Callin’ it like I see it.

You know what I’ve always thought would be cool? To finish a meal, pull out my wallet to pay the bill and have the waitress (Or waiter. Actually, preferably waiter. Preferably good-looking waiter. Preferably foreign good-looking waiter. Preferably Lachlan, the tall Scottish waiter with light brown curly hair and dark brown eyes with just a fleck of blue in them and a chin dimple, who gives off the faint scent of soap and freshly cut grass, who just from his smile you can just tell that he’s kind to his mother and to children… let’s just write a blog entry about Lachlan the waiter instead!)… where were we? Oh right. I’m about to pay the bill, and Lachlan the waiter comes over, waves his tanned left hand (with no wedding ring) at me, and he says “I’m only working as a waiter because I love the way food brings people together. I’m actually a millionaire, but my life’s work is to support fellowship and community. You’re the most captivating woman I’ve ever seen. Would you do me the great honor of accepting my hand in marriage?”

Sorry. I had 3.5 cups of coffee today.

Ok, what I MEANT that Lachlan would say is “Don’t worry about it; it’s taken care of.” And I’d say “What do you mean? Taken care of?” And Lachlan would cup my chin in his hands, stare directly into my soul with those piercing eyes, and…

HEIDI. GET A GRIP.

Lachlan would say “Another customer paid for your meal. It’s taken care of.”

God’s attempting to teach me how to let others take care of me. And it’s HARD. I am resisting it with every fiber of my being, in fact. You see, when you’re burdened with abandonment issues, the last thing you want to do is to put your trust and your well-being into someone else’s hands. *Awkward switch to first person NOW.* I would much rather be independent, take care of myself, and not have to worry about being disappointed by other people.

I was staring up at the cross on Sunday during communion, and I was trying to wrap my head around the idea that Jesus died for ME. (Yes, for you too, but right now we’re talking about me. Why? Because it’s my blog.) I pictured him walking up to the cross, and I tried to put myself at the scene. What would I say to him?

I think I would beg him not to die for me. I would plant my feet in the ground, grab his arm, and pull with all my might. I would tell him that I could take care of myself, that my life was not worth the price he was about to pay, and that I couldn’t possibly live with the fact that I let him die. For me.

But here’s what actually happened – he did it. He suffered through unspeakable pain and did the one thing that I needed most but could never, ever ask for.

I still have a hard time accepting it. Obviously, if I want to let others take care of me, I need to start by trusting Jesus enough to allow him to take care of me. Because if I can’t trust someone who WILL NEVER let me down or turn his back on me NO MATTER WHAT, then I have no hope of ever letting another imperfect human take care of me.

I have no problem with the concept of taking care of another person. In fact, it sounds pretty great. To love people enough to give them what they need even when they can’t or won’t ask for it is a privilege. And it’s so funny that I can say that (and mean it), but when I think of someone saying that about ME, I shudder.

Hopefully someday I’ll get to a place where I can more fully let someone do that for me.

And hopefully that someone will be Lachlan.

Oh man, I love to dress up. Like, in costume. Not in fancy clothes. Except today’s costume technically IS just fancy clothes, so…

Halloween has always been a favorite holiday of mine. Not because I love Satan (I don’t. At all. In fact, I have some very strong negative feelings towards that darn devil) or evil or scariness. I actually HATE being scared, and I don’t like scary Halloween decorations (especially the fake spiderwebs), and I don’t like gruesome Halloween costumes. But not because I think that stuff is WRONG or anything. I just don’t like it.

Wait, I take that back. Spiderwebs are always wrong.

Every year, my office dresses up for Halloween. We’re just a bunch of goofy people, and we’ll take any excuse to throw a party and get silly and have some fun. We’ve done tons of fun Halloween themes in the past. One year we were hillbillies and I spent a good portion of the day whittling a pencil while sitting on a recliner on the lawn in front of our office while students were served root beer from a keg. THIS year, though, we threw a Registrar Prom. (“Registering dreams for a lifetime…”)

It was pretty awesome. But don’t take my word for it. Check it out for yourself.

A bunch of us brought in our actual prom pictures from back in the day.

I have the best coworkers.

Pinksplosion

Lisa won Prom Queen.

If you know Joe, you know why this costume is so perfect.

Me and my boss in an awkward prom pose

The power went out last night on accounta the ridiculous end of the world winds.

Here’s the thing – I don’t have a key to my house. Yes, I know, it’s absurd. But I park in the garage, so I always use my garage door opener. Here’s what I have on my keyring: my car key, my car clicker, my garage door opener, my office key, a fancy American flag key to a friend’s house, and my LA Fitness membership card. That’s it. No lanyards, no cute silver keychains with Bible verses, no keychain nail clippers…oh yeah, and no house key.

