Before we begin today, let’s take a moment to acknowledge holidays can be difficult for a variety of reasons and for many around the world that struggle with eating disorders (past or current), body dysmorphia, discomfort with their size (feeling they are too big or too small) this time of year can be more challenging than it needs to be. As we sit around our own tables or gather with friends or family, let’s remind ourselves we should not be commenting about someone’s choice to eat or abstain from eating certain dishes or drinks. If someone wants a single serving or seconds, that’s their decision. No one should be chided to “walk off” their dinner or earn a slice of dessert either. (I personally like a nice walk after a Thanksgiving meal, but it has more to do with the fact it’s finally cooling down here in Arizona instead of feeling like the inside of an oven.)
Holidays started to be a struggle for me a few years ago when I learned the hard way I had developed lactose intolerance. Between Thanksgiving and Christmas, it often felt like there wasn’t something that wasn’t full of butter, heavy cream, milk, or half and half. I started to dread the holidays, because I’d have to carefully consider what amount of dairy I could tolerate based upon taking Lactaid. I often found Lactaid worked well enough when a meal or snack was simple and only had one dairy source. It didn’t work at all for anything that still had lactose as an added ingredient, so I had to give up a lot of my favorite childhood mass produced chocolate candies like M & M’s. My husband discovered a better lactase enzyme tablet from a company called LactoJoy. It’s great for days where I don’t know if a meal will have a variety of dairy products in it although I am still hesitant to ever try M&M’s again. LactoJoy makes me less anxious about holiday meals, but I still work a little to reduce my dairy consumption around the holidays.
Having a holiday meal where it’s just my husband, daughter, and I is an easy way to find balance. Not that it’s always the case, but I do breathe a little easier when I have full control over the menu. This year we’re enjoying chipotle braised beef cheeks (from Olive magazine’s recipe that uses ox cheeks) over mashed potatoes and celeriac using lactose free milk and ghee and some cornbread muffins (my goal is to pick up Abe’s mini cornbread muffins, which are vegan). For this year, all the regular dairy comes from my dessert selections: a Maine Pie Co. gluten free pecan pie and homemade spiced apple cider ice cream using Yes to Yolks’ recipe. Our super easy Thanksgiving meal and dessert wasn’t really focused on paring back on the number of food dishes to avoid dairy this year so much as it was a way to avoid a lot of food prep that is difficult for me right now. (I made the ice cream last weekend to spread out the labor.) I am still working through a number of medical tests to determine if I am correct and this is an autoimmune disorder I am struggling with for any newcomers to my blog.
This has been a year of appreciating snacks and special treats. I thought about sharing some photos of great meals I’ve enjoyed out at local restaurants, but I think the simplicity of snacks cannot be overstated this year. Going out to a restaurant is work (certainly not something I thought I’d every say!). It’s work on a relatively healthy day to get ready, wait for a table, and wait even more for appetizers, meals, or drinks to be delivered; and it’s more work to go out on days where my pain level is worse and restaurants are colder than expected, there’s no seating available during our wait for a table, and I’m stuck standing around outside in the sun as my skin has become more photosensitive.
I know we all have our favorite snacks. As a huge fan of Oreos, I will tell you we currently have packages of regular Oreos, apple pie Oreos, and blueberry pie Oreos on hand. I can eat Oreos any time of day, but there’s been some other fun stuff I’ve come across the past several months.
