sunshine

i had a shitty day today. can you say shitty on a blog? is there a cuss police on these things? i sure hope not, because there is no better word than shitty right now. but since ive said it three times in as many sentences perhaps i will stop.

it didnt start off so bad. i woke up to journey, like i always do. ive found that 'dont stop believing' is by far the best noise to wake up to, especially if it is at 5am. i went to work, made coffee, prepped for the day, sent my girls back to bed (which they loved) and bopped around the kitchen for the next few hours as the day unfolded. im not sure exactly when things turned sour. i think it was sometime around hour 11. the eleventh hour. not 11am- but my eleventh hour of working in my hot, cramped, bakery hole. as i continued to lose hours of the day i lost control of my pleasant attitude. not even *nsync pandora could make it better. by the time i got home at 7:29pm i was so crusty.

i am frustrated with myself at the end of days like this. i can do anything for 24 hours, and this day can, literally, not last more than 24 hours... so why do i let myself get so frustrated. and tired. and what is it about this place that makes it damn near imposible for me to maintain some semblance of joy.

my boss has been calling me sunshine lately. im not sure if he is calling it like he sees it, or if he is speaking it over me and hoping i will somehow adopt a sunnier disposition. another kid that is working here, who i dont actually know all that well, called my sunshine this morning as well.

id love to embody that more tomorrow then i did today.

inspiration

i think if i had no self-consciousness. and loads of money. and free time. and a new place to move to i would like to try my luck at being a writer. it is one of my secret dreams (but not so secret, kind of like this blog) to be published someday. and not just in the local elementary school 'reflections' contest for a song about racism. because let's face it- been there. done that.

but i want to write a memoir. or maybe a reflection piece that happens to be chapters long, full of these wonderful vignettes about my life and how i see life and i want others to see life. i would have one of super talented friends design the layout and i would have theme songs for each chapter. and i would footnote things that didn't need to be footnoted. and i would write like i talk and people would love it and i would finally feel like i had settled into a career. or a calling. or figured out what color my parachute is.

i wonder if other people know what i am talking about when i say that. i feel like i got no less than three copies of that book from my parents when i was in highschool and college. perhaps they noticed that i had no specific direction. perhaps they were worried. i dont think that i gave them cause to worry, but i still dont have any clear direction. and i am years out of college... i wonder where that parachute book is now.

i like to buy books in the airport bookstores. and i like to buy books based on the cover art. the most recent purchase that i made according to these two personal preferences was this one, a collection of journals, emails, drawings and lists of rachel corrie, a young american girl killed in gaza while working for peace. i have not been more inspired to write my own journals and emails and lists by any other work. as i read through the pages that rachel's family had compiled and released after her death i found that this woman seemed to be a sort of kindred for me. i was encouraged by her hope in action, and i was blessed by her passion in writing. i found myself making markings as if her memoir was a text book... words underlined, passages highlighted, rabbit trails in the margins. i filled the blank pages at the end of the manuscript with dozens of topics that i want to expound on. i am starting up this blog again and i plan to use it as the forum for those very topics.

another lovely female voice in my head these days, anne lamott, says that "with writing, you start where you are, and you flail around for a while, and if you keep doing it, every day you get closer to something good."

so, here's to inspiration.

vows

i had the pleasure of being a bridesmaid a few weekends ago for one of my lovliest friends and i dont know what it is about weddings, but i am always the weepiest one. the weepiest one with the not so lovely cry-face. i really dont understand how some people manage to remain photographable whilst weeping. bygones. the thing is- there is something incredible about two people standing in front of their friends and family, committing themselves to one another. two people choo-choo-choosing one another. two people pledging to forsake all others.

there is a deep beauty in a covenant. and deep beauty in submission...

bet you never thought you would hear those words coming from me. but it's true. i so look forward to the day when i, too, am privilaged to enter into that kind of relationship. that kind of things used to really unnerve me. i mean, who wants to give themselves to someone who might choo-choo-choose to change their mind someday. i think it is hard for those of us who have not had faithfulness in family modeled for them to imagine that such a thing exists. but i think it does. it just might take a lot more effort, a lot more intention, a lot more jesus, and probs a lot less janell than i originally anticipated.

moving on up...

one of my favorite things about this internship is that i get to do things i would never even imagine doing outside of this place. plenty of the aforementioned 'things' have to do with the toys that belong to the maintenance department here at camp. within a month of being here i had learned how to lay concrete. or at least how to edge out a patch of concrete that someone else has laid. and i know that it is concrete, and not cement. cement is in ingredient of concrete (unless you are in michigan. then the words are interchangeable). i also got to drive the backhoe. just for a quick minute. i dont think that doug trusted me to operate that thing, and since i was wearing a pair of gap jeans and some toms. not exactly man/maintenance department appropriate attire. but i made it work. i always do :)

all of this led up to my biggest (literally biggest) achievement thus far. some time in january i took on the front-end loader... the IT... the pinnacle of what i'm sure will be a short-lived stint in acting tough and riding dirty.

i dont have a photo of me and my IT. but the cartoon will do.

im a b.a.

thank you itunes again

can i just say that i love my genius playlist maker?! my genius playlist maker always knows what i am in the mood to listen to and anticipates just as well, if not better, than pandora. although, my genius playlist maker doesnt have to work that hard. all it has to do is find a song that might be well received in a coffeehouse and i will be more than satisfied. my musical tastes have mellowed dramatically as of late (although i still crave the vocal stylings of steve perry) and i am deeply entrenched in a singer/songwriter foxhole.

lately i have been building off of ryan adams' 'desire' and patty griffin's 'long ride home'... it's because i have heavy boots these days. but my genius playlist maker is helping.

extremely loud and incredibly close

im in the middle of reading a few books right now (as always) but there is one in particular that i am really enjoying. it is the second book by 'everything is illuminated' author, jonathan safran foer, and it is superb.

foer is quickly becoming one of my favorite authors. i particularly enjoy his idioms- when oskar, the nine-year old protagonist feels great, he feels like one hundred dollars. not 'a hundred bucks', but one hundred dollars. and when oskar is not feeling great he has heavy boots. incredibly heavy boots. the prose is off-beat, the characters are quirky and tender and i am enraptured.

thumbs up.

christmas eve family photo

on my NEW CAMERA!!