second set of baby steps: March 2014

Sunday, March 30, 2014

all good things: not fish, but friends and food

9. Pizza. This week has been full of pizza. On Monday we had Barcelona Pizza for dinner, because they have a Monday night special and its still a treat to get takeout on family night. And then we had build-your-own pizza for Lisa's party and there were so many delicious creations: one big, square, Italian flag pizza with a pesto base on one third, cheese only in the middle, and red sauce on the other side; an apple, goat cheese and prosciutto pizza; a four-cheese spinach artichoke pizza; two dessert pizzas with chocolate, peanut butter, bananas and jam; and tons of other combinations. So delicious, and also super fun.

10. A friend of mine started a business that opened this week! It's called Le Macaron Nashville and basically she just bakes and sells French macaroons. She's always been a pretty stellar baker, and the photos on her Facebook page of her finished piles of different colored macarons are mouthwatering. Props and good luck to my girl!

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Thank you, readers, for being with us tonight, and for giving me reasons to write, and things to write about.

And thanks for joining us every Sunday night! Join the Baby Steps on Facebook at www.Facebook.com/TheBabyStepsSaga for good things every day, and updates on new posts. Come back next week for another reminder of 10 more things to be thankful for!

Until then, be kind to each other, and find a reason to smile!

posted from Bloggeroid

Wednesday, March 26, 2014

paradigm shift

When I look back at some of my early blog posts, I am struck by how different they are from what I'm writing now - stylistically, topically, philosophically... I don't like saying this, because it seems like discrediting the whole purpose of the blog, especially at its inception, but the word that often comes to mind is "immature." I have definitely had a facepalm moment or two reading back over old posts.

I'm used to retrospectively recognizing changes in my own perspective, philosophy, emotional maturity... But there are fewer times when I record sudden and dramatic paradigm shifts as they happen.

Recently I've noticed this happening with a kind of sweeping frequency, like my mindset is going through a total overhaul, piece by piece: first work, then money, then faith...and it's really bizarre. But I think the sum effect is a positive one.

The first domino fell when I read an article on Slate a few months ago, about how the Do What You Love/Love What You Do mantra is elitist, how it overvalues the role of "work" in people's lives and undervalues jobs that are looked down upon but entirely necessary to the functioning of society. As I read it I felt my opinion changing. For a typically stubborn person who likes to mull things over before accepting them, this was an entirely new experience. Maybe it's weird in general, for anyone.

Since then, I have done a lot of mulling over, and I don't reject the "mantra" as vehemently now as I did after my initial reading. But the way I approach work has definitely shifted since then, with some support from outside conversations about the impact of work on personal relationships, and my growing obsession with reading articles on LinkedIn (most of which are about work and work culture). I think there is some value to finding something we actually enjoy doing, and getting paid for it, but I'm recognizing the value in letting work be work, and leaving work at work when the day is over.

And maybe this perspective also soothes some of the shock many of us felt upon leaving college, feeling pushed to fulfill our greatest dreams and make a ton of money and "do anything," when suddenly none of that seemed so possible anymore. Particularly in the post-recession economy. Sometimes, we just have to get by, and find fulfillment outside of the nine-to-five (or serving shifts, or the school day... whatever keeps your boat afloat).

And then there's money. Something I have always worried about. For awhile I got caught up in the "making more" paradigm, the culture of spending more and being frustrated when whatever it was cost too much and everyone else seemed to be perfectly comfortable just shelling out.

I've been talking about it a lot, with my mom, my dad, and with J, and even with a financial life planner. I've been hearing that familiar "thou shalt not worry about earthly things" message in sermon after sermon for years (and even more often lately), frustrated by the Gospel's inability to understand how impossible it is, to just not worry about money, and clothes, and food, and my car. I've been jealously clicking through pictures of my friends who seem to be embracing their characteristic millennial broke-ness with proper millennial nonchalance.

And then, earlier this month, one of my friends posted an article: You Don't Have To Be Rich In Your 20s: How Much Money You Should Actually Be Making. And even though I didn't 100% agree with the article, or want the life it touted, something clicked for me: I make enough. I'm not broke. I eat enough. I do a lot of things I like to do. I have gas in my car. I'm even saving. And there's nothing productive in worrying about paying for a wedding, because the important thing is that I'm going to marry the guy I love, and I really think our hearts and minds are in the right place on that whole issue.

A lot of the topics I've wrestled on this blog are serious aspects of adult life and even, in some cases, of basic survival. Lately I find myself thinking back to an interview with the author of a fairly new parenting book. The book is called All Joy and No Fun, and her main point is basically (bluntly) that parenting can kinda make life suck, if you measure by the same standards of personal happiness that you use when you're single; but it's worth it, because it brings joy to your life. Joy and happiness are not necessarily the same thing.

I've latched onto this idea because there are a lot of things I have to do, and even things I choose to do, that don't always make me feel happy, per se, but in the long run they bring joy and contentment to my life. That's what I've found with work, and finances, and exercise, and even cooking and eating. But I'm determined to hit on long-term happiness, and living a joyful and beautiful life, and I think I'm doing that.

One of the reasons I'm bringing the blog to an end this year is that I'm starting to get a sense of divergence in the collective lives of my class. I write fewer posts that I expect will be relatable to a general majority of my reader base. I don't entirely expect that this post, in particular, will hit home for a whole bunch of people. I think we, as a class, have moved past the point of having a lot of very similar new experiences and struggles and perceiving them similarly, and are now having different experiences, figuring things out at our own paces, in our own ways, in our own contexts. I just hope we'll continue to find ways to share our various paths, because we can all learn something from each other.

Stick with me to the end, dear readers. I've enjoyed coming this far with you, and now, more than ever, I treasure your feedback and your thoughts about where you are and where I am now, and where we are headed in the years to come.

posted from Bloggeroid

Sunday, March 23, 2014

all good things: something new every day

All Good Things started as a one-hour Sunday night radio show on KSTO St. Olaf radio, featuring feel-good music and 10 highlights from the past week. The show, and its current written form, is brought to you by Clara, Second Set of Baby Steps creator, and my radio co-host Cassie. We both contribute things to the list, so I'll tell you who said what to avoid confusion.

So get cozy and get ready for this week's batch of good things!

1. Song of the week: And We Danced by Macklemore X Ryan Lewis. My officemate has been taking care of the music for the past couple of weeks, and every time this song came on I would ask her what it was. Finally figured it out this week before I had to ask her... And when I put a name to the song I realized that it makes me feel goofy and devilish and carefree... Which is just what I need at work a lot of times.

2. Irish soda bread. This has become sort of a tradition over the past 2 years: soda bread for St. Paddy's Day. It's got a quick prep time and it's dense and delicious. - Clara

3. Accountability. The women I swim with are a source of great inspiration to me. A lot of them are older than I am, and understand the importance of fitness on a much larger scale than I do. And this one woman in particular is so perceptive and thoughtful (without being overbearing) and humble, and says something to me every week that lifts me up and leaves me thinking. Last week she said, "I watch the people in the other lanes who are faster than me, and I learn from them. I learn something new every day and I get faster and faster." - Clara

4. FROZEN CAME OUT IN STORES THIS WEEK. I didn't get it yet, but just knowing it is now available to me is a constant source of excitement. - Clara

5. Getting our families together. Family is a big thing for both J and I, and this afternoon we got both of our families together for an engagement dinner at an Indian buffet we like. It turned out greater than I could have hoped - everybody got along great, and even the baby liked the food! We laughed and talked and ate for hours until (maybe even after) they closed for lunch, and my mom brought in ladoo (traditional celebratory sweets) and shared it with the whole restaurant! Definitely a highlight. - Clara

6. About Time. From the people who did Love Actually, I should have expected nothing less. It's billed as a "romantic drama" but it's really comedic and British and beautiful and it just says a lot about life, and family, and how we use our time, and what is important. Definitely recommend. - Clara

7. Well-deserved vacations. My parents headed off to a resort in Mexico this weekend. They never go on vacations (their last one was in 2004) so this is huge! They both work so hard, and it's so great to see them finally spend some time away to relax. - Cassie

8. Picking out paint colors. Luke and I are moving into a new apartment in a week or so. Our new landlords are painting the walls for us and are letting us choose the colors! After living for 2 and a half years in an apartment with all white walls I am so excited to be surrounded by color. Being able to choose our own colors is really going to make the new place feel like home so much more quickly. - Cassie

9. Membership at the local co-op. A couple years ago I became a member at the co-op in my neighborhood. Every time I go there to buy produce or organic products I leave feeling great! The people that work there are so friendly, and it feels like I'm part of the community. They also have amazing produce so that doesn't hurt. - Cassie

10. Going with the flow. I'm a planner by nature so sometimes when things suddenly crop up I have a hard time. However, when I'm forced to be more flexible things inevitably end up going well. Though it's hard for me I'm always grateful when things pop up that force me to be more easy-going. It's never good to have everything planned out all the time - even a planner can admit to that :) - Cassie

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Thank you, readers, for being with us tonight, and for giving me reasons to write, and things to write about.

And thanks for joining us every Sunday night! Join the Baby Steps on Facebook at www.Facebook.com/TheBabyStepsSaga for good things every day, and updates on new posts. Come back next week for another reminder of 10 more things to be thankful for!

Until then, be kind to each other, and find a reason to smile!

posted from Bloggeroid

Wednesday, March 19, 2014

online dating (part 1?)

I have been meaning to write this post for years, since I started seeing posts from a surprising number of friends and classmates in the year or so after graduating college. I have always half-wanted to start a profile, as a social experiment, but my time for that is past, so instead I've talked to some friends, read some Pew Internet research, and left the social experiments to other people with a passion and a mission (like Amy Webb - seriously, watch the TEDTalk; it's amazing).

To give you an idea of the vastness of experience with online dating, I have friends who:
- have decided squarely not to try it, and resent the constant suggestions by coupled friends to "just try it, it helps just to meet people."
- are happily married or engaged to someone they met online.
- have had relationships with people they met online, and have had the relationships crash and burn...
- ...while others have had them end well, and are still looking.
- have internet-dated and now are married or engaged to or are happily dating someone they met offline, in bars or through friends.
- have never gone out with anyone met online, but not for lack of trying.
- moved to a new place and made a profile just to meet anyone of similar age and/or interests.
- have just never gotten on one of these sites, like me. Maybe they just haven't gotten one yet, but will someday...

...and the list goes on. Plus, the nuances in each of the stories, even if they have big things in common, are as varied as human experience in any other realm.

Talking about variation through a scientific lens, Pew has published several studies about online dating; I looked in particular at one general report from 2006 and one from 2013 to write this post.

What jumped out at me right away was that a major focus of the study responses in 2006: people by and large were widely afraid of the safety and security of online dating. While this is definitely still a concern now (even within my small social sample, catfishing was mentioned), this barely factored in the 2013 study among all the other, much more prevalent findings and impressions.

For example, far more people now have gone on a date with someone they met online. It's also much more public: significantly more Americans now know someone who has used online dating, and the percentage of people who know someone who has gotten into a long-term relationship or marriage with someone they met online has almost doubled! Those numbers are even higher once you start talking about college grads and younger people (like us!)

Not surprising, I suppose.

But it also depends on what you're looking for online. Some may be looking for a long-term partner, while others may not be looking for commitment at all. (One person responded to my question about goals with: "Just wanted someone to pay for my meals and take me to the movie theater because I was broke. LOL." Should have tried CarrotDating!

But she and others who said they weren't looking for commitment did have positive experiences and good relationships with people they met online. This particular person did ultimately end up meeting someone she was "head over heels" for, and they are now married with kids. A modern-day fairytale - love changes our world!)

Most people in my sample use OkCupid (it's free!) Think about how many different goals people have for creating a profile, and imagine them all flocking to one general site. It might shed some light on why nobody responded when you tried to get in touch! (Not that uncommon, it seems.)

But especially now, there is a seemingly endless list of different sites with different objectives. There are all the ones you see ads for: eHarmony, Match, Plenty of Fish. And the growing cohort of religion-based sites, and even at least one for missionaries! Then there are sites for people in a specific age group, like OurTime.com for the 50+ singles crowd. There are sites for couples to meet other couples (I may get my chance yet!) and sites to find people with similar interests (HowAboutWe). Then there are location-based apps like Grindr and Tinder that may be taking the place of approaching a hottie at a bar, because you can find them on Tinder first and avoid the sting of a face-to-face rejection, or the creep factor. And I had totally forgotten about chat rooms when I started researching for this post - the online dating of the AIM era! I know a few people who met someone in a chat room and are still together.

But no matter which site(s) or app(s) you use, the answers to the "why" question were very similar across the board:

"I was using it more to have a person outside of my life and social circles to talk to."
"I longed for communication outside of my circle, outside of my community and outside of my town/country. I wanted to know all different people, without involving myself into any activities I wasn't interested in. It's like getting past all the walls really fast, instead of looking for doors."
"I realized I wasn't meeting people (don't go out to bars, and most of my friends were either female or married or both, so that can make it hard to meet date-able people), and decided to try it on a whim."
"Most guys on OKC seem to join because they're new to a city, or because meeting people out in public is difficult."
"'The best and most satisfying aspect of online dating is hope. There is ALWAYS someone available in online dating and they are usually looking for, broadly speaking, something similar to what I am looking for - a date."
"It seems like most people are into casually conversing, but never setting anything in stone.... I think the truly exciting thing about it is just seeing people who are out there who you can really imagine digging.... Overall, it allows for an expansive view of what's out there (at least what is out there on one dating website) and knowing that there are a lot of possibilities to find great people and lotsa love in the world."

I'm sure you've picked up a common thread: many people who try online dating are looking to expand their horizons, meet people they might not normally meet, fulfill a need or desire for a meaningful human connection of a different sort than what they have on hand.

And isn't that something we're all looking for? Meaningful, stimulating human connections?

There are so many different ways to find and develop those kinds of connections, and why not, when the internet is so deeply intertwined with our everyday lives, use it as a tool to that end?

The 2013 study also talked about how social networking in general comes into play in modern-day relationships with people no matter where we meet them, but I won't get into that.

In fact, there are about a million different aspects of online dating I couldn't delve into in this "short" form, so maybe I'll do a series. Or a longer piece, sometime in the future. I would talk about how people present themselves on their profiles; the selection process of who we try to contact, and which advances we reject or ignore; the perception of online daters as "desperate," even among the online dating community!; how online and offline relationships compare, and interact...

What do you think, readers? Do you want to read more? And if so, are there any specific areas I should focus on? Let me know in the comments!

posted from Bloggeroid

Sunday, March 16, 2014

all good things of earth and sky

4. BuzzFeed Quizzes. I am obsessed with these lately (and the ones on Zimbio are pretty good too). What Hunger Games/Harry Potter/Princess Bride/Firefly character/mythological creature are you? Can't get enough!

(Also, if you were wondering, I'm Peeta, Dean Thomas, Inigo Montoya, Wash, and the Phoenix.) - Clara

5. Fresh baked granola. I usually take granola and yogurt for breakfast when I go to the gym in the morning, and my granola jar was getting empty this week. So I whipped up a new batch and it's so crispy and delicious... And it makes the whole house smell like honey and molasses and toasty oats! - Clara

6. Attilio's. This Italian restaurant is just a few blocks from my house, and it's legendary. Neither J nor I had been there, though, until this week, when we finally made it over there for some of the best Italian food I have ever had at a restaurant. Yummm! - Clara

7. Our radio show AGT! I was listening to MPR a lot this week at work, and I started browsing their DJ list. They have written bios of each DJ so I was reading each one. I miss AGT a lot, but I was so nostalgic after reading those bios! It reminded me of how much we got to share with our (small) audience. The songs we played and the good things we shared allowed me to start my week on such a high note. - Cassie

8. Bunnysitting. Luke and I are bunnysitting for my friends, Mitch & Kristy, this week. Noah, the bunny, can really drive me crazy sometimes--how does he always find a way under the loveseat?!?!?. But when he hops up to me and nudges at my hand letting me know he'd like some petting my heart melts like a Popsicle on a summer day. - Cassie

9. Thanks to our amazing friends and family members Luke and I were able to buy a cappuccino machine with some wedding money. We are HUGE coffee drinkers so though this was a large purchase we'll definitely get our money's worth. I was a barista in a former life, and it's been so fun to teach Luke how to tamp the grounds and froth the milk. We've been making lattes, cappuccinos, and miels every day! - Cassie

10. Double features. This Friday I saw The Grand Budapest Hotel at the Uptown theater at 9:30ish. It was a super funny and ridiculous movie. Also, the Uptown theater really did a great job remodeling over the summer/autumn, but I digress. Right after that the Lagoon had a midnight showing of The Royal Tennenbaums. It was so wonderful to enjoy 2 hilarious Wes Anderson movies on the big screen in one night. Also the midnight showing was nearly empty so I could put my feet put up and laugh as heartily as I needed to :) - Cassie

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Thank you, readers, for being with us tonight, and for giving me reasons to write, and things to write about.

And thanks for joining us every Sunday night! Join the Baby Steps on Facebook at www.Facebook.com/TheBabyStepsSaga for good things every day, and updates on new posts. Come back next week for another reminder of 10 more things to be thankful for!

