Twenty WHAT?!

Well hello!

Playing in super soft Canary Island sand

I turned twenty five yesterday.

My grandfather gave me a birthday phone call and casually asked how my life to do list was going.

THANK GOODNESS I have another three years to complete the list.  I take it very seriously despite all appearances.  Thanks, Grandaddy, for inquiring after the list and holding me accountable :)

Here is the list.  (I'm only 90% sure this is 100% accurate as I lost the original documentation.)

1. skydive
2. hanglide
3. ride a camel
4. ride an elephant
5. swim with dolphins
6. volunteer at an orphanage 
7. write a song
8. write a book
9. learn to sail
10. pay for a family vacation*

One, two, and three.  Done.

Four, five, and six.  Okay so, I'm not trying to be lazy, or a tree-hugging hipster, but I'm not sure these are very nice or ethical. I've decided I'm not going out of my way to do these things; I certainly won't pay to do them. But do I secretly hope that one day I'll dive off my sailboat into crystal blue sea and be suddenly surrounded by Flipper and his extended family?  Yes.

*Ten.  I don't know what I was thinking when I was eighteen.  Maybe that I'd win the lottery by twenty one?  I don't know. So I'm going to cheat.  Melissa and I paid for our parents to stay in a nice Florentine B&B.  So... check.  Until I win the lottery.  And I'm taking Melissa on a postgrad Caribbean cruise.  So... double check.

Seven, eight, nine.  Working on it.

love,
mb

Be still, my soul

I've been trying to write a post about Lent, but I keep tripping over my words. Instead, I thought I'd share some bits and pieces that've had me thinking.

WSJ article on how we spend our time: 

"If you're working 50 hours a week, and sleeping eight hours a night (56 per week) that leaves 62 hours for other things. That's plenty of hours for a family life and a personal life -- exercising, volunteering, sitting on the porch with the paper, plus watching TV if you like."

Sojourners article on doing nothing for Lent: 

“One of the things the monks used to say: ‘Stay in your cell. The cell will teach you everything,’ Peterson told us in a conversation about simplicity: 'I took that personally in terms of my congregation. ‘Stay in your congregation. Your congregation will teach you everything.’ I was always thinking about projects, but I kept coming back to that until I was content to be just with these people. Receive from them. Not always thinking up ways to make their lives more interesting, or godly, or whatever.'”

And a quote attributed to Thoreau: 

"I make myself rich by making my wants few." 

How difficult it is to make my wants few. 

I drive myself a tiny bit crazy, wanting experiences, relationships, successes, character traits, and recognitions that simply aren't compatible with one another. Often I dream about living and working on a quiet farm. But I remember our time in Guatemala when the day moved so slowly, from chore to chore, rainstorm to rainstorm, and I went a tiny bit crazy then, too. 


Would I be satisfied milking cows every morning? Or simply working from home in a rural area?  (Because let's be honest. I'm never going to be a farmer.)

For Lent, I gave up blogs. That hasn't been going well. So I'm giving up giving up blogs. Instead, I'm trying to calm down. 

It's so hard to calm down. 

Be still, my soul. 

Psalm 131 

A song of ascents. Of David. 

My heart is not proud, LORD,

my eyes are not haughty;

I do not concern myself with great matters

or things too wonderful for me.

But I have calmed and quieted myself,

I am like a weaned child with its mother;

like a weaned child I am content. 

Israel, put your hope in the LORD

both now and forevermore.

Linking with love: both pieces of art from awelltravelledwoman

23 Things I Learned When I Was 23

I learned that...

1. Having a tan looks and feels good. I thought I'd embraced my whiteness. Then this summer I got a real tan. And it looked good. And I miss it.

2. Minnesota is a beautiful state.

3. Driving solo for eighteen hours is not a good idea.

4. Pleurisy is the inflammation of the lining surrounding the lungs. Pleurisy burns and hurts a lot.

5. New Orleans jazz is groovy. 

6. Mardi Gras is gross and awful, especially when I'm desperately searching for a taxi at 4am.

7. Alabama has all sorts of funky homegrown festivals that I haven't discovered. 

8. I love bike rides in Grand Teton National Park. Okay, so I love most things in Grand Teton National Park, but I didn't go on a bike ride until my last week. It was one of my favorite afternoons of the summer. We discovered a hidden country store with free gingersnap cookies hot out of the wood-burning oven!

