sunday lunch at my restaurant. I came home and played with Jessica, this incredibly smart 6-year-old Mexican girl who my sister-in-law was babysitting. She has a baby sister who she carries around like she’s a doll even though she has to weigh at least 20 pounds. Jessica wanted to learn how to use my computer, so I showed her some of my digital pictures, and we tried to play chess and some other assorted games. It was my first time really communicating in Spanish with a child. It’s a lot different than with an adult, you have to speak a lot more clearly.

Today
We bought some stuff for the bathroom we are putting in the upstairs of our house. I worked out (I wish that was a common enough occurrence to not have to mention) and then did some reading. Now, you would find me writing a marathon blog entry and awaiting the start of my novella.

Tomorrow
I don’t work tomorrow either! I am planning on sleeping in, cleaning up my house and then hanging out with an old friend who just got back from Mexico.

5 Snacks
1. Yoplait yogurt
2. Popcorn
3. Tortilla chips and salsa or guacamole
4. String cheese
5. Juicy nectarines

CDs whose songs I know all of the lyrics to
1. U2 – War, Joshua Tree, All That You Can’t Leave Behind, Atomic Bomb
2. Mana – Revolucion de Amor
3. Juanes – Un Dia Normal
4. Garden State Soundtrack
5. Over the Rhine - Ohio

5 Things I would do with $100,000,000
1. Buy some good properties that will appreciate over time. Buy some properties in blighted areas of the city and work to redevelop them into something useful for the community.
2. Give a big percentage (75%, I mean, what does one girl do with $100,000,000?) lot to some really good charities
3. Travel all over the world. I definitely need to hit the six continents. I would probably go to every country in South America, Europe and lots of interesting places that someone would recommend to me in Africa. I would definitely spend months if not years in Mexico and China – traveling and writing and traveling some more.
4. Keep working, but in some business that I have yet to dream up that would provide good jobs to working people.
5. Finally, put some away in the bank so my family and I can live our final few years without worry.

5 Locations I would like to runaway to.
1. Beijing, China
2. Madison, WI
3. Chicago, IL (I’d live in Mary’s neighborhood, in one of those great old row houses)
4. Portland, OR
5. New York – I’ve never been there, and I think I would love it

5 Bad habits I have
1. Biting my nails when I am nervous or bored
2. Swearing – this is a new one, but since becoming a General Manager, this has become a serious problem
3. Easily becoming bitchy with my husband
4. Not going to the gym even though I pay $60 per month for my membership
5. Eating too much crap – I really enjoy good, interesting food, but in its place, I also can put away the junk

5 things I like doing
1. Reading
2. Writing
3. Riding a bike through the city
4. Watching people
5. Cooking

5 Things I would never wear
1. Those God-awful furry moon boots that are in style (or maybe that was just last year) let’s hope
2. On second thought, fur, real or fake, on anything
3. Feathers, on a belt, or on anything else
4. Tool belt
5. Basically any hat, especially that really big sombrero that Mary is always talking about

5 TV shows I like
1. La Madrastra – my novella that’s going to end in one week!!!
2. That 70’s Show
3. King of Queens
4. Seinfeld re-runs, especially watching my Mexican husband “get” the humor
5. Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, What Not To Wear, While You Were Out, and Extreme Makeover Home Edition (these are all sort of in the same category, so I thought it best to mention them all)

5 Movies I like
1. In America
2. Garden State
3. Spanglish
4. Motorcycle Diaries
5. Office Space

5 Famous People I would like to meet
1. Bono – and not just meet, but have time to ask him some really good questions about his life in music and social justice
2. Phillip Yancey ((not really that famous, but an author I would like to speak with)
3. Brian McLaren (ditto from above)
4. Juanes
5. The next Democratic Party presidential candidate, whoever that may turn out to be

5 Biggest Joys at the moment
1. Returning to consideration of all things eternal through great books given by others
2. Working in my garden
3. Hanging out with my husband and his family, on good days there’s a lot of people (and a baby) laughing, having fun, and eating something yummy
4. Any opportunity to visit friends in Chicago, or even just visit with friends here in Milwaukee
5. Reading great books

3 Favorite Toys (I couldn’t think of 5!)
1. My car – I love the sunroof and the stereo, and being in the car, with the sun shining, and the music playing
2. Whatever book I am reading at the moment
3. My laptop

missing the point (capitulo dos)

2005-08-26T00:53:00.000-05:00

So, I finished Generous Orthodoxy, and although I still have lots to say about it, I decided to check out a book Mr. McLaren had footnoted, called If Grace is True, which I found at the bookstore the other day and started reading right away. I’m not that far into it (it’s about universalism, the idea that through Jesus every person will be saved, not just people who have “accepted Christ,” or however your respective denomination describes it) but it’s given me some food for thought related also to Generous Orthodoxy.

The author talks about how over the years as someone who grew up in the conservative Christian tradition, he began to change some of his ideas based on his experiences with God, rather than just rely on the tradition of the church and literal interpretations of the Bible. He uses homosexuality as an example. He writes that he had a friend who was a strong Christian, became a pastor even, and into his 20’s realized he was simply not attracted to women around him and started to think he might be gay. He explains how his friend went from trying to rid the “thorn” in his flesh to accepting the person God made him to be to eventually looking for a man to share his life with.

There are several passages in the Bible that comment on the homosexuality as though it were a sin, but what do we do with those verses when they don’t seem to address reality? Likewise, what do we do with passages that suggest women should not be church leaders? Furthermore, many people find God to be very real to them although they are living in what many of us might define as sin; what about our experiences with God? Are they equally important? If there are genuinely right-seeking, God-loving people out there who really seem to be (or simply, are) gay, then what do we do with that? Condemn them although God made them that way?

The author writes that we need to let our experiences with God rise in status in our theology, even to the importance of the Bible. As modern evangelicals, we have created all sorts of ways to get around this, like stating we interpret the Bible literally but then using tricky words and extremely interpretive methods of interpretation to argue as to why Paul wasn’t saying women couldn’t be preachers, for example. I mean, really, Paul said that. But Paul was speaking to his time and maybe he had good reasons, but this is a different time. Why do we need to use linguistic smoke and mirrors to address these issues? God has clearly used women over the centuries to teach and make monumental change and good in the church, so why aren’t we able to accept God’s way? Likewise, if God is working in the lives of committed Christian homosexuals, ought we not accept that without judging?

I am not trying to look good here. I am all sorts of guilty of judging, but when I look back, I have had many experiences with great homosexuals who had accepted who they are and wanted to live a good life. If God let them be at peace with who they were, why are we unable to think that way? I don’t know, but this idea of our experiences with God meaning something, I think could be revolutionary to the church. Think of how many confusing lines of thought and outright contradictions there are in the Bible, and what would happen if the Bible wasn’t intended to be used like we use it (like a dictionary of right and wrong) and was instead a narrative with lots of lessons along the way? What would happen to our Christianity?

missing the point

2005-08-21T17:30:00.000-05:00

Reading Brian McLaren has really re-ignited my struggle and thinking about “Christianity.” I am usually a bit wary of myself being swayed by one book, or one person’s opinion, but A Generous Orthodoxy covers a whole lot of topics, and almost all of my recent hang-ups with being a Christian. He offers insights on our culture and the way it has impacted what we call Christian faith in a way that resonates in my soul.

Here’s what happened to me. Because I was an evangelical Christian, I got involved with Campus Crusade, a so-called para-church missionary organization. Through that group I went oversees for the first time when I was 19, to China, and discovered, among other things, my love for cultures, exploration, discovery and language. Had I not had that experience, I would probably not have gone to live in China, and would not have gone to India, nor Thailand, nor read many books nor listened to countless radio programs and therefore learned about places all over the world.

But, had I not had these experiences, I would never have struggled with the things I had because of them. I wouldn’t have seen seas of people, all individuals, part of this post-Communist, atheist state that every day strives for capitalism and the American model of consumerism. I wouldn’t have seen poverty in India and realized that there is just no way that a missionary – especially the feeble ones like me and others I know – are going to impact each and every one of them sometime in their lives. Perhaps I am cynical, but for those of you who have been in other parts of the world, you cannot argue with me. I know all the arguments, they will get their chance, or Jesus will speak to them in their heart, but I can’t accept that God created them for destruction. I can’t.

So what to do.

Here’s the thing: my whole personal theology has been based on a Paul-centered, saved or unsaved, sinner or saint, us against them thinking. The thing is, I never realized there were other legitimate ways of interpreting the New Testament than the way our modern church did it. When someone would mention Lutherans or Methodists or Catholics, I would instinctively think “watered-down Gospel message,” because, honestly, that’s the way these radical evangelical groups portray other interpretations.

Now, I am being way too harsh on my roots here, but when I think about my life growing up at an evangelical church and with CC, I realize that Paul’s teachings were really taken more seriously than those of Jesus himself. Jesus as savior, and Paul as master and teacher is how McLaren puts it. And as I am reading, I’m bluntly smacking my forehead, because it’s so obvious what our modern, scientific culture has done to the Gospel: turned it into an equation. And the thing is, I totally bought into it. In fact, I practically went to work for this organization as a career.

I have to say here, I know a lot of amazing people who are involved in Campus Crusade, really amazing people, that I still love to think of, although it’s been some time since I’ve really been in touch with any of them. But the thing is, I don’t believe in God exactly the way we have portrayed him, and I think we were missing some of the point. I don’t know where I am going with all of this, but I am trying to figure it out.

a phone call sparks many thoughts

2005-08-13T16:47:00.000-05:00

I got a phone call from an old friend today. I thought the strange number on my cell might end in my second telemarker hang-up for the day, but I was surprised to hear Tim's voice on the line. He was a good friend who I went to school and did ministry with in China, a really great guy who I used to envision myself marrying to create the perfect adventurous missionary couple. Ha, that was clearly not meant to be and woe is me if he reads this sometime, but I'm a lot more transparent than I used to be, and I realize, it doesn't really matter if he knows that.

I guess it's been about two years since we spoke, since I got all crazy, left my para-church college world and shocked most of my friends with my decision to get married. I chuckle about it now because I was so impulsive, or so it seemed on the outside. On the inside, I had been pondering my life, my ongoing committment to some sort of evangelical ministry, my faith at it's core, for a while. My decisions just seemed shocking because I was too afraid to be a back-stepper, a doubter, a questioner, a church drop-out, to allow my thoughts to air among my closest friends. It's all so silly now. What if I had been more consistently open, transparent, during that time? Would it have been easier? I don't know. Maybe so, maybe not.

I couldn't bear the typical response - the probing questions, seeing the look on people's faces as they judged me for no longer being the righteous, right-on-track young Christian woman I was cracked up to be. I don't know, perhaps I am too harsh on my old church companions. I know my close friends no longer see me this way, probably they never did, because they are amazing, but those on the fringe, I feel like I know how they are thinking, because that was me, categorizing people, judging by their in-ness or out-ness of a certain circle of faith.

