Best of 2009 – Rush

December 14, 2009 · 3 Comments

By far, hands down, my best rush of 2009 happened during my marriage ceremony. Funnily enough, I wasn’t really nervous. All day long, I was feeling good. I was ready. During photos, I was concerned with herding all the members of the wedding party to the right spots to get the right shots. Before the ceremony, all I wanted was a beer. I was thirsty and I needed to wind down from how hectic pictures and hair and all the rest were. The girls and I hung out during the cocktail hour, waiting for the ceremony. We enjoyed peeking out the window at the arriving guests.

Peeking

While walking into the tent with my parents, I was only nervous about falling flat on my face. I had beautiful shoes, but I’m just not used to heels, like I used to be. On top of that, I was trying to walk on uneven ground that was still a bit squishy from the rain the day before.

Green Wedding Shoes

The ceremony is sort of a blur, but I remember the rush I got when my cousin, Elizabeth (our officiant), declared that we were married. It was a mix of “Oh, holy crap” and “Yay!” and “Thank goodness it’s over!” and “Thank goodness this is just beginning!” and “Man, I love this guy.” Totally out of the blue, my new husband and I high-fived. It was something that was totally unconscious. So many guests related, later, that it was their favorite part of the whole day. Since then, I realize that we high-five a lot. I’m glad we did it, then. It was such a rush, and what better to signify that rush than a kick ass high five?!

High Five

p.s. I also think I promised some people pictures of the homemade wedding dress. Here they are!

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Best of 2009 – Album

December 10, 2009 · 2 Comments

This year, I’ve heard so much angst about the death of the music album. Most people don’t buy their music in full CD form, these days. They listen to Pandora or Last.FM or see a song in their iPod Genius sidebar and they go find that song that piqued their interest. It’s a track-driven world instead of an album-driven one. I get that. I do that, sometimes, but I’m still an album buyer. It’s not always a physical CD that I buy, but I like to buy all the songs on an album. Now, don’t get me wrong. I didn’t buy the entire Black Eyed Peas E.N.D. album just to get that one song I wanted to play at the wedding reception. For everyday listening and enjoyment, though, I buy albums. I’m afraid that I’ll miss my favorite buried-in-the-album song. I miss finding out that I love that one song that no one ever talked about or wasn’t released on the radio.

The thing is – I don’t buy very much new music. I like old music. I’m set in my ways. I’m, mostly, a pre-2000 music girl. Here’s a list of what I bought, though, as well as I can remember (or research from online downloads):

  • Monsters of Folk – my love for Jim James and the almost-local My Morning Jacket drove me to buy this and I REALLY enjoy it. The Husband’s current favorite song is probably Magic Marker.
  • White Zombie – Astro Creep 2000 – HA! I bought this to replace The Husband’s copy that I broke, maybe in a fit of anger? I can’t remember.
  • Pearl Jam – Backspacer – See? I told you that I like pre-2000 bands and music. I need to listen to this album, more. I love Pearl Jam.
  • The Avett Brothers – I and Love and You – Great album. Probably a break-out album for this group.
  • Wilco – Yankee Hotel Foxtrot – I downloaded this whole album and then realized that I already had it. Obviously, I need to listen to my purchases more.

That Wilco album really proves a point to me. In this post-album world, I find that I forget that I bought music. It used to be that I had a tangible reminder. I would wear out cassettes and CDs in the first few months after I bought them. With the advent of Shuffle, I forget what I have. I think this will be another of my 2010 resolutions – to pay more attention to my music. To curate my collection and appreciate it.

Also, I miss liner notes. I remember, as a kid, thinking how cool all of those people that got a thank you from the band must be. When I had friends, in high school, that formed bands I hoped they’d remember me when they got famous and I might get a shout out. Digital liner notes, like the digital booklet that came with my Pearl Jam purchase, just aren’t the same.

However, I know for a fact thatif these guys put this John Wall remix on an album, and I played it on my video enabled iPod, it would be my favorite of 2009.

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Best of 2009 – Challenges

December 9, 2009 · 3 Comments

I am notorious for starting things, finding out that I don’t have a natural aptitude for that thing and then quitting. It’s something that I really dislike about myself and that I am slowly working to change. It’s appropriate that I read this post, today, from a new blog I found called Make + Meaning. It fits well with today’s #best09 theme. The blog is all about engaging the craft community in conversations about craft and community and art and processes. The post, in particular, though, talks about the process of trying new things and the reaction that people have to the process of learning a new craft. I fall intot he category of people that gets angry and frustrated if I’m not a natural at something. Basically, I get frustrated at a challenge.

This is nothing new to me. In the third or fourth grade, I had to go to the state university and take a bunch of tests. I had no idea what these tests were for, but it turns out that my parents were trying to have me placed in the Gifted and Talented program in the local public school system. Being the natural nerd and pleaser that I am, I tried very hard on these tests. When we got the results back, they were unlike any I’d ever seen. This wasn’t pass/fail or grades of A, it was more a discussion. I remember, clearly, being ENRAGED that one of the negative comments was: Frustrates easily. When presented with a challenge, Lydia will try once and will discard the challenge, quickly, if she does not have a natural aptitude to solve it. I’m still sort of indignant about it – EVEN THOUGH I KNOW THAT IT’S TOTALLY TRUE. I believe that this is what my mom (and my husband!) would call Being Hard-Headed.

