Time travel in the garage

I took a little stroll down Todd's memory lane tonight. Sometime in the early 90's Todd's mom packed up a bunch of his childhood stuff. In 1995, when Todd's folks sold their house and bought a much, much smaller house, the boxes of Todd's things went to live in the room attached to my parents' garage, where they lived for ten years.

When we were home last Christmas, my mom ever so subtly hinted that it was time for the boxes to find a new home, as she was attempting to clear out some of the clutter from their lives. So home the boxes came, to sit in our garage for a few more months.

Todd emptied a few boxes several weeks ago, setting aside some things to keep and some things to try to sell on Ebay. But he wanted my help with the last couple of boxes.

Now, I am the last person you want helping you sort through sentimental stuff. I am fairly good at purging our belongings once or twice a year, but the sentimental stuff always triumphs over me. So tonight I took the camera to the garage with me, to get pictures of the things that will not stay with us, and also of the things that will go into spiffy new Sterilite boxes, seldom to see the light of day again. It's easier to let stuff go if you know you have a picture of it!

Here are just a few of the things we uncovered:

What boy's childhood would be complete without creepy-crawlies?

Notes, drawings, and high school senior year term paper, entitled "Comparing Grippers for Use in Multi-Purpose Robot Arms." Riveting, eh? (I was in the same class, my term paper was on "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts' Club Band." You can tell ours is a marriage of minds.)

Todd's baby plate, brush and comb, resting on his baby afghan. All together now: "Awwwwwww!"

A little homemade shirt that Todd's mom sewed for him. One more time: "Awwwww!" (You should see the print on this thing--large-headed Seventies kids doing wholesome Seventies activities. Very ummm...Seventies.) A vintage box of Legos: High school graduation cap and graduation party sign, complete with streamers: Ah yes, the Star Wars model that was never built. Don't worry, he completed plenty of others. Note the Star Wars jigsaw puzzle visible in the background.This was the stuff that made us a little sad. One is a birthday card from Todd's granddad, probably from just before he died...another is a card from Todd's other grandpa, from just before he passed away--the signature is so shaky. And a note to the family from Todd's great-grandma Fairbanks...speaking from 1979, about how lonely she is in the nursing home. Very sad. Todd's grandfathers would be so proud to see the man he is now, I just know it.

We'll end this on a happy note...here's me with a little graduation doggy that Todd says I bought him for our high school graduation. I have no memory of that, and if I'd known him better then, I'd have known a stuffed animal was no way to win his heart. So we took a picture and Todd was finally able to throw it away, just like he probably wanted to do back in 1988!

The bumper sticker

We live in a condo complex, on the very last street in the development. Every day on my way home, I pass this white pickup truck parked on the corner, and every day it annoys me. On the rear bumper is a sticker that says "Marriage =" and then a little figure of a man and a woman with a plus sign between. One day I was walking past the owner's condo, and they had their second vehicle parked in their driveway, sporting the same sticker.

Every time I see it, I feel this flare of irritation. The "Bush/Cheney" sticker right above it probably does contribute to that feeling a little bit, but mostly it's the marriage sticker that does it.

So I’ve been trying to analyze why it irritates me. First of all, I'm curious why the owners of those vehicles picked that particular topic as the topic they want to share their opinion about with the world. Out of a hundred current topics, why gay marriage?

Well, first of all, I imagine that the truck owners believe homosexuality is a sin. That’s the foundation of the issue for most people who share their convictions.

I grew up in a fairly evangelical church, and I went to school at an extremely evangelical private school. And I honestly don't remember homosexuality being discussed. I vividly remember being told in Bible class that it was a sin to masturbate, but homosexuality...nah. Maybe it never crossed anyone's mind that a Christian kid would even have such thoughts and yearnings, I don't know.

As a result, I never had a strong opinion about homosexuality one way or another. Until I had a friend in my early adult years who was finally addressing the feelings he’d had all his life. His fear and self-hatred were incredibly painful. Accepting who he really was deep down came very hard for him. Watching him go through this process, it became clear to me that sin is a choice…and homosexuality is not a choice. I can’t accept that it’s a sin to be gay.

The next conclusion I see the truck owners making is that allowing gay people to marry somehow cheapens or demeans marriage as an institution. Or, from a Christian standpoint, if being gay is a sin, then a relationship based in sin can’t be part of the sacrament and covenant of marriage. But if love comes from God, as Christians also believe, then isn’t a love commitment holy?

When gay marriage was a hot topic on the news last fall, the stories would always feature footage of two men, or two women, finishing their vows and smiling and kissing each other. It never failed to make me teary-eyed. How often do you get to see two people of any sort experiencing a moment of pure joy? Especially on CNN? It always made me think of my own wedding and how happy I was at the end of that ceremony, and how happy I have been for 13 years with my husband. Seeing someone else—anyone else—make that commitment and experience that joy and hope…that could never diminish the legitimacy of my marriage. On the contrary, it actually reinforces my own memories of my vows and the way I try to live up to them. That, to me, is a beautiful thing.

The final thought I attribute to the truck owners is that gay marriage not only diminishes the institution of marriage, but is also a threat to society at large. It goes against the natural order of things, they might say. This, to me, is the most disturbing argument. I am a fairly conservative person, and I don’t like change. I don’t like the idea of our society losing its way. But of all the things that I think could bring us down, gay marriage isn’t one of them. War, poverty, casual theft, deception at all levels of government and finance, dishonesty, child abuse, bad parenting—yes. Gay marriage, no.

When people invoke the “endangered society” argument, the very first thing that springs to my mind is the uproar that took place years ago (and still takes place here and there, let’s be honest) at the idea of a black person and a white person getting married. People, plenty of them Christians, had lots of good reasons why that should never happen, why it was sinful and went against the proper order. Now we look back and see how wrong that was. I believe that our society should still be striving for all its citizens to have life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

So the bumper sticker bothers me. It feels ugly to me, like it would if a neighbor had a racist bumper sticker or an anti-feminist bumper sticker. It’s an ugly thing to have to look at every day. And again, I just keep wondering what is it that has made this particular issue so important to the truck owners. If I spot them outside someday, maybe I’ll ask them. Or better yet, maybe they’ll move.

Birdies

birdies
Originally uploaded by JScrappy.

Todd got some excellent photos Sunday night of our mama bird feeding her babies. We checked the birdhouse Tuesday night, and the babies had all flown away. I think they're still hanging around in our holly bush and eating from the birdfeeder.

Grateful

I've been feeling grateful the past couple of days...I had to go in for a D&C ("dusting and cleaning" as my dr. calls it--har har, Doc) on Monday morning and I was a little bit nervous about it. It's been ten years since I've had surgery of any kind, and I wasn't at all sure what to expect. Since I had to take three days off work for the surgery and the recuperation, I was concerned that I would be feeling not-so-great for a while.

But the surgery was just like taking a nice little nap! I came home and slept for a few hours and then got up and tidied the kitchen, did a little laundry...feeling quite good. Yesterday I went shopping in Williamsburg and cleaned my scraproom. Haven't had a pain pill since right after the surgery, and I'm not bleeding like they warned me I would.

Today I got up early and felt awfully tired so I took a snooze on the couch, remembering that I am supposed to be taking it easy, after all, and this is my last day at home to do that! Maybe I overdid it a little bit yesterday.

Anyway, I am just really happy that I am feeling so good! Now, if the surgery will just help with my problems, then life will be spiffy.

In other news, I am trying to scrap, but it's like pulling teeth, LOL. Now THAT'S painful! My inspiration done dried up--for now, anyway.

Albums, albums, albums

I think I'm a tiny bit OCD about my scrapbook albums. I have fourteen 8.5x11 albums stuffed in 3-ring binders that I bought early on in my scrapping life. None of them match. And they're all extra-large, so the page slide around in them.

Tonight I went to Target and bought five new 3-ring binders, very plain, three red and two pale green, and transferred five albums over. I think they're looking okay on the shelf.However, now I have to go up to Williamsburg tomorrow and try to find nine more, since our local Target didn't have enough.

