Our Facebook Obsessions

Attention everyone! I have an important declaration to make.

You should not base your happiness, or the value of your life, on how many "likes" you get on your Facebook status update.

This is ludicrous! I cannot claim to be innocent in this issue, so those of you who are already offended (maybe I hit a little too close to home) please know I am not throwing stones. However, as I continue to use technology like social networking, both for work and for personal use, I can see that we as a society are starting to change our views of technology's role in our lives. I have evidence to back up my claims:
1. I recently got invited to a football game viewing party. When I say "party", I mean that my boyfriend and I were invited to a friend's house, with 4 other people total, and instead of calling us to ask us if we wanted to watch, I was invited via a facebook event.
2. When implementing a new technological tool at school with my students, I got the response "Can't we just do it the old fashioned way and print it out for you?!" Old fashioned way is now "to type and print"...
3. I realized that upon completing tasks like doing the dishes, I felt a unnerving need to post about it online and get complimented by the general public on my great "accomplishment".
4. I also realized that I once got extremely angry at my boyfriend for not bothering to update his status for months on end... mostly because I wanted people to "see our relationship grow". What?!? Can't our friends just go out with us to see this?!?!

There is so, so much more...
However, what I decided to do was not to complain about this inundation, but rather to be sure that I accept this reality (although I don't need to like it) and to let you all know that you are BETTER than this. True friends don't need to be "friends" on facebook. Truly good news should be shared in person. Real accomplishment comes from your feeling of satisfaction within, not from how many people "view your profile". And, when you update your status to share that you've finished brewing another cup of tea for an afternoon pick-me-up, know that perhaps the world won't really take notice, and if no one "likes" your post, it is going to be ok. You can still drink your tea and find pleasure in it. If not, perhaps you need to turn off the computer. Now.

So I took a year off!!!

Everyone gets distracted every now and then. The saddest part is that I distracted myself from, well, myself for the past year of life. I started writing because I felt like I needed to write again. I have always dreamed of writing in my "spare time" and low and behold, this past year I didn't allow myself to even HAVE spare time. I have completely gotten wrapped up in my image of what life is supposed to look like, what I am supposed to be doing, and how I can prove to others that I am good at it. Well, it may just have all been a big illusion! When you get busy, especially when you bring the business upon yourself, you don't allow yourself any time to think. THINKING IS VITAL PEOPLE! It is not just an expression, I am sure if I really looked hard I'd find psychological evidence of this fact. Here is my hypothesis:
Being too busy allows you to be constantly distracted. What distracts us, as humans, are the things we THINK are important or think we need. For example, I think that I need to be the last person at work every night to prove to all my coworkers that I work hard. Um, ok, why can't I work hard and still maintain NORMAL working hours? And why can't the joy in my students' faces (maybe not joy but at least not disdain) be all the recognition I need? We think that we need "stuff". After being robbed in November, I realized we don't need stuff, it is just stuff. I was so calm and so comforted by my calm nature at that moment that I started to see the fault in needing to buy the best, the most expensive, the most in general... So, while we are being distracted by our lives, it is really to avoid what we dread the most: having to really listen to our hearts.

I once had a friend who I thought was the coolest! I loved her sense of fashion, style of decor in her house, culinary tastes, and company. As I moved through this friendship, I started to feel like I was never good enough, never trendy enough, never going to be as beautiful or as rich as this girl wanted her friends to be. I mean, I don't own designer jeans, expensive make up, or even get my hair and nails done at top salons (or at all!) When I started to realize that I was constantly comparing myself to this other lifestyle, and I realized that it wasn't "me", I was miserable with guilt. I felt like I had lied to other people, when in reality it was myself I had been lying to all along. I am not the person I was wanting to become, and I had to really listen to my heart, as much as it was breaking, to know that I couldn't remain friends with someone who was on a totally different path than I was.

So, if you wonder where this return to the written word has come from, it is from reading! 2 weeks ago I resolved to return to activities that I knew once made me happy, but I had moved away from for far too long. I read a book again. For fun. One that I had started months ago but never finished once I got "busy". Paulo Coehlo's The Alchemist. Perhaps it is where my heart is now, or my introspection, but holy wow is that philosophical book about my life precisely. I want to read it again, picking out passages that touched me and made me want to be "me" again.

