Just Kinda Hippy Fabulous

As we were deciding on our order, the waitress popped in, "We try to have local ingredients whenever possible and we are all about natural and whole foods here." 

 

I looked up at her and said, "I like this place.  It's definitely fits my hippy ways.  Now, if we could just get this one to eat some weird cheese!" 

 

"We don't go to Walmart for produce that's for sure," she replied with a laugh. 

 

"Ugh, I hate Walmart.  It makes me feel crazy inside," added in Danae.  The same one who didn't want to try cheese with blue or rind. 

 

To which the waitress replied, "I hate capitalism." 

 

And then I added in, "Oh so you're like a real hippy.  You see I still like Target and I believe in hair products and I buy cheap jewelry which was made in other countries. 

 

"Yeah, she's more like hippy fabulous while you are the real deal," quipped my friend with her quick wit. 

 

Ummm...yes, I believe in capitalism I guess.  Because I shop at Target and I fully embrace using mascara and use my fair share of hairspray in this wild hair.  But I do like to grow food in the dirt and I do pay attention to where the food we can't grow comes from.  So, I'll go with being kinda in the mode of hippy fabulous.  Hippy with a side of glitter maybe. 

 

There's how the lunch began and it kept rolling in that exact same manner.  The this is real life manner.  The clinking of the ice cubes in our tea and the feel of the smooth leather chairs in the dim contrasted the bright outside bustling of downtown while my friend and I sat across from each other hashing out some business.  The business of having your friend tell you the stuff you need to hear which might not always be the easiest to digest.  The stuff which can lead to a tear or two falling down. 

 

Sometimes you need your friends to make that tear fall.  To push you into a direction you know in your heart you should take but don't have the courage to take yet.  The sharing of my story.  I forget I've done some major life changing in the past couple of years.  Okay, wait.  Let me be honest.  Like you were my friend sitting across from me while we sipped unsweetened ice tea.  It's not that I forget where I was; it's more of a not wanting to believe or admit I was ever there.  I'm working on embracing that I am more than half less of what I used to be.  I'm working on sharing more about how I did it on my own.   

 

I'm working on accepting it might be inspiring to others.  Because really, I'd rather probably just pretend it never happened.  Like I never was only able to run one/tenth of a mile.  Like I never was unhealthy in not just my physical self, but also my head's well being.  Pretend like I was always the way I am now.   

But then I think about how hard I worked for this.  How it took strength and will power and pain because love a freaking duck it wasn't easy.  Not one bit.  But the whole time I knew I was in it.  I knew it was never give up time.  So I kept at it.  Learning about eating real food and forcing myself to take one more running step after one more running step.  And I think about how during that time, it was something I internalized and put my nose to the grindstone and just did.  No programs.  No gimmicks.  No quick fixes.       

Hard work.  It was hard work.  And really, it's not over.  It never will be.  Being healthy is an every single day choice we all make.  Moving our bodies is another every single day choice.  But I'm now almost to the point I would say it's my natural way of living. 

 

Which is why my friend Danae sat across from me and pushed.  Pushed me to share about how I lost an entire person's worth of weight while gaining my life back.  Pushed me to not pretend to forget or to feel shame about where I was, but rather embrace the inspiration of being here.  In the now. 

 

And what I'll say is this.  Losing weight didn't simply change my body.  It changed my way of thinking and my way of looking at the world.  It made me more apt to notice the small and the goodness in the very tiniest of moments.  It changed my entire life.  So maybe I'll talk more about it.  Maybe.  I'm about two finger types away from erasing this entire thing.  The "forgetting" part of me wants to.  Because I know we all have stories to share and we all work hard and we all have had some wins along the way, so I'm not all about shouting from the rooftop, "I did this!"   

 

What I am about though?  Is noticing that when I walked intersected the spot where an alley met street after that lunch, my skirt flew up and around in the best of ways.  The ways of feeling alive and happy and embracing the two minutes of standing there on the not so clean sidewalk with the fresh air blowing to capture the feeling.  The feeling of living.   

 

Danae turned around and saw me standing in the middle of an alley, with my camera pointed down, and laughter coming from my mouth while saying, "Look!  The wind catches this just right!"  She replied with, "See?!  This is why you need to just do it.  Write the dang book already."    

 

I'll start with this one small step of sharing.  See if it sits right.  

 

And I'll thank my friend for taking the leap to enjoy really good cheese with me while at the same time pushing me into a leap of my own.  Pushing me to the edge enough to know it's time. 

 

Time to embrace where I was and where it has taken me the same way I embrace the wind from an alley making my skirt flitter around.  Which means it might not make a lick of sense to anyone else.  Which means I must finish this before I let my now one type away from erasing fingers do just that. 







Yes, You'll be Blessed

Last Saturday morning, I awoke in not my house in not my town.  After a quick whoa it's still early assessment and a rub of my eyes, I made the decision to actually stand up.   Because what greeted my ears was the sounds of my friend visiting with her aunt while her babies were ruffling around doing the morning business of playing with race cars and fighting over race cars with little sisters and needing a fresh diaper and non stop chitter chatter.  A cup of coffee soon found my hand and a blanket curled up around my feet on the couch to partake in the early beginnings of the day.

So the three littles wouldn't go completely awry in their not usual setting, we scooped them up and headed outside to run and walk and get out some of those fighting over race cars issues.    

