It's not creepy if it's you

I am facebook stalkling myself. Pictures. I smile in every picture so as I look at those pictures I try to recall the actual emotion associated with the smile. There are clues. My surroundings. If the picture was taken in my apartment you know the smile is extremely fake. If it was taken any where near 6th street, you know I am trying to supress something. Other clues, the subjects. If I am with my family the smile is real. If I am wearing black, the smile is fake. If it was taken in October or November chances are I couldn't give you many details. If my eyes are red, it's because I just emerged from my closet. If it's from last weekend the smile is real. If I'm wearing spandex, it's fake. If I'm not smiling, chances are you won't see those pictures up at all. Gotta keep up appearances....

and they said SPEAK NOW

I talk too much
Especially about my hair and bread and my relationship

I envy my mom for her youthful eyes and her big house

I want both of my sisters to live in my 800 square foot apartment with me.

I think yoga changed my perspective on exercise and my body

The jovial part of me comes alive at Friday around 3 pm.

You Weren't Expecting This

Admittedly, I am sitting outside writing this. I usually wrap up my day on the computer and it is just so beautiful that I decided to make all my calls and check my email outside. I am halfway in the shade so the sun is beating on my black shirt but there's still a breeze. I couldn't ask for any better weather for my favorite day of the week. My hair is up which usually makes me a little weary but it is fitting for this day. At any moment I could jump into a pool or the lake. I began thinking about Summer in Texas yesterday and it made me kind of uneasy but then I remembered that for most of the year it is blissful, and only painful for a short time.

Weather changes everything. I can see the reflection of myself in my computer screen and my bronzer is glimmering. I can't get over how great this is. I can't see how anyone could be unhappy. Life is stressful and mind-numbing but sometimes you just need to sit outside in the sun and count your blessings.

Too Much Noise

We hardly ever listened to the radio in the car. There was no time, we had too many conversations to have. Too many thoughts to share. Too many questions and stories. Even on long, early trips to Houston for work, we would talk work or travel, inventions or potential business ideas. I almost feel like the ingenious part of me, the creative-risk taker part of me died with you. I haven't thought about anything like that recently.

I loved seeing you relaxed. Coming over to my apartment to get dinner together and you were early and you would lay down on my couch and tell me a funny story from the drive over. Or when you'd come up and visit me at school and you'd get up at 4 and work 5 hours so by the time I got up all your work was done and we could laugh.

You were so quietly capable. You had no specific talent, just an ability to work hard and get things done. Without you around it's amazing the things that we have to make up for.

You always made me feel loved. You always made me feel protected. Safe. Cared for. Funny. Beautiful. Righteous.

Eclipse Polar Ice Gum. The kind with the annoyingly loud package that is not conducive to a quiet church service. That's what it was today. I saw the package of gum in your office that no one has touched. The package has one piece left. You left it there on a Wednesday morning thinking you would come back the next morning and finish out the package. Unless you knew. I wonder if you had any inkling. Would you have told us if you did? Would it have helped?

I didn't think to take the gum. I felt like if I kept it untouched it would preserve that day and maybe I would wake up and it will be next year and this actually didn't happen. I'm mad at myself that I think like that still.

Controllable Plans

Things to do in the next 5 years:
Own a home
Expand Family Service International
Have a child

3 years:
Run a 10k
Visit Europe
Learn Spanish

3 months:
Grow out my hair
Travel somewhere with Kyria
Learn how to make homemade biscuits

The Mister and Misses

I am obsessed with Mad Men. A couple months ago I was sick and watched the entire first season and then immediately followed up with the second. Life hit me upside the head with an inability to do anything but work and cry, so I took a bit of a sabbatical.

I have begun again. And this time- Season 3 is even more calmly intense, even more complicated, and even smarter. Mad Men is brilliant because it is brilliant people with some extreme talent, good fortune, and complicated pasts and relationships.

For starters- Don and Betty Draper. Individually they are complicated, confused, successful and beautiful. Together they crave to be blissful but neither is built for that. They are so vulnerable to each other that even after years of marriage they put on a good face. They aren't built for romance because of this vulnerability, so when they let go of that they are uncomfortable but hot. They are smart, charismatic, sleep deprived, stubborn, imperfect... He is adored and she is sought after. They enter a room loudly without making an audible noise. Everyone is watching their next step and not fooled by their act but still envious because inspite of their obvious defects, overt and uncalled for affairs, they are completely, totally, and abidingly in love.

A Four Pill Day

All day I was serious, interested, sharp, poignant, strong, having tough conversations with ease, laughing at the right time, selling my ideas, finding new ways to accomplish tasks. I suppose you could say I was on my grind.

And then 6 oclock happened. I changed from my Oxford shirt and 3 inch heels, put on skinny jeans and stilettos, and hit the mall like a careless teen. Bought a ring because it was shiny and laughed and talked about things that probably won't have any eternal significance. Laughed-- no, giggled. Spoke my mind for 2 straight hours. Whatever I thought is what came out.

The two me's are so opposite. They are both relentless in staying away from eachother. They won't share a warddrobe. They use different phones. One rests and feels and the other one sees that as a weakness. One seeks understanding, accomplishment, and laud, the other wants handbags. One listens to MGMT and the other to Manchester Orchestra. They balance eachother in an odd, deeply functional way. They are both likable and charming and, like any good pair, they are only complete together.

It's exhausting being me.

Wise Men Care

As I woke up this morning to an alarm and brushed my teeth and washed my face, made to do lists in my head, assessed which part of my body was sore from yesterday's workout, thought about what I wanted for breakfast, picked a song to listen to, and got ready for work, I felt an ache to be back to that Island in Mexico where the water looks like the sky and the sand is a white as my skin was 4 days ago.

Then I thought about my reality. My life and my family and my friends and the ability to effectively communicate with vendors when I'm in America. I began to feel extremely grateful for a regimen. I felt grateful for things in life that are consistent. I felt it necessary to acknowledge that I don't handle surprise or lack of planning very well. I like a version of spontaneity that is very controllable.

This is new for me. New for me to not miss home when I'm on vacation and not miss vacation when I'm at home. My Dad often says "Wherever You Are, Be There," and I never understood it until now.

Everyone Has Something To Say

Dear Dad,

You have good advice. The irony of our situation is that you are the most opinionated person I have ever interacted with, but because you know me, and trust me, your opinion is muted. Your opinion is whatever my opinion is. If we disagree, it is in private or with Mom as a buffer. You would never call me out in public. You would never make me feel like I shouldnt be heard or respected.

No one has that art down as well as you do. People are full of unsolicited advice. People are too sensitive. People are wrong. You were right and candid and a communicator.

Miss you,

Elyse

Que Sera, Sera

I've been thinking about the silver lining, the bright side of life. Too often I think about the cloud or the dark side because that is what effects us in our immediate situation. Somehow, in hind sight, the most difficult circumstances end up being a blessing.

Let me explain. This originated yesterday when I received a picture message of the birth mom of the most recent addition to [our] family. Her name is Natalie and she is the miracle that reminds us all that God is in control. I looked at the picture my entire drive to work and felt overwhelming joy for this stranger's trials. What I feel bold enough to suggest was the biggest trial, and toughest decision of her life, yielded us a miracle.

Just like a friend who knows the right thing to say because of their struggles, I know there is purpose in every tough day, or week, or year. I feel grateful for my struggles because I know somewhere, someday, the hardest things in my life will bless someone else.

What Will Be, Will Be.