What I really need to do with these albums is to continue the process I started three years ago of consolidating layouts, editing out photos, and re-doing layouts so that there are fewer layouts, more concisely arranged. I did way too many five, six, seven page layouts early on, because I thought I needed to include every mediocre picture.

But I just don't want to muck around with re-doing stuff right now, because...I also have five 12x12 albums that need some attention. I had a small stack of layouts that were published, sent back to me, and then just sat in a pile, so today I replaced them all in their respective albums, and I have a few albums that are just too, too, too full. I try to do one album per year in my 12x12s, and 2002 is ready to pop. I guess we did a lot of interesting stuff that year, LOL. 2003 isn't much better, and 2004 isn't done yet but promises to be pretty full as well.

Added to that--I'm not totally happy with the albums I'm using for the 12x12s. The books themselves are great, but the covers are all different colors and patterns and I hate the way they look on the shelf. They're too expensive to replace, but I'm just not sure how to extend the 2002 book and what kind of book to order for 2004.

Ugh, I'm boring myself with this. And I suspect I am obsessing over albums because I don't feel like doing any scrapping even though I'm really getting far behind. I made a list of everything I wanted to work on the other day and got myself all twitterpated. I've never been one for goal-setting in my scrapbooking...I've never really kept track of how many pages I do or how many I need to do, but it might be a good idea to do that...put my head down and power through (Arrested Development quote).

Only a manaical scrapper would understand why I do this to myself. I mean, this is a hobby, for crying out loud. Being an insane perfectionist is not helping matters, either. I just need to think positive!

Father's Day

In honor of Father's Day, here are a few random things I learned from my dad:

--Family is important, and you can learn about yourself when you know their stories.
--History is living and breathing all around us if we just tune into it.
--Fresh-grown produce tastes better than store-bought.
--Taking care of the people you love should be your number-one priority.

And a few random things I've learned from my father-in-law:

--Work is what you do to pay for your hobbies.
--Don't take life too seriously.
--Simply enjoy the people you love.

Thanks, Dad and John! Love you both!

Our bird haven

Our bird haven
Originally uploaded by JScrappy.

We have baby birds living in the birdhouse--the second family this spring. Todd bought me the birdbath for our anniversary in May, and then he stuck our old birdfeeder out there for a total bird pampering experience. Too bad birds creep me out. Our crepe myrtle is finally starting to leaf out after we chopped it back in April, and we have shade once again.

Mint and coleus

Mint and coleus
Originally uploaded by JScrappy.

My pretty spearmint plant is doing so much better this year. I don't know if the change of locale helped, or the constant picking, or what. This is the mint that always grew around the well at my grandma's house, and we would pick a huge bowlful and make iced tea. Another evocative childhood smell and taste.

Marigolds

Marigolds
Originally uploaded by JScrappy.

I've never planted marigolds before, though they were always a staple in my dad's flowerbeds when I was a kid. The smell evokes childhood in a big way. I was going for the impression that they are spilling out of the big crock, but I think I should have planted them a little more densely.

Superheroes never get old

We went to see Batman Begins tonight with two other couples. On the way out of the theater, my DH mentioned seeing the first Batman movie in the theater and how we saw it over and over that summer...well, each of the four people we were out with tonight was in grade school when Batman came out. GRADE SCHOOL. Todd and I were in college. COLLEGE. If that don't make you feel old, nothing will. I spent the rest of the evening feeling like we were a mom and dad out with their kids. Ugh.

The movie was okay. Not terrible, but not great, either. I had only skimmed one review, so I was going in with no real preconceived ideas. (My favorite way to see a movie, incidentally.) I was pleasantly surprised to see Michael Caine playing Alfred--I adore Michael Caine, and he was very good. Christian Bale was also good as Bruce Wayne/Batman. I'd love to know the rationale for casting an unknown actor in that part, since the last three guys to play the role have all been big-name stars.

This movie was also far different from the four bombastic blockbuster-type movies that preceded it. Quieter, more character-driven, less cartoony. While I think the first (Michael Keaton) Batman movie was very much of its time, so this latest movie also seemed very much of its time. A definite Spiderman influence, with the hero searching for his role and dealing with the limitations of that role that life has forced upon him.

I love superheroes. I grew up watching "Justice League of America" with Superman, Wonder Woman, Batman and Robin, Aquaman, and of course the Wonder Twins. And my siblings and cousins and I played superheroes for years and years. I love the first Superman movie, the first Batman movie, and both Spiderman movies. And I am SO excited about this Fantastic Four movie that's coming out in a few days--I was addicted to Fantastic Four comic books in the sixth grade.

There's a few things I like about superhero characters: they come from comic books, which have always fascinated me. (I wish I had had the money to indulge myself with comic books the way I wanted to when I was a kid. ) Most of the characters are rooted in the era from 1940-1960, which is a time that looms large in my imagination--I feel nostalgia for that era even though I didn't live through it. And then there's just the wonder of being a superhero--who doesn't imagine what it would be like to have superhuman powers? Totally cool, that's what it would be like.

And then of course, there's the very best thing of all about superheroes--they stay young and re-invent themselves every decade or so. I'm gonna have to start thinking like a superhero to get over the trauma of this evening, and figure out how to make myself feel young again.

Book Talk

Today I'm using this meme I read in Mimi's blog, because it's a topic near and dear to my heart.

1. Total Number of Books I've Owned:

This is not something I could even ballpark--it's gotta be in excess of 5,000, but numbers become hard for me to grasp once they get that large. Let's just say this: bookshelves have always been my most crucial piece of furniture, bookstores are my very favorite places on earth, and I have been cursed by moving men in four states because of my excessive number of very heavy boxes of books.

2. Last Book I Bought:

I bought several books for a flight three weeks ago: Errant Knight by R. Garcia y Robertson, and two humor collections by Laurie Notaro. I think those were the last, but I buy books like I buy bread and milk, so I may be forgetting something.

3. Last Book I Read:

The last book I read was White Rose, which is the third in the series begun with Errant Knight. They're time travel fantasy books with a terrific premise--third-millennium Hollywood producer ends up in the middle of the War of the Roses--but the plot development, characterization and narrative left a lot to be desired.

4. Five Books That Mean A Lot To Me:

A. the Little House series by Laura Ingalls Wilder. The detail and the history of these books is just amazing, but it's the way the characters live their lives that has always inspired me.
B. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. This is a book with its roots deep in my psyche, because I spent the first five years of my life living near Hannibal, and the Mississippi River loomed very large in my life and imagination. Plus, it's America in book form.
C. Lake Wobegon Days. Another American classic. This was a book I always turned to when my real world seemed too harsh and I needed to go to a place that was friendlier. Between the ages of 16 and 24, I must have read LWD 100 times. For a long time I wrote just like Garrison Keillor!
D. The Accidental Tourist by Anne Tyler. This is the book that taught me that detail is what brings writing to life. It's a little gem.
E. The King James Bible. I grew up to the cadences of the KJV in church and in school, and it shaped my love of words and language.

5. People I Will Infect With This Meme:

Bev, will you give this one a shot? I am so curious to hear your answers!

Being known

I had the beginnings of a deep thought at work today while I was packaging die cuts. (Packaging die cuts is quite conducive to deep thought...very Zen.) My friend Donna asked me the other day why people blog:

“Why are these so hot? Like, what's in us to be so into both writing them and reading them?? Is it our strong, innate desire to be known? Are we less known in our culture today?? Do you feel more ‘known’ yourself when you peer into someone else’s thought life?”

I told her I didn’t know, but it made me start to think about why I finally decided blogging would be worthwhile for me to do. Specifically, why do I want to be known? Even more specifically—do I want to be known?

I have always been a reserved person, even as a child. Being honest with people is hard for me, showing my flaws and faults is hard for me, making myself vulnerable is very hard for me. I have always felt lonely because I never feel like people know me, and yet I am the one who is unwilling to really let people know me. It takes a long time for me to let down the barriers, and in most of my relationships, the barriers never come down completely. Worse yet, on occasions when I do push down a few stones from the wall, I almost always deeply regret it. Or I am made to regret it.

