~Wednesday~ Since we’re being “sent home” (in a good, Thanksgiving, kind of way) today at 3:00, the Wolfline buses aren’t running, and the city bus wouldn’t depart until about 3:40, I decided to use one of my dozen or so free parking passes that you get as a sort of “thank you” for taking public transportation to and from work at the university.
I left my house at about the usual time and took the same route as the bus to check on my peeps from a different angle on the way in. I passed by Li’l Dino‘s stop, and not finding her waiting, I remembered that the food courts (in one of which she works) at State all closed yesterday for the Thanksgiving Holiday. No sooner had I processed that, I saw a lady on the other side of the street burdened with six bags of groceries—three in each hand—who was none other than… drum roll… Li’l Dino!
I rolled down my window and called to her, “Good morning,” and as she smiled with recognition, I said, “I’m living the high life this morning!”
“I know that’s right!” she called back laughing.
Walking from the parking deck in which my permit allows me to park, it occurred to me that the bus lets me off much closer to my building than parking there. Yet another reason to not pay $330 a year to park on campus to go to work!
During my walk to my building, I passed the Horticulture building and in front of it this beautiful tree with knots sticking out of its trunk. “A naughty pine,” I said playing with the word and cracking myself up. Then I started saying it with a British accent. “A NAWT-ee pine. A NAWT-ee pine.”
Speaking of laughing that reminds me of something—and of a couple of other things, actually—that I wanted to capture from yesterday:
- While talking to the PA who saw me about my cough, I noted that I almost always have a coughing spell after I laugh, and then I added this surprising on-the-spot observation, “And I laugh a lot in my life.”
- I received a very affirming wedding thank-you note in the U.S. mail from Renee and Hugh:
John, We just want you to know how much we appreciate you coming and sharing our special day with us. We also are immensely thankful for your awesome generosity to us in helping us with wedding expenses as a wedding gift. We are amazingly blessed to have you as a friend and we, well… we just love you to pieces! 🙂
Much love,
Hugh & Renee - I received a letter from myself in the mail. With a return address of “Me” and the beautiful handwriting, I of course immediately recognized it for what it was. However, it’s been long enough since I made it available to be sent that I couldn’t for the life of me remember what it might be about.
I have sent letters to myself on two other occasions in my life that come to mind—the first being at the end of attending The Landmark Forum many, many years ago, and the second being, after loosing 50 pounds with Weight Watchers, also quite a while ago now. However, I couldn’t think of anything as significant as those two things that I’d done, say within the last year, on the occasion of which I would have “sat right down and wrote myself a letter.”
Needless to say that upon finding out it was from the end of my 5-week participation in Study Circles on Race back in April and May of this year, it was at best, anticlimactic.
Have you ever written a letter to yourself? And if so, in what context?
For some reason, that last line reminded me of the song, “Take a letter, Maria, address it to my wife…” which for some other crazy reason reminded me of one of the trivia questions from Mary K Mart’s trivia last night:
| Mary’s father has five children, whose names are Nana, Nene, Nini, Nono, and …” |
When it came time to go over the answer, everyone but me shouted out what I had written down, “Nunu,” before I’d crossed it out and had written the correct answer: “Mary.”
Today’s explicit affirmations were:
- I especially liked my blog entry from yesterday, so this affirmation from my friend Erin was extra sweet:
JM, sometimes I just love the brief escape into the hilarious exchanges in which you either participate or observe. It’s always fun to realize how much color (and fodder for amusement) real life provides. No wonder you don’t have a TV – you are picking up entertainment waves all the time. xo! - Some time during the last month, I commented on an online article in NC State’s alumni magazine using a feedback button. The article captured a discussion from top university officials about the whole Mary Easley mess that happened in the past year. Well, evidently my comment made its way to the editor of the magazine, a few days ago she asked me if I’d write a Letter to the Editor for publication elaborating a little more on the comment in my feedback. I did that and sent it to her yesterday. Here’s how she responded:
Thank you so much! This is a wonderful, eloquent letter and I appreciate your writing it. Becky I, of course, will link to the letter here once it’s published.
I think I had an asthma attack (even though I don’t have asthma) at dinner tonight. As I was waiting for my Stromboli order to be ready, I had a coughing fit, and I stepped outside the restaurant so as not to create a scene. All of a sudden my throat got so constricted I could hardly breathe. I took long, deep breaths, but only the tiniest bit of air seemed to be making its way in. It was a little scary for a minute, but it passed.
Ironically, I’ve just started using an inhaler, of Proventil, for this cough. Odd to have an asthma-like attack when using an asthma-relief type gadget. Or perhaps it was because of that. Who knows? If I have any more incidents, I’ll certainly check in with the doc about it.
I had tons of fun at dancing tonight, recognizing both implicit and explicit affirmations about my dancing. Tom (bearzendurham) actually complimented me on my leading during a two-step to the Mandy Barnett version of Planet of Love, which meant a lot for two reasons: 1) I’m definitely a better follow than I am a lead, and if I have ever gotten a compliment about leading they’ve been few and far between, and 2) He’s a great two-step lead and has even taught two-stepping before.
The implicit affirmations were all with regards to being asked to two-step or someone accepting my request to dance the two-step with them. I had them with Bill, Rob, Tom, Rick, and Michael.
It didn’t start off that way, but it got pretty festive in there as the night drew on—being the night before a holiday and all. A good number of folks took the lesson, and we made it through the night with a guy there who loved to clap along with the songs, but couldn’t clap on beat. That’s not a good thing when you’re trying to count the dance beats in your head. Bless his heart.
This is pretty amazing, if you haven’t yet seen it: