I've been past "past" my capacity for a week or two now.  Borderline breakdown point.  And if I didn't have such an awesome guy who listens, and surprises me with flowers, and puts his evening plans on hold to just spend a Thursday evening sitting on my couch.... I probably would have had a melt down.  As it stands, it is Friday and I'm feeling optimistic.  Life feels like the challenge it should - the possible challenge that I can tackle.

A couple days ago I was telling Beau, "I think I just need a vacation.  A real, get away and relax vacation."  But I don't really have the time for that right now.  Starting a new job means trying to not take lavish get-aways.  I'm just a week away from 4 months at the new job and I have yet to take a day off.... even with a concussion in there.

Next week, however, I'll be taking Friday off!  I will get a 4 day weekend and I'm soooo excited!  And this weekend, we did our best to say our "thanks yous", "pleases" and most importantly, a few "nos"  -- well, we're trying.  We'll see how we really do in the end.

But it's Friday.  And for the first time in weeks, my tank doesn't feel empty!  Hell, I don't even need "full" any more, just give me a few gallons and watch me run! Of course, I prefer full.  It's sunny.  And I just put on the Keith Urban.  Life has hope.  And my heart somehow is in Nashville again.  It's residing in that peace I always find on the quieter side of the country - reading a book beside my sister, or driving down some almost familiar road.

I'll let my heart hide there for the day, but it's time to get the rest of my capabilities clambering on at my full work-list today.  Hope you all find a little peace and hope this beautiful Friday morning.

Love each of you.

9/20

Can anyone tell me why I'm listening to my "Disney Collection Volume 1"?  Didn't expect my fingers to pick it... didn't expect I'd be 10 songs in an hour later... all by myself on a Thursday night.   Well we've all got our own things I guess.  Tonight, apparently classic disney is mine.  :/

Very much love this room. 

from here.

Aren't these such funny times?  All at once they are "make us or break us" days, every one of 'em.  And they're unexpected walks in the rain days.  Dance lesson days.  Sailing lesson days. Great new job days.  They're the best and the hardest.  The most exhausting and trying, and also the most fun.

After I let my dad in on it all, all that's on my mind, all that's burning up my heart (and my esophagus again), he says kindly, "It doesn't get easier."  But it's got to!

There's got to come a year where it's not a new job, a house to take care of, a dream that comes with weekly commitments and constant challenges, a  relatively new relationship, bills to pay and forms to fill out, and a friend to bring a meal to every week. A summer where there aren't five or six weddings! Where there's not some place to be every weekend or someone visiting from out of town.

There's got to be a time where you spend weekend after weekend with nothing to do.... right?  That time does exist.  It has to exist. Some day.

Today, I'm okay with how things are - because they'll make us.

And they'll make some great stories.

After all, these are some of the most exciting times... these are the things we've been waiting for expectantly.

This is where I work.  :) 

I don't know why this place holds so much sway over me - a magnet to my heart, buried high up in heavens I've never seen, and an age I've never known. 

St. Etienne, a glimpse of you and my heart starts to burn.  Your grandeur overwhelms me - moves me - all at once the distant, the beautiful, the dangerous meet in you. You are my sublime.  And someday, I will see you.  Sit with you in ageless silence.  And together we will contemplate the heavens and think little of time. 

(photography by klas sjöberg)

Good Morning.  

Happy "Get sh*t done week!!"

So much on the horizon, so much on the table, so much on the line. 

So much on the list!!  

Amazing, the work and responsibility of dreams - we don't imagine them for years and live them for a moment.  No, we work toward them and through them for years.  There are years of anticipation, hope and longing, there's a moment of excitement as the page turns and life transitions into the thing anticipated.... and then there are the steady, long days of living out that dream.  The weeks of assignments, of acquiring the new skills now necessary, of keeping calm and staying grateful and excited.  Of reminding yourself, this is what I've hoped for... and now I get the joy of the work.  

It's true of school.  Of a home.  Of a friendship.  Of a romance. Of a career. Of any passion or calling.  

You'll have to remind yourself several weeks or months in:  this is the joy of the work of a dream. 

Otherwise, it's then your dream will be stolen. Or rather, just forgotten.  After you've turned the page not before.  After you've felt the excitement.  After you've set in to the days of living it. 