Until then, be kind to each other, and find a reason to smile!

posted from Bloggeroid

Wednesday, March 12, 2014

eating the apple

This post is not so much about new adulthood or post-grad life, but it is about being human and negotiating independence in this particular time... The Age of the Third Screen? Is that a thing?

Anyway, I hope it's thought-provoking!

Many of you know that I don't buy or use Apple products, if ever I can help it. I had an iPod Mini, back when those were a thing... And while I remember that brief fling ending in frustration I can't remember why, exactly, at the age of 17 I was so disillusioned. I did still use iTunes (on my Dell laptop) until sometime in the middle of college, when I swore off the brand altogether - and I do remember what spurred me then.

It was the moment Windows Media Player stopped playing the preferred iTunes file type.

In that moment of acute first-world frustration, I realized that Apple was very intentionally selling not a series of products but a lifestyle - a type of person. And I didn't want to buy into something that by design excluded everyone who didn't buy a certain item (or, worse, couldn't afford it).

Of course, it is an absolutely brilliant business model. The dream for any brand. And these days, when the vast majority of people have a personal device, every tech brand is selling a personality, when you get down to it. There's the artsy designer type; the non-conformist; the geek; the loyalist. And Google - Big Brother - The Cloud - is my personal poison. They all have their drawbacks, and are good for different types of things and different uses.

It can also be a very social decision, which device and operating system you use. It is much more convenient to have the same family of devices as your family, the people in your inner circle. (My sister and I bump phones to share photos or contacts; J's family Facetimes. That's going to cause some issues in our marriage, I can already tell!

...kidding. Hopefully...)

But back to the issue. One of the most foolproof ways to get under my skin, to really raise my blood pressure, is to tell me that your iPhone is better than my Verizon Android phone, or any other device I could possibly choose. Drink the Kool-Aid! Go on! I won't mind! (I'm getting worked up just thinking about it.)

But, last fall, I took it too far. I was having brunch with a bunch of friends I hadn't seen in awhile (a few of them Apple users) and we got to talking about those group texts, which only work on certain devices (i.e. not flip phones and certain Android devices, like the one I had at the time). One of my friends joked to me, "OR you could just get an iPhone!" not knowing she had entered delicate territory. I made a sharp reply, basically insulting everyone at the table, which turned into a momentary awkward silence before someone brought up another topic.

Talk about drinking the Kool-Aid. It's funny, isn't it, how in pure hatred of a thing we end up epitomizing the very object of our hatred? I always marvel how people fighting passionately for two opposing sides tend to sound so much the same. (More on that another time...)

Since then I've tried to tone it down. I still won't buy Apple products, but (aside from this post) I'm quieter about it. I'll do my best to steer the conversation somewhere else if you bring it up, and trust me: if you value my good humor, it's better not to touch it. To each our own.

This past weekend, I spent 24 hours with a couple of my college besties. I noticed, about half an hour after I got there, that their phones were just not a part of the gathering. They were not a presence.

And what a shock it was for me to realize just how different that is from my norm. It was hard for me not to think about my phone, or to move it with me from room to room. As the odd one out, I realized how dysfunctional it is for my phone to play such a dominant role in my life, in my relationships and my group gatherings.

Maybe what I should be worried about isn't what phone I'm using, but whether I'm using it at all.

posted from Bloggeroid

Sunday, March 9, 2014

here comes the all good things

All Good Things started as a one-hour Sunday night radio show on KSTO St. Olaf radio, featuring feel-good music and 10 highlights from the past week. The show, and its current written form, is brought to you by Clara, Second Set of Baby Steps creator, and my radio co-host Cassie. We both contribute things to the list, so I'll tell you who said what to avoid confusion.

So get cozy and get ready for this week's batch of good things!

1. Song of the week: Here Comes the Sun by the Beatles. This is a plea for spring to come, and it just always makes me happy.

Also, one of my Facebook friends posted a throwback website she made in middle school this week, which featured a polytone .midi version of this song as the background music. So great.

