geocities closing? WTH?

I dont even know why I'm randomly clicking on my geocities sites but I'm kind of thankful I did. Apparently geocities is closing. Which is fine, except that I'm in Japan right now and kind of can't transfer all of my files. Which I really want to do because I put a lot of work into that, especially the pages for our immigration story and such.

And this means that the website I created for my sister is forever closed and missing. I tried logging in but yahoo can't find my username. Which makes me really sad. I put a lot of effort into that, especially writing out my thoughts after she died. So I'm really bothered. There's nothing I can do about it, and I'm really surprised that yahoo didn't send out emails. I think this makes me want to print out, at the very least, all that I made about Dennis and I, because I had some really special stuff there.

I hope I can get this fixed.

High School Reunion

I just got a notice about my ten year high school reunion. Already?? Has ten years already gone by? Were did those years go? (most of them were spent married and all were spent in school, actually). I don't know if I will be able to go to my reunion- I don't think I will be in town.

I'm not against going, in theory. I have a pretty good marriage and I'm pretty impressed with my scholastic endeavors.

I think any reservations I have about attending are because I don't want to see certain people I've spent ten years forgetting about. More than people, there are feelings (like feelings of inadequacy) that I want to forget about. High school sucked. Maybe in ten more years... (Plus, hello, they have facebook and myspace so if anyone wants to know what I've been doing all they have to do is google me.)

updates!

I had a good birthday. I turned 27 on Wednesday. It wasn't as traumatic as my 26th birthday- I got a lot of love this year in the form of cards and online greetings and Dennis took me to a really really nice restaurant (Hawaiian fusion!). My Dad actually sent me flowers. They are gorgeous and moved me, considering the fact that Dad rarely even sends me a birthday card (he has a new girlfriend and I surmise that she is pretty awesome). Unfortunately said flowers have given me serious hayfever and allergic reactions. But I love and cherish them and am really really sad that they can't stay in our living room. (They are hiding in our guest room/office right now because I can't throw them away! My Dad bought me flowers!!)

I did break lent for my birthday but I had already decided that you can't blow candles out of an apple. You can't tell from this photo, but it's a chocolate souffle with a candle. And bananas foster on the side. (I can't even just have a little sugar on my birthday.)

On an unrelated note, we are still seriously talking about moving to Monterrey, Mexico. Don't anyone freak out because it highly depends on Dennis getting accepted to the PhD. program that he is applying for. I think he has good chances. Things like this have increased my stress level and I wonder if I might rename my blog to "ERIN FREAKS OUT ABOUT EVERYTHING ALL THE TIME-BLOG!"

So I'm trying to figure out how to get caught up and organized for life. Right now, school is a priority (one reason my blogs are few and far between and always end up like updates!) I need to make a resume. I registered the other day for my last classes in this degree that has taken FOR-EVER to finish and that was kind of a strange feeling. I imagine that I am not done with school yet, as I have started thinking about getting another degree (in what? not sure!).




Can I put LOL-speak on my resume?

Milestones...

I belong to a forum for diabetics who are women and who are mothers or who want to be mothers. I'm not planning anything right now but it has been motivational for getting my health under control. Anyway, when your diabetes is under control, you tell everyone in the forum and they give you a dancing frog (so under 7.0 A1C). My A1C two weeks ago was a 7.8, which is the best I've ever had. It's a milestone and the forum members awarded me with a tadpole. I've been keeping it on my computer harddrive but I haven't been really keeping up with trying to do better. But posting it here might help me to stay focused (I've caved twice in the past week and had some french fries and I've decided to give up candy and cake, except for Mar.11 bday cake, for lent). I just feel like I have so many goals and things I have to do this year, and I think I've been putting the goal of being healthy on the backburner.

I got this email when I was wasting time on facebook (which very well might steal my soul). I'm going back to Japan so I've been raising money. I've reached my half way point, but I don't know how because I can think of 10 people that I know I need to talk to but that I have put off writing letters too. It's another goal.

I'm also taking Japanese, kind of. I'm sitting in on a class but I'm not really auditing it because I'm not paying for it, because the professor and his department have been really ridiculously graceful and generous. But tomorrow morning, there is an exam. I haven't studied and now I feel like I should talk to the professor and just ask him if I can not worry about this exam? I feel really bad, like I'm already wasting his time and like him grading my exam would be just worse. I feel like a flake.

