this is part of an email i received from a customer the other day. i was thinking of submitting it to Reader's Digest.
And I would again like to say that I am happy with the book, and with the fact that it arrived very quickly after I received it.
my dad showed me an article which announced that he was nominated for an award in his town. it's called the Children's Champion Award, and here is the blurb that was submitted to describe why he deserves the award:
"[J.O.] walked into our office approximately five years ago without solicitation and volunteered to help in any way he could," [S.K.] said in the nomination. "Every Wednesday morning, he reappears without our prompting and without assignment. He comes willing to do any necessary task."
[J.O.] has mentored students, arranged for "day on the job" opportunities, recruited guest speakers and other volunteers, and provided relationship and grief counseling, [S.K.] said.
"He continually serves as a positive male role model for our students," [S.K.] said. "His goal is to truly make a difference in the lives of others."
i don't think i could possibly be prouder. i've always known my dad is a hero. he's my hero, and i've been blessed to have such personal ways to be affected by him. most of who i am today was encouraged and nurtured by him.
except my sense of humor. i have a waay better sense of humor. ;-)
one of my co-workers, who i will refer to as R, is in love with the circus. she very enthusiastically talks about it once a year when the area elementary children (3rd or 4th graders) get to take a field trip to the circus. the buses gather at the county fairgrounds, and then caravan the 45-minute trip down the state road to the big city where the circus is. she said that she still vividly remembers the day she got to go, and it was a happy memory, so she almost gets teary-eyed thinking about how much fun the kids are going to have.
today, we were each assigned a job at the circus, assuming we would all one day run away with it. R decided that she would be one of those girls that hangs on the rope by her teeth and twirls in fancy circles.
R: what are those girls called?
anonymous contributions: ...ok, i'll be honest - i can only remember my own contributions, which were "floozies? sluts??"
i was just kidding, of course. i don't consider those artists floozies or sluts. i was told that i could be the lion tamer, because then i'd get to pet the lions. our manager (M) was told that she was going to be the clown. she said she didn't have what it takes to be a clown, and hates clowns anyways, so asked if she could, instead, be the person who does sign language down in front for the deaf children in the audience.
R: do they have sign language people at circuses?
M: no, but deaf children like the circus, too.
R: do you know sign language??
M: no, but i can learn
R: you could learn how to be a clown, too.
anyways, this is a common thing in our office. last year, we all chose who we would be in relation to R the Country Music Star. I first was manager, then i was demoted to wardrobe girl, and finally i ended up being the merch girl. :o(
i think, somehow, we all assume we're going to achieve these huge aspirations - as a group. i need a huge aspiration in which other people can follow me around, picking up my dirty laundry, or making me fresh-squeezed orange juice. actually, i'd just be satisfied having a human calculator at hand 24/7. i need someone to do math for me. or, it would also be nice to have a Sven.
i totally just got a personal message on facebook from matthew mayfield. haha.
time for a new Postsecret installment.
there haven't really been that many funny ones, recently. the word poo makes up for the deficit. who doesn't like to hear the word poo every once in awhile (one reason i have great appreciation for a.a. milne.)?
i recently watched Pan's Labyrinth, and had promised someone i'd write out some of my thoughts about the ending. i'm still working through them, though. i will write some things, so here is the ***SPOILER WARNING*** for anyone who hasn't watched it. since i am specifically dealing with the end of the story, i can't help but give things away. and i don't feel like trying to be secretive about it.
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my immediate reaction, while watching the movie, was not just that her death was too quick. it had to be that way. del toro spoke about the stark differences between the two worlds: real life and fantasy. he spoke about violence in stories, and implied that the violence should be harrowing, not sensational. the way the captain killed her was harrowing because it was so quick and thoughtless and void of caring.
but i didn't like how i was expected to accept it so quickly. it wasn't ok that she was killed. it wasn't ok that, for her, death was a better path than life. i don't know if i feel that way because she was young, or because i hadn't had quite enough time to decide that all her options and reasons had been exhausted. was it a deliberate choice of the story that i not feel prepared, or was it poor construction? i don't know. i feel like i have to sit on it for awhile.
maybe i have just become too accustomed to series of novels in which i have the luxury of becoming fully attached to characters and invested in their lives. maybe the 2-hour story is no longer working for me. too bad my attention span can't sync.
this week, my french pet* called me a queen ("You're a queen! Love you, D."), and another customer said, "You're a peach!". a peach. i'm a peach? am i wrong to consider that a bit degrading? maybe it matters who it comes from. if my french pet had said that to me, i'd have been amused. but this customer is always a bit of a jerk. it didn't make me feel good.