Subject change, I am reading a really good book--a Generous Orthodoxy, by Brian McLaren, who's a leader in the emergent church movement. There are several new links on my site because of my recent interest in this subject. I've definitely still got a lot of issues with Christiainity, but reading authors like McLaren, who boldly discuss the weaknesses of the church while still standing by the teachings of Jesus is good for me.

I've also got a lot of desire to write lately. I have all these scenes to write drifting around in my head. I'm not much for a narrative so far, but I'll have details when I get there.

an eating tour of Chicago

2005-08-08T22:59:00.000-05:00

In the tone of some of Mary's blogs
a few comments on my weekend with a culinary theme.

Friday evening: Inspired by Mary's infatuation with fried chicken, five friends gathered in Chicago, enjoy Erin's fabulous mashed potatoes, corn on the cob, Popeye's chicken and a few beers. Adrianne, an old high school friend married and living in Detroit, Erin, a world traveling Madisonian, Jenny, a witty journalism grad student, the famous missmaryb and myself, accompanied by some gorgeous yellow daisies, under the shade of a plastic palm three. Just a little relaxed chatting before some delicious fondue at Ethel's Chocolate House.

Saturday afternoon: En route to one of my favorite restaurants in the world, Joy Yee's in Chicago. Despite the dark rumors spread by one Allan,, it was indeed open, free of rodents and pestilence and sating the appetites of many. The food was great, and introducing Adrianne to the legendary Joy Yee's was quite a treat. Where else can you find huge fresh fruit smoothies for $3 and amazing Pan Asian food for $8 a plate. Good times.

Saturday evening: My first dinner at Coobah, a fun Cuban place with great sangria and mojitos. Whoever thought up the mojito is a genius. Rum with lime and mint leaves (and some other things I am sure) - yum, it's a perfect refreshing herbal pleasure for me. Erin and I shared some appetizers and tamales which were all spectacular. It's fabulous trying new cuisine for me. I've tried a lot of different foods in my life, but even trying things I may have tasted before wrapped up, combined, sauteed in different ways always holds a magical affect for me.

Take bananas for example. How many plain, out of the peel bananas has any American kid eaten in their lives, and how many different delicious ways are there to prepare bananas in so many other cultures? We have banana bread and banana cream pie, but there's also sauteed plantains with sweetened condensed milk and carmelized bananas and probably a thousand other delectable ways to eat bananas.

Sunday morning: A gorgeous perfect day with two amazing people at one fantastic cafe. We stayed for hours, talking about what our lives have become in the last few years, pondering 20-something-ness and relationships. I can't think of a better way to end the weekend, eating, drinking (coffee!) and being merry.

Mary spoke about wanting to enjoy life, to remember her 25th year like any other year past, not as a blur, but as a combination of great moments, I think. This weekend was one of those moments - being together, bonding, laughing, learning, enjoying. For me, this is life, and this is memorable.

before the weekend

2005-08-05T10:16:00.000-05:00

My weekend started last night at 9 pm and I was pretty happy about it. Two and a half days away from work sounds fabulous. When you work in the restaurant business for a while, you start to appreciate the concept of weekends a lot more. I can't take two days off in a row in any one week usually, just because the business keeps going through the weekends of course. In one way I don't mind my hours, sometimes I go in at 10 or 2 in the afternoon, but on the other hand, it's much harder to schedule family or social events when you work a lot of nights, etc. And some people get this shocked look on their face when you say you have to work Sunday, like they feel sorry for you and it's some great hardship. I don't know, but a Tuesday off can be just as glorious as a Sunday, as long as you have some decent weather and a few relaxing things to do.

Anyway, this weekend I am going away to Chicago for a little reunion among my friends. I'm real excited about it. I haven't seen most of these girls in months, and it's especially sweet to see them all together. We had planned to eat at the legendary Joy Yees in Chinatown but Allan informed us that they are apparently closed down because of so-called "rodents and pestilence." Serious, rodents and pestilence aside, that place is amazing, and forgive me for saying this, but some of the best food comes from some of the er, less clean places of the world, so I don't know what the big deal is.

To totally change the subject, does anyone know if 10-foot sunflowers are normal? I planted these sunflower seeds around the edge of my little backyard vegetable garden, thinking that they would make a nice border. I swear the package said they would be six feet tall. And they are really like ten feet tall. The flowers are almost ready to rest on top of my garage. Seriously, they are really big. The stem of one of them is almost like a small tree. I think, when they die, I can use the stalks for fire wood, it's crazy.

Well, with that, I think I'll be off to get ready for my Chicago weekend, see you all soon.

from my college town

2005-07-20T20:12:00.000-05:00

You are graced tonight with a rare on-location blog straight from beautiful, magical Madison, Wisconsin. I was going to write my whole entry here from the computers in the student union, but I am afraid it's all a little too distracting. Babies are crying, music is playing, beer, ice cream and popcorn are being consumed. More later.
=)

a world of stereotypes

2005-07-09T00:18:00.000-05:00

There was an interesting piece of news recently about a Mexican postage stamp portraying a popular black Mexican cartoon character famous in a series of comic books. According to my husband, who is Mexican, the character, named Mimin Pinguin, is totally innocuous, very family-oriented, perhaps a bit precocious, but in general portrayed in a very positive light in the books. In the last few weeks, however, black activists such as the Rev. Jesse Jackson have been in an "uproar," suggesting that the stamp is racist and stereotypical. The Mexican government has refused to apologize, stating that the American activists don't understand Mexican culture and are totally misunderstanding the character.

I thought this was interesting, because although the character is drawn in caricature, with large lips, a large head and a lanky body, this cannot be the basis for the offense, can it? I mean, how many times are white people caricatured with big noses? Can George W. be pissed off every time a newspaper cartoonists draws him with enormous ears?! I was thinking about whether my assessment was too shallow, and if there is somehow something more sinister about caricatures of people of color than of whites. I don't know.

As a middle class child of the '80s, I was taught to treat everyone equally, but at the same time, my parents and other adults I knew growing up defined the differences between people indirectly by their comments and actions. My parents are by no means racist, but their lives are obviously much closer to the Civil Rights movement, and they can remember something from before it. I grew up in the mostly white suburbs, but have since lived in the city and have always worked with a lot of diverse people. I know I am by no means a perfectly accepting person, but I think my work experience starting in my teen years made me less quick to stereotype than perhaps my parents, who grew up in a very different Milwaukee than we live in today. This is all to say, I strive to treat people equally, although I know I don't always. I know that my gut reactions sometimes betray my good intentions, leave it at that.

I have a bit of international experience and try to keep informed about the world. In my exploration of China and indirect knowledge of Mexico, I have realized how unique the "melting pot" nature of our society is. Certainly there are similar situations in Canada and many areas of Europe, but within the U.S. literally live individuals from all over the world. There are communities all over the country of Mexicans, Chinese, Koreans, Somalians, Germans. That list doesn't even do justice to the diversity of our culture. There is no escaping colliding, co-existing cultures in any urban area today. Increasingly, there are immigrant workers in smaller and smaller towns, even rural areas of our country.

Today, my husband and I were watching a bit of Gone with the Wind on TV, and he commented that the "Mamie" character was similar to the mother of Mimin Pinguin. This took me back a bit. "Mamie" is certainly a noble, good-hearted character in the story, but also the quintessential example of the subservient, master-adoring slave, clearly disdained in one respect by most African-Americans. But as I tried to think about it from the Mexican perspective, the character became totally different. In a society where women still typically take care of the children and household, and where mothers are universally adored, "Mamie" is not a negative character at all. And Memin Pinguin is simply, like all boys, a mischevious, spirited child goofing around with his friends.

So I started to think about how the U.S. is condemning this postage stamp because "a stereotype is a stereotype" and all that jazz. And I started to think, what right do we have to do that? We are increasingly a nation of free-thinking, individualistic, excessively greedy (and overweight) people. We may like our lifestyle, but it certainly has its ups, downs and health risks. A nation like Mexico has never had a Civil Rights movement, and likely never will, because it is basically a homogeneous society of mixed Spanish and Native Indian descent. Perhaps they could come up with a more realistic drawing of Memin Pinguin, but then perhaps we should do away with Speedy Gonzalez, that old Mariachi-singing mouse with the huge sombrero. The double standard is so absurd. My husband and several of the liberal Mexicans whose comments I read online agree that the Mimin Pinguin character has helped Mexicans become less racist, as they are so extremely unlikely to ever meet an actual black person in their life. The fact that the character seems just like any regular Mexican kid with a mother similar to any Mexican mother, puts this particular "stereotype" in a new light.

under construction

2005-07-07T21:19:00.000-05:00

My good friend Adrianne left me with a great phrase that perfectly summarizes this array of thoughts and ideas floating around my blog the past few days and I have therefore used it as my title. If you haven't been here, please read the "manifesto" post below and all the comments that followed it. It's good stuff.

I'm not sure where to begin today. I guess the fact that my friends have responded to my doubting in the sincere, non-judgmental, refreshing way that they have means something is happening in the church. In a way, we are all in the same place: wondering what it all means, but handling it in different ways. Adrianne works for a church, Mary has gone through a tough stretch but of late has felt all the love of God streaming through her life. I have stopped going to church. I see God’s presence around me in my garden, in the sky, in people, but I am yet unable to re-join the world of Christianity. Two years ago I was terrified of what everyone would think of some things I had done with my life, ie. deciding not to go into ministry and getting married. I don't really hide anything anymore. I am a much more honest person. I can't say I have much of a relationship with God right now, but I don't doubt His existence. I just don’t know how to relate to Him honestly anymore, with so many big, fundamental questions.

I think I am my own harshest critic. Part of my inability to be around a church or read the Bible or pray anymore has to do with my own judging of myself. If I lived on and off for years acting (to a degree) like the world's best Christian without being totally honest with myself, what does that mean for other Christians? What does that mean about God that He let me (or led me) across the world to be a witness to people for things I didn't necessarily believe? Not that my time overseas was wasted or in vain, because I wouldn’t trade those precious times for anything. I learned so much about the world, about people, about myself even. I loved and laughed and had great fellowship with my teammates.

I am just so stuck now on what is true. Maybe my problem is that I feel like I need some truth in order move on, in order to know what's right and do it. Isn't that what the Bible says? The truth will set you free. Everything I have learned taught me that Jesus is Lord and Lord of the whole world. Is that true? Is everyone that doesn't know about Jesus in this world going to hell? (Sorry to be frank, but what's the point in glossing). Maybe there is no answer to these questions without becoming a fundamentalist, which is rather unsavory and revolting to my spirit, but I just don't get how to live in that mysterious gray area.

I don’t have too much time for elaboration tonight, but as usual, I love the discussion, so please comment.

a manifesto from my soul right now

2005-06-29T12:24:00.000-05:00

Sometimes I sit down here with a little time on my hands, knowing I have to update my blog or likely lose the last of my readers, and I haven't even decided what to write. Last weekend I went to Chicago to see Mary, check out [in progress] down a bit and to the left of your screen. It was a great weekend, my first days off from Qdoba in two weeks, a little time away, relaxing, enjoying things.

On Saturday we spent some time at Chicago's indoor garden conservatories at Garfield and Lincoln Park. It's so relaxing, calming, refreshing to walk about God's amazing creations without all the confusion that humanity has thrown into the mix. Just seeing the diversity of the flora, the colors, shapes and detail. It's clear that the creator is showing us something in all this.

That's really about where my faith is these days. If I sit down to read the Bible, I get through about five verses before I get an almost gagging, suffocating feeling. When I read something "Christian" in nature, even if it's sincere and insightful, I start thinking about how much rhetoric is out there being spewed based on ignorance, hatred and worse, pure capitalism. I can't separate my intense confusion from my remaining detached relationship with God. I can't pray without my thoughts turning to all the carnage in Iraq or the "lostness" of the billion people in China or India.

If Jesus really is the "One" for all of them, then what about the huge majority who have never had an encounter with Him, who have never even seen a church, couldn't read the Bible if they had one, and have never known a Christian in their lives? I know I am supposed to believe that they will all have an opportunity to hear about Jesus, but I have been to these places, and that is about as realistic as shit actually hitting a fan.

Seriously, when I did missions work for a few years during college, I really tried to believe that what I did made a difference. And maybe I helped a few people here and there become more spiritual, more enlightened people, but what about the billion that don't know. During my time in India, China, Thailand, I tried to convince myself that all these people would know about Jesus through some means in their lifetime, but you know what, I never really could get that. It's not possible given the current state of the world. First of all, they have their own religions, which for the most part, they are quite happy with. And second of all, there is not even close to enough Christians in these places to actually convert people to Jesus, assuming they wanted to convert. But considering the opinion toward the West in most of the East, I seriously doubt how many would be interested in converting.

This is all, of course, very faithless thinking, but God for whatever reason, made me rather rational. My soul doesn't mesh well with stuff that makes no sense whatsoever. I can believe in miracles. I can accept all the crazy stories of the Bible, Noah, Moses etc, but I see the world around me today, and I don't see God intervening to "save" people. So do they need to be "saved" in that redemption Jesus-saved-me sort of way? I don't know. I really don't know. And if you aren't sure about something, you certainly shouldn't attempting to preach it and follow it.

And if God can create orchids, mangoes and 150-foot palm trees, he certainly doesn't need me to help him figure out humanity. I don't know why I think like this. Certainly millions of people are perfectly happy being Christians, but I don't know how to do it anymore, I just don't know how.

So much for a quick blog entry. Please comment.

stems leaves and flowers

2005-06-12T22:44:00.000-05:00

I know it's getting old to say this, but my job really is crazy. I've been working a lot and although things in the restaurant are better, there is still a lot to do, and we are stuck working a lot of hours until our shift supervisors are properly trained. This is indeed the challenge of my working life so far, and I'm trying hard not to burn out.

I did get off early today and had some daylight hours {after the sweltering heat toned down a bit) to do a little work in the garden. Something about seeing tiny seeds tossed into the ground turn into cilantro or golf-ball sized bulbs planted six months ago sprout huge purple flowers, it's a reminder for me that life goes on. I don't think I'm so self-absorbed to not actually realize that, but in some ways I am so caught up in my job lately that I hardly realize that time is passing, the world is turning, and it's going to be alright. Whatever happens. A few hours in my garden and things seem right and level and even again.

In one way my job is stressful right now because for the first time I really am majorly responsible for something. Ultimately, if something goes wrong in my store, I take the blame. Of course I have superiors and people that work for me, but in one sense it comes down to me. My training of others, my supervision, my attitude, my example for my staff to lead. I suppose that's why the sight of something that I started, but then the soil fed, the sun enriched, the rain watered, gives me a new burst of energy. All that's left is to pull the weeds, add some fertilizer, and anticipate the results.

my day, and a confession

2005-05-30T22:47:00.000-05:00

Good things about today:

1. It's my last day of work until Friday because I have a (work) conference the next three days. This may sound like breaking from work for work, but being out of the actual restaurant for a few days hanging out at a posh golf resort will be nice.
2. One of the people who lives in my house just handed me a strawberry custard shake on his way in from work. I think the shakes are common occurences, it's just that I haven't gotten one in a while.
3. I saw a very good movie tonight, the Aviator, while eating a great curry that my husband cook and having a nice glass of Riesling.

Confession: I am about to end my entry so that I can watch my guilty pleasure - La Madrastra. Yes, I am watching a Spanish-language Mexican novela, aka, soap opera. I feel like when I confess my novela-watching hour that I need to back it up with, I am an NPR addict all day. Just a novela-watcher at night. You see, my husband is Mexican, and although I speak a lot of Spanish at work I still have a lot to learn. I figured I could learn something about both the culture and language from purposefully watching a little Spanish TV.

Novelas are a major staple of Latin American television and people in my house are always watching them. I figured a few months ago that if I followed one, I would be able to understand enough over time to get into it and in turn, enhance my language skills. Well, it worked, but it also got me hooked on the story of Maria, estranged from her children after serving 20 years in prison for a murder she didn't commit, trying to re-enter their lives as their stepmother after being released. It sounds crazy, but it's really quite gripping. And unlike American soap operas, which take years for anything to happen, things actually happen almost every day on La Madrastra, because it runs for a few months, and then it ends. So that also means that I am not hooked for life, just a few months. See see, it's okay.

I'm going to miss the show for the next two days while I'm in Lake Geneva.. I guess I'll have to ask Fermin to let me know what happens.

spring maybe

2005-05-16T22:11:00.000-05:00

It seems like just days ago my Mexican sister-in-law was commenting how back home everything would be so green by now, and it was still so grey and brown around here. No leaves on the trees - just a hint of buds - nothing but a few early daffodils blooming. But today, it was radiant outdoors. Perfumes of flowering trees are wafting in the streets, pinks and yellows and reds speckling lawns and porches, and the trees have beautiful new green leaves. It's so sudden. Spring strikes, and it's great. I never appreciated spring like I do this year, aching to get out into my baby garden and patting myself on the back for at least a few successful tulips. In the whirlwind of hours, activity and labor that is my job right now, it's great to have the green beauty of spring and the solace of home to look forward to at the end of the day, whenever that might be.

rollercoasting

2005-05-11T22:27:00.000-05:00

This has been a crazy as heck week. I've learned a lot in a short time. I've been put in situations outside my comfort zone and forced to confront my hesitations and fears about confrontation. I've had to hire and fire a few people in my second language.

Tomorrow I have to confront someone about some very minor but nonetheless blatant theft that we proved with our security cameras. I can't fire her because of a technicality, so I am forced to allow someone I no longer trust to work in my restaurant.

Next week I should get my own business cards. I'm pretty excited about them, I can't deny it.

My new boss is awesome. Finally, a woman for a boss! It's so different than having a man for a boss. She actually considers the feelings of people to a certain degree when making decisions and speaking. Plus, she's just really good, really dedicated, and really helpful. I like her a lot.

I've made a new friend in my assistant manager, who I barely knew before I transferred here. He's actually way more qualified for the job than I am, as he's been around for several years, and is a really good manager, but he didn't want the job. I figure some people might be competitive in this situation, but because we've been honest about our situations, we can basically make fun of ourselves and attempt to make light of the situation. Our laughter is basically the only link left to our sanity in this place.

You might say my restaurant is teething. It's alive but persists in a very uncomfortable state. I am struggling to train and manage my staff and still maintain the numbers that are expected of me. There is a lot to do and many days I spend 12 hours there and feel like I have barely scratched the surface of making sure it runs right.

Well, those are just some facts from my life in the past week. I feel void of insightful thoughts tonight, but I had to write.

2005-05-02T21:56:00.000-05:00

My first day as a General Manager in a store that really just needs a lot of leadership. I've just worked a 14 hour day after working a 13 hour day, so I am tired. But other than the exhaustion and dull headache, I feel good, accomplished. I think we made progress even in one day.

Sunday evening was my last shift at the store where I was previously. It was sad turning off that open sign the last time, watching my employees effortlessly and thoughtlessly do their jobs with little motivation or direction needed. We played loud Juanes pop in the lobby after close as I finished my paperwork and they finished their cleaning. It's great to be comfortable.

When my new store opened today I felt like I hadn't had a second to even think about the day. Our time was spent in the morning searching for missing invoices, correcting a very messed up inventory and sifting through seriously piles and piles of crap that the former GM somehow managed to work in. Someone made a joke that we are going to start building little forts out of all the extra paper and plastic stuff cluttering the restaurant. Lunch went pretty well considering. Customers seemed happy although just a few days prior at the same store the cooks ran out of cooked chicken, steak, sirloin and rice - which basically eliminates 80% of our menu potential.

I've got work to do, but it's good. My assistant is awesome and I've got a few diamonds in the rough as far as staff goes. Hopefully I won't have to work 5 hours late tomorrow.

Time. for.. sleep...

it all turns out...

2005-04-29T00:09:00.000-05:00

I've had an interesting two days. I usually don't use my blog for personal life updates but in this instance I felt I needed to process. You see, yesterday I got a promotion at work. I had been expecting it for a little while, but with restaurants, you don't usually get a lot of notice when you are moving. You hear rumors, you ask questions, you get some veiled answers, then one day your boss comes with a cake to tell you that in four days you will be running a different restaurant.

It's funny, I came to the company I currently work for about 7 months ago. I was frustrated with my other job. They gave me a good offer and it was a good fit. I've been an assistant manager of restaurants now for about two years, and in the last few months I have wondered if my new employer was still serious about promoting me.

Well, they were, but I had my doubts for a while. About a month ago the general manager of a coffee shop that adjoins my location asked me why I didn't have my own store yet. I expressed my minor frustration that they seemed to be dragging their feet with me but I didn't know; maybe they just didn't have a good place for me yet, or maybe what seems like a very male-driven company really doesn't take me that seriously. I really didn't know what to think. So as I chatted with the coffee shop GM he said I should apply with them. I was interested. So, what the heck, I wrote up a cover letter, polished my resume, and sent it in. I waited several weeks for the coffee company to call me for an interview. And they finally did, as the GM next store assured me they were going to.

Well, they called last night, right after the conversation where my regional told me I was getting my own store this Monday. How ironic is life. Actually, it's good this way. The past few weeks I have really felt ready, for the first time, to run a restaurant. To lead it how I want, and be accountable for what happens. I am excited. It's going to be a big challenge, from what I hear.

I'm heading to a very new but already opened store that's had a rough first few weeks. I'm expected to go in, take charge, basically turn over the bad staff members and get my own stronger staff together, and increase their sales. Whew. I was searching my soul for nerves as my regional manager told me all about the bad open they had, the staffing problems, the dirtiness, etc etc and amazingly, I didn't find any. I'm not nervous. I think even a few weeks ago I would have been.

In one way, I'm sad. I am leaving a great staff, an awesome GM who has really allowed me to grow, and a place where I am very comfortable. My "new" job, at least for a while, will be very uncomfortable. I will need to work a lot of hours, fire some people, have some difficult conversations. But this is growing up, having responsibility, living life. And I think I am ready for it. Wish me luck.

lost in translation

2005-04-25T20:55:00.000-05:00

I was paging through a new book I saw at Border's today. It's called Translation Nation and although I didn't read that much of it, it's generally about the rise of Latin American influence in our culture. The author begins the book describing his childhood, growing up with recent Guatemalan immigrant parents in L.A., over the years watching the city become one of the world's largest Latin American cities. This is a place where the most common name for newborns last year was Jose. Our country is changing, fast.

I am at a unique vantage point for this cultural shift. My husband is from Mexico, I live in a neighborhood of Milwaukee that has, over the past 20 years, become a settlement for Mexican and other Latin American immigrants, and these days, managing restaurants generally means employing a lot of Hispanics. Several of my husband's relatives live with us, meaning I am the only white, native English speaker at home.

So, I was thinking today, as I was skimming through this book, how ironic that I live in my hometown, in the United States, in my own culture, with my own language, though on some days I speak more Spanish than English. It wasn't really an option for my husband and I to settle down in Mexico at this time in our lives, but of course one would expect that living here would be somewhat of a compromise for him; he's the one sacrificing his homeland, most of his family, his culture, etc. But strangely, I think we are pretty even on this one. He can head east a few blocks for Mexican groceries, restaurants galore, a community within a community, with a shared language and culture. Of course, I can head a few miles out of my neighborhood or almost anywhere west of where I live to be in a world of mostly English-speaking caucasians.

I look forward to more cultural immersion in my own city as the years pass. I see more and more change in the world all around me, and I hope that I will have the chance to chronicle it as it happens.

what do you speak?

2005-04-19T17:50:00.000-05:00

I found this on Melissa's blog today. Take a look, it's kind of interesting.

What Kind of American English Do You Speak?

Your Linguistic Profile:

65% General American English

20% Upper Midwestern

15% Yankee

0% Dixie

0% Midwestern

Now, since you followed the directions and took the quiz, all of you Milwaukee (hear: M'wawkee) readers will recognize one major flaw in this quiz. One word: bubbler. I can't believe I had to choose between the terms "water fountain" and "drinking fountain." We get no respect. =) Age-old questions. Can you tell it's my second day off from work in a row and I am a little bored?

movie recommendation

2005-04-14T22:51:00.000-05:00

I would highly recommend to anyone the movie Spanglish. I forgot to mention that before. It's hilarious to start and painful to end, but it's worth it. Fermin and I rarely fully agree on movies but we did on this one.

la primavera

2005-04-14T22:12:00.000-05:00

Honestly, where did we start using the word "spring" for this beautiful season? Primavera is a lot better. And I bet the word in Italian is also a lot better. I am pretty sure the Chinese word, although it wouldnt' really sound as nice to our English-speaking ear, is much better in it's own cultural context. Spring to me is a piece of metal shaped like a coil, or something to do with a trampoline, but it just doesn't evoke feelings of peace and life and beauty, like it's meaning.

The weather has been getting sufficiently warm some days to do some early tanning, my favorite spring pastime. This is the time of year that I miss being a student most. I can't tell you how many afternoons I spent at Library Mall or on Bascom Hill just relaxing and enjoying a book or a nap in the warm, sunny, but not yet humid air. Some of those days I skipped class, just to keep my sanity and feel alive and healthy in a world of textbooks, lecture, exams. I don't regret that at all.

Now, in a new stage of life, with house, husband and full-time job I am much more restricted in my free time. I have been itching for one of my days off to fall on one of these fantastic spring days and today was my lucky day. But instead of just laying out with my sunglasses and book I pulled weeds, threw down some grass seed and made my first attempt at planting herbs from seed. I really honestly don't know what I am doing with the gardening, but I am learning and I hope that in ten years I will be at least passable at having a garden.

I would have to say I really enjoy this busier yet more responsible life I now live. Hanging out outside for the sake of doing it is great, but gardening or cleaning up the yard or working around the house gives me a sense of accomplishment and satisfaction. Then it's time to have a beer, perhaps watch a movie, or read a book. Life is good.

my dad's old trek in the city

2005-04-11T22:33:00.000-05:00

I went on a bike ride tonight, which I really haven’t done in forever. I think the last time I went biking was the spring of 2002 when I was in China for a few weeks. Beijing was the first city I really got to know. I loved the smells, dirty and savory, the reality of being on the streets with millions of other people, riding here and there.

Biking is so much better than driving, you’re out there in the air, you feel a little vulnerable, a little dangerous, like a stupid driver could hit you with their Cadillac any minute, but you are going to dodge death and make it to the public library in one piece. I don’t know, but it just does something for me. I rode today on streets I frequent in the car, and the view is so different from the bike. There’s this bridge raised about three stories up above some train tracks where I could see a bungalow neighborhood, a county park, the local energy company, some distant defunct factories, the north-side radio towers at least 10 miles away, all tinted by a gorgeous sunset.

I would never notice all this in the car where we are always going somewhere quick, insulated and safe. here's nNothing like a bicycle in the city. I suppose this is a big reason why my dad spent several years biking 10 miles to work, from the burbs, through the city and all the way to his office on the north-side. He did it for exercise, but I am sure he loved the exhileration of being one with the bike and the road and society.

On my way home I rode some side streets passing the unbeknownst to me Working-Class Heroes bar, just a few blocks from my house, adjacent to a Big Bird yellow house with Cookie Monster blue trim. Something about this house really reminded me of Sesame Street. I'd never really noticed this block before. My trip to the library had been fruitful, resulting in the new John Grisham novel, which I will likely devour in a day or two, but the way there and back reminded me why I enjoy the city, why I loved Beijing. I think I’ll start making this a regular event.

death in the family

2005-04-08T00:09:00.000-05:00

Death. It's a painful word to say. It's hard to think about. My good friend Jenny is dealing with it in a very real way right now and I feel her and her great family deserve much more than my scrambled thoughts can amount to. When I arrived at Jenny's father's funeral tonight I was a little anxious. I hadn't talked with her, didn't know if my clothes were right, what I would say, what the mood would be. I couldn't remember anything about the last funeral I had been at, many years ago.

I was surprised to walk into a room buzzing with calm chatter, a community of sorts, familiar faces chatting about life and college. Easels with photo collages created a half circle around the room, the open coffin on one end, 52 years of photos and memories scattered around the various coffee tables. Gary Janscha did not live long enough, but I don't think anyone would argue that he could have lived those years fuller than he did. He was dangerously energetic well into his battle with cancer and I can hardly name a couple whose affection for one another was more obvious to me growing up than the Janscha's.

My closest friends were there and I could not think of an event when these particular people would gather again, save Jenny getting married, that would draw this particular group, my group, our group. We caught up, some world-mixing occurred and some long-forgotten high-school acquaintances were re-established. I was amazed to see Jenny able to socialize, laugh, chat in this way. She loved her father as much as any daughter does and clearly there was nothing surprising about his death, but who knows how to handle losing such a close loved one? My thoughts and prayers, whatever they amount to, are all with Jenny and her family this week, that pain would turn slowly into peace and memories into stories that allow Gary to live on in the hearts and minds of his children and grandchildren.

mr. sunshine

2005-04-06T23:04:00.000-05:00

I just finished Blue Like Jazz (see links), round one. I read a lot and my husband frequently asks me how I can remember everything I read. I can't of course, but I'm mastering the art of taking away what's most important while still appreciating the pleasure of the little details during the read. Halfway through Blue Like Jazz I decided that as soon as I finished it I would read it again, because it was that good and I wanted to remember more.

Anyway, the last chapter of the book relates a story about a friend of the author who had the opportunity to ask questions of a well-known Evangelical Christian leader, who happens to be the founder of the organization I was very involved with in college. The story goes that the friend asked "mr. sunshine" (some of you will appreciate this code name)"what does Jesus mean to you?" Mr. Sunshine couldn't answer the question because he was overwhelmed with emotion and tears. The author goes on to comment that this sort of love for Jesus is something he aspires to.

The reason I write about this is that I am seriously questioning what I really believe about God, religion, Christ and Christianity after years of being a very serious, committed evangelical. I have a ton of intellectual questions about the Bible and even more problems with the religion. I really don't relate with most American Christians anymore. I have some awesome, amazing friends, but the whole Christian culture with it's own vocabulary, clothes and behavior is a huge stumbling block for me. I am totally embarrassed by what people pass off as real Christianity, which is basically a marketing tool for conservatives to make even more money.

Of course this is clearly not what Christ stands for if you read his words, but this is what we are showing to our culture that we are. Now I've become this sort of angry, cynical, liberal Christian. I've turned into my best friend Sara's father a while back when he used to argue with me in their kitchen about the merits of the Democratic Party. Back to Mr. Sunshine, I have grown to see his organization as sort of the epitome of what is wrong with the Christian culture. Don't get me wrong, there are amazing people in this organization and they have done great things in the world, but there is this American-dream, success-driven and results-oriented approach encouraged that I now find repulsive. There are discussions of the "corporate culture" of the organization and strategies to "weed out" those uninterested acquaintances because they are unlikely to become converts.

But Mr. Sunshine, the founder of all this work, is a person who weeps at the thought of Jesus. I realize I have no right to judge his organization any more than I have the right to judge anyone, but something in me is just constantly seeking what's right and can't seem to accept the gray. My innate tendency for righteousness, liberal or conservative, keeps me from accepting the diverse ideas, beliefs, cultures and personalities of others. I can only hope to someday reconcile what's going on in my heart and life and soul so that I can also weep peacefully at the reality of life, reality, God, humanity.

Conversation

2005-03-31T22:27:00.000-06:00

I admit it, I love going to restaurants alone from time to time. It's nice to sit, eat in peace, perhaps read or journal, and most importantly, eavesdrop on a few conversations. Today I ate Thai surrounded by tacky wooden buddhas, gold wall carvings and purple carpet. The busboy was Mexican and the rest of the staff seemed Thai. Sipping herbal tea and eating spicy food with chopsticks makes me all nostalgic for Asia. Nostalcia inspires me to write, as does envisioning the possibilities of the future. I hope the more life experience I garner to be nostalgic about, the more prolific my writing will become.