Which brings me to my 10am midterm tomorrow morning. It's something else I haven't satisfactorily studied for. But I'm paying for this class, and I think I might be smarter if I studied and did well for it. But this is like the story of who I am as a student right now- I'm flaking on my studies and putting things off and hoping that I can just get by. It's not how I want to do things, and I'm probably being too hard on myself. I'm just really tired and stressed out.

Which brings me to my whole life right now. I finish school finally in December. My husband doesn't have a job and the US economy is not providing him with anything. We are talking about moving back to Chile or to another country, in general. Which freaks me out. The thought of moving to another country and changing my life so dramatically all by myself (with Dennis), so freaks me out that I feel like I'm almost paralyzed. It's like I'm sabotaging myself physically, spiritually, and scholastically because I'm terrified of the real world, of moving away, of the very very unknown. It's not that I don't have faith in God or in Dennis or in myself. It's that I'm just so anxious about this that I can't even concentrate properly. Me, who has to two hours early for a flight when they say be one hour early. Me, who has to show up 15-30min. early for a movie just because I want to pick the best seats possible. I turn into Godzilla if we miss one preview. Not knowing, not having a clue, not having any control.

I realize, as I type this, that this is what I'm doing. I'm so freaking out that I'm sabotaging myself. Which is absurd because I, of all people, know how amazing God is and how much things can change in one year. In less!

I am a banana in pajamas.

Let me rejoice in this glorious time, when I can be in pajamas for most of the week and blame it on my status as a graduate student. I had a big retreat on Friday and Saturday for Japan and now I have nothing until Thursday morning. Which means I celebrated Martin Luther King in my pajamas perusing facebook. And while I did indeed watch the presidential ceremonies today and I did tear up and fall in love with the Obama daughters, etc., I did also return to bed after I saw George W. board the helicopter.

I do have more important things to do. I can get dressed, go for a walk, do the dishes, clean our apartment or do the laundry, or take out the trash... Or really more importantly, I could do my homework. I have some reading to do, especially for all of the many book reviews that are due at the end of the semester AKA in two months. And if I did do my homework, it would certainly lend credence to any of my arguments when they do happen, with Dennis about just how busy I am as a graduate student. (As in "hey, I work really hard! I'm a full-time graduate student!")

I think that this is my last year to use this excuse. I am finishing classes in December and while I expect for the comprehensive exams to be really tough (the ones I must pass in order to get my degree in April of 2010...), I know that a year from now I am going to be worrying more about my resume (which I still need to write...) and all of the real grown up stuff that comes along with GROWING UP.

I'm rejoicing. And freaking out.

'Tis the Season...

'Tis the season for stressing out about papers. I have two papers that I have procrastinated on and one is due tomorrow evening. I have faith in myself, but I can't sleep because my papers are one thing that is going through my mind right now despite the sleep aids. This is what happened last night. I started freaking out about my term papers, especially the one due before Thanksgiving, and I spent the night working on it instead of sleeping.

Which has led me to believe and come to terms with the fact that I'm 26 and not 20 and that all-nighters are no longer feasible for me. I've also been thinking about how my undergraduate classmates stress so much about their grades. And I'm reminded that I really could care less about grades I received years ago so it doesn't really matter. The problem that I face is that in recognizing that my grades don't determine my self-worth, I find myself sometimes sliding into an apathetic and unmotivated academic attitude. If it doesn't really matter, why should I stress myself out. Unfortunately, stressing myself out at the last minute for things like papers is the key to my academic success. I always seem to triumph or at least slide by if I work up to the 11th hour.

My apathy towards school is really a symptom of a larger picture. Quite frankly, I have bigger issues in my life. Dennis isn't working, my hormones are freaking out, I'm worried about my dad, etc. And I am starting to think about life after school, where they really don't care what grade you got on a certain paper. I just don't want my apathy to turn into laziness and apathy in other aspects of my life.

So, I've been stressing myself out and thus I feel like garbage. Trying to pull an all-nighter didn't work and made me feel sick. So I was lying in bed listening to the rain outside, thinking instead about all the things that worry me. I'm worried about school. I'm worried about our future after I graduate. I'm worried about my diabetes. We want to have children, eventually, and I want to be healthy when we do that. In realizing that we will be moving a year from now, I am also realizing that "right around graduation" was when we keep telling people we will start trying to pop out kids. Which means I can no longer procrastinate and not take things like my blood sugars seriously. I have to care. So I find myself caring more about things like my diabetes than I do about my Old Testament Pentateuch class.