What a moron.

Anyway, as I pulled up to my garage it slowly started to dawn on me (which is totally the wrong choice of words, because isn’t the whole point of dawn that the sun is coming up and the world is filled with light?) that the power was out in my complex. Ah, nerds. I knew that roommate #1 was at a meeting, roommate #2 teaches at APU on Tuesday nights, and roommate #3 is never home. (Seriously. I barely remember what she looks like.) Double nerds. So I sat in my car in front of my garage finishing my phone call while the person on the other end of my iPhone had a good laugh over my stupidness, and then I pulled my car out to the street.

Behold! What did I see? Roommate #2’s white Camry, shining like a beacon of hope. (Ok, it wasn’t shining. It was dirty and getting dirtier because of all of the crap flying around in the Wizard of Oz Winds.) I called her, she let me in, and all was well.

Well-ish, at least. I kind of made a mess trying to eat my El Pollo Loco street tacos in the dark. And then Roommate #2 left to go teach her class and I was alone in the dark. But she came home soon after because the power was also out at APU, and Roommate #1 came home, and we all played Settlers of Catan by candlelight.

It was weird not having power. I felt very disconnected. But I think it’s always a good thing when you’re put in a situation that forces you to have some human interaction sans technology. And even though I got mad at Roommate #2 and called her a horrible name for blocking my road twice, it was good times.

You know what else was good times? Running upstairs and turning on my TV the minute the power came back on.

I know I exaggerate a lot, but y’all – this is my most favoritist story of all time. It comes to us from a friend from college. We’ll call him Pete.

Pete was the leader of a summer small group. Summer small groups consisted of singers and musicians (yes, I did that on purpose. Suck it, singers.) from the music department that traveled around the country performing at churches and camps. Pete is a very outgoing, funny guy. Oh, and Pete also suffers from Irritable Bowel Syndrome.

It was early in the summer, and Pete’s small group was in the music building practicing their rep before they hit the road. The place was pretty much abandoned since it was summer. During one song, Pete let out a fart (as he often did), but much to his surprise and chagrin, the fart released more than just gas from his butt cheeks. Oh yes, he sharted himself. (For those of you who don’t know, and please excuse my profanity, to shart is to both shit and fart at the same time. Usually unexpectedly.)

Because of his battle with IBS, this was not the first shart incident that Pete had endured. So he excused himself to the little boys’ room to try and remedy the situation. (Yes, the situation being fecal matter in his underpants.) When he got into the stall to survey the damage, he realized it was going to take more than just a little dry toilet paper to clean up the mess. “No big deal,” Pete thought. (Pete has the gift of being calm under pressure.) “There’s practically no one in the building. I’ll just go to the sink, bare ass, and rinse out my underpants.”

So Pete waddled out of the stall in his shirt and socks and proceeded to rinse out his underpants in the sink. All of a sudden, he heard footsteps coming down the hall and saw, almost as if in slow motion, the door handle to the bathroom start to turn. “Ok, no reason to panic,” Pete thought. “It’s just one of the guys from my small group, and they all know how goofy I am. I’m just going to take this potentially awkward situation and turn it into one that we can all laugh about.”

Pete turned to face the door head on (err… ahem… moving on) and as the door opened he spread his arms out wide, shook his whole body in a shimmy, and yelled “Ooga booga!”

The man at the door stood, wide-eyed, made some sort of unintelligible grunt of fear and shock, and ran out of the bathroom.

And who was this man at the door, you ask?

A monk.

A fully dressed in monk garb MONK.

It wasn’t until years later that Pete discovered that a group of monks (Group? Order? Posse?) uses the recording studio in the school of music every year to record their monk songs.

The moral of this story? Don’t shake your junk at people. Because you never know if the people are monks.

The end.

I truly believe in thinking of things holistically. Always have. I don’t compartmentalize. This bodes well for me sometimes, but not always. It’s great when I get motivated, because it really reaches to all areas of my life. My room is spotless, my refrigerator is stocked full of healthy food, I’m staying within my budget, and I’m being a productive person. But when one tiny thing goes wrong, I can’t just isolate it to that area of my life. My room looks like it vomited clothes, I can’t muster up the will to go grocery shopping so my dinners consist of cheese and ice cream (or something equally ridiculous), I buy stupid stuff that I don’t need in an attempt to make myself feel better, and I spend A LOT of time in my room watching really bad reality television. All in all, I suck.

But as you all know, I’ve been on this quest for self-improvement over the past few months. And in the course of that quest, I’ve truly discovered that I can’t become a better person unless I’m willing to look at my life, see everything that needs improvement, and take steps to work on all of it. And let me tell you this.

It’s exhausting.

I finally had my first counseling appointment. It was both really hard and really great. The great part is that through lots of prayer, amazing encouragement from friends, and a few very special people who have taught me that I have value, I am at a place where I believe in myself and in God enough to know that I can live a more fulfilling life. That I deserve a more fulfilling life. And that’s an awesome feeling. (The hard part is blubbering in front of a total stranger about issues I didn’t even know I had.)

I’m doing what I said I would never do – I’m hiring a trainer at the gym. My roommate (Jeannette) and I are actually going together, and I can’t tell you how great it was last night to have my friend working out by my side and my trainer encouraging me and teaching me and making it his goal to get me more in shape. I’ve only had two sessions with him, and I already feel like I have learned so much about how to work out effectively.

I’ve lost 20 pounds on Weight Watchers. It’s HARD and sometimes I screw up, but I am teaching myself new habits and I feel really accomplished. I even bought a new pair of jeans last week one size smaller than I normally wear.

And although it’s exhausting and it’s a lot of stuff to work on all at once and sometimes I worry about getting burned out, it’s just freaking awesome. It’s freeing and exciting and motivating and it gives me hope.

And hope is the stuff dreams are made of. (And yes, I will needlepoint that on a pillow for you.)

In other news, can I just say publicly (I checked that word very carefully to make sure I didn’t type pubicly, because that would be a mighty unfortunate typo) how proud I am of my dear friend Aaron Stewart? I went to his CD release concert this weekend in Vegas and I was blown away by his musicianship, his gifts as a performer, and the authentic and endearing way he presented himself and his music to his audience. It’s so great to see a friend go from having this idea to take on this big project to actually hearing the completed project live and seeing hundreds of people lined up to buy the CD and get his autograph.

The album comes out on iTunes in a few weeks, and I strongly suggest that everyone picks it up. Seriously folks, I don’t just say this because he’s my friend. This is GOOD STUFF. Yes indeed.

I don’t know if these will be at all interesting to anyone else, but they make me laugh. Like, a lot. We did a video blog every night of our cruise to help preserve some sweet, sweet memories…

I was blessed beyond measure to participate in a group for three years in college called University Choir and Orchestra. It was in this group that I truly learned how to worship God through music, and the most valuable lessons I learned in college were all a result of being a part of this body of believers. Here’s a little trip down memory lane…and I apologize for the red sequins.

(I’m first chair french horn, right behind the piano.)

I have been back from one of the most fabulous vacations of my life for a couple of days now, and I think I’m ready to talk about it. We actually recorded a video blog every night of our cruise, and I will post those as soon as I get them, because that’s really where all the fun stories are best told. So in classic heids124 fashion, I want to talk about some random highlights.

• Food vs. activity. Boy howdy, let me tell you. They know how to FEED you on a cruise. We started most every day with a big hot breakfast, followed a couple of hours later by a nice lunch, and of course a snack a couple of hours later from the 24-hour pizza counter, and then some pre-dinner dessert a couple of hours after that. (Well, we had the late dinner seating! You wouldn’t want us to starve in between 6 and 8:15, would you? I didn’t think so.) We ate. Mmmmmm. My favorite was always dinner, and we all started ordering 2 appetizers, 1 main course (or 2 if we didn’t like the first one we chose), and at least 2 desserts. We didn’t always eat everything we ordered, and honestly, the portions weren’t huge so it was really ok, but it was still a lot of food. But here’s the great part – we were so active the whole week that I only gained 1 pound. ONE. It really just goes to show that an active lifestyle is so important to maintaining weight. I mean, duh, everyone knows that. But it just really drove the point home for me.

• On and off the boat. I think some people worry that they may get bored on board (yuck yuck yuck…), but Carnival did a GREAT job of always having lots of activities for days at sea. Never a dull moment. But I loooooooooved getting off the boat in Mexico! We stopped first in Cabo San Lucas, which is amazingly gorgeous, and took a boat tour and then went a few different places by bus. Very fun day. In Ensenada, we took a kayaking tour!! It was one of the coolest things I’ve ever done in my life. We kayaked for at least an hour, and we were sooooo far out in the ocean. We got to kayak right up to La Bufadora, which is one of the 3 biggest blowholes in the world. So. Awesome. I’m feeling much more adventurous after this cruise, and I want to start doing more cool things. (All while keeping up with my extensive TV watching schedule, of course.)

• Relaxing. I think this was the most relaxing vacation of my life. Even though we did a ton of stuff, we also did a ton of relaxing. Reading by the pool, lounging in the hot tub, taking mid-afternoon naps, getting massages…it was pure wonderfulness. It was so great to get away, turn off my cell phone, and just focus on having fun, being with friends, and doing whatever the heck I wanted.