On another note, seated near me this afternoon were a middle-aged couple, seemingly business associates. They were chatting for most of the hour and a half I was there, or I should say, he was chatting. This man honestly talked non-stop about immigrant labor issues for a good hour. I hope the woman found it interesting, because otherwise she was in some major agony. I couldn't see her face so I couldn't really tell. Poor lady. I'm thankful to not be acquainted with anyone who talks that much. I used to work with someone who talked about mundane aspects of his personal life incessantly. Some days, at work, when it was just him and me and there wasn't much to do, I wondered if job abandonment might be a better option than passing time listening to this guy.

I suppose I should be a better listener, but some people just try my patience. I don't have a lot of patience though, so maybe I had better just work on myself.

cafe time

2005-03-22T22:56:00.000-06:00

Today I decided to check out this nearby cafe I had heard about. The owner is the mother of a great new employee at the restaurant I manage. This girl, Emma, totally reminds me of this awesome friend of mine my last few years of college - Danielle - and when she told me she had helped her mom set up and open a restaurant a few years ago, I was intrigued. Then I looked up the place online and found it was a well-reviewed lunch spot right near the headquarters of Miller and a big Harley-Davidson plant.

I headed out to Highland Park Pies and Cafe and was greeted by the very friendly Maureen, who I soon found out was Emma's mom. She was very outgoing and encouraged me to check out the restaurant, which she just referred to as "the house," and indeed it was. Actually it's a very unique place for Milwaukee--an old bungalow restored with ecletic decor featuring some fabulous local photography. The place had the buzz of a good community spot and Maureen frequently walked around to chat with customers. She's the type of person who calls everyone "honey" in a really sweet way and clearly knows the faces, if not names, of most of her customers. I was impressed.

But enough of the restaurant review. Maureen came over to ask how everything was we started talking about how she had opened up the cafe and how risky and exciting and worthwhile it is to start your own business, or do whatever you really want to do. It was funny because lately I have been thinking more than normal about really doing something I will love in my life. I like what I do but I would love to open my own business, be my own boss, start something where I can set the standards and expectations. I would love to have a place that brings a neighborhood together like Maureen's. There are other things I can see mysef doing too, but I have no patience for planning. I suck at saving money and without something to invest, I can't think about leaving my little corporate world.

I need to learn to live better today in order to prepare for tomorrow.

2005-03-22T22:40:00.000-06:00

nice wallpaper

see above

2005-03-22T21:53:00.000-06:00

This is probably the most amusing picture taken at my wedding reception in February. Don't you love the decor behind us? And my freaky muscles? And Jenny's expression?

life or something like it

2005-03-21T23:20:00.000-06:00

I haven’t felt very inspired lately. I’ve been reading and painting (walls) and working and sleeping and eating and not feeling all that motivated to write. My boss was fired the other day, which confirmed that my new company is almost as crazy as the last place I worked for. Restaurants are, by definition, unstable, but I have seen some crazy stuff in just six months with my current employer. I guess I’m quickly becoming disillusioned with corporations. I like my job because of the people and I enjoy business but there is something really shady about a few executives making hundreds of thousands or millions a year on restaurants while paying all the people who actually do the work in the restaurants as close to minimum wage as they possibly can. Then there are us managers. They pay us as little as possible too and when they don’t want to pay us our proper bonuses they just indiscriminately raise the sales goals or begin failing us on our audits for things they have never mentioned before. It’s all great.

Well, I’m pretty cynical lately, which has lead to me thinking, again, about what to do with my life. I will probably do many things in my life, but here are a few things I would like to do:
1 – be a travel agent – free trips, helping people plan vacations, organization!
2 – be a writer – we’ve been over this one before – I would like to write non-fiction stories about things going on around the world, perhaps a memoir and then, maybe fiction
3 – run my own restaurant – this would definitely be ethnic food, perhaps Mexican or Chinese and it would definitely be both healthy and really good – I would also have the best staff and everyone would love working for me =)
4 – work in retail – I think this is a great job to have when you are furnishing a house – discounts – also, it’s like restaurants without the food aspect
5 – be an immigration lawyer – help lots of people that don’t have the resources or knowledge to deal with their situations here

Those are just a few of the more recent ones. Who knows what will really happen?

compromise, the corporate world and fox news

2005-03-17T17:48:00.000-06:00

The email was among several that arrived Tuesday morning. After I checked my financials and recounted my inventory I went back and read it. It explained that our regional Qdoba company has a great opportunity for some free exposure on a local morning news program. Friday morning, live on Milwaukee's Fox 6 Channel we get to promote our catering program as well as our new Waukesha location. Laura (surprise!) and Greg, you will have the chance to promote your stores and our company.

I laughed and read on to see if there was a question here or if I had been unwittingly volunteered to do this without consent. It was, indeed, this way. It was implied that if for some reason I couldn't go on Friday then Roxy - the other manager at my store - could do it. Clearly unless I was out of town or had some serious stage fright I would have to do this.

Several people said it sounded like fun. Well, fun isn't exactly how I would describe it. This is, indeed a small task, but for several reasons it was ironic that I was asked to go on TV to promote Qdoba Friday morning.

1) I have opened the past 8 days in a row without time off; Friday was my day to sleep in; unfortunately I have to get up at 5 am tomorrow to get to the store, get the food prepped for the show, and then go to the tv station.

2) I hate local television news. Really, I think it's pathetic and in college I learned all sorts of reasons why that was statistically true - like people who watch only television news actually know less about the world than people who don't watch any news at all. How is that possible. It's all soundbytes and cheesy human interest stories and excuses to frighten the American public into irresponsible consumer consumption.

3) I hate FOX news. I mean, local Fox news is not as evil as, say, the Fox news network, but they are still related.

Seriously, how can I go on a Fox News show and promote Qdoba? I mean, what is Fox news doing letting people like us come on their news show and promote our product? That's now news! Well, the way I am going to do this is just to do it. Like I said, I didn't have a choice, my boss' boss volunteered me for this, and it would look bad if I didn't do it.

So, wish me luck early in the morning tomorrow.

dreaming and writing and dreaming of writing

2005-03-10T23:10:00.000-06:00

Some days, like my friend Mary, I imagine a world where either my husband starts making at least $60,000 a year, I win the lottery or else I just figure out a way to not have a job most of the time. If that were to happen I would spend my time writing. Maybe I could make money writing, although I'm sure thousands of people ponder that every day. But the step from working full-time and thinking of writing and actually quitting a job and doing it seems like leaping off the side of a building praying you grow wings before you crash to your death.

Sometimes when I lay in bed and can't fall asleep right away, or I have just fininshed a good novel and am thinking about how the author came up with the story, I imagine what my novel could be about. Sometimes in odd places I have moments of inspiration - some small tidbit of life that becomes poignant because of circumstance and setting. I imagine writing a version of my life or my husband's life into a short story or a novel. But then I think I haven't lived enough yet. But since it's a novel, it can continue any way I like. But then, it wouldn't be real, and creating stories that taste of reality seem to require a bit of life experience. If we got story ideas from tv and movies they would basically end perfectly, but I want to write about real life and real people's lives.

Last night I layed in bed brainstorming pieces of my novel and then prayed I would remember some of what I was thinking the next day to write it down. This evening, I did, and so I wrote them down. I have been thinking of taking a creative writing class and I think I really will do it. I certainly have time, it's just initiative to start up, get rolling. In the meantime, I keep dreaming.

insights on being "home"

2005-03-09T00:05:00.000-06:00

So, I'm living at "home" or "my parent's house" this week. It's wierd to not call it home although I don't really think of it as home in the usual sense now, it's like old home, childhood home, but those sound so wierd and formal. My parents are on vacation so my 13-year-old sister Kayla sort of needs someone to check in on her and make sure she doesn't stay up all night or get scared.

I have observed some amusing things in the last few days.. all random.

1) Light switches - in our back hall there are four light switches that form a square. Although I lived in this house all my life with these particular switches I have never remembered which one is for what - the garage light, the outside house light, the basement light and the hall light. Every time I come in the house and need one of these lights I spend a minute testing them. It's just too much for me. However, when I walk into my old bathroom I instinctly reach for the second switch knowing that it turns on the light. It doesn't even come near my conscious that the first switch is for the fan, my body just knows.

2) My sister is a funny kid. Today I brought home a pizza because she wanted it. But when it was ready she said she wasn't hungry. (She doesn't eat like a normal person to begin with but it was still odd that she hardly ate). Later I was in her room talking to her and realized on her cluttered desk that were not one, not two, not three, but SIX empty bags of cheesy goldfish laying on the desk (these had apparently accumulated for some time). There was also half a box of Lucky Charms, which after chiding her for her freaky eating habits, I took to the kitchen, remarking I was having them for breakfast tomorrow morning. Laughing out loud, she yelled that there were no more marshmallows. Sure enough, she had stripped an entire box of Lucky Charms of it's considerable wealth of colored marshmallows. I almost wanted to save that bag of tan unlucky charms to show her when she was 20. I say this laughing because I know I probably would have eaten like this if the parents had been as lenient with me as they are with Kayla when I was a kid. (Sorry guys, but I think it's true) I tend to either lean toward eating really healthy fresh foods and just craving junk food and garbage.

3) How is it that I grew up always having pets, usually a dog and a cat at all times and rarely ever felt any allergies to them at all, but now I am home for one night and I feel like I am getting sick? It's funny, when I moved out for college and then came back for summers and breaks the animals really bothered me. I would get a cold or just be sneezing a lot for days afterwards. It's funny how the body adjusts to something and then quickly loses its tolerance for it.

Just some mundane thoughts for you all. Have a good day.

The interview game

2005-03-03T20:56:00.000-06:00

I better get some comments on this one =) I know there are a few readers out there!

Here are the official rules of the interview game:

1. If you want to participate, leave a comment below saying "interview me."
2. I will respond by asking you five questions - each person's will be different.
3. You will update your journal/blog with the answers to the questions.
4. You will include this explanation and an offer to interview others in the same post.
5. When others comment asking to be interviewed, you will ask them five questions.
6. I will answer reasonable follow up questions if you leave a comment.

Here are my answers. Enjoy!

Questions from Mary-- http://missmaryb.blogspot.com

1) if you could only hold on to one photograph for the rest of your life, which one would it be and why?

This is definitely the hardest question. I LOVE photographs, taking them, looking at them, looking at other people's, etc. I guess the one that sticks out to me now is one Jenny J. took of Fermin and I when we were dating in our apartment. It's definitely the best picture around of us, we both look normal and even good. It evokes an odd turning point in our relationship. If I could pick a runner-up 7 photos, there would be one of Sara and I, one of Jenny and I, one of Mary, Erin and I, one of my family, one awesome Great Wall shot I have to remind me of China, a picture of these two adorable girls in my classroom in India, and a picture we took of Fermin's whole family in Mexico.

