Generalismo

I’m borrowing Porter’s laptop because mine is in the shop. The three year warranty expires in less than a month! I’m so glad I got it in, because it really does need work. It’ll mark six years since someone gave me a laptop anonymously - and I’ve gotten it replaced under the warranty once since then.

Ah, but other, more exciting news. I got accepted at George Fox University! This means I might be studying there this fall. In the meantime, I have time for one or two more terms here at the community college. This term I’m planning on taking nutrition and writing. And in other school news, I’m kind of bummed that my grades have not been posted yet!

And in other news, I’m “refinishing” a floor while my clients are in Hawaii. It’s not exactly refinishing, because all I’m doing is cleaning, staining, and waxing the floor (little or no sanding.) I’ve just scrubbed the floor and applied the first coat of stain, so far. Hopefully by Monday I’ll be ready for the handyman to bring the buffer for me to use on the wax!

It seems like all of my clients are on vacation, by the way. One is in Japan, one is in Hawaii, one just got back from Hawaii, and one is out somewhere else that I don’t know, he’s just out. Hope they’re all having fun In the meantime, I’m kind of on vacation too, because two clients aren’t having me come. I might take the train up to Portland this week and do some sightseeing and meet up with someone.

I got a nice email from someone today, though it was short. I do not know why or how there can be such conflicting actions towards me. I do love my mom.

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Outside of the library window, there is a vast blue sky stretching out as far as the eye can see, and I know it extends even beyond where I can see. Sometimes life feels like that. All you’ve got is a blue sky, Bonnie. Other people have excitement and interesting detailed lives, and all you have is a blank.

However, I forget what it is that I’m actually doing. School, for one thing, is something that I’m doing towards a goal that is very important to me. The music I’m going to be practicing this afternoon is working towards another important goal. It’s always greener on the other side of the fence, I do believe. Maybe I’m feeling a little down because school is out and there’s nothing that I’m required to study

This morning is an unusual lull. I always think that what I really want is just time to relax and do nothing, but then when it comes, it only makes me down. Right before and right after getting out from work are the best times I know I’m almost finished, and then I know I’ve done a lot of work. And then it’s over and it’s time to face going to work again.

I know what my problem is. I just finished looking at pictures of my family on facebook. It’s the feeling I got when I left home to study Greek at my grandparents’ house. Things are going on. Only that time, I talked on the phone with my family, and they told me about what was going on (and I was only nine). This time, I see things as someone spying, nearly, and I am not allowed to be told from the participants how fun something was, or how they missed me.

I really miss you. I feel awful that you never pick up the phone. It rips me up inside. 

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Wow, it’s been way too long since I’ve blogged! News, news, more news.

First of all, I finished this term of school. I got an A+ in Algebra, which is the absolute craziest thing ever. I didn’t understand Algebra at all in high school. Maybe it’s my age? Porter helped me a lot by buying me a Saxon Algebra II book earlier this year and encouraging me to work through it. (And helping me work through it). I’m finding that I really enjoy math.

Writing class went pretty good, too. I got an A on my last paper despite the fact I forgot to submit the citations page with it, and I forgot to bring it to the class when it was due. Grace has been given to me!

Still on the school front, I took the SAT last Saturday. It was surprisingly fun. I’ve always liked standardized tests in high school. Just as with the other tests I’ve taken, I finished all of the sections early except math. But I finished a lot more math problems than I usually do.

On the fun front, I sang karaoke last night. I sang We’ve Only Just Begun, by the Carpenters. When I first got up there, I asked the karaoke guy “I’ve never sung karaoke before, is there anything I  should know?” and he sighed, and said “You’re asking me at the wrong time.” But he offered some general tips. But it went fine, and after the first verse he came over and laughed - “There’s no way anyone will know you’ve never sung karaoke before!” It was pretty fun.

Oh, on the unfun front, I lost $60 in an ATM yesterday. It was obviously a malfunction, so I called the number on the ATM that said to call to report errors. It was the regular phone number from the back of my bank card, with no options to report a complaint! It was awful. Of course, the bank was closed, and the machine wouldn’t give me a receipt (not that it would have shown that the machine had eaten my cash, either). On top of that, the two phone numbers for the bank in the phone book have been disconnected, and the bank doesn’t open till 9. I’m supposed to be at work by 9 – although I pick my own hours, really – and now I am going to be there very late. It’s awful. So I decided to come down and hang out at the library, because there’s no internet at home and I wanted to get something done. So right now, I’m in a cafe at the library, sipping on a coffee, checking emails, blogging, etc.

