Boredom. It  is my least tolerable of emotions. Even anger and frustration seem easier. In fact, I often shift boredom into one of these emotions just to relieve the feel of it.

Why is boredom so intolerable? Is it because it feels like such a waste of the day? That there is something “out there” amazing and great, and I am not taking part in it.  Is it because what I am right now is not enough? That I must do something to prove I am enough. That I need excitement to prove that life is valuable.

What would it look like if I fully embraced boredom? Wouldn’t it be great just to sit and not feel the need to do anything? Isn’t this what contentment feels like?

“Boredom: The desire for desires.”

~Leo Tolstoy

I have recently fallen in love with consignment clothing stores.  I’m not talking about thrift stores, which are very valuable and worthy in there own right.  I’m talking about those resale clothing stores where fancy labeled, barely worn clothes can be bought at just a smidgen of the price.   Here are just a few benefits of consignment clothing stores:

(1) as stated before, nice quality clothes at a reasonable price

(2)  smaller stores than the retail giants, which curbs my sensory overload

(3) more limited choices than the retail giants so decision making is easier

(At first, limited selection seems like a downside, but isn’t it easier to choose between 200 items than 2,000?)

(4) the opportunity to support a local business and to experience the local flavor of your favorite shop

(5) consignment shopping is great for the environment since the clothes are essentially being “recycled”

I have found so many benefits to buying resale that I am going to  make 2009 “The Year of Consignment Shopping.”  In 2009, I will buy almost all my clothes from resale shops.   To build in some breathing room, I will allow 12 items in 2009 to be bought retail.  Also, I will exclude underwear, socks, and shoes.  I’ve got to build some flexibility in the plan or the pressure will make me cave. I’ll post an update blog in the future to let you know how the year unfolds.

In the mean time, here are a few of my favorite Austin resale shops:

Buffalo Exchange on Guadalupe has a young, funky vibe.

Second Time Around Boutique on Burnet Road has a sophisticated, more mature vibe.

Have fun shopping!

I crave comfort food.  I’m talking about the foods that bring up a warm remembering with every bite.  Foods that just feel like home.  I am writing this on Thanksgiving, which provides me with the greatest of all comfort foods—Turkey and dressing.  Include some cranberry sauce from a can and every part of me is giddy.

Comfort me with apples: for I am sick of love. The Song of Solomon 2:5

I am grateful for wild flowers. Recently, while looking at pictures of myself as a small child, I was surprised by the number of photos of me with wild flowers in my hair. It seemed like such a natural, joyous thing to do.

How did I get away from doing small things that bring such joy?  Now my brain is wired for responsibility and obligation.  But picking  wild flowers certainly doesn’t fit into those categories.  I want to get back to that place where picking wild flowers is second nature, and I don’t have to justify a reason to do it.

Earth laughs in flowers.Ralph Waldo Emerson

Check out the Lady Bird Johnson Wildfower Center.

Aren’t mud pies so freeingly fun? I loved playing in the mud as a child, and making mud pies was a favorite past time.  In my five year old mind, it ranked right up there with tire swings and puppies.  I still remember the dirt’s earthy smell and grainy wet texture as it squished between my fingers and toes. I’d start my mud pies by taking the water hose and running it over a spot in the yard, usually taking out an ant mound here and there along the way. Then, I took a cake pan and piled mud into it. I derived such pleasure in smoothing the top layer of the mud so that it was even with the top of the pan. Then, after all that effort, I dumped out the pan and did it all over again.

As a child, I did things like this for the pure pleasure of them. Imagine if I had said to myself, “Well, no one can eat mud pies so I shouldn’t go about building them.” This sounds absurd to a child, but as an adult, I regularly deny myself enjoyable experiences because they are not considered productive or useful.

Mud pies remind me that joy and pleasure ARE useful, and anything we do that creates them is worthwhile.

I do it for the joy it brings, cause I’m a joyful girl. ‘Cause the world owes us nothing, we owe each other the world. Ani Difranco

Oh, yes, anger.  The emotion you’re not supposed to have.  Growing up I always felt it was wrong to get angry. That nice girls put on nice faces and use nice words. While I definitely think we should strive to be loving and grateful toward others, I also think anger has its place.

I have been learning more about the mindfulness approach to emotions, and it has been very helpful for me. Instead of judging an emotion like anger as bad and tying to shove it out of the way, I just acknowledge its presence and the reactions it is causing in me. I notice my breath becoming labored, and my pulse becoming faster. Here’s the important thing to mindfulness — don’t intellectualize the emotion, just feel it.

It is important to feel our feelings and not to push away an uncomfortable feeling when it arises. Honestly, the harder you push away an emotion, the deeper it becomes lodged inside you only to resurface later in your relationships or your health. There is so much talk about releasing our unwanted emotions, as if we could hit an eject button and they would fly away. I believe the way to release them is by moving through them. We release by feeling completely, with acceptance toward ourselves and all our varied emotions.

For more info on mindfulness: Mindfulness of Emotions by Insight Meditation Center

Most women have not even been able to touch this anger, except to drive it inward like a rusted nail.
Adrienne Rich

 I am not the best listener in the world. I too desperately want to be heard. This desperation keeps me always ready to interject my thoughts at the next space in the conversation. I often feel that the person I’m speaking with wants to be as desperately heard as me. Thus, the conversation goes like this:

“Listen to me.”

“OK, now listen to me.”

“That’s nice, now listen to me.”

Most people aren’t even conscious of what is happening, but they do recognize the emptiness they feel after one of these conversations.

This is why I am so grateful for someone who truly listens to me. They can break the desperate “Listen to me” cycle. Once I feel listened to, I relax and feel so much more open to completely listening to the other person.

I am going to strive to listen more. Not the kind of listening that lets you feed into your next line, but real sincere listening. I suspect that the more I listen, the more I will be heard.

You must be the change you want to see in the world. Mahatma Gandhi

I am in awe of the public libraries. As a young child, books from the public library took me out of my everyday life and revealed to me that not everyone lived or thought as I did. Other possibilities for life existed.

Public libraries are truly about public service. From literacy programs to story book time, the public library is about serving the needs of the community. Few public institutions serve the community so selfishly and do it so well.

Perhaps no place in any community is so totally democratic as the town library. The only entrance requirement is interest. Lady Bird Johnson

Wow, what a year.  2007, with all of its inconceivable blessings and growing pains, transformed me.

We meet today
To thank Thee for the era done,
And Thee for the opening one.
John Greenleaf Whittier

I don’t think my two older sisters know how much I appreciate them. My mother was schizophrenic, and although she lived with me my whole childhood, her mental illness prevented her from being much of a mother. She loved me, and I loved her, but she was more like a younger sibling who always got in your stuff and caused trouble. My two older sisters stepped up and helped to fill that motherly void. They were eight and six years older than myself. Just babies themselves now that I think about it. Well, they protected me, fed me, and clothed me. They did all this without ever once making me feel like I was a burden to them. I am especially grateful to my oldest sister who carried the heaviest load.

Sisters are different flowers from the same garden.Author Unknown