This year, I took on a challenge. It was something COMPLETELY outside of my skill set. So completely outside of it that most people still think I probably was forced into doing it by my husband. I started whitewater kayaking. Yes. A rather athletic endeavor that involves a lot of hand-eye coordination, balance, endurance and a sense of adventure. Those things do not come naturally to me. On top of all of that, it’s a very social thing, and I am not a very social person.

We bought our whitewater boats in February, trekking to Tennessee to pick them up directly from the manufacturer. That’s how excited we were about this stuff. Then, we went to indoor roll sessions – weekly sessions in an indoor pool where one learns or practices how to roll a kayak. That was the first challenge. It was gruesome. In two sessions, neither of us could get it down, flailing underwater without success. We got pretty discouraged, but we’d made a huge investment in boats and gear and stuck to it. During our third session, The Husband got it. He landed rolls one right after another, looking like a regular plastic-bottomed sea lion or something. Meanwhile, I flailed. I got motion sick. I puked in my mouth instead of the pool. I sucked. I tore a ligament or tendon or something in my shoulder. That’s how bad I sucked.

The wintry weather of February and March gave way to a beautiful, wet spring. Rain is a blessing to whitewater kayaking enthusiasts. It was an abnormally wet spring. We headed out to the creek and rivers. I loved it. I wouldn’t practice a roll, though, because I couldn’t do it and didn’t want to swim and didn’t want to bother with a bow rescue and my shoulder hurt and…and…and…

Summer came with more rain – after two consecutive drought years – and we were still paddling outdoors. Summer roll sessions started up and I tried, tried again – to no avail. I declared, publicly, that I’d learn to roll by my 29th birthday. Lo and behold, the session two days before my birthday, I landed an unassisted kayak roll in the outdoor pool. Then, I landed another one. Then, I was dizzy so I had to take a break. Once that passed, I tried again. Nothing doing. Flailing. Wildly. With tears. And a sore shoulder.

Before I knew it, my self-imposed kayaking hiatus was upon me. I am accident prone and didn’t want giant bruises from rocks and other assorted river junk to mar my lily white skin on my wedding day. I was also extremely busy. In the meantime, The Husband was developing into a legitimate Class III+, IV- paddler. He’d left me behind in skill, determination and drive to excel at our new sport. I doubted more and more my ability to learn, to conquer a challenge. I made more and more excuses when my kayaking friends would implore me to join them on an easy paddle.

Enter the recent start of winter roll sessions. Here it was again, my failure spot. I was good at the paddling part. I handled rapids at my skill level rather well. I enjoyed it. I hated the thought of rolling. It was like I had a mental barrier against it. So, I talked my way out of the first session. Then, the second. Finally, it was put up or shut up. I went so far, the day of that third session, to voice to The Husband that maybe I didn’t even like boating and would just quit it, altogether. In the end, I decided to just go. Give it one last try.

We arrived at roll session and it was packed. I meekly asked The Husband to help me and not to yell at me. (There’s a reason the seasoned vets advised us that spouse-spotted rolling isn’t a great idea.) I was in my boat. In the pool. He told me to Just Do It. So I did. Tuck. Flip. Sweep. Roll. Air! Air! Air! I didn’t flail. It clicked. It was easy. I was in the water and then back on top. No pain in my shoulder, no strain in my back, chlorine-tainted air in my nostrils. I’d done it!

I proceeded to do it three more times, unassisted. I tire easily (because I’m completely out of shape) and I get nauseous quickly in an indoor pool environment, rolling in circles. It was best to not push my new trick’s luck. It was out of the pool, until the next time.

I’m hoping that the roll is still sweet to me, this Friday.

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Best of 2009 – Blogs

December 8, 2009 · 1 Comment

Two of my favorite blogs that I found this year are the short, funny, snippety type.

First, Duchess Jane turned me on to Not Always Right – Funny & Stupid Customer Quotes. I think it was sometime in 2009. My increasingly vague memory is failing me, again, so I’m going with 2009. Anyway, this blog is hilarious to me. I only ever read it on my feed reader, but it brightens my day. Publishing about 20 items per week (according to my handy dandy Google Reader), there is never a dearth of quickly readable blurbs that make me chuckle. People can be really dumb, but normally they are endearing in their dumbness, and I think everyone can remember dumb questions they asked of the poor, overworked person on the receiving end. This blog reminds me of that.

Second, I just found Dear Old Love from one of NPR’s blogs, Monkey See. The author has recently published a book from the blog’s content, which is love notes to former loves. While the author reserves rights to edit the notes, I don’t care. I’m pretty much a sappy romantic, at heart (I don’t show that part of myself, really), so I love this kind of stuff. Back when I would wallow in my singleness self-pity I would have absolutely eaten this stuff up and filled the author’s inbox with one liners that would only be a third as witty as necessary and never get published. This is another feed-only read but one that I enjoy throughout the day when I need a quick break.

I thought about listing all the new quilting and crafting blogs I’ve found throughout the year or the wedding blogs that I read for ten months of this year, but it just would have taken WAY too long. Way.

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More to come…

December 7, 2009 · Leave a Comment

I just finished my new winter purse, my quickest project to date! No time to write. The Husband is working crazy hours and I’m gonna hang out with him before he goes to bed. I’ll catch up with #best09, tomorrow. Plus, I’ll get some action pics of the new purse and post them over at LP Quilts & Crafts.

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