2. Overcoming obstacles. Last time I drove on I-95 from Baltimore I had a panic attack and had to take the smaller U.S. Highway 40 the rest of the way, which is how I've gone since then. But it takes a little longer, so this time I gave 95 a try, deciding that if I started to feel really anxious I'd switch... But I made it the whole way on the interstate, in good time! - Clara

3. Reunions. This one makes the list a lot, but I saw my girls Mary and Lisa this weekend and it was awesome. We talked about lots of important things, cooked and ate good food, and cuddled. Talk about soul food! - Clara

4. Making a new recipe. I made a delightful quinoa Greek salad this week that had tomatoes, spinach, cucumbers, onions, and an awesome dressing. I find that during a long week I can easily forget to eat healthy foods, so it's a wonderful feeling when I make the effort and things turn out well. It was doubly good because it's vegetarian so Luke and I could eat the same meal that night (which doesn't always happen!) - Cassie

5. A new honey store opened up in my neighborhood! I visited this week and ended up with so much honey in my house. Raw honey, vanilla bean honey, and honey candy fill my cupboards right now, and I'm feeling good about it! - Cassie

6. Spring is coming! This is a bit premature, but it's in the high 30s here today which is an incredible feeling after having 50 days this winter where temps dipped into the negatives. I'm going to be one of those crazy Minnesotans who wears shorts outside today! - Cassie

7. Discernment. Today I actually went to church because we had some mission specialists coming from the synod. Despite my complicated relationship with The Church, I do have great interest in the efforts It makes to come up to speed with the world, so I went. I don't know how much progress we made, exactly, but it was definitely a step in the right direction, and I know I for one left feeling inspired and hopeful. - Clara

8. Bourbon in mimosas?! We had brunch at a place called Golden West Cafe in Baltimore's Hampden neighborhood on Saturday, and they sell carafes of mimosas made with bourbon as well as champagne! Yummm. - Clara

9. Mardi Gras. I had made plans to go out for dinner with some girlfriends on Tuesday night, not realizing it was Mardi Gras... But we found 3 seats at the bar and had some drinks and half-price burgers and great conversations. Love my girls. - Clara

10. Unexpected smiles. I desperately needed some motor oil tonight, so we swung by Walmart. Our checkout clerk in the Express Lane seemed a little cranky, but when we left I said, "Have a good night," and looked over my shoulder to see her absolutely beaming like no one had ever said that to her before. It definitely made my night, if not hers! - Clara

posted from Bloggeroid

Wednesday, March 5, 2014

how one thing can change everything else

After our visit to the Wolf Sanctuary last weekend I am a bit wolf-obsessed. And it seems like I'm not alone in that: a week or two ago this video was making the rounds, called How Wolves Change Rivers. Our tour guide at the sanctuary even said they're going to use the video in their programs.

I highly recommend you watch the video, which is about four and a half minutes long, although it doesn't seem it - but I'll give you a summary anyway.

Yellowstone was starting to turn brown, because deer and elk were overpopulating and getting lazy and eating all the vegetation in certain areas, near the banks of rivers where the water was close. The ecodiversity was leaving the park, and slowly killing it.

So they introduced wolves back to the park. And gradually the populations of the rest of the members of the food chain started to level out, and the deer started to move, and the grass and shrubs grew, and animal species that had left came back, and erosion reduced, and eventually (after 8 years or so) the rivers changed, and became more fixed in their course.

And so, one species changed the entire park, right down to the actual earth and its geography. Wolves changed everything.

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I finished a book, Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern, on Sunday night, and I still can't get it out of my head. When I was little I used to spend the whole summer reading, and when I got to the end of a really great book I would fall into a post-story depression. Depending on how much the plot swept me up, I would be more or less upset, and came out of it quicker or slower.

Books like this change the way you look at the world. This one made it seem believable that we could actually be surrounded by magic in our world, and not see it that way because we have been trained (or trained ourselves) not to.

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Now that I've started writing this post, I'm having a hard time focusing away from the fact that each of our experiences changes the way we see everything that happens from this point forward; everyone we've known changes how we meet new people and get to know them.

And this is true; this is a real fact of every day. But I think what I'm really getting at is those BIG changes, the paradigm-shakers and -shifters, the hairpin turns and one-eighties. Like the job I found on Craigslist two and a half years ago: As a result of that one application my daily routine, the way I have viewed the world, and even the people that are now an inseparable part of my life have changed.

Like my friend Jordan deciding to leave his fairly secure workplace to travel the world (and writing about that decision for the blog a few months ago.

Like my friend Mary going to seminary. Like she, Jordan, and me (and all our classmates) choosing to enroll at St. Olaf College when we were 17. Like my dad leaving medical school. Like my grandparents (all five of them) becoming missionaries.