Be consistent - especially when it gets hard and the rush has passed. 

8/20

Tom Douglas is opening a what?! 

Apparently, he is opening a culinary center in the same building as his wonderful Mediterranean themed restaurant, Lola. ("Best breakfast I have ever had!" says my boyfriend)

According to Seattle Eater, there will be weekend intensives on pastry, cooking for men, etc.  Classes should start next January/ February.

Anyone want to take a cooking class with me in 2014? :)

The days I have my headphones, I sit in silence for hours at work.  Often, I realize I've had them in with no noise vibrating through them for some abstract amount of time.  I'll pull my chair back to leave and they'll fall from my ears.  But the days I don't have them - I forget them at home - I'm miserable, I crave a rhythm or melody to flood my mind.  The silence feels empty, unfulfilling, uncomfortable.

Today they sit right beside me so naturally I'm loving the peaceful quiet of my office.  No need for what we have.

bicicleta? 

amore. 

MY SISTER FLIES IN TODAY!!!

I debated whether or not to blog about it... but I had the greatest day yesterday.

My Beau surprised me in the morning and we had breakfast together before he drove me to work.

I was stupid and complained about stupid things in the car - no one needs that first thing in the morning.

I felt awful all morning at work.  I was praying and listening to worship, praying desperately that the Lord would sort me out.  I feel a mess in a lot of ways lately.  Sinking into ways I strongly, strongly dislike.

In the midst of that, in that moment, in walks our receptionist with a big basket full of flowers.  I was confused.  I couldn't even answer when they asked me what they were for - I was still trying to put together that there were flowers here, for me. Pretty ones!  I'm a mess - and he sent me flowers.

After work there was coffee and lots of conversation.  And then there was our favorite restaurant.  We walked down a quarter to 9pm.  They were closing up, a couple tables finishing their meal or wine.  We offered to leave, but they wouldn't have it.  You see, we time it this way.  Not usually that late.  But late, when they'll bring out the dogs.

We sat and ate while the others left, we pet Fin & Lucky and the cat.  And then we talked with the owner as he set a table and sat down to a family style meal with his staff and a friend and fellow restaurant owner who arrived.  We sat as all the other staff said goodnight.  He offered us a digestif and we sipped on into the night, hearing story after story from his life and from that of his friend.  They have been in the restaurant business as long as I've been alive.

It was a perfect evening.  We walked back with smiles, as we usually do. Thank you Beau for the best day.

One year together.  And what a wonderful year it has been.

I saw this quote on this sweet ladies's blog today.  It resonates with my thoughts lately - on everything.  If you have to tell people you are, you probably aren't.

Being powerful is like being a lady, if you have to tell people you are, you aren't.   

- Margaret Thatcher

And if you ask me, she was quite a lot of both. ;)
[And how did I NOT KNOW she died 2 months ago?!]

 A few paragraphs in, I was starting to suspect Linda had a blog... and was pulling a whole George Eliot thing, blogging as "Tyler." This is a fantastic blog post on marriage and the "wrong one".

There are only wrong people who pretend to be right and wrong people who are becoming right, through Jesus. That’s why I like the biblical image of marriage. The fairy-tale image of two soul mates finding love at last is just that, a fairy tale. But the biblical image of marriage provides something so much more beautifully realistic. 

It paints a portrait of two sinners, committing to the task of one another, for the sake of one another, until death do them part. It’s two imperfect people, committing to the sanctifying work of expressing Jesus’ self-sacrificial love, to their lover, so that they might see him or her become the person God has always intended them to be, knowing full well that neither of them have yet to reach this goal.

7/20

I went sailing for the first time last night.




Oh yeah, and I came home with a concussion.  Not the first time.  Safe to say, not the last.

Beau says he hopes it doesn't turn me away from sailing for good (there's a great little pun in there, if only you knew).  I informed him he doesn't need to worry - I've received a concussion from most of my favorite activities.  Queue the Kelly motto... "We take a lick'n and keep on tick'n." 

I know all my family members are already working on the jokes they are going to make in regards to my first sailing trip.  But, I'll have you know, when I ashamedly admitted the tale to my sailboat owning (and competition racing) coworker, he informed me the injury was sincerely not my fault.

6/20

I open at the end.