9. If I don't ask, I probably won't receive.

10. Being brutally honest to the right person relieves guilt and makes problems more manageable.

11. Blackberry produces mediocre phones. I'm sorry I cheated on you, Apple.

12. Extra exercise gives me more energy than extra sleep.

13. Six-foot live Christmas trees smell nice, but they're a pain in the ass to get rid of.

14. The City of London is its own separate city; it even has its own police force and tax code. 

15. I may prefer the countryside to city life. But I reserve the right to change my mind always.

16. I'm high maintenance, just like my dad said I was. I thought he was very wrong, but then in the middle of a serious relationship, I discovered he was very right.

17. It's almost always a good idea to meet up with friends I haven't seen in years, even if I think it might be awkward.

I learned how...

18. To skip a rock (sort of).

19. To ski (sort of).

20. To use London's bus system.

21. To crush garlic cloves so that they're easier to peel.

And why…

22. Grown ups don't do extracurriculars... 9-5s make you tired.

And what…

23. P&L, ETD, OTC, and CDS stand for… profit & loss, exchange traded derivatives, over the counter trading, and… I can't remember CDS, actually. I'll get back to you on that one.

Oh!  And the first thing I learned when I was twenty four:  how to make amazing lentil burgers.

Happy Lent(il)...
mb

Notes from India

A message from my friend travelling in India:

So we hear about this rat temple, where rats are the deity and are celebrated and fed and let to just run around. Awesome, right?! It was the worst thing i've ever done. there were just rats everywhere, crawling across the floor, eating food, crapping everywhere, dying and rotting in corners... it was terrible. why would something like this exist?

Made me laugh and think about joys of travel.

Thoughts & Ireland photos

So many evenings I'm power walking through London's business district, headed home, bundled up in my trenchcoat and scarf, zig zagging through business suits and shoppers and bicyclists, and my mind is overflowing with thoughts. Questions, goals, guilts, revelations, confessions. And I consider blogging some of them. But I've become self-conscious about saying too much online. Honestly, I've become self-conscious about asserting an opinion in any forum, be it over dinner with friends or at work meetings.

You'd think I would become more confident and articulate as I got older, not less.

Maybe doing it in reverse isn't bad.

To break the blog silence... here are some things on my mind.

(a) Just DO something is one of my current mottos. I get easily overwhelmed and I'm learning that committing to small concrete actions is the only way forward. Taking a job at an investment bank - just do it. Running for 15 minutes - just do it. Reading with kids once a week - just do it. Praying for a couple of minutes - just do it. Calling a family member - just do it.

(b) For the past year, I've been concerned that I'm becoming more frustrated, cynical, demanding, and whiny than I've ever been. A few weeks ago, I had a revelation that maybe this is because historically, things have always come easy for me. And I've continued expecting everything to be easy... work, relationships, happiness, money management, public transportation, writing... No longer! Now, my expectations have changed. Now, I expect most things to be difficult. This way, I always have my game face on. I'm always ready to work hard.

That's the theory, anyway. I sure it's flawed.

(c) Reason #34 working for the investment bank was a good choice: I've volunteered more hours since September than I did in three entire years at college in Auburn.

(d) Most days, I feel like such a sell-out working in a bank... but it helps my sanity to spend time reading with middle schoolers and working on charity projects where everyone looks like a dirty hippie. It reminds me of life outside the corporate world.  Often fellow bankers are working alongside the dirty hippies, and that reminds me that (some) bankers want to save the world, too.

(e) Reason #209 I hate being a grown-up: knowing that you're ordinary and despite your third grade goal, you're not going to become the first female president of the United States of America.

(f) I love reading fiction these days. The last two novels I read were amazing. Read them: The History of Love by Nicole Krauss and The Glass Space by Simon Mawer.

Dave and I went to Ireland last weekend. It was pretty sweet. Beautiful blue skies, chilly autumn air, delicious comfort food, good books, seaside rocks and green hills to climb...

A great place to stay in Northern Ireland: Heathfield Farm

It's a great location for exploring major sights; the rooms are lovely and comfortable; the host, Heather, is friendly and has good travel trips; *and* she cooks such tasty breakfasts, which include several kinds of homemade bread (like the hobo that I am, I kept pieces of fruit bread in my pocket for snacking throughout the day).