(* for anyone who doesn't know: as a customer service rep, i have a few customers who have latched onto me, and only correspond with me, and i call them "pets". there is one who lives in france who says things to me that no one but a french person would say to a stranger.)
recently, i found out that one of my favorite bands, moses mayfield, broke up. i know it's silly, but it makes me sad. they're really good, imo, and they make me feel at home. however, i also found out that the lead singer, matthew, is recording music by himself. he's got a few songs up on his myspace page, including a solo, more accoustic re-recording (cover??) of element, which is one of my favorite songs of theirs. it's sort of slowed down, or more anthemic. i'm not sure the right word to describe it, but it's so much more intentional. for some reason, since the first time i heard matthew sing, i've felt a connection with his voice and his emotion. sometimes even more than jon. visit his myspace, if you're so inclined. i just think he's such a genius songwriter. it's weird how and where people find connections, sometimes.
i said, please ... don't talk about how every living thing goes away.
~jon foreman, learning how to die
for christmas presents, my mom just has us go through this one catalog and circle things we want. it's not the greatest way to get presents, because you're limited to what's in the catalog, and it's generally not stuff i'm interested in. but anyway, it's cheap, and you can get lots of stuff to unwrap.
one of the things i circled was a set of stars that look like they're made of wrought iron and colored glass. they're 3-D and have a place to fit a votive candle inside. i was going to hang them in an archway or something, but then got an idea to hang them from the ceiling above my dining "room" table. it looks really cool. i figure, if you have a drop ceiling, take advantage of it. my sister suggested hanging snowflakes during the winter. ooh, i just remembered i got some snowflake ornaments for christmas. maybe i won't pack them away for next christmas just yet...
when i got home from my friends' house on new year's eve, i found a snow angel in my yard, next to my walk way. i considered taking a photo, but it was so dark, and i was so tired. i just decided to enjoy knowing that someone put it there for me. yesterday, i found out that it was my landlady who did it. she said she knew i'd like it. she also said it was really cold, and she stood there for some moments poised to fall back into the snow before actually doing it. that was probably one of my best gifts this christmas.
this is life as i live it: random, small, pointless, and a little bit funny. evidently, also corny. (corny is a funny word). i'm doing this for a friend and former roommate, who somehow seems to still be interested in what's going on in my life. it might have nothing to do with me, really, but more to the fact that she lives in Cambodia now, and i am just a connection to her past life. maybe i'm sort of a safe place to go for a few minutes, too. i don't know. anyways, the news from today:
it's been snowing a lot lately, and the best thing is that the snow has stayed for about 3 days, so far. it's thick, wet snow, and it was a generous fall: everything is covered. i would get more photos if i happened to feel more artistic at the moment. it's not in me right now, though, so this is the best i've got:
yes, i took the photo from my doorway. but this time, i can say that it wasn't due to laziness, just that i didn't want to risk dropping my camera in the snow. i was on my way out to shovel, and that's not lazy.
a friend at work asked me yesterday if i would like her old ipod, as she just bought a new one, and didn't want this one to go to waste. it's 3rd generation, so evidently it's an older one, but she said that it generally works well and that maybe i wanted it as a stop-gap until i got a newer one myself. stop-gap, ha! i accepted it graciously, of course. and it might be a realllly long stop-gap. i honestly don't know how some people do it, buying things like this, as though they're no big deal. or maybe i should be more at a loss for how i do it, living on my income. i guess it pays to have a tech-savvy dad wrapped around your little finger, and a work supervisor who is generous with her hand-me-downs. here is my booty. no, not my booty as in ba-donk-eh-donk - oh, ok, forget it. you know what i mean: here's my new(-to-me) ipod:
i said, "ok, i have to write that down. let's see, did you say, 'just because everything sounds good...'?"
my humidifier stopped working the other day. probably because of the mold; and the mold was probably because my water is yellow with yucky stuff that makes water yellow... so i'm in the midst of cleaning it (yay, oxyclean!), but now it's horribly dry and static-y in my house now. i've resorted, now, to the old-fashioned method of trying to get moisture in the air.
