Wednesday, April 27, 2011

The frustration of discouragement

As I type this, my back is slumped, and unlike when I normally notice I'm slumped, I correct it, but I'm so downtrodden that I don't even care to prevent my old-lady-humpback from forming.

When I have days like today, when all the tiny things that happened add up to you suck I start to think that I'm supposed to change something in my life. So that the tiny-you-sucks will stop. It makes my mind wander around to:

"hey, I never waitressed before, maybe I could do that?"
or
"maybe I should just make paintings and sell them"
or
"maybe I should stop working altogether and stop paying for that expensive preschool and just stay home like a hippee and be one with the earth?"

But those aren't really good ideas. Well the painting one might be. I do think about it sometimes, that maybe I should just paint, and sell my paintings and tell graphic design to stick-it, or just be selfish with it and make my own badass promo materials from the comfort of my own dark creative cave...and grow a beard...

I also think "my dad just kept quitting things when he felt like he sucked, and that was disastrous to say the least."
So I have a little "quitting will make you a loser" tape that plays in my head*.
Even though my [earthly] gut says "go! take your family to the Amish country and never look back [else I be turned into a pillar of salt], I suppose that's not a viable option.

I wish I had the entrepreneurial wiring. Unfortunately according to Strengthsfinder 2.0 , I'm only good at coming up with ideas and being the first to act on them, not actually coming up with a plan and following through on it. I know this comes as a big shocker to everyone that knows me! But that makes me feel like a loser. 'That I can't manage people, and what I think is a detailed plan is what detailed people call an "outline."

I recently read Tina Fey's quasi-biography, and while reading it, I thought "I could be a comedy writer. I could totally do it!" But then I was discouraged that I'm already 30, and she got her college degree in playwriting. And I don't want to live in LA or NY, so that's out the window too.
But maybe just writing a book? Maybe that's attainable...

I know all this boils down to an attitude change. I need to accept that my daughter thinks she's better than the rest of the family, her will cannot be broken and just wait for that day when God smites her to rock bottom or something.
I need to accept that my son never wants to leave the house, won't eat anything but candy and gets in trouble all the time at school/church. I think he'll actually grow up to be just fine, and I have to just let people think I'm a terrible mother and be okay with that.
I need to accept the limitations of my job and be grateful for it. I need to continue to engage with other people even though on most days I want to stay in bed with my covers pulled over my head, because that's what humans have to do.
And I have to stop feeling bad that I'm not feminine, I have chubby upper arms and I'll never be as cool as the women in ReadyMade magazine.

Easier typed than done.


*other tapes that play in my head: "headbands are for normal size/shape heads, stay away" and "if you don't wear make-up, people won't be nice to you."

Saturday, April 23, 2011

I just submitted this to another blog

I just submitted this quick post to one of my favorite blogs.

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Around 18 mo's old, my first kid climbed on the toilet paper holder (like an indoor climbing wall) and broke it.
So my husband fixed it.
And she broke it again.
Repeat, repeat until we just gave up on having a tp holder and just put the roll on floor like a gas station restroom.
Recently, I thought I found a solution to the problem and stuck those 3M hooks onto the wall and tied a ribbon through them to hold the roll.
Then this morning, I walked in and saw this:

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*note 1: It's now been 5 years since we had a real TP holder
**note 2: The kids have their own bathroom down the hall, in which the tp holder is completely intact and unbroken.

Saturday, April 16, 2011

Get out your Bibles, and cross out "corn"

As I was researching Isaac Newton's determination of the original calendar date of the Crucifixion (the most scholarly thing I did all week, for sure) I noticed the mention of "corn."

A while back I heard a sermon in which the speaker referenced Biblical corn as well.

Corn?!

Corn is a New World crop, so why the heck are there 33 references to it, in both OT and NT?

Now, you probably know where this is going. It wasn't corn, the original Hebrew and Greek don't say "corn," they say grain.
But why not just say grain? Or phonetically translate the weird ancient word for it, like other hard to pronounce names and places?

According to a couple of commentaries I read, it's because the King James Translators knew that people of their time thought corn was really cool (because it was from the mysterious New World).
Then why do so many other modern translations still use "corn"? (Thankfully there are a number of English translations that say "grain") My theory is two fold: 1.American translators are USA-centric. Just like we counterintuitvely split Asia down the middle to make a world map with us in the center, so also do we think American corn is the best grain (it's in almost everything we eat). 2.Translators think we're smart enough to understand a triune God but too stupid to understand millet.