I love Ireland. You should go there.

On a final note, a big happy birthday to both my parents. And... congratulations on the upcoming move to Italy!  I look forward to "going home" on the weekends...

No excuses

Oh, it's late and I'm giving up on trying to figure out my new bank account, my loan repayments, and how the heck to order myself a proper cell phone.

I miss places like this.

London is very busy. It's not easy adjusting to it, or adjusting to being in an office 50 hours every week. I get sleepy and grumpy and frazzled because there's hardly enough time to figure out boring details like bank accounts, much less time to be social. And forget about sleeping for nine consecutive hours.

As I often say to others, I now say to myself: get some real problems. 

I still have much to learn about balance and prioritizing and letting things go. This weekend I identified things I'm gonna try to avoid compromising:

Go to the gym... no excuses.
Don't complain... no excuses.
Put other people before yourself... no excuses.

Exercise, a positive attitude, and selflessness are all very, very important to me. And lately I'm no good at any of them. But I shan't give up!

While avoiding the gym and whining about corporate life and English weather, I've managed to have some good times. Last week I went to a house group dinner/Bible study with people from Church on the Corner. I made some orange cookies because I had two old wrinkly oranges that I didn't want to throw away (the cookies were so yummy). Friday, we watched the 1952 movie The African Queen in a big outdoor amphitheater at the foot of Tower Bridge. On Saturday, some interns and I took the train to Brighton, a town on the southern coast. And yesterday I gave up my no-caffeine diet and made my first at-home cup of coffee since arriving in England. Thinking about it almost makes me look forward to seven am...

Almost.

Mountains, banks, & cheesecake

Today I'm waiting on UPS to deliver my passport and UK visa. And then I'll buy a plane ticket, hopefully in time to avoid the hurricane.

The past two weeks have been chaotic. But chaos energizes me. I kind of love it. A few days ago, after I'd applied for my visa, I started getting stir crazy. By noon on Wednesday, I'd almost booked a plane ticket back to Wyoming so I wouldn't miss Signal's annual Christmas party. (It's an old tradition, having Christmas on August 25 when everyone is together. It started in Yellowstone, but we do it better.)

Taken from here.

I miss the mountains. I miss my mountain friends. I wish I could stay there forever - or at least for the rest of the season. 

But London awaits me!  

Can we pause for a moment to count the ways in which London is the complete opposite of mountain life? 

Restaurant work, investment bank. 

Hiking boots, high heels. 

Black bears, black taxi cabs. 

Millions of trees and less than half a million people in the entire state of Wyoming; millions of people and itty bitty green spaces. 

But I love city life. It'll be nice to have dozens of ethnic restaurants in my neighborhood, to walk everywhere, to catch buses, to see shows and museums and street theater, to stay in on rainy days with a cup of tea, listening to the comforting hum of the street below my window. And pubs. There are pubs everywhere. And meat pies. And bookshops.

I'm also excited about working in an investment bank, primarily because I never, ever thought I would ever work in an investment bank. A brief explanation: I'm part of a business internship program that helps Americans find jobs in London-based companies. Technically, it's not a "real job" because I'm not getting a paycheck, but practically, it's a real job. I'll be working full-time in the bank's risk management department. Didn't I major in English and history? Yes, yes, I did. Do I know anything about finance? Not very much, no, but I have been paying more attention to NPR's finance features. That's a start, right?

I think this job will be a huge and satisfying challenge. Lots of people quit jobs like these and embark on round-the-world journeys and call that the adventure... I'm doing it in reverse. And if I'm awkward and awful in investment banking, if I hate it after 12 months, I can dislike - and avoid - the industry for the rest of my life, knowing that I gave it a shot.

Kind of like I do with oysters.

And who knows? Maybe investment banking will be like cheesecake. I thought I hated it for years, and one day I tried it. The rest is history.

Little things

I had a couple Moments last week, when everything was perfect and in my mind and emotions there was only space for pure, wordless happiness. Such highs!

I just really like this photo. It's not directly related to my post, except maybe it makes me wanna buy some expensive cheese and go camping, and I do those things somewhat regularly out here.

