I Want You To (Weezer)

It's amazing how someone can bring you down more than a few notches just by thinking of them and equivalently there are others that can lift you up just as much with so little effort. Just thinking of an uplifting person makes you want to burst out laughing, do a cartwheel, sing (basically act like a five year old). I am among the number who believe that these individuals are not put into our life coincidentally - indeed they make life worth living most of the time. Even now I can conjure memories of hilarious car rides and day trips to Great America with my best friend when I rode a roller coaster next to a Zac Efron look-alike, sauntering through a coastal town with friends belting Twist and Shout, a new years dance where my childhood bestie asked me for the first dance: memories that would never have been the same without the people I was with. Today I take a moment to be truly grateful for some of the amazing people I have been friends with, and events I have had the pleasure of experiencing. 

Recently I've had the pleasure of meeting a group of people that make me feel pleased to be myself. They reminded me that when you meet the people that really clique with you and make you a better you, you know immediately. Only when I met them did I realize I've been trying way too hard, and that the people I was interacting with didn't uplift me. Everyone has to have the strength to recognize the time to nurture a healthy relationship, and when to separate yourself from something that is poisoning more than helping the participants. Life, love and relationships, even conversations are so thrillingly organic, they never fail to impress me. Words give you the power to get along with just about anyone, but the way you use your words makes all the difference. 

Some people use words and relationships as weapons against others, a means solely to get what they want. They selfishly exploit an originally selfless and beautiful creation, but the most disappointing thing about seeing people of this type is that they have no idea what they're missing out on by only allowing themselves a disposable, plastic pretension. They're not fostering a healthy relationship that would ultimately improve their own lives. It's a gamble to put yourself out on the line for people, and it can be hard when others aren't used to someone being up front and genuine with them, but I have always found the rewards of doing so greatly outweigh the pitfalls that you occasionally experience as a result. I guess I must agree sociologically with the belief that most people are inherently good, and want to foster good. As for those of us who can't bring themselves to put yourself out there and be genuine, you're hurting yourself more than anyone else, and my heart aches for you.

The best time to make friends is when you're comfortable being yourself already. That way you aren't seeking validation from your relationship. The very best friends are the ones who are there for you when you're going through things that aren't very fun. Are they kind and supportive, or are they pessimistic and unhelpful? It's hard to let people go, but when they begin to discourage your personality and express unpleasant opinions about you and those you hold dear, it's usually a pretty good sign that the person isn't a healthy connection anymore. I've had friends that I had difficulty maintaining a relationship with because they discouraged the outgoing bits of my personality. At first I listened, but the lifestyle I led in fear of doing something wrong, getting into trouble, or even of simply wasting my time was worthless time for me. Doing things wrong and getting into trouble are valuable learning experiences that help us all learn who we are and where we stand. Never avoid doing something because you're afraid it would be a waste of time when the alternative is doing nothing... In my experience, trying something new is almost never a waste of time.

Friendship is such a beautiful thing in nature that I'm not altogether surprised that there are so many ways they go wrong sometimes. There are just so many things that can go so RIGHT with a loving friendship that the risk factor is more than compensated for. When you see two individuals in a healthy relationship, whether platonic or romantic, you can immediately tell. You know by the way they smile,  the way they move, speak, act, the things they say, the look in their eyes. A healthy friendship is such a blessing. When you have a good friend you can't wait to tell them everything, because you know they'll support you in your newest venture, remark honestly on your thoughts, feel comfortable with silence, but mostly you know they'll have an overall positive effect on you when you interact. When you've been in contact with a real friend, you'll feel better for it, blessed, and even excited about when you'll see them next. 

Friendship is also the door to the heart. When I see a couple that weren't good friends beforehand I feel curious as to how they've managed it. Dating, to me, is a stage of courtship that eventually leads to marriage, but how can you progress to dating someone when you didn't know them as a friend first? I suppose personally I hope someday for the kind of marriage in which I am the best of friends with my husband and can laugh and joke with them. I'm not really interested in spending the rest of my life with a person who can charm their way through dinner and a movie but aren't much good with real life problems and situations. In fact I've found that the moments I find men most endearing and attractive are when I witness them handle a difficult or awkward life situation with grace and humor. Life is pretty full of hilarious, awkward and difficult situations, so the moments that truly matter are not when they handle a good moment, but how they handle a trying one. Honestly, when I see someone smile their way through and remain kind to others, I feel a deep sense of appreciation for them. It makes me want to grin, and give them a hug. 