So I’ve been a little frustrated with my blogging so far—I feel like I need to be more personal and deep so that whoever reads my blog will know me better, and yet--! There are people who know me in “real life” who may end up reading this blog! How can I be real and personal in front of them?

It was that thought that really brought me up short. I can write about personal things for the relative strangers who might stumble across it, but the thought of a friend or family member actually reading what I truly feel—that appalls me. Um, yeah. Anybody have a pickax? Because I’ve got a bonafide Red Communist-type Berlin Wall around my true self, and I don’t think that’s helping me anymore in my life. If it ever did. Which it probably didn’t.

Our friends Brian and Sonja got married last spring in a very old and beautiful Episcopal church in Smithfield. During the ceremony, the priest read from 1 Corinthians 13, certainly no big surprise there. I’ve heard that chapter a thousand times in my life, and not just at weddings. But the priest had a translation that I’d never heard before. The verse was, “For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known.”

Except instead of the word “know,” this particular translation used the word “understand.”

“…then shall I understand, even as I am fully understood.”

Well. It was one of those moments that just slaps you between the eyes. That little word change made all the difference. God understands me. Sure, he knows me, he’s known me before I was ever conceived, as the psalm says, that’s old news to me, but—he understands me. And he doesn’t just understand me—he fully understands me.

This seems to me to be really what we crave in life. It’s easy to know stuff. I know all kinds of stuff, from WW II history to useless movie trivia to the birthdays of everyone in my family. And I know a lot of people. I’ve encountered lots of people, and I know them, to one degree or another.

But understanding? That’s on a whole other level. The TV news channels are full of people who know stuff…but how often do you see anyone who actually understands anything? Understanding runs deeper. It’s knowing what’s underlying, what the undercurrents are, what’s underground. It’s seeing the underpinnings and what’s way down underneath. See that common word? If God understands me, if he fully understands me, then he sees everything I’ve got down under. And if the verse is true, then he gets it and he accepts it. All of it.

So maybe some of us out here are blogging to be known, and maybe some of us are blogging to be understood. Or to understand ourselves. Or maybe it’s a mixture of all of those things. I don’t know who will read this after I hit post. And I think I’m okay with that. It’s a tiny step towards knocking down a piece of wall and allowing myself to be known. And maybe even understood.

Worker bee

Super long day at work today, I was on my feet almost the whole 8 hours. We kept having these mini-rushes of customers, I was bagging, pricing and hanging die cuts, and then I ended up rearranging half the store. Which is sort of fun. It dawned on me this morning that we still have Easter stuff up on our front display, and spring papers in the rack next to that...so I grabbed some summery stuff from around the store and some of our new summer-themed die cuts.

Die cuts...that sounds extremely passé to a seasoned scrapper, but they are our stand-by. They're custom-made by the owner, mostly titles, but a few other odds and ends, too, and they are almost singlehandedly keeping us in business. I'm sure there are some advanced scrappers in Virginia, but I have only met a handful. Most of our customers are just starting out, and they loooove the die cuts. We feature titles for all the main tourist attractions here, of which there are many, and also a large military section with titles/frames for all the bases here, of which there are also many.

I had to explain scrapbooking from the ground up to a customer again today..."This is an album. It's post-bound, which means there are metal posts that hold the pages in. These are page protectors, they're like pockets. You put your photos on cardstock, which is heavyweight plain paper, or patterned paper, which is lighter weight...." Yada yada yada. I totally don't mind explaining--that's my job--but it is always hard for me to shift my mind that far back. I have spent so many years happily immersed and chatting away with dozens--hundreds! of like-minded people...it's odd to think of someone who's never given my world a thought until now. I mean, how did they manage to struggle through life before? LOL. It's fun to see that glimmer of excitement grow in their eyes as you explain. Too bad they don't realize the damage that's about to be done to their credit cards.

