weekly gratitude

thank you little £3 sandals for lasting almost 7 years and still going strong

-

Things that make it harder to get a post written:

sleep deprivation

internet distractions & text messaging

juggling a chocolate covered ice cream bar with the keyboard

sleep deprivation

I am so tired.

The last two weeks have been nonstop for me and I've all but lost track of life for the most part, barely able to catch back up with myself long enough to get a good night's sleep before doing it all over again.

(Lord help me someday when I have a family to care for - it'll be totally worth it but my, oh my, there will be a certain degree of frazzle going on)

Everything really came into focus this morning when my alarm went off at 7:15am.

Being so far north it starts to get light about 4:30am 'round these parts, so by the time the instrumental rendition of "Viva la Vida" jumps out of my phone my apartment has already been inundated with light spilling in from the skylights. This sounds like a good thing, and mostly it is, until you go from "happy, dark, comfy slumber" to "Oh, sweet moses, who turned on the sun so early?" 

Anyway, digression aside, this morn came as a shock.

I jolted awake, heart slamming out of my chest, into my throat and vibrating over my teeth (it was a deep sleep I was enjoying, man) followed by this immediate thought process:

OHMYGODIT'S7:15ANDIHAVE TOLEAVEFORCHURCHIN15MINUTES!


I launched out of bed, into the briskness of my poorly insulated attic apartment, immediately regretting my decision to not wear pants to bed, get halfway to the bathroom before realizing:

It is in fact Monday, decidedly NOT Sunday, and you already went to church yesterday. 


Well done, child. Now take a nap and call me in the morning...

-

1. Thank you for this weather. We're all pretty obsessed with this popular topic of small talk, but up here it really is something of a fascination. It's the end of June and we're hovering in the high 60's-mid 70's all week. Much as I'd love to work on my tan (except, even then, not really because I am rationally terrified of skin cancer) or tuck away my sweaters for more than a day or two, it's really nice to be able to sleep comfortably and not melt away in the sun like the artist formerly known as Lauren, Queen of the Fairskins. It's probably that my job relies so heavily on the weather throughout the growing season, but I honestly don't see it as a cop-out conversation starter. I am sincerely fascinated by the completely erratic nature of the weather in the PNW. And after the sympathy pains I feel for Jenn over there on the "southeast side of the sun" with her two ginger babies in triple digit heat, I am extremely grateful for our mild summers.

2. Thank you for a working freezer! My landlords finally got me a new fridge and for the first time in three years I have a freezer that is not just a "keep-things-just-the-other-side-of-reasonably-cooler-than-the-fridge" box. Like any normal person I celebrated by filling it with a giant bag of frozen chicken breasts (a time-honored tradition in these parts). It also explains the aforementioned chocolate covered ice cream bar juggling (it's entirely possible that I began typing this with one hand while I enjoyed my frozen treat until I realized at that rate I should be done in about 45 days). But seriously, I wonder how many calories I've saved myself in the last three years by not being able to sustain ice cream in this house? Whatever. I'll make up for lost time with Trader Joe's frozen fruit bars and an assortment of freezer jams once I get into berry mode.

3. Thank you for a chance to see Portland again with the eyes I first laid on it almost four years ago. I mentioned my friend Nathan moving to town and how much fun it was showing him around town, but let me say again how much I loved imagining being new to this city again. Driving him through Sellwood I remembered the first time Helios toured us in and out of its little streets. Cruising down Hawthorne I imagined once again my first glimpse of the colorful storefronts. Wandering the Pearl I could almost recapture the smell of paper and ink the first time I set foot in Powell's. I hope I never lose those feelings.

4. Thank you for The Camaraderie (again and always). We are so good at life sometimes man, I swear! Friday night we all (minus Jared, man of fire that he is, what with being a member of the United States Forest Service now and all) met up and made dinner. Beer & wine a plenty, fresh veggies for salad, creamy-cheesy-potatoes a la Heather, and Dean's famous burgers made for the perfect evening as we sat down to our meal around 10 o'clock, with light still in the sky. What contentment, being young and sometimes just foolish enough to believe that maybe, just maybe, life could always be this good. That will always be my blessing.

5. Thank you for the first raspberries of the season being almost ready! I'm eyeing the bush in the backyard like a sparrow hawk watching a mouse, ready to harvest at a moment's notice (the same will be true come blackberry season when I inhale them as surely as they ripen). Reading Joanna's post about taking her city kid out to a farm and what a treat it was to pick fresh raspberries made me realize what an intensely wonderful existence it is here in my little corner of the world. I think my dad put it best:

"Yeah... I think your life is a bit of magic, and whimsy...makes me smile."


Me too, Dad. Me too.