2) pick one year you'd like to live over again as is. which one is it and why would you choose it?

I suppose I would live my first year of college over again. I think if I had been a little more focused on the opportunities available to me in college as a fresman I would have done a lot of things differently. I really wish I would have done half the things I was interested in in Madison, taken more risks in meeting people, and not spent most of the year with just one guy. I might have held out to get a different job than I did, perhaps being a Capitol page or working on State Street. I might have read more, started writing at the Cardinal earlier, who knows? But then again, if I had made a lot of new friends my freshman year I might not have been looking for new relationships my sophomore year, so maybe it all worked out for the best. =)

3) better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all? why?

No question-yes yes yes. Love is a mechanism for change in a person's heart and soul. Of course I'm speaking from the perspective of having relatively recently fell in love, married, etc. But if I think about the future about the possibilty of losing that love through some tragedy or something, I could never want to take it back. I've learned so much. I think if you open your heart to a person you are never the same and would never want to be.

4) what's your favorite memory of living with me and erin in college?

I often think of those days the three were home at the same time and somehow ending up sitting in our tiny kitchen. One of us sitting on the counter, another perhaps stir-frying and other other having a rum and coke. =) I would undoubtedly be wearing my grey Tsinghua sweatshirt, perhaps Erin in the Hans-blue-hooded sweatshirt and Mary wearing something a little more presentable. We would just hang out, eat, talk, enjoy each other's company. It was comfortable and homey at those times.

5) what do you most look forward to sharing in your life with fermin?

I look forward to traveling together. That could be anything from going to Chicago for a day to perhaps visiting Texas or the Southwest to ideally heading to Asia someday. There is definitely some time in Mexico in our future. I love travel, and Fermin has such a different perspective on the world than I do because of his background; it's fascinating to see what he thinks of places, cultures, people. I think he gets an equal kick out of seeing how I see and experience the world.

closer I am to fine

2005-02-24T14:52:00.000-06:00

There is a line from a song that hits me every time I hear it. Since I have worked for three years in casual restaurants that play the same cursed Adult Alternative Muzak station, I have heard this song about a billion times. (I'm serious, a billion.) It's Indigo Girls "Closer to fine."

I used to think the point of this song was really immoral and sacreligious, the story of spending time in church and educational institutions trying to figure out the truth and live it to the fullest. But the more I live my life the way I do now, the more I think the opposite is true. It's important to me to be a productive person in society, family, work, relationships etc, but honestly, "the less I seek my source for some definitive, closer I am to fine." How that is, I don't know.

I used to be an exemplary Christian, dedicated and involved in the church, studying my Bible every day in my quiet time and seeking what God wanted for me with every step. I mean, I tried to do all those things as much as I could. I never felt that God really told me what I should be doing despite all my efforts and I grew upset and frustrated for it. I was taught that not doing all the things Christians do would lead to a lifestyle that would be unfulfilling, ultimately unhappy and discontented. I went next door and to the other side of the world thinking I could please God if I did what the church taught. Then I just let go of it all. I wouldn't say I "fell away" as I'm sure many people would describe me, but I let go.

When I let go and started living my life in a similar but less restricted way, things changed. I don't feel like I let God down or that I've lost His blessing. I feel as though I don't fit in in the church. Without digressing into a lot of theology, I'm just not quite convinced that everything is the way they say it is. I see lots of inconsistencies in people, the Bible and the church. If God is the God of the Bible than he's sometimes a little crazy. Modern Christians have created ways to talk our way out of so many criticisms of the Bible, of so many questions and doubts that are real. Does this mean I don't believe in God or don't consider myself a Christian? No, and yes and no. I know nothing else but Christianity. I'm not drawn to any other religion for many reasons. I'm also no longer part of the mainstream church. A few years ago I would have said to someone like me that sooner or later I will regret my "letting go," that I will "need" God in a more tangible way and that I am missing the true calling of my life. But if my spirit, soul and person feels more content than ever in life than why should I go on pretending that there is some huge piece missing?

Acquaintance

2005-02-24T14:34:00.000-06:00

I might have to write two entries today. I am afraid that no one will read my blog ever again if I don't update it more often and I have to send my new laptop in (again!) to be fixed so I might be offline for a while.

I had an odd social experience yesterday that happens on occasion. I live in the same city I grew up in, was educated in (until college), went to church in etc etc. I don't live in the same part of the city but for the past three years I have worked in that same suburban area. Occasionally I see someone that I knew from school or church from the past. We usually chat a bit, which is nice. I enjoy getting to see assorted acquaintances from my past. I used to work for Chin's Asia Fresh (http://www.chins.com) and now work for Qdoba Mexican Grill (http://www.qdoba.com) so when I see customers from Chin's in my Qdoba I often get to chat with them now too. "Oh, you're over here now, good change?" That's kind of nice too.

There is a part of my past however that I haven't quite figured out what to do with. There are many people who know me almost entirely through the church, as an upstanding moral Christian who's been on a lot of mission trips. I'm not ashamed or regretful about any of my life but I'm really different now. Of course my friends and close family members know the changes that I have gone through in the last few years in my worldview and outlook on life, but how do I react to someone who walks up to me in Qdoba and introduces me as though I'm some missionary on furlough to a real missionary on furlough?

"Hey Laura, this is my friend John, he's a missionary in Pakistan. Laura has spent a lot of time in China, she's so and so's friend or daughter." I smile and It's not as though I owe this random acquaintance an explanation, but I sometimes feel like I should stop the conversation and just catch them up on the inner workings of my mind. It makes me wonder what people who come out as gay or convert to a different religion or change careers midlife do with all their acquaintances from their "before" life. It makes me wonder how I classify people. If I treat them as a part of a certain group or as an individual with many facets and a complex personality. I wonder...

society, culture and behavior - some thoughts on social manipulation

2005-02-22T23:50:00.000-06:00

Well, it's been over a month, I doubt anyone looks at this site anymore, but I didn't have a computer for a long time. I'll try to woo my dwindling readership with something good. I don't know. =)

I have been at a few traditional and a few non-traditional weddings in my 20-something life. I have never been too bound by feelings of tradition in my way of doing things. I believe strongly in many traditional institutions like the church, marriage, the justice system, etc, but I don't buy into the idea that those things should be handled and executed the same way generation after generation if people's ideas, values and customs change.

I get a wierd look from some people when I tell them I got married in a courthouse on an otherwise regular day in May and had a reception 10 months later. I spent the rest of my "wedding day" in Chicago enjoying a nice dinner and shopping trip with my husband. We didn't feel that different than most other days leading up until that day. I didn't really tell anyone I was getting married until after the fact, although most were aware that I was goinng to get married.

Anyway, I may sound a little impulsive, a little odd, but this is what I wanted. What is amazing - and I am not excluding myself from the coming criticism - is why as people we are not only influenced by tradition and norms, but that we are so bound by it. How as a race, species, whatever, did we get so conservative? I don't mean politically. What I mean is that it seems everywhere I look in society I see people fearing change, disdaining the different and scoffing at individuality.

A lot of times this is very subtle. I see it even in myself. When someone tells me something unusual they do/did/will do I sometimes comment with a sound sort of like "oh." But, this kind of "oh" is really a not-so-smooth cover for a varying degree of disapproval. It's sort of got a high start and falling tone, that gently lets the other know that deep down I think it's wierd. I consider myself an open-minded, accepting and generally liberal person, so when I make comments like that I generally follow it up with, "not that I think there's anything wrong with that," or, "that's cool," but at times I am just trying to compensate for my disapproving half. I don't know why I do that. In fact, I'm amazed at the number of people who don't even try to cover their distaste for the lifestyles and choices of others.

I write this because I have recently pondered how much we feel we have the right to interfere in other people's lives. I am not trying to knock relationships or downplay the importance of advice and mutual support, but there is something so degrading about being condescended or judged, yet so many of us seem to do it every day. We try and talk people out of their passions, convictions or ideas so that they will be a little more like us. Perhaps we just want to be accepted for who we are and therefore try and shape others to be like ourselves. But didn't we all learn in kindergarten and Sunday school that everyone is different and this makes the world interesting? A mystery of life. Thoughts?

Birthday time

2005-01-13T13:13:00.000-06:00

It's been a while! I meant to write the other night but I have a new computer that isn't properly set up for service yet so every two minutes I get kicked off the internet. Any day now a cd will arrive to fix this problem, I hope. Well, Tuesday was my birthday. I've never been a huge birthday person, unlike my friend Mary at missmaryb.blogspot.com, who celebrated even her half-birthdays into college. Not to slam that, it's just different.

This year I moved some furniture and then went to work on my 26th birthday - which is a really useless birthday by the way, it's not a multiple of 5 and it's way beyond getting to do anything new like drink or go to casinos. I was blessed at my first job managing a restaurant out of college to have an awesome staff that often felt like a family. That family atmosphere was usually a huge blessing although there is also the drama and gossip of a family involved too. Anyway, that aspect of the job was great and when I left I wondered if that would ever be replicated somewhere else.

After a month of training for my new job I was placed at a restaurant that already had that sort of family atmosphere going and I happily fit right into the culture. I love where I work right now, most of the time, and I can't say enough for how fun it is to work with people who generally like their job and care about the people they work with. This is sort of a tangent out from my birthday but they bought me pizza and made a poster that wished me happy birthday which was really cute.

That night when I got home there was a Mexican-style birthday cake on the table at my house. Mexicans have a very interesting birthday tradition. I first learned about this about a year ago when my then-boyfriend and I went to a birthday party for one of his friends. When it was time for cake the birthday person stood in front of her cake looking around nervously (I wondered why). The onlookers sang a song and then started chanting "Mordita" over and over, which means "a little bite" or something to that effect. (I was confused). Then the birthday girl leaned over and took a little bite out of the edge of her cake, at which time two of the onlookers' arms appeared out of nowhere to quickly push her face into the cake. This is followed by pictures of the caked-face, laughing and of course, the caked-birthday person trying to quickly get the frosting out of their nostrils. It's actually a pretty amusing thing to watch.

Anyway, when I saw my cake the other day I immediately knew I was going to have to take a "mordita," being in foreign territory here. So, I made everyone stand as far away from me as possible, especially my husband, made my wish and bit my little cake. Unfortunately I was not nearly fast enough to avoid my husband reaching over the table and giving me just enough of a push to get frosting in my eyelashes and up my nose. (He said later he's had a lot of practice at stealth birthday-cake pushes). Well, that's life I guess. It was funny to become so involved in a tradition so foreign to me. Everyone treated me like one of them and like it was the most normal thing in the world for me to bite the cake. And, that was my birthday.

insensitive

2004-12-30T13:46:00.000-06:00

So, after I wrote that little post about the places I have been in Asia I felt like it probably seemed trivializing and rather flippant about disaster. I didn't mean to sound that way at all. Actually when I heard what happened and as the days have passed I have been partly in shock at the destruction that has been wrecked by the earth's whims and the weather. I painted my bathroom yesterday and listened to NPR the whole time, fascinated by the news and in sickened awe at what is happening on the other side of the world.