Either of these elevates a cup of black coffee in the morning, but the kithul syrup’s smokey flavor is a nice touch for fall.Certified vegan chocolate….and expensive for a chocolate bar, but it’s pretty tasty. It’s normally $7 a bar if you don’t find it on sale. It’s not an every week kind of purchase.Halloween has a special place in my heart. The moment I saw these chips (aka crisps) I knew I was buying them solely for the novelty color. I already love this brand of chip; the chips are a bit crispier than Pringles and as a food texture person, crunchy snacks make me happy.If you need a savory snack, this one is perfect. We had a few slices of chorizo on Ritz crackers topped with homemade pimento cheese. I won’t call it “girl dinner,” because it irritates me that we label snack dinners grown women eat as “girl dinner.” This was our low effort dinner during one busy weekday evening.I popped into this hotel bar for a little daytime date adventure with my husband. We both love a good Manhattan. Honestly, if I had been more hydrated and had eaten a proper breakfast beforehand, I would have finished my $20 barrel aged Manhattan. (So sad drinks have gotten this pricey.) The resort is already decked out for Christmas with glitzy trees, prepping for an ice skating rink, and bringing in/manufacturing snow for tubing. I do enjoy seeing all the holiday decor without having to maintain it myself.
I need to make something similar at home for either Thanksgiving or Christmas but using rye whiskey.
That’s all for today. I hope as we get closer to the end of the year everyone stays safe and is relatively happy. It’s been a crazy year across the globe and we could all use a few more moments in our lives where we are more neighborly towards each other. Open the door for someone in need. Maybe ask someone what book they’re currently enjoying. Offer to share a favorite recipe (it doesn’t need to be a family recipe, by the way!). Just be a good person and let good come back to you, too.
Hello, everyone. 2024 is almost done and with the winter solstice behind us, we are settling into a new season.
This past month, like any other, has varied between highs and lows. I love fall. It is my favorite season and I anticipate it to be my favorite for the rest of my life. Seeing the world fall away from the flashiness of summer and embrace all things that feel cozy speaks to me. I’ve come to love fall more as each Arizona summer becomes more unbearable and makes me contemplate moving out of this state to seek refuge elsewhere. (Conveniently forgetting that plenty of places have unbearable snow blanketed winters instead of scorching heat in the summer.) My biggest achievement last month was setting up my family military history locker. The company I purchased from is Mustard Made. Their Twinny locker has been my favorite although plenty of other companies also produce lockers; this one cost me just over $700 with shipping, making it something worth waiting for to ensure it was 100% what I wanted (color included).
This locker houses military items that once belonged to my late father-in-law, things from my father’s service, numerous training materials my husband collected, and all the sentimental things that make up my service, including the only set of uniforms I saved (minus the cover that’s gone missing). There is one scrapbook that is not shown in the locker. I had forgotten to move over my boot camp photo album as I’ve been toiling away on my memoir and numerous journals, photos, and letters have traveled from my home office to my living room or dining room or breakfast nook to my bedroom, depending on where I was writing. I have never established a designated space devoted to writing, but as a quick aside, if you wonder about authors’ writing spaces please read Rooms of Their Own: Where Great Writers Write by Alex Johnson.
I don’t collect military memorabilia, but I realized I do take pride in keeping some things that have become souvenirs. The Marine Corps, like any service branch, is always changing. It might change at a slower pace than our sister service branches, but I love to see how the service and I have changed over time. Challenge coins and foreign currency I picked up in Qatar and Iraq are housed here with the paper coins my service branch used in our post exchanges (PX’s) versus taking on the more expensive endeavor of bringing actual American coins overseas. My journal entries show that I struggled a lot emotionally with my time in service; I went from being thrilled to join, eager to serve in Iraq, frustrated with expectations, and ultimately, unwilling to continue on the path of feeling like I had to constantly do more to show I earned my place at the table. I say these things because not everyone’s service feels this way. It is ok to love and despise military discipline. I felt like there’s a lot about being a person that gets lost in the duty to country and if my voice was heard more, maybe I would have considered staying in for at least a second enlistment.