The first one came on Sunday night, after an exhausting shift at work. I stumbled into the employee dining room around ten pm and had a snack before dragging my sore server's feet up the hill to the dorms. Like every other night, people were outside hanging out. I had to be at work at 6:30am and had every intention of going straight to bed, but for some reason, I knew I would stay up until the wee hours of the morning and I knew it would be a good time. I trust my instincts when it comes to sleep deprivation - if I don't feel like staying up, I don't (this is the case most of the time). But when I'm feeling it, I know it's going to be a good night. And lo and behold, twenty of us ended up sitting on the edge of the boat dock, on Jackson Lake, looking at the stars, laughing, singing-a-long. After a loud and passionate rendition of "You Are My Sunshine," I thought my heart would burst from joy.  And then, around 2am, a couple of boys jumped into the lake. My friend Allie and I followed. It was oh-so-cold and exhilarating.

The next Moment came a few days later, near the end of another exhausting shift working on the restaurant deck. I was busily cleaning my tables and checking on customers when I noticed people were coming outside with their cameras and I looked up and saw a particularly brilliant sun set. My co-server, Josi, and I put away our towels and extra ketchup bottles and sat down at an empty table and stared out toward the mountains. "I don't think I could ever work at another restaurant after working here. You just can't beat this," I said. Josi told me he's going to work at Signal for the rest of his life. A woman overheard Josi and started asking questions about our experience in the Tetons and at the end of the conversation she said, "I wish I'd done something like this."

And I know a fulfilling life doesn't just consist of sing-a-longs on boat docks and majestic mountain ranges and adventures. But those things sure do help.

This morning I started reading Anna Karenina and in the first chapter Tolstoy writes, "There was no answer except the usual answer life gives to the most complicated and insoluble questions. The answer is: carry on with your everyday affairs..."

A pretty little boxcar flower bed outside Nora's Fish Creek Inn, where we had Breakfast Club last Saturday morning. I got pretty excited about the breakfast and the boxcar.

I hope, even when I'm not living in the Grand Tetons, I always choose to live my life in a way that makes every day affairs whimsical and joyful... and even when my affairs seem dull, ordinary, or confusing, I hope I keep finding something to get excited about anyway.

The northern lights

Despite the sunshine, I've been in a grumpy mood for the past few days. The one thing I'm enjoying is rereading Phillip Pullman's "Northern Lights." I read the His Dark Materials trilogy when we first moved to England in 2002 and loved it so much that I named our dog after the heroine, Lyra. The books contain so much raw and beautiful adventure, and Lyra and the other kids are so innocent and fierce... they make me want to be ten years old again... preferably traveling across universes atop a loyal armored bear.

 Right now, Lyra is in her world's equivalent of Norway. I stumbled across this beautiful photo of Norway earlier... and it reminded of this song. Have a listen and have a good day.

Holy moly

Oh me, oh my --- hello!

Long time, no update. Sorry about that. 

It's hard to get into a rhythm living in the mountains, doing seasonal work. None of my days are the same. And the weather is temperamental, too. It seems every time I schedule a few hours of reading and blogging time, the sun comes out and being outside is a must. Last week, we had a few days of 70 degree summer, but since then it's been rain, snow, sleet, and lows in the 30s. Yuck. 

But it's lovely to be back in Wyoming. It feels a little bit like home and though lots of my friends from last season are gone, I'm getting to know new folks (and old folks I didn't hang out with last season) every day. The community aspect of Signal Mountain Lodge is intense. If I'm tired or in a bad mood, it's difficult to cope because there are always people around and I don't want to be antisocial. On the other hand, it's like summer camp for (sorta) grown ups. Hikes, picnics, basketball games, movie nights, drinks by the bar fire, sharing 3 meals a day together... And when it's not raining, snowing, and sleeting and those mountains are out, it's pretty magical.

So, I'm a lot more scared of bears this season.

Awww.  http://www.grizzlybay.org/SarahPalinInfoPage.htm

Maybe because there's a grizzly mama and her cubs around Signal or because I had a few possible close encounters with bears last season. Shelley and I hiked up Signal a few days ago and I was scared the whole time, armed with easily accessible bear spray and making plenty of noise with my keys. I haven't seen any bears yet --- or any big animals besides elk --- and once I do, I'm sure my fear will subside. They're pretty relaxed creatures as long as they're not hungry or angry... kind of like me.

YIKES. http://bushpilotdhc.blogspot.com/2011_04_01_archive.html

This season, I'm serving in Signal's restaurants rather than hosting. The first few days were difficult: I was nervous about messing up and having customers hate me, and physically, it's challenging... lifting heavy trays, power walking for 8+ hours, etc. But I've gotten the hang of it now, and I love working for tips. I find it's very motivating. And like with hosting, I get to talk with different people while I work. Last week I served a table of seven psychology professors; they were hilarious and I talked with one guy a long time about international development. He's involved with Mennonites Economic Development Associates and gave me some names and email addresses. A few days later, I served a girl who is about to start graduate school at the University of Denver's Josef Korbel School of International Studies, one of my favorite grad schools. She gave me her information and told me to Facebook her because she knows the dean of admissions well and would help me out if I decided to apply in the next few years.  You never know.


If anyone needs a vacation, consider the Tetons!  I don't think I will ever live in a more beautiful place.

http://offthewallposters.com/img-barns-grand-tetons-photography-art-image-18338.htm

I promise more regular updates starting now. Hopefully my next post will be about my first moose siting of the season. I'm so ready to see a moose. Moose are delightfully weird and one of my favorite animals.

http://www.eastbranchlodge.com/Maine_Hunting_packages_specials.html

We're grown-ups now

I spent most of this weekend at the lake house in Georgia. It was lovely and just what I needed. Bonus: I returned home with leftover blueberry pancakes, shortcakes, squash casserole, and pimento cheese... I've really been overeating today. And also, procrastinating.

Since it's warm and sunny I decided to start running on a nearby bike path instead of going to the gym. But I think I need new running shoes --- or maybe a running coach to correct my form. Because my left knee is killing me and my calf muscles are sorer than they should be. Dear body, let me be a runner!

If you're a xkcd fan, you've seen this comic already. It's one of my personal favorites:

And speaking of grown-ups, my sister's turning twenty tomorrow!  Holy cow... that's all I can say about that.

My favorite people

I wondered how much it costs to be rich in friends and how many years and stories and scenes it takes to make a rich life happen.

- Donald Miller, A Million Miles in a Thousand Years

My Australian friend Amy is here!

Earlier this year when Hannah and I decided to spend two months in Guatemala, I immediately sent word to Australia and within a month Amy and her boyfriend James began planning a Central America backpacking trip. Amy and I had casually discussed a potential South America trip when I was studying in Canberra, and I'm happy we made it happen so quickly.

I don't want to gush, but seriously - I have the greatest friends in the world. I've moved around a lot, written a lot of good-bye letters, grown up and apart from a lot of people. But a handful of friendships haven't changed at all - actually, they've deepened over time and across continents. My family and this handful of friendships are my real roots. I could morph into a full time homeless free lancing world nomad and still feel secure and at home with these people.

And my friends are cool. They are passionate and witty, well-read and sensible, and they take risks and live big. It's fun being jealous of their jobs, their degrees, their houses, their travels. It's fun getting excited about things, getting inspired, together.

You become like the people you interact with. And if your friends are living boring stories, you probably will too.

One of my favorite things is traveling with these friends. Strange lands, foods, and languages create great stories for us to live and retell. During high school Hannah and I got lost in a sketchy London suburb and paid over a hundred pounds for a taxi home so my parents wouldn't know where we'd gone; we jumped fences to escape angry cows in Yorkshire.

2005: London's West Inn

Four years later we were on Kangaroo Island off the coast of South Australia listening to Lebanese tour guide Karim lecture about the local counsel's opinion on feral cats and the breeding habits of koalas.

2009: riding camels at Sydney's Aroma Festival

2010: Grand Teton National Park

My friend Shelley introduced herself to me at a sorority rush party (!) and drove me around Auburn for a year before I got my driver's license; three years later she was driving us around New Zealand's south island where we played with wallabies and climbed glaciers.

2007: on the Gulf of Mexico

2009: the Franz Josef glacier

This past spring break she returned to London with me on an expensive but delightful whim.

2010: Tower Bridge, my favorite bridge of all time

During my year in Canberra, Amy and I bonded over our love of teapots and local markets, got terribly lost in Melbourne at 2am, and consumed large amounts of her hometown's sun dried tomato cheese.