After our legs were sufficiently stretched, we came back for breakfast. 
 

And I had a moment. A moment of appreciating their peanut butter smeared faces and little fingers reaching for their food and their twinkly smiles from already having time in the fresh air. 

Sure it's a messy affair, this breakfast with three kids thing, but my goodness it is the stuff of greatness at the same time.  The stuff which deserves appreciation for the beauty of childhood.  Even when it's covered in peanut butter and sticky jelly.    

On the way home road on a week ago from today, I heard an Elton John song on the radio.  It spurred me to quickly purchase his greatest hits on my phone so I could listen to his genius for a few hundred miles.  Towards the end of the album there is a song called Blessed.  The first time the lyric "but I swear you'll be blessed" came out of his mouth, somewhere near the small town of Larimore, I actually had an almost tear.  

Not a tear out of sadness either, but one of happiness and brightness for what will come in the future.  The lyrics, along with the way Elton (sure I can be on a first name basis with him) delivers them, gets me.  Because it's exactly how I feel right now in my life.  I don't know when I'll have peanut butter smeared faces of my own in the every single morning, but I know that when they are with me someday, they'll be blessed and loved so deeply because I'll be in the spot to appreciate the messiness after having all of this time of me, myself, and clean.  I've come to the place where I don't wonder if, I wonder when.  And that is a beautiful thing of acceptance for loving living in the now. 

   
Elton, you are a true genius.  This song with the name Blessed is blessed perfection.  Now all of you out there, do yourself a favor and don't simply read these words but also take the time to listen to the pretty way in which he sings it on this Sunday morning.  If I was real crafty, I'd figure out a way to play it from here for you, but Google can be your friend instead of me getting too with it.        

Hey you, you're a child in my head  

You haven't walked yet  

Your first words have yet to be said  

But I swear you'll be blessed

 
I know you're still just a dream  

Your eyes might be green  

Or the bluest that I've ever seen  

Anyway you'll be blessed

 
And you, you'll be blessed 

You'll have the best, I promise you that 

I'll pick a star from the sky, pull your name from my hat I promise you that, promise you that  

Promise you that, you'll be blessed
 

I need you before I'm too old  

To have and to hold  

To walk with you and watch you grow  

And know that you're blessed
 

And you, you'll be blessed 

You'll have the best, I promise you that 

I'll pick a star from the sky, pull your name from my hat I promise you that, promise you that
 

You, you'll be blessed You'll have the best, I promise you that 

I'll pick a star from the sky, pull your name from my hat I promise you that, promise you that  

Promise you that, you'll be blessed

When I snapped that picture of my coffee cup with the sounds of forks clanging and kids laughing, it was because of the sunlight streaming in.  I'm not sure I even read the words and now it turned out to be so much more.  I love when that happens. 

From This Labor Day On

From this day forward, I am declaring a tradition.  The tradition is called on Labor Day, we shall all meet at the farm in the morning and can homemade graden salsa.  The official title is From This Labor Day On. 

 

Momma Debi will chop the onions and garlic while Sil peels and slices the tomatoes during which I dice the green and hot peppers.  With Sister Pister doing her college homework at the counter and the four kids running underfoot. 

Dad-o and Brother will pop in and out from testing the flax to see if it is ready to combine and the two little boys will insist upon going along for the back and forths.  Dad-o will have to almost run me over with the combine before I realize mid-running stride he is behind me because the music and the sun and the gravel road are doing it right.  The kids will play outside and find treasures to show Nana.  We will all visit and catch up with each other.

I'm declaring a new tradition because that's exactly what happened this morning and I think it should happen again.  That's the way it is with traditions; they start from something that makes you go, "This right here?  This is the life I want."  And then you recreate the good stuff over and over again. 

 

Yes, Labor Day is now forever going to be precisely what it was today.  Productivity, family, and life loving.          

 

The smell of the salsa cooking brought on my final feelings of fall.  It's here.  The air is crisper, the grass is crunchy underfoot, and the leaves are thinking about it.  They are.  So naturally when I walked in my door in the late afternoon with a box of jars in my hands, I ignored my unpacked suitcase from earlier weekend travels and I ignored the clean dishwasher which needed emptying and I ignored the laundry and I ignored the stack of work business brought home on Friday and I ignored that I could see footprints on my floors.  Ignored all of that to take a few moments to tie some pretty string around one jar of salsa. 

 

Ignored all of that to dump old fashioned oatmeal which had been sitting in a canister on my counter for too long in a vase to magically become a candle holder. 

 

 

Ignored all of that to place the not quite ripe squash to top off the start of my fall table.  It's totally September now so I don't even feel any shame.  My happy fall dance is officially rolling. 

   

Maybe I love this time of year so much because it brings about these feelings of gratitude inside me.  Of being more than thankful my family is all close and that we can gather at the farm to do something like can homemade garden salsa.  Sure it's amazing to have jars of fresh salsa to crack into anytime I want, but what's better is knowing all of the action which happened behind the scenes of that tomato slicing and green pepper dicing. 
  

Now that's in the late hours of the night, I know I put my nose the grindstone after the table episode and everything has been crossed off the to-do list.  Another reminder of sometimes it's alright to do the pretty-ing up stuff first before the work is done. 

Add to my From This Labor Day On tradition:

Decorate the table for fall.  Only the table.