Leaving the Marine Corps opened other doors and I don’t want those doors to be considered lesser options, because challenges await us all whether it’s in-service, post-service, or we’ve never served a day in our nation’s military. I used my education benefits to offset the cost of four college degrees, two VA home loans in my name, VA health care (only more recently), and receive VA disability compensation based on health issues tied to my time in the Marine Corps. My life has been transformed, positively and negatively, from service and I continue to reflect on how serving in the Marine Corps shaped my life and the stories I tell my daughter who will one day only have stories about me to share with her children (should she choose to have them). The challenges this past month have centered on health issues and I was originally hesitant to share anything after UnitedHealthcare CEO, Brian Thompson, was killed December 4th. There were enough stories coming from others who have been frustrated with their ability to utilize healthcare and at a reasonable cost. There are stories worst than mine and I stayed out of the fray, allowing others to vent, including their worst thoughts about the loss of a man whose total compensation last year was $10.2 million made it hard for the average American to emphasize. His death, a tragedy of its own, was no less tragic than the many Americans whose lives are negatively impacted, to include their own deaths, based upon the myriad of challenges plaguing our healthcare system and the insurance companies who decided what services are warranted, to what extent will be paid, and when services can be accessed.
I am not the first to admit our country is terrible as far as healthcare access is concerned. I wish that was not the case. We’re a wealthy nation that does far too much to conserve wealth for those at the top at the expense of those at the bottom. Our country deserves to have a healthcare system that leans more towards a universal health care system. Perhaps one day we’ll get closer to that objective as more and more Americans are disgusted with the status quo and what that means for those living with chronic diseases and their family members that have perished due to unnecessary challenges associated with getting referrals and paying for care.
Developing edema last year and seeing the expenses related to that ER visit played a role in using private health care as little as possible. The timing of the visit made it less terrible than it could have been. I paid $200 or so out-of-pocket that evening and later saw that the total visit was about $5,000 sent to my healthcare company. We’d met our deductible, so things were ok financially but not all families are so lucky, especially if their medical needs have higher regular costs to manage them. My problems pale in comparison to theirs. The edema is a consistent issue and varies by day, but throughout the year, I developed nerve issues that started in my feet, moved up my leg, and after switching my exercise routine to pilates to manage my leg issues, I soon started exercising nerve issues in both arms. Since nerve issues are one of those invisible health conditions that are hard to demonstrate, I wanted to share with you all the swelling and redness that developed in my hands over the past few months.
Sudden redness after putting on sweaterAlmost instant reduction in redness after removing sweater
My health care journey has included blood work and starting hand occupational therapy (OT) to manage my upper body concerns. Over the next month, I will begin working with physical therapy and have asked to start with my lower body extremities. About mid-November, I developed a fire-like nerve pain in my right upper thigh and daily, it still develops an uncomfortable warmth and sensitivity to fabrics. I cannot access a referral to rheumatology or cardiology (based on my exercise intolerance) until we’ve navigated lesser care options at the Veterans Health Administration. The OT is lessening the severity of the upper body nerve pain, but it is not completely gone nor has it alleviated the swelling, stiffness, and redness that develops in my palms. I started taking ibuprofen on my own to address my concerns although I did ask my provider to consider whether my combination of symptoms might represent lupus. (I am grateful for others in the medical care community who tell me to be my own advocate, which is why I brought up this concern.)
My symptoms more closely match lupus more than anything I’ve been able to find on my own.
hair loss/excess shedding (this past year)
reduced exercise tolerance
hand stiffness with swelling
hand redness
nerve issues (all extremities)
possible brain fog (I say possible because I am constantly learning new things at work and cannot determine if it’s a struggle to learn new things and balance the busyness of this season or if something else is at play)
possible weight loss connection (I’ve lost 11 pounds this year I thought might only be tied to a prescribed low sodium diet but now I wonder if this might be a lupus symptom, too.)
Based on my challenges that have worsened since September, I’ve adjusted my home life a lot. (Thankfully, my supervisor and work mentor are great supports, so all I’ve done there is taken more sick leave to attend to my appointments.) My family is helping more when my issues make prepping meals, opening jars, or grabbing groceries more difficult. My exercise routine centers more on walks. I don’t run and I haven’t picked up pilates again as reducing my heart rate during exercise seems to positively reduce the amount of daily nerve pain. I am sticking to lighter weight routines and taking more time in-between sets to address my heart rate and prevent more exhaustion. Cooking is a space I am navigating carefully and trying to not feel frustrated that some meals are too complicated to make right now without more help.
I picked up Food 52’s Big Little Recipes by Emma Laperruque from the public library and the pared back recipes have been a blessing. This week I will make the smash-fried potato salad with sweet pickles and red onion, pork meatloaf with cabbage slaw, and asparagus and cashews with green polenta. Here is one of the previous recipes I made. I could not fit everything into the cast iron skillet I have. Instead, I had to spoon some of the schmaltz into a measuring cup and add it to a second skillet to roast the radishes. My store did not have radishes with greens still attached, so the results varied. I would recommend if you’re in the same boat you can pair with a green salad.
With the year ending so soon, I want to extend good wishes and lots of blessings for you and yours this season. Stay humble! 2024 may have been wonderful all around or hit you terribly hard. I don’t see what you’ve achieved or the pain you’ve endured, but my heart asks that you keep your chin up and reflect on your current situation. Don’t let pain let you sink further and don’t let your achievements stall you from becoming the best version of yourself. You can be an inspiration on both spectrums, but you need to take care of yourself first before you can give space for others who would benefit from your influence.
My apologies for skipping a check-in here for the month of October.
I let my favorite month get away from me and neglected to post. Instead, I spent a lot of time attending to my life outside this website. As the election drew near, I devoted my time to crafting the stories I wanted to share in my memoir. This long journey developing my first draft is still in progress; I like to imagine if I had a background in journalism, creative writing, communications, or English, my project would already be done by now. Instead, it has been an almost forgotten friendship that I visit–to stave off its death. My memoir has become an apology to my younger self for what I put her through and an exploration of the relationships that sustained me, harmed me, caused me to look to the future and ask myself what do you want to become and how are you going to get there and who is capable of traveling that journey with you.
This past month has been a pivot point as the individual stories are finally connecting to each other. I am grateful for my slow devotion because it is far too easy to give up and say it’s emotionally damaging to look back on my failures. There are a number of ways people showed up for me at the same time other people were barely putting any effort into the intersection of their lives with mine. When I look back at those difficult moments, I wish I had the courage to trust my first instincts. Things I felt didn’t line up the way the should and instead I gave some people a lot of grace given their past poor judgements and decisions. I opened myself up to needless hurt while they were running around destroying their own lives. Learning to see my 20-21 year old self and her struggles, I see she gave a number of people a blank slate to start their lives over and people punished her for the sins of women who came before her. I could have been a different person in some of the most difficult months of my life if I wasn’t holding space for people who treated me like a throwaway character in their own stories. I survived them, and it’s time I am honest about what it’s like to stop choosing to walk through chaos to heal hurt I never caused when I can choose shelter from storms I didn’t foster, peace of mind surrounded by like-minded spirits, and build a happy existence away from bitter souls.
This Thanksgiving I am leaning more into a life of peace and appreciating my blessings. The transition from 2023 to 2024 has been far from an easy one. Losing three family members was devastating. Finding time to sell one house and buy a new one heightened my personal stress as I also navigated moving from one work position to a temporary assignment to my current role. Developing yet another slew of health symptoms a source of frustration. My ongoing health challenges don’t yet have an official diagnosis and I will end 2024 in that same boat. Months of nerve pain and discomfort brought on by physical exertion is forcing me to slow down in ways I would not choose for myself. I would love to know what’s going on, but my new health care provider is having me go through a gamut of other lesser avenues of care and potential pain management through occupational therapy and physical therapy before seeing if we need to consult rheumatology. Right now, I am still waiting on answers for my last round of bloodwork, but the holidays are coming up and I am determined to enjoy my tradition of crafting something new for my family to enjoy.