Honesty is another thing that's important to me. And general openness. When there a couple are so secretive that they're not even sure what to say around others anymore it's uncomfortable to spend time with them, and uncomfortable for them too. I love to feel as though I can be completely open and say what's on my mind. If I like someone, why not say it out loud, to them and anyone else? When friendship turns into love, honesty is often a side effect that just kind of comes with the territory. There is something so satisfying about starting a relationship with someone that's your best friend. They know you, they support you, and receiving love from such a pure source (love from someone who knows your flaws along with your strong points) is freeing. It makes love that much stronger. 

I am so much in support of dating exclusively your best friends, that I almost don't even understand the "friend zone" idea. Friend zone? What does it accomplish if you refuse to date someone you're good friends with? There's nothing to lose. When something is right, you know it is deep down. Stop resisting, and stop overthinking, you silly, silly people! Love happens, and you are not in charge of how, when, and with whom it happens. When love comes knocking through friendship or dating, don't turn it down, because you never know what you'll miss if you aren't willing to take a chance.

Home (Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeroes)

The past couple of weeks have been full of great times and a packed full schedule for me. Last weekend I underwent two separate interviews for job offers that I had gotten out of the blue. The first was only for an occasional date night sitter for a nearby family with three boys, but the second was closer to Anchorage and seems to have been exactly what I've been hoping for.
I hit it off with the family right away. They have three boys, Zebbie, Psalm, and Justice. They love music and art and playing outside, they have healthier eating habits that mirror my own a lot more than most people I meet or have sat for. Healthy eating habits have become more important to me since I sat for a family that insisted I let their children eat whatever they wanted. They had a boy who drank exclusively apple juice, and a girl who only drank cranberry, and that was all they would drink all day. They never drank any other kind of juice and worse, they never drank water!! It drove me completely off my rocker and since then I have always greatly appreciated a family who maintains healthy eating habits for their kids.
The new family I met are friendly and christian, and they are completely open to a nanny trying new things with their kids, as long as they're interacting together. They don't want their kids to sit around and watch TV all day, but they don't expect rocket science - they just want their kids to be kept busy doing constructive activities, which I can appreciate. I also underwent a sort of drivers' test. I was told that their previous nanny had been quite the crazy driver. Luckily I have been on enough nanny interviews to know when a parent wants to check in on something like that even if they hadn't explicitly told you. Also luckily I happen to be a pretty good driver.
Although this new job is pretty much an answer to prayer, it was really difficult to put in my two week notice at my old job taking care of an adorable six month old named MacKenzie. The family had been very good to me, always putting in the effort to make me feel comfortable and considering that the baby takes three naps a day and is overall happy the job would be perfect if I were already attending school. The main reason I even interviewed with the other family is that I needed the extra money to return to school, and when I explained this to my employer, Carrie, she was really very kind about it. Everything really seemed to smooth out when Carrie was happy to meet my sister Lexie to take on the job.
On Thursday my sister accompanied me to work and hogged the baby. Things went as well as expected considering Lexie is pretty much the baby wizard and she seemingly swept up the job before I could blink. It was a huge relief that Lexie was able to take it over since she had been looking for a job anyway and I've really come to love Carrie's family.
Following work on Monday I swung by one of my favorite thrift stores in Palmer, Bishop's Attic. When I had passed over a couple of snowboards that I knew would be useless in this wonderful new warm and sunny weather we've been getting in Alaska, I made my way to the back room where all the sports equipment is kept. It's always a gamble what you're going to find there. There are always an abundance of skis there, enough to fill two giant drums. There are shelves full of snowboard boots, the occasional pair of ski (shoes?), the ever present trio of skates that look like they've been used by hockey players and  the rest is always questionable. They get shoulder pads and gloves, cleats, and a whole assortment of random sports equipment from time to time.
This particular day the items I discovered in the sports section of Bishop's Attic fell decidedly into the last category of randomness. They were climbing harnesses and for some reason the moment I set eyes on them I knew I was going to have to try them on. I examined the first, keeping an eye on the other shoppers in the aisle and waiting for them to leave. The second I pulled the first off the shelf I knew it was too big, and sure enough when I checked the tag it was an XL, but the second was a medium and I fidgeted with it until every last person had left the aisle I was in. Then I made my move, stepping into the questionably large enough harness and thanking God I had worn my thinnest, tightest blue jeans that day. I had just managed to wiggle into the harness and was admiring my handywork and wondering if it was too tight or just kind of snug when I glanced up and noticed a tall redheaded man watching me with thinly disguised amusement.
I was horrified. Here I was standing in the middle of Bishop's with a decidedly tight harness wrapped around my thighs and butt and someone had noticed. There was no hiding the harness, or even getting it off in a discreet manner, besides I suspected he had been watching this go on for far to long for me to make a dignified exit. He examined a shelf of random donated items with a smirk to his features while I struggled out of the accursed harness with the alacrity that had thus far avoided me. I was halfway through escaping the thing when he met my gaze finally and commented, "Seems a little risky." "Yeah, that's true," I replied, removing the harness, shoving it back onto the shelf and exiting the aisle in the time it took me to utter the words. At that point I was so embarrassed that I had not only been caught trying on the harness but that someone had actually bothered to point out to me the stupidity of buying a climbing harness from a thrift store that I didn't even try to settle down and browse the store... I left immediately. Looking back now it cracks me up how utterly I was thrown by this occurrence. Why did I care?
The day before St. Patrick's day I headed over to Younique Boutique to kill some time before I had to go to the gym. When I got to the Meta Rose center, though, Younique Boutique was closed so instead of just leaving I decided to head upstairs to that gaming store. I had never been there before but when I entered it had some cool fandom based merchandise, and then a lot of other items that were pretty nerdy and a lot of secondhand. But the very first thing that struck me was the quantity of teenage boys flooding the place.