A few thoughts come to mind. It's very surreal to have memories of a place that no longer exists. One of my favorite times was hanging out on an island called Ko Phi Phi in south Thailand (off the city of Phuket's shores) in 2000 when I was on vacation from my year in China. About 8 of us hung out, laid on the beach, ate endless fruit smooties of the freshest pineapples and mangos imaginable and just enjoyed time together on a little island totally focused on tourism. The people were sweet and helpful and the tourists were mostly European. We stayed in quaint little huts with mattresses on the floor and hoards of mosquitos at certain hours of the day. It was one of the most beautiful places I have ever been. I snorkeled there for the first time, seeing amazing fish and getting stung by lots of little jellyfish. I remember a woman who had a little laundry service down the road from our cottage. I remember chatting with another woman who with a few computers and an erratic internet connection ran a business. I remember banana pancakes and coffee for breakfast watching BBC news before hitting the beach. I heard the name of that exact island today on the news - they said it was completely destroyed. I'm not sure how many hundreds of Thai people lived on that island, running little internet cafes, coffee shops, snorkeling trips, beachwear stalls and restaurants. They may be mostly dead now. How surreal, how terrible, how?

I haven't been able to find out if there was any damage in the little town of Sivikasi, India that I spent some time in last fall. I'm not sure exactly how far we were from the coast, but I think they are probably safe. The idea of that school and those kids being washed away in a flood is totally unimaginable, but I know it happened in countless other towns in numerous coasts around the world.

I think right now if I had the resources and less committments I would fly to India or Thailand or Indonesia and volunteer. I'm sure there are countless other Americans like me, who having been to these places, cannot imagine the thought of them wiped out. I always imagined going back to Ko Phi Phi sometime on a dream vacation. But there never seems to be a limit on the suffering and constant change that the world tosses at us. I just hope and pray that the world will come together to make some good out of this tragedy.

2004-12-28T22:40:00.000-06:00

Ahh.. my computer doesn't work. I've never had a computer "crash" before but it appears that my computer has crashed. No word yet on whether I will have the 4.5 years of data saved on there when it returns to life, but right now I can't get past booting up. I will not be able to write any meaningful thought-provoking blogs from the Qdoba office unfortunately, but don't stop checking back.. as soon as I can I will write again.

Before I go, I was thinking about a borderline morbid but interesting fact today, and I'm going to make it a little game.

Interesting morbid fact: I have been in two of the exact locations where the earthquake/tsunami crisis happened the other day.
Game: Do you know which ones precisely? (including city or state name) Comment to answer. First correct answer gets something special from me. =)

I guess this is my entry...

2004-12-19T23:15:00.000-06:00

11:30 pm Sunday night. (Many days since last entry. I feel like there may be new people visiting my blog. What will they think when there are no updates for a week. Shameful of me, but things are so busy. Must write now).

First, I can thank my father for definitely the best comment to ever grace my blog - it's also by far the longest - sort of like it's own entry. Hmm.. maybe a blog for Jack Bruss in the new year. Tales from a conservative suburban engineer. Hee hee. Just kidding dad. (See below following entry to read the comment).

Anyway, it's almost Christmas and it's freaking cold outside. I live with some people newly emmigrated from Mexico. A few weeks ago when we were riding the edge of freezing they began commenting that it's cold. I'm a realist, so I thought it best to warn them that this wasn't really that cold. Oh no, it's still coming I told them. Better to be prepared.

It's depressing to me all this cold weather. I like pretty snow, but the year I spent away from the upper Midwestern winter did not bother me one bit. I hate it being mid-December and having January, February and March to "look forward" too. After my birthday in early January it's just freezing February and March, which sounds a bit like a spring month, as does April, but us Wisconsinites know that those are really the worst manic months of winter. A deceptively warm 45-degree day followed by a -20 degree windchill killer.

Anyway, who writes about weather on a blog? Seriously, my brain is overworked from a beating of a weekend at work, a lot of running around finishing Christmas shopping as well as planning the late January wedding reception. =) All fine and good but taxing. I'm looking forward to the coming weekend off, eating and resting a lot, it's going to be good.

Feliz Navidad.

coming out of a closet

2004-12-09T21:42:00.000-06:00

When I first started this adventure a few months ago I basically only told my friends about my blog. I suppose because I have had friends traveling with me through different stages of my life I am closest and most vulnerable with them.

I have always had an average, at times rocky, at times peaceful, not especially intimate relationship with my family. I have always been a bit paranoid about appearing on top of everything, successful, poised and together in front of my family. Perhaps to evade questions, perhaps to keep a distance, perhaps because of some childhood desire to do everything perfectly.

I know I've taken a different route to do many things in my life and I'm not sure I really care about their opinion, but it's easier sometimes to not hear the opinion you fear. I know my opinions about many things contradict those of my parents and my family in general. I also feel that our life experiences are very different, and that the opinions of youth are generally discredited because they come from youth. As I have grown up I have sometimes been too outspoken and ended up hurt, so I sometimes try to lay low, stay quiet, even though I hate that feeling. I am not trying to say that I have felt especially put down or that somehow my life experiences have been more worthwhile or more alive and real than anyone else's, I am just fumbling towards my confused thoughts about family.

All this rambling to say that on some level I didn't tell my family about my blog because I wasn't quite sure if it would be acceptable to them. I wasn't sure how it was going to be, what I would write about, what sort of things I would share, if I would even keep it up. I know my family loves me and supports me, but keeping an online journal makes a person so vulnerable. Now that my little subconsciously kept secret is out in the open, I know I have to strive to write with the same honesty, clarity and reality.

You see, I'm starting to think of myself a little bit as a writer. At work I have become a person people frequently tell their live stories too and I imagine how I would frame them in an article. Whenever I am alone, driving usually or walking somewhere or watching people at a coffee shop or listening to NPR or music, I am thinking about things I could write about. I am thinking about stories of real people, things I might like to research, my own life or friend's lives, how to capture it with words for others to comprehend. And right now this blog is my outlet. I have no idea if my writing will ever be anything to anybody; for now it's just something for me, and I guess as many of my friends, family and acquaintances who can stand to read it.

home improvement

2004-12-03T09:44:00.000-06:00

I put up my first Christmas tree the other night, in my house that I sort of own (with my husband and the mortgage company of course), with my lights and garland and ornaments. I got to decorate it how I wanted and now we can enjoy it for 30 days or so to come. I really like my Christmas tree.. I really like the feeling of making something happen in my house.

The same night I decided to hang some decorations above the built-in wood China cabinets in this old house and noticed how dirty some of the woodwork and window area was above the cabinets. I got out my slick non-abrasive cleaner and started scrubbing away. As I was sitting up there on the buffet, alone in the house, listening to Harry Connick Jr. Christmas tunes, scrubbing away at perhaps decades of dirt, I thought, I might be the first person in a while to really love this house. These rooms have held countless people, I have no idea how many I just know that there have been at least two different owners in the last ten years or so, and before that, who knows. I don't think in the last ten years there has been much improvement. There has been maintenance, nothing is trashed or ruined, but I'm into improvement. I envision this a place for me and my family and my husband's family and eventually our children to enjoy because of its comfort, utility, and elegance. I put money into the house not because I think it's going to make me happy to spend money, but because as with my personal life or my marriage I believe in improvement.

I changed jobs not so long ago. At my previous job, I thought myself an old hand at everything. I had been around since that particular restaurant concept had opened and thought myself pretty all-around experienced and better than everyone else at most things. I wouldn't have said it like that, but that thought was lurking there just below the surface. Changing jobs and learning the ins and outs of a new one, whether it restaurant, office, whatever, makes you realize all the things you really aren't that good at, at least for me.

In a way I had been so confident with Chin's that I had left little room in my person for growth there. There is so much humility and discovery in learning a different place with different rules and policies and trying to figure how to be great here. The best part personally is to meet new people. I thought I would miss my employees at Chin's so badly, and I do miss them, but I get to interact with so many fascinating new people at Qdoba. I get to focus on running a good business with great leaders helping me become a great leader. This is improvement.

2004-11-23T20:22:00.000-06:00

Dreaming about the past...

dreaming...

2004-11-23T20:21:00.000-06:00

Last night I dreamt of China.. unfortunately I don't remember the dream in detail like I did when I first woke up, but as with many of my dreams, it seemed so real as it happened. It was like I was there again, I think with my friend Erin Rufledt, just like 2 and a half years ago. But this time it was like she was re-introducing me to life in China, she was showing me the new Beijing, how things had changed, etc. I was running through the streets, somehow arriving 10 miles across the city in two minutes of sprinting through the streets. I was looking for old friends in their homes and dorms around town, although in reality they have long vacated and been replaced by new families and students. I'm not sure what the point of this post or my dream was. I dream about China, India, Mexico fairly often. But China will always have a special place in my heart. My first foreign country, the start of something new and exciting and different in my life, the opening of my heart to so much variety, in people, food, customs, life. The picture above was from out my back porch when I lived in China. I always loved this picture, the mao-suited men playing cards in the courtyard, very everyday yet poignant look at Chinese life. The world is so amazing, for this holiday season, I wish that everyone would get a chance to glimpse life in a foreign land. Or, get a glimpse of those foreign lands right here in our backyards in America.

now hiring

2004-11-21T13:57:00.000-06:00

I live in a neighborhood drifting somewhere between post-industrial wasteland, quiet residential district and booming commercial center. It’s smack in the middle of what is now the metro-Milwaukee area, not downtown, not the suburbs, semi-South but not trendy Bayview or the gang-sprinkled “south side.” My house sits on the edge of rows of old bungalows butting up against mostly former factories, foundries and manufacturing plants. The demolition of some unused buildings has sparked growth of a new high-tech industrial park.

When I return from my semi-suburban restaurant out west to my home I exit I-94 to cruise along a main road—passing first Miller Park, then a brand new Starbucks, Boston Market and Chili’s. In view are several huge—probably 10-story—vacant factories surrounded by desolate many-acre lots. Go farther and turn east again and there sits another giant, the Froedert Malting Company. This building boasts a painted-on-brick logo that spans the building’s 8-story façade, “Froedert Malt: Better Beer Starts Here.” This building amuses me; I once tried to take a cool picture of it but couldn’t find a good safe position to fit the whole building in view without getting trees or cars in the way. These gigantic structures inexplicably draw out contemplative thoughts. I wonder what exactly was here 200 years ago. What will be here in ten, twenty years? People have worked, earned, toiled and lived part of their lives in these places and now they are empty steel and concrete cases waiting for demolition. One could make those same statements about any old building, house or otherwise, but because they are so giant and make for such unusual landscape, they evoke more profound thinking.

