wow. a thousand words, indeed

Bill signings of two of the most important women's rights bills to have passed over the course of the past few years.

The Partial Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003

The Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009

I will not cry at work, I will not cry at work

Should you ever feel pessimistic about the state of the world...

or doubt the possibility for change or progress...

or your ability to be part of them...

Should you ever feel insignificant...

or wonder "what's the point?" or "what's it all for?"...

just have yourself a look

I'd quote a lyric but I have no idea what they are

I discovered this song shortly before I was headed back to New York at Christmas a couple years ago.

Since then, it's become somewhat of a flight ritual for me to engage in a little bit of illegal procedure with my electronic device and listen to it as we're preparing to take off so that the big, beautiful crescendo at the beginning coincides with our liftoff and any and all feelings of being grounded begin to just fall away.

I've only just discovered the video today but it makes me feel every bit as free and unfettered as the song does by itself.

Sigur Rós - Hoppípolla

a new tomorrow

Rather than a beautifully written, introspective post about the beauty that will be Obama's inauguration tomorrow, I give you this.



Cheers!

I'll never let go, Kate...I'll never let go

I've always adored Kate Winslet. I don't think there's a film of hers I don't love and every time I've seen her on any kind of television spot, she seems like some random person they pulled off the street who is just there to chit chat rather than the youngest women to ever rack up 5 Oscar nominations.

If you watch any of her films, it's obvious she is amazingly talented as an actress. She's banned fashion magazines from her home in case the thin models influence her daughter, her style mantra is "whatever fits and whatever works," she's stated repeatedly that she loves her body whatever way it is.

As a bonus, she's easy on the eyes. We're talking easy like Sunday morning-easy.

And even though I hate Oprah, I love, love, love this clip. God bless your real breasts indeed, Kate.




Sidebar: In any and all future conversations that may directly or indirectly refer to my breasts, I'm going to try my best to somehow work in the sentence, "...when they race for sanctuary under my armpits when I lay on my back?"

Doogie!

That is all.

I know they say we can't pick our family...

But if we could, I'd still pick the exact same one.

A few years ago when my cousin was in rehab, she was allowed a home visit right around her birthday so we went up to my Aunt & Uncle's house for a little "home visit / birthday celebration." It was the beginning of August and we spent the afternoon in and around the pool, which is where I took the following picture (some of you might remember it from my asking for help cropping out the woman who is no longer in it).


It quickly became one of my favorite photos I've ever taken for several reasons. My uncle, who was...maybe 62 around the time, had been afraid of water pretty much his entire life. Our families have had pools since I was in high school and he never got in one because of it. I'm not sure exactly when that fear dissipated and when he finally took the plunge but this picture was taken one of the very few times I've seen him in water. He has always been closer to Alexis (the one in the picture whose birthday we were celebrating) and my aunt has always been closer to Ashley so I loved seeing the two of them together in this picture. Plus, they look genuinely happy and that's not something I often see in my uncle's face. He's never been one to talk about his emotions and has always shown his love and appreciation for other people in material ways. To see him so obviously happy in this photo, just hanging out at the pool with his family, makes me feel happy.

For years, I've wanted to give him the photo but I wanted to add a little something more than, "hey, look at this great photo." So when I received an email awhile ago from a friend that made me all appreciative and teary-eyed, it inspired my family Christmas gift this year. I went through photos I've taken of my family, picked my favorite one of each of them, and wrote a note that said a bunch of stuff but is pretty much summed by the last part of it:

So. Put the photo up somewhere you can see it every day. Or hide it in the bottom of your sock drawer. Either way, when have you a lousy day…when you wish you were someone else…when you doubt yourself…when you don't much care for who you are…look at it. And realize you're an amazing human being. I'm glad I know you.

I wasn't going to share the photos publicly because I wanted them to be just for them. But I believe each one of them has put it up somewhere they can see it everyday, which I think is fantastic. And they're phenomenal photos of phenomenal people.

So I'm sharing.