Lamb is the on the menu for our entree and I decided I would like to add some American Indian/Indigenous persons touches to our holiday given the complex origins and ongoing celebration of Thanksgiving. I cannot really say why I hadn’t thought of it before. I haven’t unpacked whether I was concerned it would be culturally appropriate or whether I wasn’t sure I would be skilled enough to try out the recipes and/or able to find the ingredients. Rather than criticize myself for coming to this late realization it would be good for me as an American to try my hand at making this type of cuisine, I am hoping it encourages someone else to do the same. We’ll be using the New Mexico Magazine sumac Navajo leg of lamb with onion sauce recipe to craft our holiday entree although ours will use lamb shanks and lamb neck due to my lack of understanding I could ask my local butcher ahead of time to order a leg of lamb or a lamb roast, the other suggested cut within the recipe. In lieu of dinner rolls, we will make Navajo fry bread, a family favorite, although I made the mistake of not picking up powdered milk so I will adjust my plans and find a recipe that uses regular milk that I already have on hand. The milk I have is lactose free and this will be my first time frying with it, so I need to watch it in case it behaves differently like how it browns more quickly when baking with it.
Our main side dish is the enkum recipe below. I found this recipe a few months ago in The Cookbook in Support of the United Nations: For People and Planet I borrowed from a public library. In the past few years, I’ve come across a number of articles on making Thanksgiving dinner less beige (think white dinner rolls, gravy, turkey, stuffing) and boring. I love how this is a nutrient dense potato dish and the vibrant colors will make for a beautiful contrast to the lamb entree. I will still keep some “traditional” beige on the plate with the stuffing although this year I found a stuffing mix made from Hawaiian bread that caught my eye.
I have one thing that I absolutely love from my childhood and that’s Ocean Spray jellied cranberry sauce. I don’t care that it’s not healthy for me with all the added sugar and the fact it’s low fiber. I love it far too much to care that it’s lacking in nutritional value. While I will occasionally indulge in mine or someone else’s homemade cranberry sauce, if we are going for the stuff in the can, it better be Ocean Spray jellied cranberry sauce. The generic stuff won’t do–it’s not worth saving the $0.30 or $0.40 a can for this stuff.
And for one of the first years in awhile, I don’t have a dessert planned. Originally, I considered making a homemade ice cream with the frozen leftover crumbled chocolate chip pumpkin cookies a girlfriend made for us back in September, but I want a less busy holiday. We have some German Benton’s Spekulatius Cookies we picked up from Aldi’s recently or we could enjoy the Mexican assorted cookies we have in the pantry. There’s always a local family farm we could visit for fudge or pie if we want to venture out in the next few days, too.
Before I leave you all for this month, I do want to say I plan to have a bit of a hiatus to concentrate on my memoir. Whether I stick to said hiatus is another story. I love the fact I am finally past the 300 page mark for my memoir and I want to help see my first draft through completion before the end of 2024. This work has helped me to see the burdens I carried from my service and the blessing of people who want the best for me while I haven’t always worked towards that goal for myself. I’ve gotten to see myself in moments of deep pain and setting big dreams for the future. Next year will be the 20-year mark returning home from my first tour in Iraq and I think a bit fitting of a time to ideally see the draft come together as a finished project I want to market for publication. I cannot juggle that endeavor all that well if I have my regular 40-hour a week job and weeks of planning what to post on this blog. If I do check in, I think it might be a paragraph or two wishing you all well and I hope that’s enough.
I want to deliver this memoir to those who seek to understand our nation’s military better and what service members go through. I want this memoir to show young adults military service is always changing and to help people who have never served to see another facet of the Iraq war. This book is not meant for everyone, like any good story. It is an appreciation letter to a number of people who have worked to make my goal of serving come to fruition, to those who supported me through the unknowns of that first tour, for those who tolerated my anti-social behavior on tour number two, and the ones who met me along the finish line to ending my four year enlistment in the Marine Corps. I do want to see a second book come to light, too, to honor a number of passionate persons who helped get me diagnosed with PTSD and get the treatment I deserved, but it won’t come together as it needs to without book 1 happening first.
Wishing you and yours a lot of blessings this holiday season.
Being a few days ahead of Christmas, I wanted to catch up with you all before things get too busy and I completely forget to post for the month of December. I’ve spent a few weeks trying to decide what to share. This year has been a pretty big one for my family, both immediate and extended. For the first time, my family took a weeklong vacation; let me focus on that for a second. FOR.THE.FIRST.TIME. In a country where we both have paid leave time, it’s felt almost impossible to make this happen over the past few years. It’s not that we haven’t traveled, but we haven’t managed a trip that lasted seven calendar days. Not everyone would want their first weeklong vacation to be in Kentucky; they might choose Hawaii, somewhere in the Caribbean, or spend all those days ensconced in the glory of Disneyworld. I wasn’t saddened for our first long trip 1) wasn’t somewhere warm, 2)was away from the ocean, and 3) kept us stateside. We caught up with a Marine friend of ours and his family and it felt like going home. The hardest part of the trip was not being prepared for the sudden, first cold spell of the year. Once again, we did not bring enough cold weather clothes. Moving on…
As it goes for my extended family and our family relations, we lost two members on my mother’s side of the family. An aunt by marriage and a biological uncle passed away. Both were sudden news to my siblings and I. I guess part of that all comes with age; we all have our own routines and some of us live out-of-state, but there’s also the part of me that sees these deaths dug up a lot of buried feelings. We felt like we were reliving our mother’s loss because she didn’t want us to know she was dying and we had similar circumstances for these two loved ones. It takes a moment to shirk off the feeling that you do not feel a part of the familial group because you were left in the dark. I see us recovering, and I know we’re not alone in experiencing grief this year. Many in my family joked about how someone else would have to take up my uncle’s habit of eating all the deviled eggs at Thanksgiving and I know my Facebook has looked a lot different this year without seeing the positive posts my Aunt would share to bring joy to our small world. The last time I was back home was in 2019 and I don’t know when we’ll be back for the holidays there, so it will take a moment to soak in how different life is once we are all under one roof again.
Being in our small trio here (plus the dog), Christmas preparations were pared back this year. In part, we’ve still considered the possibility of moving and on the other hand, it was nice to just have less work on our hands. Our vacation checked the box for rest and relaxation needs and I like having that feeling extended further into the year. We bought a few little things from Trader Joe’s: a tabletop Christmas tree, live green garland, mistletoe, cedar scented balsam pinecones (which I put into empty vases and oversized candle holders) and a door arrangement to replace the bell ornament wreath we normally put out front. This year, we put the latter up over our dog’s oversized dog door; he might not appreciate it, but I love seeing it when we come home from errands or a night out. From our decor collection already on hand, I set out only a few things. I want to mention specifically my two origami cranes (gifts from a friend in Cody, WY and they honor the experiences of Japanese Americans who lived in internment camps in the United States during WWII). I never visited the Heart Mountain Relocation Center, but her small gift still resonates with me today. I’ve had these about 11 years now and I do think it would be worth it to get them professionally mounted so I can leave them out year round rather than just as a sign of peace and goodwill at Christmas. From our ornament collection, I only pulled out the Hallmark snowman my husband’s grandmother has purchased for us over the years. Sadly, we’ve had a few ornaments go MIA so not all years are represented. Lastly, I put out a few plaid Christmas trees from Target (which are on our last year with us) and a metal string light desktop tree (another Target find). I stopped myself from buying some cute wooden ornaments from Target, knowing that to do so was self-defeating if my goal was to keep our prep and takedown simple this year. And speaking of simple, we aren’t the type of family that goes nuts playing Christmas music and watching every Christmas movie under the sun.