I can't sleep so much that I am actually trying to think of things to make for Thanksgiving. Typically, we get invited to a local family's house for the meal. Not family but church friends. This year we don't have invites and I'm actually a little relieved because in our early married years, we went to Denny's for Thanksgiving. A part of me (the part of me that is pushing towards being a real grown up), wants to make something on Thanksgiving. Not a turkey (we wouldn't eat it) but maybe some comfort foods (I'm thinking about deviled eggs, mashed potatoes, stuffing and a small small ham of sorts.) I'm debating on whether or not desert should be included as I am the only one who really eats sweets and Dennis isn't a big pumpkin fan. I'll figure it out but this is what is keeping me up at night.

Or my mind wanders to the stuff our church is doing for the poor people in the area and when they travel to Mexico. They have asked for blankets and I think I am going to give a bunch of blankets away. I came from a family that never ever through away blankets. I don't know why but blankets were just always valuable, even second-hand ugly and outdated ones. We have a few that we never use and don't need. I'm trying to downsize everything we own whenever I get the opportunity because as I've hinted earlier, we are probably moving.

According to Dennis, we will ideally stay in Southern California. It's the easiest way to move. He is looking at jobs in Florida and in Texas. If he cannot find any jobs, we are considering moving back to Chile. In Chile, Dennis can work as an online professor for a school in the states and get a job in Chile. Chile, as in every other place in the world, is economically freaking out. Someone needs to give my husband a job. We need health care and he needs to feel like he is providing again.

This list of things going on in my mind could go on forever. One of the things that I've been hearing again and again and trying to process is this idea of "God's timing". God waited until Sarah was 90 something before letting her have a baby. He waited YEARS before he got his people out of the desert to the actual Promised Land. And even after they arrived, they still had to fight for YEARS more to actually get the land. Things that happen in one or two verses in the Bible actually take a lot longer in real life. And so I'm told to be patient. God is all powerful and all knowing and has control and I just need to wait and have faith. It's just easier said than done. I can see, looking back on my life, times that I have felt God acting slowly and now those times seem to have gone by so fast. A week or even a year flies by and the person I was a year ago and the place we are in our life is just so different. But just every once in a while, it would be so nice to know for sure what is going to happen. More than what grades I'm going to get- where are we going to live? What will we be doing professionally? When will be start a family? I wish I could see God's plan instead of passively waiting on Him to act. It's frustrating and challenging and ever so easy to ask out loud "God, where are you? What are you doing? What is the point of this??"

Okay. I need to try to go back to sleep. I have to wake up early tomorrow to write this stupid paper.

Why Angelina Jolie hate?

So apparently, no one likes Angelina Jolie! I'm a little surprised! (A little.) I think that Brad is kind of annoying personally (actually he does a lot of good things). I just don't like him because to me, This is a massive cop-out. (Or a massive win for Brad, who has the cow and the milk for free).

Anyway, this is me today. I'm not sick just completely tired and unmotivated as far as school. It's just a lack of energy- I don't want to wake up for the 8am class I'm auditing and I don't want to read for my other classes. This will lead to panic in the coming weeks as two papers are due before thanksgiving which is approaching fast.


On a side note, Dennis and I are working with two other guys who may go with us to Japan next summer (fingers crossed that the timing works and we all have the ability to do what we are planning!) We made dinner and talked about it tonight with them and things look really good but I realized that once again I have a big mouth and I am very intrusive. God, I'm such a girl. I hope that we can work as a team without me interfering as an annoying female who wants to know marriage plans and medical histories. I know that Dennis, rightly so perhaps, says that I talk to much and I probably embarrass him. I've never met someone who is so closely the epitome of a meddling chatterbox, as I am myself.

*On another side note, this is like the 4th time this semester that Dennis and I have had a dinner for students/undergraduates. We are very old married couple mentorly aren't we. :) It's not heavy cooking- I made a frozen lasagna tonight.

Osmosis.

because I've been pretty exhausted for the past five days or so. not studying as much as I'd like....

(Seriously. I've noticed a new self-diagnosed ridiculous monthly body symtom. I'm comatose for 5-7 days. I have NO energy. I slept more than I was awake this weekend!)

Quarter life crisis in the making.

I feel really old to be 26. It's not Dennis's fault or the fault of the fact that we live with people who are still barely legally able to drink.

It's been brewing in me for awhile but it came to a head tonight. I feel so old. I've been wearing black nail polish for about a month now. I think it's cute and it reminds me of the funner parts of high school. Dennis groaned. Apparently, black nail polish is not sexy. I counterattacked- not only are famous people who are my age and older wearing it, but it's actually being worn in fashion magazines. Chanel has a black polish. But the very thought of me wearing it makes me look juvenile.

This attack on my nails paralleled a similar discussion about having a glass of wine to relax. I reason this: I'm not drinking alone, I'm not binge drinking or drinking every day (or even every week!), I'm not a mother of anyone and really am not responsible for anyone except for myself, and I'm an adult. But apparently my urge to want to drink hints that I'm immature.

So what I see as me being a normal 26 year old is "immature". Maybe I am wrong. Maybe I should strive to be five years older than I am. Marriage, perhaps, means that you have to shrug off anything that makes you feel like an individual or young.

I'm kind of freaking out about this. If I'm "too old" for black nail polish or the thought of an occasional glass of alcohol, I'm definitely too old to do something really crazy like die my hair pink or get a nose ring.

Marriage and all of its' complications aside, I have one question:
a)Am I really too old to wear black nail polish. I know that I have 4 years on most of my classmates and that I can't wear the same fashions (leggings, painful boots, etc.) But can't I have the black nail polish?

update! update!

ugh. I know. I've been a lazy blogger. Not very good at posting anything. In a nutshell, I got distracted and then I got stressed and I've been very lazy.

I started school on Monday and I fear based on first impressions that this will be one of those semesters of Graduate work that I've got really paid for. Sometimes, because a lot of my classes are with undergrads, I feel like I can kind of skate through things. I'm pretty good at procrastinating and such and I've polished my skills at writing thing last minute or pretending I've read the text.

Also, when the Professor is asking you to read the first five chapters of the Gospel of John, and you've read those devotionally at random different times in different chunks and/or you've heard at least one sermon on them, you feel (or I feel, atleast) like I can just kind of figure out what I'm supposed to know.

This semester I'm taking a class on God and Providence and we are going to be reading ancient scholars and German scholars. It is a lot of words and I'm not really a reader and there are big theological words and concepts. It's an important class- the first of three that I need to take for my degree- and I am happy to know that I will be smarter for them. But these are daunting books and not only do I need to read them but I need to talk about them in class and write substantially on them.

I'm also taking a class on the first five books of the Bible, which shouldn't be as bad per se, but I do need to respond in writing to the required reading and there will be a paper and (ahem...)work.

What I am counting on, as fun, will be the Japanese class that I'm auditing. I'm enjoying it but I'm not paying for it, except in time and in the cost of the text books. I think it will be like yoga for my brain.

Dennis is teaching online for Kaiser College in Florida (I know not alot of this school so google it.) And he is looking for work, everywhere (like every place on earth that is hiring. But I refuse to move to Dubai, for example.)

So at the moment, I don't have an opinion on much outside of the little bubble of myself and Dennis and school. I don't even care about the whole president thing anymore.

It Is finished...

We bought my books for the summer class that starts on Monday and we bought the dress for my cousin's wedding. That is a lot of pennies spent on me.

The start of a really busy freaking summer is upon me. I have jury duty/summer school starting Monday. I break for a week and then go to New Mexico for my cousin's expensive wedding. And then a few days after that Dennis and I will go to Japan. (Actually after Japan, I see the summer being not so busy. Just work and teaching Sunday School on Sunday morning!)

This week was Pepperdine's Bible Lectureships. I heard a lot of the message that I need to depend on God, because my happiness is not to be found in things that I can buy or what I can do for my social status. So I know I am at the point where I must say, "I can only depend on God at this point." Because I am otherwise really stressing myself out and being rather hard on myself about our financial situation or fundraising for Japan or being the best mentor/maid of honor/cousin to my cousin. All I can ask is that God takes care of me and those things take care of themselves.

So I guess the title of this post is more than just the answer to "Jesus Christ's words on the cross". It is also the answer to "Erin freaking out about financial things and thinking that the world is going to end...".

I'm not freaking out. That is also finished. For today.

I'm a bad Maid of Honor. Maybe.

I have been putting off the bridesmaid dress purchase for my favorite cousin (and my only girl cousin). It's $180 plus extra for a special sash and I hate bringing this up with Dennis, and I hate thinking about it, and I now really wish my cousin would have fallen in love with something a hundred bucks cheaper.

According to David's Bridal- I called two separate stores- if I order the dress this week, it will arrive the week before the wedding. Which is fine. Unless I need alterations. Which I wasn't planning on needing, and I don't know how big of a deal they are. One of my good friends who just had her own wedding and is a bridesmaid, and who is familiar with the store, said it takes less time than the store gives you.

So, it's just a pain. I have to go to the store to make sure that I fit- I've lost a little weight since I tried the dress on last. And the nearest store is like 45 minutes away.


I suppose all of this would be different if I felt a little more connected to what is going on with the bride. I am her maid of honor, and yet I have no idea what is going on in this wedding. I have no idea who the other bridesmaid is (there are only 2 of us). I don't know if she expects a bridal shower the day before the wedding (I will try to throw a bachelorette party...) And I have no clue what she wants, because she isn't registering. I don't know anything about the wedding, and I am just annoyed and frustrated. I can't make e-vites because most of her friends don't even have internet connection.

To all future brides:

Please communicate with your bridesmaids, especially if they are out-of-state. Please think of them when you are thinking of the dress. Think about the costs, think about the location- if you are having your wedding outside in a ghost town in New Mexico in the summer, pick a summery dress. Not a big-ass ballgown in black. (Actually, it was my suggestion to do black for myself as I am the Maid of Honor. But now that there are two of us, I suppose I could have stayed with red).
Just. Look, I know you are stressed out with life. Job, school, family. I get it. And I know that throwing a wedding isn't cheap. But if you don't communicate with your Maid of Honor, she might start to freak out.
Also, if you choose inexpensive options, you can do more. You probably will get better gifts too. I know you don't want to hear us say "I will look for the dress on EBay" (note: not what I have said or done) but you can't blame us after we fork over money for everything else.

Also, seriously, after all of this, you better not get divorced. And if you get remarried, do it in Vegas.

Thanks,
Erin

I am Beautiful. So stop nagging me.

I have spent the entire day in email-battle with my grandfather, who has made me very aware every time we are together in person, that I need to watch what I eat and lay off the sweets. He emailed me to say "happy birthday" and to simultaneously tell me about lap-band surgery and the fact that this can be a cure for diabetics.

I sighed at the email. Can my grandpa send me even a happy birthday without hinting that I'm overweight? So, I email him back. I decide that it is time that I say out loud/ write in email to my old grandpa, that he needs to stop reminding me of my weight. I say:

I think that the lap-band surgery works mainly for type 2 diabetics, who have diabetes that can be cured. There are advances on type 1 diabetes too, but surgery wouldn't cure me. Also, it could be dangerous because of my diabetes, which affects my ability to heal and my immune system. At any rate, lap-band surgery is also for people who are severely obese. I know I'm not as thin as I was in high-school, but I also don't think that I am severely obese. I see an endocrinologist and a diabetes educator/nutritionist once a month and they have never suggested that I was dangerously overweight. Thank you for thinking of me but I would appreciate an email exchange that doesn't include discussion of my weight- I know that you are worried about me and only tell me because you love me, but it hurts my feelings. I think I'm beautiful and I would think that you would see that to.

He emails me back:

Erin, you need to lighten up about your weight. There was no intent to criticize your weight, the information was taken from an article in the paper here in Dallas. Morbidly obese is defined as a person that is at least 100 pounds over there ideal weight. I don't think you classify in that case. Yes, I do care greatly about your health because I don't want to lose anymore family members and love you very much. I am also proud of your accomplishments and would like to see you both reach your goal of becoming professors. If you do not reach that goal it is not the end of the world and I am sure you will succeed in whatever that will be.

Your aunt Nancy was the one that told me when I inquired about you that she called you the morning after your birthday and you were eating cake for breakfast.

So, touche. Maybe. I mean, maybe I did react a little sensitively. But on the other hand, it is a consistent mention in our relationship and it hurts my feelings. So I kind of don't regret it. I really needed him to hear that I think that I am a beautiful and curvy girl who does not need to think about lap-band surgery. I do (hopefully doing some damage control) write back:

I'm sorry that I am sensitive about my weight. It's just something that I worry a lot about-it's probably the nature of the beast with grandaughters. We worry about our appearance and our weight a lot. It means a lot to me that you care and worry for me- I know you aren't against me and that you aren't attacking me intentionally. I love you too, and I hope that we are okay. I just needed to tell you that.


Can I get some validation? Am I the only one who understands how annoying it is to explain why I've gained some pounds since high school??? Was I too hard on him?

All of this makes me wish I had money for retail therapy. I so want this Holy Water bottle.

Today is almost over.

Thank Christ.

This morning at 7:30am ish, I put all of my things in my bag and went to my car. I got in my car and looked in my bag to make sure that my wallet was there. It wasn't. I remember picking it up off the table and putting it into my bag, so I know I had it. But in the span of 15 minutes, I lost it. And I've spent the entire day looking for it, calling people, retracing my steps, etc. It's a nightmare. And Dennis is (finally) coming home on Sunday but now I'm freaking out because I don't want him to be frustrated with me because I can't find my wallet. It's one of those weird things where I think and stress out about Dennis like he's going to punish me for making an honest mistake, instead of giving him the benefit of the doubt. I'm harder on myself than he is and the whole thing just makes me ill. Dennis is going to be so happy to be home and to be in his own bed, in his own town, with his wife, that he isn't going to stop loving me or stop caring if I have to get replacement cards for the cards lost. I didn't lose credit cards, only bank cards, and I didn't lose anything that cannot be replaced. But I'm freaking out and already anticipating stress. I'm my own worst enemy. Tomorrow I have to go to the bank to make sure that I can get a new bank card, to prevent anyone from spending our money, and I might go to the DMV to order a new driver's license. Things could be worse. But I'm in panic mode and today has just been horrible.


That all aside, here is today's very late (but much needed) Friday's Feast

Appetizer
What is your favorite type of art?

cinema or photography. I love making collages with things that I find interesting or beautiful in magazines.

Soup
When was the last time you got a free lunch (or breakfast or dinner)? Who paid for it?

I got pancakes about a month ago for a lunch with my co-workers!! (so I guess Pepperdine paid for it...)

Salad
On a scale of 1-10 with 10 being highest, how emotional are you?

10. I'm too emotional.

Main Course
Approximately how long do you spend each day responding to emails?

10-20 min. Sometimes I put responding off and it does depend on who I'm responding to.

Dessert
To what temperature do you usually set your home’s thermostat?

We don't have a thermostat. We do have an air conditioner in our window. It is set at 75 but I might put it at 78 later tonight. It was really hot two weeks ago and now suddenly it's like raining and time to put on sweaters and socks. Oh Southern California weather, how I do love thee.

(five minutes after this post).
Oh my God!!! I found it!!! Like a day freakin' later I found my wallet!!! In the couch!!! Thank you Jesus Christ!! Oh MY GOD I have been praying next to this stupid sofa all day!! ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!

YESS!!!!

I can count on the snarky humor of web-comics (see sidebar) to give me what I need to write.

Between you, me, and Jesus. And the other people who read this, I am feeling pretty iffy on how the whole "me re-meeting Dennis's family after four years" thing is going down. I'm sure I've mentioned it. See, back in 2003, I was like a dream size 10. Oh man, I miss those days. I was also really sick and having some serious depression issues and always getting things like seizures and infections... but oh how I took my waistline for granted. Anyway, even then I felt fat. Because in Argentina, the women are all a size 7 and under. And in Chile, they might find you a size 9.

I mean, then it wasn't so bad. And my obsession with various junk foods over the past year especially hasn't been so helpul. And I keep thinking "stop it. Your mother in law is not shallow. His family loves you." blah blah blah. Dennis loves me and thinks I'm beautiful. And when I am with him, I feel beautiful. But his ex-wife was a freakin' underwear model. Yes, she was a model 15 years ago pre-babies. And yes, I cheer inside because I've "beat her" on the age card (yes! I've got NO wrinkles!!!). Dennis doesn't understand why there is this part of me that I'm trying to kill off, that can't help but feel like I'm competing with his ex-wife. I don't even know what I'm competing for or if I'm competing by myself. I'm the one Dennis is married to. I'm afraid in part, that people will see "fat" and think "weakness of character" even though that's like the one thing I can think of that would really show weakness of character.

So I've been mentally beating myself up about this for about a month, and it's not easier when Dennis is gone and the apartment is super quiet and I've got my thoughts to wrestle with. I'm a good person. I'm genuine. And I genuinely like all of Dennis's family. I love his mom and I love the girls and I love the quirks of the chilean family that is so close and yet so distant. I love his family. And I'm worthy of their love and respect. So I need to leave the self-destructive-thinking Erin at home in Malibu. With the heavy shoes.

Prayers for me, that I love myself. And that I pat myself on the back for a change, instead of beating myself up. And prayers that even though I will probably be so nervous about seeing everyone, that I can relax once we've seen each other again because they are excited to see me and don't care about my cellulite. It's not like I'm going in a bikini.