In my neighborhood I see the crossroads Milwaukee is at. Old manufacturing, Brew-town, baseball, steel-making making way for department stores and restaurants and hopefully new blue-collar jobs at the rising industrial park. I see a truly diverse and integrated neighborhood of whites, Asians, Hispanics and some African Americans. It’s a place that the newspaper does stories about, so much growth in an area that was once completely blighted by an excess of forgotten industry. Old houses being sold in days after entrance onto the market to young buyers, many minority.

A few weeks ago there was a shocking tragedy in the neighborhood. A former employee of a new Arby’s six blocks from my house shot and killed the 24-year-old assistant manager and a 17-year-old employee who were closing the store. He stole $2400 and used it to do repairs on his mid-90’s Buick before being turned in by what turned out to be an accomplice. There hadn’t been a murder in the Village of West Milwaukee for almost 5 years. The surrounding businesses were shocked and unnerved that this could happen, here. When it turned out that it was staged by a former employee there was some relief that it had not been random violence, but still.

A few weeks have passed but last night as I passed Arby’s I saw something that caused me to pause for a second and be amazed at the unintended boldness of pragmatism. Outside the Arby’s, on the sign, in black letters on a white lit background, were the words: “Now Hiring.”

merry christmas

2004-11-19T23:28:00.000-06:00

A few weeks ago it seemed that 2004's Christmas season had arrived. I went for my morning coffee at Caribou--which is conveniently adjoined by a short hallway to the Qdoba I manage--and found that the Christmas marketing machine had arrived. There was festive music, staff wearing reindeer antlers, a peppermint stick mocha on the menu and customers picking up cans of "special edition" hot cocoa for gifts.

Remember now, we are talking about November 1st here.

I observed as the general manager, a jolly fellow himself, smoothly sold one woman another can of cocoa because "they are such good gifts and I just know we are going to run out and not get any more in." Again, this was the first day these items had been in the store. Amazing.

Anyway, I comment on the Christmas season because this year it evokes both revulsion and delight in my spirit. Revulsion because I enjoy giving gifts but am amazed at how materialistic and shallow our society is. I am sickened by the crap we buy just because it's sold to us. I'm sickened by the fact that at times I am the one buying the crap.

Delight because this year I've acquired a husband, a new in-law family and a house, and I've been thinking that we get to have our own Christmas tree this year. As with many, Christmas brings back mostly happy childhood memories. My house has a lovely set of five street-facing window that will be perfect to show off our well-lit and decorated tree.

Tonight I spent some time picking out my own ornaments for what will become my first Christmas tree. Mine because it's a family I have helped create, rather than one I have been born into. And holidays and Christmas trees just bring out that feeling of wanting the best for family and community.

friends

2004-11-15T13:36:00.000-06:00

It's been 10 days since I last wrote. Way too long as my friends assured me this weekend. I know I'd be slightly annoyed if someone whose blog I read didn't update their page for 10 days, so although I'm not feeling particularly inspired on any one topic this morning, I'm forcing myself into spending a few momemts being thoughtful and productive.

I'm actually supposed to be at work today but I'm sick and when I keep talking all day long like I did most of this weekend I have lovely fits of coughing. That sort of behavior does not mesh well with restaurant managing, and it turned out to be ok for me to take a sick day. So I slept in. I finally got up, did a bit of reading, showered and now it's off to update my wedding celebration registry and finish my invitations. I've been thinking last night and this morning about my great weekend picking up relationships with friends whom I haven't seen in far too long.

We went to college together and for many years saw each other many times a week or every day as roommates; now it's been months, nearing a year since we've been together. People say that after turning 24 or 25 life starts to speed by, and that's totally how I feel. I don't know how I have managed to go so many months without seeing these friends. I'm amazed that it doesn't seem nearly that long, although so much has changed, especially in my life.

The most wonderful discovery of the weekend is that there are still remains of an undisturbed bond beneath what has been on my end a distant, reserved, apathy toward keeping up some of my old friendships. It was not intentional, just a time of adjustment and processing where I didn't feel able to explain my behavior, my thoughts, my faith, my feelings, except that I was going somewhere and I hoped we could all meet again some day.

My friend Erin said to me as we cruised south toward Chicago that it's interesting how we are all in different places doing different things with different people and somehow seem to all be tracking. "Tracking" is an interesting word, like we might be taking different routes now although we were once taking the same train to the same place. But we're still headed to the same destination, wherever that might be, just with different stops along the way. Like our trains or cars are going the same distance, parallel to one another, although the loops and turns of the route take different ways to head that way. What I mean is, the bond of amazing times and friendship and love doesn't have to be broken by circumstance and change. It's still there, hiding beneath whatever hurt and distress has happened, but it's still there, like waters waiting to be tested once again.

I was a coveted swing state voter

2004-11-02T19:50:00.000-06:00

In the last week I've received at least five voice mails from the likes of P-Diddy, Bill Clinton and Spike Lee reminding me to rock the vote or die. I feel a little special this election, perhaps because I am a sought-after adult who out of apathy or laziness didn't vote in the last election. Or perhaps it's because I was excited about the election this year; I even put a sticker for my candidate on my car the other day. I'm also in Wisconsin, one of a few highly contested "swing" states critical to both party's campaigns. It seems like Bush, Cheney, Kerry, Edwards or their spouses have been in Wisconsin just about every day for two months. Both candidates have tried to woo us young, previously disinterested voters. I have done my homework, thought about my values and the issues important to me and made an educated decision.

So, I had the day off and went to vote around 10:00 am, already hearing reports that the polls were unusually crowded and everyone was paranoid about voter fraud and voter suppression. In Milwaukee: The tires of 20 GOP-rented vans to be used to transport voters to the polls today were slashed overnight. My polling place, set to open as expected at 7:00 am, was delayed by an hour when election officials didn't have the proper keys to start the ballot machine. Fifteen polling places ran out of ballots around 7:00 pm when police turned couriers were dispatched from city hall to avoid shortages.

When I arrived at the local middle school to cast my vote there was an irritated man in line complaining that he arrived at 7:00 am this morning, waited 45 minutes before heading to work, and was now waiting in line again to vote. My voting happens in the school's dimly lit but beautiful old theater. Unfortunately the two individuals managing the lists of names were at least 80-years-old and could barely understand the names of my diverse neighbors much less read their sheets because of the bad light. It was busy but mostly it was just slow. Everyone waited in one line and if you needed to register you simply held up others who could have passed ahead and voted. I registered at the primary a few months ago with my current address and my name was not in the books today. Before leaving the house I had so much confidence that I wouldn't have a problem today that only out of sheer luck did I have a check I was about to deposit in my purse with my correct address on it. I had to re-register, so had I not had that check I would have had to return. At that point, I might have given up, who knows. Thankfully it didn't come to that.

After voting I felt good. I was amazed at how many people seemed to be heading to vote. There were lines all day which most people agree is extremely uncommon. I was out and about running errands the rest of the day, watching volunteers stand on overpass bridges waving their candidates' signs and staring as a passing airplane pulled an enormous pro-life banner complete with pictures of what was apparently a 10-week old dead fetus (I am unfortunately not kidding about that one).

It's 8:30 pm central standard time and I'm monitoring the news. So far Bush leads Kerry with several swing states still too close to count. I'm still rooting for my underdog. Wisconsin is important, my vote is important, it's a good day to be a U.S. citizen.

Luna

2004-11-02T08:45:00.000-06:00

There was a beautiful moon the other night. I was driving around, doing some mundane errand when I glimpsed a huge low-hanging orange orb in the sky. Those big stunning moons always make me gasp. There among the silouettes of Walmart, Pick N’ Save and fast food joints appears that magical glowing planet in the sky. It intrudes onto my view of urban landscape to jolt me out of the haze of daily life.

I never paid much attention to the moon or the sky in general until I went to China when I was 19 years old. Staying in smog-ridden Beijing—amazing as is the city—makes one long to see the blue sky, white fluffy clouds and especially, a full moon. One night after a rain in the city there was a much-coveted clear sky, and there was my orange moon, hanging between glass office buildings, dirty concrete apartment buildings and ancient pagoda-style facades. It struck me because I hadn’t seen the moon, nor anything in the sky except an off-white not-quite-cloud cover, for weeks. As I biked back to the college I pondered life and the universe as I watched the moon duck behind and reappear from behind the trees and buildings.

In the summer of 2000 I used to take lots of long evening walks from my apartment to the Monona Terrace in Madison. A close friend and I would walk up there and talk and look at the amazing moon. My memory is that that moon shone every night we went out, as we pondered life and imagined a year-long separation as I prepared to move to China. In the amazing lakeside view off the terrace roof the huge red-orange moon would travel from one side of our view to the other; it reminded me how big the world is and how small we are in it. Planets and suns moving around the universe and here we are, with so many individual hopes and dreams and heartaches and joys, trying to make sense of it all.

blog surfing

2004-10-23T23:10:00.000-05:00

Tonight I am crabby. I haven’t worked out in over a week, I’m tired from the first week transitioning into my new job location and my husband was annoying me. I probably unnecessarily snapped at him, but, for the record, he really was being annoying. Anyway, it’s late now and I was thinking of going to sleep but some of my husbands relatives stopped over at my house (which is totally normal and acceptable in their culture) which means I don’t really feel like I can actually go to bed, but I will sit and “work” on the computer after the compulsory 5-minute chit-chat to leave them conversing in Spanish.

So, I did a little surfing on sojo.net, checked my friends’ blogs, and then discovered at the top of all blogspot pages a button titled “Next Blog.” Intrigued, I clicked away. The first blog I was randomly transported to was that of a insomniac Persian-Canadian girl studying in London who describes herself as very opinionated. Unfortunately I didn’t get to find many of her opinions on the blog. The second blog was titled Urban-Cinderella, written by a 14-year-old from Singapore who goes to “like, the suckiest school ever.” The third blog led me to a Spanish-language blog, except the Spanish isn’t the Mexican Spanish I am accustomed to, and there aren’t any entries, just some headings, so I think this one’s in progress. (So far, this has been a very international experience however). The fourth blog hails from Hong Kong, and is basically all in Chinese, so I’m not going to be able to discover anything here either. My fifth destination is completely in French and boasts a large picture of Charlie Chaplin at the top of the page. The sixth blog is by far the least interesting but more what I was expecting from my blogsearch: Tim Gallo sells medical equipment and he has a blog apparently to advertise that fact. The seventh and final hit is in English but is completely incomprehensible. The most recent blog contains a 1960s-looking yearbook shot of a clean-cut white kid with the caption: “This man looks as if he has an insatiable desire for cheese, but not the funds to pay for it. Note: sloppy collar.” Enough said about that one. If there is a moral to this blog-surfing adventure is that you’ve got to jump a lot of blogs to find a true jem.

Goodnight…