There are very few Christmas songs that I like; I know that makes me sound like a Grinch, but all those traditional songs I listened to in the ’90’s are why. If I want something that speaks more of traditional Christmas sounds, I will gravitate to Frank Sinatra. When we lived in California, there was a coffee shop next to the movie theater in Oceanside that would play his music around the holidays and I love those memories. These are the songs I have on my Apple Music playlist:
One More Sleep (Leona Lewis)
Homesick (Dua Lipa)
Yule Shoot Your Eye Out (Fall Out Boy)
Present Without a Bow (Kacey Musgraves)
Coming Home to You (American Authors)
Snow (Alex G.)
The Christmas Song (Shawn Mendes and Camila Cabello)
Christmas Tree Farm (Taylor Swift)
Christmas Saves The Year (twenty one pilots)
Cozy Little Christmas (Katy Perry)
Last Christmas (Ariana Grande)
For Christmas movies, there are only a few I’ve truly enjoyed. I want to start off by saying my husband is the reason I’ve seen National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation. I don’t know that I would have chosen that for myself, but I did enjoy it. There are three others that I can watch each year. The one that has been my favorite for years is The Family Stone (2005). I think a big part of my love affair with the movie is that it was the first year I was home from Iraq and after that difficult year, it was the type of lighthearted comedy my life needed at the time. I am sucker for romantic comedies anyways, but this is high up there on my list of favorite comedies. Next, I adore Noelle (2019) starring Anna Kendrick. It doesn’t matter what she’s in, I will watch it. She is one of my favorite female comedic actresses, but her range of skills surprised me when I saw her in A Simple Favor (2018). If you want a little bit of a tearjerker moment for your holidays, I’d recommend Last Christmas (2019) starring Emilia Clarke. There is enough humor in the film to offset the sad moments, but it is a wonderful representation that Christmas (and other holidays) can be a mixed blessing. I am still stunned to this day that Ms. Clarke has sustained two brain aneurysms in her life and if you are still looking for a charity to support, please check out her charity, SameYou, which helps support rehabilitation options for brain injury survivors.
As we look towards 2024, I have a few things to say about closing out 2023. We won’t know where the next year will take us, but for now, we know we’re not moving in 2023. This little meme about the housing market gave me a good chuckle about having to put some plans on hold. After our Louisville, KY trip, I’ve become addicted to Zillow again and scouted houses in Louisville; outside Ft. Knox, KY, and since Indiana was big on our list, I also looked at homes in New Albany, Jeffersonville, Clarksville, Floyds Knobs, and Corydon. As alternatives, for other federal jobs on our radar, we looked at homes in northern Indiana to put us close enough to Chicago without living in Chicago; parts of Maryland; parts of Hawaii; and parts of Virginia. I have a few federal job referrals locally here in Arizona, so we might just be calling this place home a bit longer.
Trying to feel more “at home” for the holidays, I have caved and done a little holiday baking. There was a three-day whiskey gingerbread recipe from Ruby Tandoh’s Eat Up! book that I made for our neighbor and ourselves. Since our daughter is 13, I opted to use orange juice in the glaze over whiskey but next time we’ll make one completely with whiskey brushed on it and the glaze and see how we all feel. I will also use less liquid in the glaze so it sets better. Most of the glaze ran off the cake and make an orange icing puddle instead.
And there is one last thing I wanted to focus on today. This is my last year in my 30’s!!! If I had stayed in the Marine Corps, this would have also been the year I retired from military service. My life is so different now from what I envisioned it would be. I still have so much I want to accomplish, but I am also grateful that I feel more settled now, too. My 20’s were such a busy time trying to power through college and raising a young child and now there is breathing room. It might not feel like it every day, but I like that I can call it a day at the end of my work shift and there’s not a mountain of other responsibilities waiting to greet me. At this time, I am still powering through the first draft of my memoir. This thing might not be released until I’m 50, but I guess late is better than never. It’s taken a lot of courage to put pen to paper and write down some lovely moments, those cringeworthy incidents, and to own up to being a shitty human being at times. I don’t have it all figured out, but at least when you get older, you feel better about saying so. In your teens and 20’s, it’s tempting to try to fit in and compete with everyone, but once you sit back and see how others are living, you see their journey isn’t your journey. Their wants and needs aren’t your dreams and basic necessities. I am sitting at around page 245 and that’s a far cry from my 2016 start of 3 pages that I later tossed because that story was one I didn’t want to tell. I want to show I survived a lot of crap in a short period of time, and it’s the people that showed up for me that helped me become the woman I became today.
Wishing you all gentle holidays. I say this because I read from someone before it’s better to wish a gentle holiday because we don’t know what others are going through. Their holidays may not be happy this year as they encounter financial hardship, their first holiday without a loved one, or they have other things going on that don’t make them feel jolly this season.
The end of the semester is almost here. I’ve read papers exploring white privilege and straight privilege. Social reproduction has repeatedly been brought up. I’ve learned about trans resistance and critical witnessing. I’m constantly reminded to check my own biases, values, and privileges. I’ve taught others about ways I’ve been disenfranchised. I am grateful for all I’ve learned, but I’m tired. Right about now I miss my bed more than I can imagine; I could sleep like my peers on the shuttle, but I find it difficult to nap this early in my day. It shouldn’t be difficult given the fact I went to bed shortly after 12:30 last night.
I had one last paper to craft for my Planning, Implementation, and Evaluation of Social Pedagogy course. My last bits of research focused heavily on the (inadequate) view that women are not suited to combat and exploring the history context that publicly enforced keeping women out of combat and direct ground combat. Oddly enough, for the 8 pages of quotes and paraphrasing I did, so much of my work didn’t seem as relevant as I sat down to craft my paper. Most of my notes were heavy-handily mean. I blame sleep deprivation, but I know I also came into my final subject bothered by how much the stories of Jessica Lynch and Lynndie England portray a vision of women in service that reinforce these hegemonic views that women do not belong in the military. They are two bad examples and hopefully, as I work to encourage my female peers to share their stories publicly, we make a greater spark that tells the world what we do is important and should be equally valued.
Currently, I have one last paper standing in the way of myself and regaining extra hours in my day and it’s due on Monday. I’m taking tonight off after class to crawl into bed at a decent hour. And by decent, I mean I hope to be in bed between 8:30 and 9. Tomorrow is another day to tackle my assignment; I desperately need some sleep.
Because I’ve been so sleep deprived, my coffee consumption has risen. Thankfully, Starbucks has their Chestnut Praline Latte to keep me going. It’s also been fun to see their stores decorated for the holidays. The one by my house has a very playful atmosphere and the staff there is among the friendliest I’ve seen for Starbucks. Love the stockings, too.
And Dutch Bros., whose coffee I like better, has the best lid motivation to keep me going: Dutch Bros., thank you!
Although we are a little late getting into the Christmas spirit (our small tree and Christmas goodies are still in storage), we did find a pretty awesome full size tree our hearts are set on acquiring. Our names are on a waiting list and although it’s likely we won’t get the tree until the end of the season, it would be a great addition for next year. This tree is seriously the best looking artificial tree I’ve ever seen. I love how realistic the fake snow is on the branches.
As well, we keep our hearts open to the idea that we could be the lucky recipients of the Homes on the Homefront home in Chandler. The selection process is suppose to take 4-6 weeks and what a Christmas present it would be to get a home!. I thought about purchasing a fridge on Cyber Monday, because we could always set it aside in storage later if we didn’t get this home and have it ready for a home purchase, but my husband reminded me it’s important to know what size the fridge cutout is before making a purchase. So, no big Cyber Monday savings for me. One of the fridges I liked too was $1,400 off. I might not subsist off of PopTarts if I can save some cash on a fridge; just kidding…I love PopTarts. I’ll always have some in my pantry.
She Wears Dogtags 