I’ve stopped at Starbucks maybe a dozen times on the way to work over these past few months – it’s on the way, and when I haven’t had time to make coffee at home, it’s tempting to grab a cup. I feel *so* out of place there. All of the people there have new cars and dressy clothes. They work at banks and offices (and sometimes hospitals). They aren’t housekeepers. I always feel awkward.

Oh, more news, I got my ears pierced. I went to the most reputable place in town, “High Priestess Body Piercing.” When I got there, I realized it was in the basement of the building. The tattoo parlour is on the ground floor. So, I sucked in my breath, and descended into the depths of the building. The room had a counter along with three of four large display racks of mostly larger gauged jewelry. You know, plugs and that sort of thing. For stretched earlobes. Then, out of the back room comes someone with tattoos all over. I mean all over. His face was tattooed like a spider web. It was pretty crazy. And sparkly blue eyeliner, and of course piercing all over his face. He was friendly and helpful, and got me the paperwork I needed and got a piercer to come. The actual piercing took just a few seconds. I wish I had looked at the needle, because it would have been interesting, but I didn’t ask to see it and he didn’t show me. I picked out dark green studs – which I almost immediately regretted, “They’re going to show up *so* much!” but then I decided they were OK. I’ve had them in for about three weeks and have to be worn for three more weeks before I can change earrings. I bought some little silver hoops that I hope to wear eventually. They say not to wear silver until your ears have healed really well. But, anyway. The whole experience was kind of surreal. I had it done in the evening, and it was raining outside. The decision to get my ears pierced wasn’t made quickly (I’ve been thinking about it for months) but  the decision to go that night was kind of impulsive. I just realized they were open and that I could get it done in between switching laundry loads at the laundromat If you get your ears pierced, go to an authentic place. I’m not sure exactly why, but guns are bad for your ears. Go to a place that uses needles.

Well, now my little morning break is over and I need to run along to the bank to straighten out my problem and get to work. 

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By my bedside, that is. I’m sitting here after a long day of housekeeping and studying. My morning client had something that cut our session short, so I got home a little early and was able to make some last minute edits to my essay. I worked on that and math homework for a few hours and then headed to the bus station to catch the right bus. When I sat down in the bus I realized I hadn’t done my writing homework beyond finishing the essay. I also had a chapter to read and some questions to answer about an essay published in the book. So I scribbled some stuff and read some of the chapter. It’s such a fun thing to write these short essays, but I’m a little intimidated by the topic this time. It is to be an argumentative paper about a local problem. It wouldn’t be too bad to just write about a problem, but I’m supposed to come up with a solution The problem I’m thinking about writing is probably going to entail in-person interviews, and I’m not sure just how much info there is publish on the issue. Oh well.

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All I have to do is open the pictures and insert them in the post. No more resizing and going through wordpress’s hoops to get them posted!

The mist is often like this in the hills.

Blurry, but more green than I’ve formerly gotten in these kind of shots.

Looking back: Mt. Baldy is to the right, Spencer’s Butte to the left, and Eugene is straight ahead. You can kind of see the city buildings if you imagine hard enough.

Lichen covers a lot of trees. And look how big the trees are compared to the road! There are huge trees out here.

This is now on the way home. That big hump is Mt. Baldy, you can see the little sign with the trail marked on it in the left third of the picture. The mountain doesn’t look very high in pictures! But you need to consider that I’ve been walking uphill on the road for a good two miles, so this is just the very tip of it.

Looking back. You can see the sign that was in the picture before this one. And look at all the lichen!

The trail was verrry muddy.

The path once you get into the trees.

Something to scare hungry wildlife away

Looking out from the path.

The bench at the top, looking out over Eugene. I think all the downed branches are from a windstorm we had a while back.

The walking-only path is the one I’m on, to the right is one that allows mountain bikes. This hill makes me feel wonderful. Toward the end of summer it was a warm golden field against a vivid blue sky. Ahh.