Minus the judgment, the guilt, the sadness, and the other weaknesses that have taken over me.

Christmas Cheer

I really wish I had more time to write lately. The end of the semester is always packed full for teachers. However, now I have time to relax in Minnesota, watch some snowy weather outside, and enjoy my favorite Christmas past time-- sipping on holiday themed beverages.

This year I am experimenting with Bailey's and Amaretto. Nothing soothes a shopped-out soul like a good martini by the fire, with reruns on TV, and your family dog chasing after you to go for a walk.

I am not a nostalgic person usually, but we certainly have our family traditions, and as the children in the family (4 of us) we refuse to let go of them. We HAVE to open gifts Christmas Eve, with one exception from Santa, who still visits. We always wake up early and search through the stockings first. We usually go to church when our parents are singing or playing in the band, but we always dress up in festive outfits. We all eat dinner together, and we can't open gifts until mom has declared that the table is sufficiently clean and all left overs are stored away. This killed us as kids. Oh, and dad usually procrastinates a bit more and pretends to do odds and ends to torture us. At least he isn't still trying to get us to perform family Christmas songs on video anymore...

Leaves

I love leaves. But, the only reason I love them is because I don't have to rake them. Actually, I take that back, I have to rake bougainvillea leaves all the time, and that sucks. They are everywhere and then they pile up and are nests for pests.

However, colorful as the desert flora is, I love the reds, yellows, oranges, and even the browns of fall leaves. I think that I really found a love for fall when I lost it in Colorado 10 years ago. Although fall exists here in AZ, and in CO, it isn't the same.

So, to cure myself of my fall blues, I went on three recent trips just to see fall, and a forth incidental trip. I saw fall in Green Bay, WI at the end of September along Highway 94. I saw fall in Dillon, Colorado over Labor Day Weekend (early!) in the yellow Aspen trees. I saw fall in Sedona during a hike that was designed around where fall colors were noted on AZHIKES.COM. And last, I saw the peak of fall in Grand Junction Colorado, surrounding the vineyards of Palisade.

Needless to say, I took as many pictures as I could and now have great visual memories to keep with me. What a great season. I am just hoping that next fall my wedding is set to the back drop of these lovely colors! :)

Halloween

Why is Halloween my absolute favorite holiday? I'll tell you why! It is the holiday that requires you to dress up, get creative, and let your wild side out. Nothing is more fun to me than a theme party, and Halloween is the only acceptable excuse for an adult to throw a theme party (that is not "Over the Hill" or "Baby Shower"...) Ok, so if you want to throw a theme party, do it, but don't say I didn't warn you.

Anyway, every Halloween I spend months trying to come up with a creative idea for my costume. I don't like buying standard costumes, because I don't want to match anyone else. So, instead, I rummage through my closet and try to piece together items to create a look. The past few years recent summer blockbusters have inspired me. This year I haven't seen any movies...

I also like decorating for Halloween. I love gravestones, skulls and crossbones, candy corn lights, and spider webs. It makes me happy to see the decorative skull candle, and to be the most festive house on the block (and NOT for Christmas).

Do you love Halloween, too?

Why am I doing this again?

Oh yea! I have and always will be a writer. I have a passion for the written word, as is evident in my passion for the subject I teach, English Literature. Every day I give students advice on how to improve their own writing through various forms of feedback and exercise, but in the recent past I have ignored my own need to write for myself, and not just for them. I used to want to write the classic novel. Then I wanted to write a teen self-help book (we all go through that whiney, teenage angst phase), and then children books about hippos and pigs being friends to improve their self images. (I had a wild imagination, and I love pigs!) Now I just want to let it all lose. I think that this will be a good form of therapy for me, and then my boyfriend of 4.5 years will stop making me call my mother during an emotional outburst. I don't even care if NO ONE reads it.

I guess my other inspiration was my journals from when I was younger. Upon searching fervently for my old copy of Into the Wild, by Jon Krakauer, before his book signing on Saturday night, I found some old writings, mostly written when venting about exes or just experiencing something new in life. These were corny, cheesy, pointless. Not that my writing is here to "change the world" but in my maturity (if that really ever does happen) I've seen the ill in my ridiculous ideals of the past. I was seriously going to MARRY someone who wouldn't call me back for a month at a time?!? If I knew what I knew then...

Ooh, great topic for the next installment.