(Seriously, this whole blog-tangent started because I was lying in bed thinking "It's a 13 hour flight to Chile. God, the first thing I'm going to need when I get off the plane is gonna be a diet coke and some of those Chilean bon-bons...")

Not Safe For Children's Ears....

But this is how Dennis and I feel. Today. Hormones.

Family Versus School...

Prayer Request:

Dennis wants to go to Chile for 2 weeks at the end of September/the beginning of October. It's something I've been blogging about a little bit because I'm excited about leaving the country and really excited about seeing his family again. This would mean missing 2 weeks of school.

I talked to one of my professors, and he wasn't mean but he was against the idea, understandably. The question is, should I go to Chile or stay and not miss school?

I feel like I really should go- it would mean a lot to Dennis if I was with him while he sorts out things with the girls and visiting his family. It would mean a lot to both of us to see his brother, who has been sick with cancer. I feel like, in the long term, it would be more damaging to my relationships with my husband and with his family if I chose to stay because of school. But school is very important to me and I can also rationalize how missing school would be an error. My brother-in-law is very sick but he isn't dying. I really want to visit with my step daughters but I would feel just awful to miss class, mainly because I really don't want to disappoint the professors that have influence on my grades and even eventually whether or not I pass the exams to get my degree. It is just two weeks and I am really struggling with how to either tell my family that I cannot make it, or tell my professors that I cannot be the student that I wish I was. I haven't missed this much school in years. It feels like Family vs. School. I can rationalize both ways and I am going to pray about it for a few days. He hasn't bought the tickets yet but this is the best time for Dennis to go even though it isn't for me. We are going to try to see if we can move the travel time to be around holidays but it looks like this will be Dennis's best window for traveling, for his job. One of the things that sticks in my head is that I haven't seen my Chilean family in 4 years. It is a lot easier to travel to family in the states and there is a possibility that it will be another 4 years before I get another chance, which is meaningful if my brother in law continues to be ill.


So, I would really appreciate any advice (I keep waffling on what to decide) and prayers for me and for Dennis, to make the wisest decisions. Ever the humanitarian, I am so afraid and so I do pray that I make a wise decision with courage.

Friday Feast

It's the first time I've given myself the mental permission to blog. Not only have I been mega-stressed out with classes (which ended today physically but I still have 2 papers to write, one of them being a massive paper technically due today that I will not finish until Monday), but I've spent the past week recovering from another ear infection that feels like it will not completely go away, and I am just exhausted. And I tried to take a nap and it didn't work.

I really hate that whole body clock thing where your body gets used to waking up early and going to bed early and then when you want to go to a late movie or to sleep in, you can't.

Dennis, once again, deserves an award of some type for being supportive and caring as I freak out (last night, for example, I just started humming and vocalizing my stress and he really didn't care).

this week's Friday's Feast

Appetizer
What is your favorite fruit?

I like the citrus fruits like mangos and pineapples but I am strangely not a big orange fan.

Soup
Who is someone you consider as a great role model?

I think that my grandmother is a great role model. She's definitely given me a great model of resiliency and how to stay married forever to someone.

Salad
If you were to spend one night anywhere within an hour of your home, where would you choose?

It would be nice just to spend a night in the Westlake Hyatt, where I go typically for work-related retreats (students retreat and I work...). But then again, they have a terrible system of pretty much no food available after 10pm and that sucks. Maybe alongside the beach somewhere.

Main Course
Name something you do too often.

I, clearly, procrastinate too often. I am sure that my two worst sins of the seven are gluttony and sloth.

Dessert
Fill in the blank: I really like ___________ because ____________.

I really like margaritas because they make me feel like a better dancer. I noticed this at the Father's Day party that Dennis and I went to this year, at this marvelous orchid farm. Dennis let me drink as much as I wanted. (Which, probably, wasn't that much because they were serving margaritas in tiny cups a tiny bit bigger than dixie cups but I had about 4 and one shot so...)

no pressure...

so here's the deal. I have a term paper due monday (20 pages that I haven't started), and I should study for finals. And tomorrow I have my second shot at the driving exam. (I didn't say anything last week, the night before, because I didn't want to jinx myself. And look! I failed! so now I'm saying something! I'm as nervous as hell!!)