Prints of something. Probably a dog.

Look at how big those trees are! This is at the bottom of the path that leads up to the Mt Baldy trailhead.

I found a nice little bridge on a second part of the trail that I’d never taken before.

The bridge was over a stream with lots of green around.

I don’t always wear this hat! It is a favorite, though

A small spiderweb I found in the dirt. The water droplets were so neat to look at. It’s amazing that the web strands will support that much.

That’s how small it was.

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Me looking out over the valley. It’s so beautiful. Meh, I seem to take the same kinds of pictures to blog

There is so much moss in the woods like this. It never comes out the same green in pictures!

No color enhancement. It makes me wonder why it doesn’t capture green in the woods!

Like a little forest.

The lichen.

The view over the house I work at.

The cat at that house It’s so friendly and purrs almost all the time. It wouldn’t stay still, which is part of the reasons this picture is so blurry.

A sunset we watched from the top of Skinner’s Butte. It is not something you can capture on camera. It was surreal to be watching it. A sunset comes close to being ecstasy. If you can experience it in more than the senses, it is something close to what heaven would be like, I would imagine.

Kind of blurry, but that’s one of the main streets of Eugene in the left third of the picture. Spencer’s Butte (yet to be climbed by us, but someday soon hopefully!) is the peak right above it.

The hat I bought at a yardsale. I guess it looks kind of funny from the side in a picture, but it feels so cute. Hehe. I wore it to church a few weeks ago.

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I got to my client’s house and there was no key! Since I was already up at the top of the “mountain” I decided to go on a hike. I went through the most beautiful woods. I stopped several times with tears in my eyes, listening to the birds and seeing the sun stream through the woods on the very green moss and leaves.God made the Oregon woods! I had my knife in-hand continually, except when people passed me (there was one runner). I’m starting to think I am afraid for nothing. Mountain lions live there (they’ve probably seen me!) but they feed on other things.  Of course, it’ll be greener in spring when more leaves are on the trees.

I’m on the verge of being sick. Sometimes I have a sore throat, sometimes I feel fine, most of the time I’m a little congested. When I get enough sleep I seem to be fine. I’m making broth right now with the chicken backs and necks that I bought yesterday. Yum yum! It was so cool to see the soup I made last time get all gelatinous when it was chilled in the fridge. I have a client who regularly makes broths and their chicken broth, when chilled, is like very stiff gelatin. You could make chicken flavored gummy bears! (Ew!)

I love my writing class. Although right now I’m putting off working on my second essay, I really enjoy it once I get into it. I’m thrilled to have gotten positive feedback from the professor, even though I haven’t gotten my first paper back with a grade yet.  I also like math class, but we’re going just a little too fast right now and I’m having trouble understanding concepts. Basically I take notes and then come home to study. But I’m putting that off because I’m just afraid of it! I don’t know why. Every time I put myself to it, I learn it. But there’s just that feeling. Ugh. We had a test a few days ago. The professor said if we get A’s on the two midterm tests, we don’t have to take the final and we get an A! I am *so* hoping it’s an A on this one.

I don’t know why I don’t blog regularly anymore. I just don’t feel like it most of the time.

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I got a call Wednesday from a client who’s home I hadn’t been to in a few weeks. He was warning me that I was going to have a long day at his house when I next was scheduled to visit. Yup. It was. Put away Christmas ornaments, cleaned/organized the playroom, did most of the regular chores there.

By the time I left it was dark outside. I really don’t like biking in the dark on certain roads. The shoulder on this particular one isn’t very wide, and my lights aren’t very powerful. I started on a downhill portion of the ride and realized that a heavy fog had moved in. It was starting to rain. The problem with my headlamp is that when it shines through the fog, all I can see is lit up fog. I couldn’t really see the road anymore. I figured I could stay on the road if I kept my light on the yellow line, so I adjusted it to shine in the middle of the road, but then I was riding in the middle of the road. And I had to slow to a crawl when cars came up the hill, because I couldn’t see *anything* with headlights in my eyes. When I was almost at the end, I nearly got sandwiched between cars coming down the hill and cars coming up the hill. Better in the ditch than dead! I didn’t actually get in the ditch, but I was pretty close to it. Very unnerving. I was so glad to reach the end of the road and get to the bus stop.

But anyway! It’s FRIDAY! And my work schedule now allows for weekends off Very happy about that.

In other news, I quit my retail job (at Harbor Freight Tools).

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Happy 2010, friends!

I’m on a new fitness kick.

Last month I was considering joining a gym since there are several within walking/biking distance. After looking at prices, though, I decided I could afford to buy a kettlebell after all. A kettlebell is basically a canonball with a handle on it. Sometimes they’re welded, but mine is cast that way.

The one I bought weighs 26 pounds (12 kg, or .75 “pood”). I got a kick out of the fact that it shipped in a flat rate priority mail box. It was almost busting out of the box when it arrived, and the mailman mentioned how heavy it was.

So what does one do with a hunk of metal with handles on it? To begin with, not much. I’m planning on performing swings and Turkish get ups this month.  That’s it. In fact, I might just do swings to begin with. Two days ago I did 50 swings (in about 2 minutes, tops)  and I am very sore in my posterior region. Swinging a big hunk of metal is incredible exercise I’m expecting to be able to wear myself out in a short amount of time and be able to get enough exercise that way. I’m tired of being tired, and I’m very much looking forward to being able to have more arm power when scrubbing showers

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Does Bonnie have a blog anymore? Yes, she does!

I’ve just been so busy I hardly have time to update it. If I was being good, and sleeping now, as I should be, then I wouldn’t be checking my mail at all today, let alone blog! But I’m up, so I am online for a few minutes.

Egan Warming Centers have opened in town. They are locations that are set up temporarily so homeless people can sleep indoors when the temperature drops below 28 – which is has been for the past few nights, and is expected to be for the next few nights. The one that Porter and I have been volunteering at (Porter has been a lot more than I have) is the youth site, and is the same as Hosea’s site, which feeds kids three nights a week regularly no matter what the weather.

So, anyway. I’m very glad they have made these sites. On mornings when I wake up and it’s freezing outside, I think about all of the guys who undoubtedly have spent their night in the park, facing a cold day – whereas I have spent a nice warm night in bed and am headed to work in a warm environment.

I worked all day today, which was very tiring for some reason, and very boring! Usually I don’t have such a hard time keeping entertained, but I was just so tired I couldn’t think about anything interesting, and I got a headache in the afternoon. Housekeeping is definitely a more satisfying job than running a cash register, but the cash register is a little easier as far as physical stamina goes. Had I gotten a headache and felt that exhausted at a housekeeping job, I might have just told them I was going to sit down for a while and try to recover. (And I would have asked for Tylenol, which reminds me that I ought to always make sure I have some on hand when I’m away from the house.) 

The other night I was frustrated with something while Porter was gone and I started crying, and I just didn’t know what to do with what I was feeling. So I put on running clothes and ran across a particular part of the river in town, which is about one and half miles from here. It was incredibly satisfying. About 2 minutes into the run I accidentally did something in my mouth that caused my toothache to kick in, which usually lasts for a few minutes. It was so painful! But I kept saying to myself “The pain will not kill you. And “A toothache will not kill you.” And eventually the pain was gone, but it was so bad for a few minutes. And I wondered what pain most of the street people have felt – the ones who sleep right in the park I was running by.  

I thought this afternoon at work, while I had a headache, that Paul actually dealt with things just like I was dealing with – I mean, physical symptoms. And he suffered much worse, of course! But I was thinking in particular that he was sleepless and hungry, and tired, and if he didn’t drink enough water, he probably got a headache. And those feelings were not some kind of weird, old fashioned things. The wear and tear on his body would have been the same as wear and tear on ours. So I will face my little trials and tribulations in trying to do God’s work with courage! It is not unnatural to suffer in loving.

On the running front again, I feel I have to return to it again for more thoughts. It is amazing when you just decide that no matter what, you’re going to keep going. Not because you get amazing things done, necessarily, but because it just feels empowering. It doesn’t matter if you end up crawling, you’re going to keep going as much as you can. Of course, I didn’t, because I walked some on the way home when I certainly could have been running. But every point at which you feel like quitting and keep going is an amazing little feeling. You can punch the air and say “Dang it!I’m going to keep going!”

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