2009: Melbourne

2009: Floriade in Canberra

Now we're drinking Guatemalan tea, eating Guatemalan cheese (not as good as Tilba cheese - go to Australia and try Tilba cheese), wandering through Guatemalan markets, and of course, planning our future adventures. (Organic farms in Eastern Europe or a road trip up Australia's west coast?)

2009: autumn photo shoot on The Australian National University campus

And then there's Dave...

2007: Argentina

... who convinced me to bike down the world's most dangerous road in Bolivia, who got terribly sick after instigating and winning a llama eating contest, and who discovered and consumed the world's best chicken sandwich with me after we spent the morning in funky Peruvian jewelry and musical instrument shops. Two years later in Bristol there was an amazing Album Leaf concert in an old wooden boat.

http://www.matthewsphotos.co.uk/view_photo.php?set_albumName=aliens06&id=aaa

And this summer in Wyoming there was cliff jumping into a freezing lake.

And in three weeks Dave will be in Alabama for Christmas! (I may or may not have been looking forward to this particular act of international travel for years.)

2007: hiking to the waterfall outside Cafayette, Argentina

In short, traveling enriches my relationships, and my favorite people - including many individuals I've not mentioned in this post - add extra meaning and fun to my travels. I love it. Consider this a belated second Thanksgiving post. (And thanks for putting up with the cheesy!)

'And today, may you hold those in your house close to your body and feel them breathe and take in their remarkable scent and give them your love.'

Patience & anti-itch cream

I've been too exhausted and confused to write this week. Yesterday I managed to churn out a few strongly worded emails to Dave and my parents (lucky them). Along with other advice, my mom kindly suggested that I update my blog.

Once upon a time I was vomiting violently in a concrete bathroom in the middle of no where Bolivia at 3am, wondering how I could love something - travel - that left me vomiting, violently, in a concrete bathroom, thousands of miles from my family, potentially soon to be dead. That's the first time I remember questioning my love of travel and my broader worldview. I may have even promised God I'd be more sensible and conventional and less stupid if he'd let me out of that concrete bathroom alive. (Oops.) More recently, I've questioned my values and decisions because being away from college is scary and the jokes people make about me going to Guatemala are scary. Usually I question myself for 24 to 36 hours before deciding that never mind, I'm on the right track, just don't stop believin'.

I could be wrong, but I think these two months in Guatemala are going to equal two months of frequent self-doubt and questioning. It sucks, but not all adventures are waterfalls, nursery rhymes with local children, or near death experiences recounted over a couple of cold beers. Sometimes adventures are overwhelming challenges that require impossible amounts of patience and anti-itch cream.

No refrigeration, no hot water, no lukewarm water, constant bug bites... a nine hour long shopping trip into Reu during which a woman steals our chicken and pancake mix, depriving us of meat and comfort food... a five kilometer uphill hike with two dozen eggs in tow and being laughed at by a large group of teenage Guatemalans... not being able to satisfyingly rant to our new friends about our awful day... all of these things are tough.

But the ultimate challenge is handling the persistent whisper in my ear: what are you doing here? You can go home. There's carpet and gallons of cold milk and paying jobs and people who under-stand you when you ask where the can opener is. When I get over the language barrier and rustic lifestyle, the voice continues, what do you think you're actually learning? You're kidding yourself, wasting your time. No one really wants you here, except to make a few extra bucks. No one needs you here. They don't need to learn English. You may fix the building up, but it'll just fall back into disrepair. And the absolute worse is, you've had your fun. But now you see, don't you? The people who stay home and advance their careers and invest in a house KNOW WHAT THEY ARE DOING. It's not too late. You can turn this around. The airport is only five sweaty bone rattling bus rides away.

The whispering voice is compelling and, if you must know, fully in control of my emotions. But I am not a quitter. I am a learner, damnit. That is what new places and new people and facing scary things are about - learning. And arguably I'll learn more useful, meaningful lessons when things are hard than when things conform to my expectations and liking.

Yesterday I learned the Spanish word for "green bean." Tonight I'm learning how to make coconut flan; we're currently discussing how to crack a coconut since Sara is gone for the day and we don't have a machete. Tomorrow I will take another nine hour trip to the market, buy another chicken and, this time, it won't get stolen. I choose to consider all the above progress!

The fanaticism of her twenties

But the fanaticism of my twenties shocks me now. As I feared it would.
- Annie Dillard