And what have I done today? A lot of nothing. I watched the end of the 2nd season of "The Office", online, at work. (and I did SOME greek homework). And then I came home and I went to like five different mind-zapping gossip websites. And it's wednesday, so I watched (and am still watching) hours of reality tv. I am not focusing. at all. So if I start wigging out on Sunday night about how I've done no schoolwork at all, this is why.

All this being said, "America's Next Top Model" is becoming really really lame. I don't know why I watch. The challenge today was to give a cover girl commercial using an austrailian accent. How does this relate to anything fashion? How? And why does Tyra Banks think she is an expert in accents? How? Whatever, I totally figured out who would leave in the first five minutes of the show.

And then I changed to American Idol. I don't like this show. I've never been an idol fan. But I wanted Sanjaya to stay. If only for the fact that Perez Hilton kept calling him "Sangina". But I figured out online that he was going and I don't have the attention span to listen to karoke of country music.

The gold of the evening is "shear genius" on Bravo. I came at this show with skepticism. I kind of thought "Top Chef" and "Top Design" were boring (really, Top Design. I just didn't find Todd Oldham interesting...)

But all of the contestants are brilliantly so serious. They are all hair-dressers/stylists. So they are all flamboyant and loud and bitchy and half of them have accents (and some of those accents are fake). How does the host tell the stylist that he/she is eliminated? wait for it......


"this is your final cut"

hilarious.


And this is Jessica Simpson a)wishing me luck for tomorrow b)giving me little joy inside especially as she looks pretty self-explanatorily horrible. it's like payback for every time Dennis has said she was hot in "The Dukes of Hazzard". She's wearing the same pants my grandma wears to Hometown Buffet each week, and it rules. Her teeth match her top. Nice.

Oh My God, I'm so Neurotic.

almost titled "Oh my God, I'm my mother".

Today was day two in what I would like to describe as me basically going ballistic quite randomly. God bless Dennis for living with me when I'm on my period, because I'm starting to freak out during. And when I say freak out, I mean mental. I can't even describe how it feels, which is frustrating because I can't explain to Dennis why I'm being so unfair- emotional and weepy and then angry and psychotic (not quite violent-knife-wielding psychotic but certainly incredible hulk territory.)

Like today, I know I woke up. I know I started freaking out about my lack of driver's license and somehow "this is all Dennis's fault", and I just went ballistic. I did the dishes in the most angry way possible and ordered him to leave (Oh I do remember him trying to get me to go to eat lunch with him and I think I remember freaking out and saying "I have to clean. Get out. Don't buy me anything. Just go away and eat.") And after he (finally) left, I crawled into our walk in closet and prayed to God amidst shoes and dirty sheets that I need to wash. It was a bit comforting but I felt like Dennis would just laugh at me if he came back to find me in the closet crying into a dirty pillowcase. I ate and we got better.

But later this evening, a series of events caused me to flip out again, at Dennis. Again, I can't explain. None of this is his fault. He can't read my mind that I want him to tell me especially as I'm especially hormonal that I'm the most beautiful woman in the world, for example. And even if I do say "honey, am I pretty?" I'm so destructive that I don't believe him when he says "of course you are!!" Bless his heart- I said tonight "give me one reason why you even want me to be in the same room with you at night" (he'd been really good with saying that I was being selfish and kind of strange in the past two days...) and he said "because I'm COLD!"

I'm pretty much panic attack blogging because I've been panic-attack reacting all day (this is when being an alcoholic almost makes sense except for the fact that I really like being present in the conversation...) This is like the third time or so that we've both really notice that I kind of wig out when I'm starting my period and so now I'm thinking:
-oh God, I have to be normal!!
-I really need to talk to a doctor about this...
-Thank Christ for Xanax. Really. It's actually a "I'm thankful for..." statement I've been meaning to blog about for a while. No one blogs about drugs and how wonderful they can be and I've been cautious about it because when I think of Xanax lately I think of Britney Spears partying with Xanax. I've been on it for almost 3 years and it's quite marvelous. So there, I've laid that out on the table.

I'm reading Anne Lamott right now ("Plan B"). She's got a lot of brilliant quotes and ideas but the one that's stuck out at me today has been that God says "Don't be an asshole." I've been brilliant at this lately so I think my prayer for the day is that I'm not acting like a jerk to Dennis, that he doesn't act like a total tool with me either, and that both of us feel God's love and peace.

**I think, By the way, that Dennis has finally learned (or atleast started to learn) that one of the worst things he could ever say is "you are acting like your mother right now" Because it's like a code for me to immiediately react and flip out.