All of these examples are intentional: we all decided to do those things. And our lives took a certain course from then on as a result, far too complicated to even begin to talk about in detail. In these examples, we are the body that decided to introduce wolves back into Yellowstone.

But there are other things that happen to us not by our own choice, that influence the course our lives take. Like the fact that my 11th grade history teacher came to my school on a St. Olaf program. Like my house getting broken into - twice - in two years. Like the churches that called my dad to serve them, leading him to consider options he would not have otherwise had, and leading us to grow up in the places we did.

Some are events of chance, if you believe in that; some choices made by others that influenced us, directly or indirectly.

I guess I don't really know what point I'm trying to make here... Just that we are interconnected and our actions influence each other. Acknowledge your ecosystems, and the series of events that brought you to where you are today, wherever that may be and however you might feel about it.

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I showed the wolves video to my parents the other night, and after that video was over we got sucked into one of the recommended videos, a full-length documentary about a couple who moved in with a wolf pack in the Idaho mountains.

We didn't have time to finish it before dinner, but right before we turned it off they introduced some new pups into the pack.

And for the rest of the evening we were left wondering, what happened to the pups? That one hour of video, spurred by sharing the Yellowstone video, spurred by our visit to the Wolf Sanctuary, got us invested in the fates of a family far from our own, in more ways than one.

posted from Bloggeroid

Sunday, March 2, 2014

all good things: keeping cool

All Good Things started as a one-hour Sunday night radio show on KSTO St. Olaf radio, featuring feel-good music and 10 highlights from the past week. The show, and its current written form, is brought to you by Clara, Second Set of Baby Steps creator, and my radio co-host Cassie. We both contribute things to the list, so I'll tell you who said what to avoid confusion.

So get cozy and get ready for this week's batch of good things!

1. Song of the week: Rocky Raccoon by the Beatles. This song came up a bunch of times this week, under totally different circumstances. The most important of them is in tribute to the raccoon stuffed animal that greeted us as we entered our vacation rental for the first time. We named him Rocky, of course, and he danced to his theme song at least once this weekend... (Video can be found here.) Miss you already, li'l Rocky!

2. Skipping town. Both Cassie and I have a serious case of cabin fever, and both of us got to skip town this weekend. We both just went over state lines, but even making a point to go to the next town over can make a huge difference!

Cassie was still on the road when this post was being written, so for the rest of the post, if it says "I" or "me" it means Clara!

3. America's Coolest Small Town. Also known as Lititz, Pennsylvania. Seems to fit the bill, even after just 3 days, and even in the cold when there's not much going on. Made me realize how much I miss small towns...

4. Good music. Do you ever have a week where there is good music playing everywhere you go? That was this week.

5. Trains. I went on a work trip this week and got to ride the train back from D.C. to Wilmington. It shaves at least an hour off the trip, and there's some good scenery along the train tracks. Plus, I can usually read on the train without getting motion sick.

6. Good tea! When I was in high school my mom and I used to go to this tea shop in a town twenty minutes away. The kind of place that has loose tea in jars or boxes for sniffing out your chosen brew. Since we left Amsterdam (New York), though, I haven't really found a good tea shop... And the first thing we did in Lititz on Friday was have two pots of tea in a place called Cafe Chocolate. Satisfied.

7. Speedwell Wolf Sanctuary. Wolves are incredible, majestic animals. Yesterday J and I got to see them up close when we took a tour of Pennsylvania's wolf sanctuary. This place rescues wolves that are sick or have been mistreated or confiscated, and keeps them safe in large enclosures. We learned a lot and got to meet a few inspirational wolf packs.

8. Local beer culture. When we leave DE, J and I tend to gravitate toward the food-and-beer type of attractions around our destination. We got lucky with Lititz, and enjoyed two separate brewpubs within blocks of each other and our vacation rental: Sturgis Haus and Appalachian Brewing Company.

9. Google Hangouts. You can do more with Skype, but Google Hangouts is becoming one of my favorite ways to easily chat with friends on my phone. It's a relatively light application for a video chat. This week I used it to chat with Cassie!

10. On Tuesday night, for the first time, J and I met with my dad, who is going to marry us. It feels more real now, and I for one appreciate the perspective I left with about what's really important about the whole thing and how to approach the planning - not just planning a wedding and reception, but planning our lives together as a married couple. Pretty cool.

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