The heat finally, finally broke tonight...tomorrow's high is supposed to be in the mid-80's. Sounds heavenly. Time for bed and my cool bedroom--we have a separate a/c unit in our bedroom in addition to the central air, courtesy of the previous owner who was a tech guy for the county and who had his computer center in what is now our bedroom. The past few nights I have been loving that extra a/c, even if Todd won't let me turn it to "deep freeze" setting like I want.

Toddlertalk

I waved Lisa and Evelyn off this morning bright and early. Evelyn was in a bit of a mood, so I'm hoping the journey went really well and that she slept for a lot of it!

We completely enjoyed Evelyn, though. She warmed up to us fairly well...I think I was expecting her to just come to us and let us hold her and take her hand the way our other nieces and nephews do, but she has spent far, far less time with us, so she was a little wary. But she did talk our ears off. I like talking to toddlers so much. In fact, I like toddlers. Those years from two to four, kids are poised so perfectly between innocence and consciousness. Yes, they are completely unreasonable and cry at the drop of a hat, but I love their turns of phrase and their little voices and the way they are constantly trying to piece the world together.

A sampling of Evelyn:
"Where ya goin'?"
"Whatcha doin'?"
"Whose road this is?"
"Whose somebody's beach this is?"
"We going to my house?"
"We going to Aunt Janelle's house?"
"Too sunny, Ma!"
"That water tastes bad." (salty ocean water)
"Hide, Uncle Todd!"
"Do 'gain!"
"Do 'gain!"
"Do 'gain!"

Splash

Splash
Originally uploaded by JScrappy.

Monday at the beach...Evelyn was just not sure about the waves, but once she got wet, she relaxed and started running through the shallows shouting "I not scared anymore! I not scared anymore!" Todd took this one--I love how he captured the splash.

Ev's first ice cream sandwich

Ev's first ice cream sandwich
Originally uploaded by JScrappy.

I like taking indoor photos without a flash, even if they do end up a little blurry. Evelyn was quite delighted with the concept of an ice cream sandwich. Who wouldn't be, really?

A few moments of quiet...

...Todd's sister and our little niece Evelyn are visiting us for a few days, so my computer time has been minimal. Plus, I've worked the past three days, including this afternoon, when I stared out at the sunshine and waited for customers that never arrived. What a waste of a perfectly good day! I came home at 5 and everyone was gone, so I snuck up to my computer for a few minutes. Tonight we're having grilled marinated flank steak for dinner, accompanied by pasta salad and tomato salad. I can't wait for them to come back from wherever they went.

Hark, I hear the door opening and a little voice...

Natalie and Marissa

sisters2
Originally uploaded by JScrappy.

Natalie looks quite happy to be a big sister. Marissa doesn't know how lucky she is!

Nice stuff

Things are going fairly well in the creating world...my second day off this week and I am finishing stuff (layout below), submitting stuff, and even coming up with some new stuff (cards, cards, cards). Tomorrow will be all about getting ready for company this weekend (grocery store, cleaning, toddler-proofing), so this is my scrapping day.

I had a nice little surprise yesterday when Shawna from Memory Makers called and requested a layout that I completely forgot existed, let alone that I had submitted it to them at some point in time. It will be in the November issue; it's about a chair that we picked up at an auction and had reupholstered. I persist in calling it my $35 chair, though the reupholstering was substantially more than that! Anyway, I'm really pleased about that call, it's renewed my hopes a little.

I'm just so happy about that new baby, I've been smiling all day. Our cousin Marissa will be so thrilled to know the baby shares her name! I can't wait to get some more pictures of the little cutie.

Puddle

Puddle
Originally uploaded by JScrappy.

My sis sent me these photos at least a year ago, but I only stumbled across the perfect paper for them a few days ago at the store. Something about those little umbrellas and boots just makes me happy. I applied Doodlebug stitch rub-ons around the edge--they may be too subtle to be seen here. (Too subtle to be seen--my trademark, LOL.) Letter stickers are MAMBI, so old they could be considered antiques. I sprayed the tags with Stylish Dyelights from Scrapping With Style, and I was really pleased with how they came out. This layout is just for me, nice, fun, simple.