The one I posted above is the one I gave to my uncle.


Alexis' photo. She's never been very close with my aunt and in addition to Alexis looking beautiful, it's one of the few photos I have of her and my aunt together.


Ashley's photo. The one I really wanted to give her wasn't of good enough quality to even enlarge to a 5x7 so I settled for this one, which I also love. The girl simply does not take a bad photo and is usually a complete ham when having her picture taken. In this one, she's relaxed but is still just...Ash.


My aunt's photo. This is her permanent face. Beautiful, happy, smiling Nan.


My mom. I don't have many photos of her because she doesn't much like herself in photos and I understand that completely. This was a candid moment she didn't know I caught and it's one of my favorite photos of her letting go and having fun. P.S. In her glass of champagne is one of those little penis straw toppers often found at bachelorette parties.


My dad. The world's nicest guy and when I looked at this shot, the first thing I thought was, "yeah, that's dad." I'm pretty sure he was waving at me and saying, "hi, my girl."


Possibly my favorite photo of my brother. Ever. There's layer upon layer upon layer to him and somehow, this shows each one.


My niece(ish). This is the photo I gave to her mom (who is my brother's girlfriend) because I don't have a single photo of her that I could have used. Plus, the entire point of the gift was for them to see themselves through someone else's eyes and how better to see yourself than through your children? Is she not the most beautiful little 7-year-old you've ever seen?

And that's my beautiful family.

B===O~~~~

Contraceptive pill polluting the environment...and causing male infertility?

Ha! I've been unknowingly screwing with your sperm for 15 years, fellas! Having been successful in playing an essential role in helping the men of the world shoot blanks, I also now have no choice but to continue pissing on everything I can find so as to continue polluting the environment to the best of my ability.

For those of you not wanting children...you're welcome.

And I hope the reason for my crude subject line is now clear.

a new time...

a new year.

I can't say 2008 was spectacular but I can't say it was sucktastic. I feel pretty lukewarm about 2008, which is why I haven't really felt the need examine it too closely with the onset of the new year. But now I kinda feel like it. So there.

Resolutions have never been my thing because I've never been much of a goal kind of gal. I can handle short-terms goals but anything long-term usually winds up pretty quickly in the shitter. However, I do realize things don't just fall out of the sky into my lap and that I need to work toward them. There are some things that have no clear end and I don't need to put a check mark next to them on my "to do" list in order to know I've accomplished something. So in that vein...

- As I sat at Caribou yesterday, I realized how genuinely happy I felt to sit there sipping coffee and writing. When I couldn't find the words, I poked around the web, checked the ol' Facebook page, emailed, and eventually got back to the writing. It was delightful and I'm pretty sure it was partly responsible for the rest of my great day. I will do it more often.

- Although I still know I never want to have children of my own, the time I spent with the world's most adorable 7-year-old over Christmas will be one of those holiday memories I'll talk about years from now. I love being around my family more and more every time I go back to New York and now that it involves my brother having a family of his own that includes a daughter we all consider to be our own, I want to do it as much I can. I will do it more often.

- In order to accomplish that, I need to summon my slayer strength and claw my way out of my grave. "Insert my full name here. She's in debt. A lot." My next paycheck will reflect my recent 8% raise, which is a cri-zazy great raise these days. If I can't pay my bills, enjoy life a little here and there, and stash away some money with that, I have some very serious money management problems. So I need to throw a little of that extra money in savings and just let it sit there. I will do it more often.

- I re-connected with a couple friends over this past year, one of whom I only grew apart with because I changed jobs and she had a baby. Since our mutual friend's wedding this past October, we've been emailing to keep in touch better and have made plans to have drinks now that the holidays are over. I have few close friends here in Chicago and my best friend in Iowa is about to move even farther away. So I need to continue working to maintain those friendships that aren't as geographically desirable or as convenient as I'd like them to be. I will do it more often.

There always have been and always will be tons of things beyond my control. Here's to focusing on the things that aren't.