They were sitting at long white plastic foldout tables playing cards, which I might have not only condoned but loved to have joined in until I realized they were playing Pokemon.... Pokemon?? In my apparently none too valuable opinion, Pokemon should be a fad that lasts between the ages of nine and at the very latest fourteen... True, I never got more into Pokemon than owning like two cards given to me by some friends when I was younger, but I honestly feel like there are just better games out there!
 As a person who loves card games and has been known to break out a game of Fluxx, play a few thousand rounds of Loot, or alternate endlessly between games played with a standard deck of playing cards (nuts, speed, BS, blackjack, I pretty much never turn down a game of cards), I am offended by the idea that there are individuals out there who remain obsessed with a childish game based on an anime series created for children which you play by pitting made up monsters with varying made up skill and points levels against one another...

Probably the biggest disappointment of visiting the game store, though, was that they didn't have any Nintendo 64 game systems. I don't know about anyone else, but other than the obvious hipster points gained simply by owning a Nintendo 64, there are actually a couple of games I prefer playing on said game system. And by "a few" I here mean Donkey Kong. As a kid there were a few relatives of mine that owned both a Nintendo 64 and the accompanying Donkey Kong game and I grew so attached to playing it, that when the Wii came out, following by Wii versions of Mario and Donkey Kong I was actually kind of disappointed.

I wasn't much of a gamer to begin with, but when I tried the Wii I was positively terrible. When Just Dance 3 came out in the beginning of the peak of the Just Dance craze I bought a copy for my family for Christmas and we immediately fell in love with it, redeeming in my eyes the Wii. Despite my love of the game, I still to this day can never get a good score on Wii Just Dance. I love the Wii for Netflix, but I'll admit I've always favored an Xbox 360 despite my lack of gamer roots. It's just cool!

A couple of new apps I downloaded this week are actually very cool. I got the Red Jumpsuit App, which enables you to listen to an entire album of their music. I have to admit that prior to the app I actually had only heard one song by them, which was Face Down, but I figured I would give it a try. I was really impressed by their music. I'm not usually one to fall in love with an entire album so much as individual songs (there are exceptions to the rule), but I was pleasantly surprised to fall in love with each song on the album as it played. They were good songs, and prior to listening to the album I hadn't realized the Christian roots that Red Jumpsuit Apparatus has. I would really suggest downloading the app to anyone.

Another cool one I discovered was SeatGeek. It shows you events and bands that are going to be in your area, which is cool for someone like me who is always looking for a new thing to try, and a new way to fill the time rather than just sitting around. There were't too many events for Anchorage but there were tons for Sacramento, which will be extremely helpful in the planning of my summer trip to California. I'm not quite sure what I'm going to do there yet, but there is a long list of ideas and I'm determined to start knocking off items from my bucket list (which I have begun to make up in physical form).

A few things that I have my heart set on that if I don't get to do this summer I have a feeling I will be accomplishing within the next few years are a trip to Yosemite, a good road trip with Portland, SanFran, San Diego, Arizona and the four corners on the list (this is only the beginning, I feel). I want to go to another country for my birthday although I haven't yet pinned down my favorite idea between backpacking Australia, a trip to Spain, a cruise (Mediterranean?), or whatever opportunity presents itself at the time.

This June I plan on knocking out the Color Run, volunteering at the MudFactor, (hitting up pretty much any 5k that comes my way), seeing the Warped Tour, completing a triathlon, and seeing Fall Out Boy, Watsky, We the Kings, Newfound Glory, and just basically taking every opportunity by the horns as it comes. I can't wait..