• Remember that time when… I’m not quite sure how this started, but that was our phrase for the trip. For example, on our way out of the Laser Tag course (oh yes, they had laser tag on the ship) someone would say “Remember that time we played laser tag on the boat?” Or as we were leaving the dinner table on formal night after one of our table mates told us that he once shot and killed a man, someone would say “Remember that time we ate dinner with a murderer?”

• Catwoman Mad Libs. I decided to bring this random book of Catwoman (like, the Halle Berry movie) mad libs with us on the cruise, and it seriously turned out to be one of the highlights. We did our daily mad libs, and there was never a day that we did not laugh until we cried as a result. The $90 kayaking excursion was definitely worth the money, but somehow I had almost as much fun with the $1.97 mad libs. Go figure.

• Well-chosen vacation buddies. I don’t care if someone is your very best friend in the world – it doesn’t necessarily make them a good vacation buddy. For me, a good vacation buddy is someone who has the right balance of wanting to do stuff and wanting to relax, can be spontaneous, doesn’t freak out when plans change, and is generally easygoing. I struck gold with Aaron and JW. I’m actually a little surprised, because I’m such an introvert. I typically need alone time every day in order to function. I had very little alone time on this trip. I could have had more if I wanted it, but I enjoyed the two of them so much that I neither needed nor wanted to be alone. It was awesome.

• Bonus vacation! So, when your 5 night cruise to Mexico docks in San Diego on Saturday morning, what’s the first thing you do? That’s right! Stop at Starbucks, then drive back to Mexico to spend the night in Rosarito. Leanne and I got to spend the weekend at this AMAZING penthouse condo in Rosarito with Aaron and his parents to celebrate “Aaron’s 31 and flirty and thriving birthday.” It was the perfect way to avoid the end of vacation blues. (Yes, by taking another vacation.) We played board games, ate good food, laughed whenever Aaron’s parents walked around the house with the tennis-racquet-looking bug zapper and determined expressions, and just stayed away from reality for as long as possible.

I just feel happy and lucky and blessed. I really do believe that God delights when we enjoy life. Not to say that life should be a vacation, but taking time to enjoy the beauty and culture of another country, growing closer to friends, and taking a deep breath away from the daily grind to thank God for this life he gave us is important.

You know what else is important? Pictures.

Boat trip in Cabo San Lucas

Laser tag. Clearly.

How do you like THEM...coconuts?

Suiting up to go KAYAKING! Little did I know that Aaron would throw seaweed at me, which would start The Great Sea Snail Attack of 2009.

Glass blowing factory in Cabo. They made a turtle (tortuga) wearing a top hat drinking a bottle of tequila.

This is at the very tip of Baja California, where the Sea of Cortez and Pacific Ocean meet.

Beautiful Cabo. And beautiful ladies.

And while Cabo was indeed beautiful, the 80% humidity and over 100 degree temperature was NOT. Maybe that's why I only gained 1 pound. The rest I lost in sweat.

So sad to say goodbye to the Carnival Elation, our floating city of a home.

I can't believe Aaron made us stay in such a dump.

Beachfront lunch

Never miss a chance to pretend to be a model. Especially after Aaron climbs into a coffee table in the penthouse.

It’s Saturday. On Monday, I am boarding the Carnival Elation for a 5 night cruise to Mexico. I cannot even begin to tell you how excited I am, so let me sum it up with this:

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yeah.

I had quite possibly the WORST week at work in the history of work. Idon’twannatalkaboutit. But I do want to go on vacation.

So I am, without question, a freak of epic proportions when it comes to planning vacations. We’re talking binders with tabs, detailed packing lists (and secondary packing lists) made on Excel, and there even may be some lamination and label makers sneaking in there at times. The funny thing is, once I’m actually on vacation I am totally spontaneous and easygoing. There’s just something about thorough preparation that I enjoy so very much.

The other day I went to TJ Maxx (You should gooooo! Sorry, I like jingles.) to try and find a bag. I think I had some sort of large tote bag in mind. You know, something that I could throw a change of clothes, a bottle of water, my camera, and my wallet in. Everything I found either wasn’t big enough or didn’t have any sort of closure. I was getting frustrated, and then I walked by the wall of backpacks.

Of course! A backpack. The perfect solution. Big enough, zips closed, easy to carry. I just thought it was hilarious I had completely forgotten about something that I carried every day for the majority of my life.

Duh.

Moving on.

It’s extremely important to me that I say what I mean. I absolutely cannot handle BS. When I say something, I want people to know that it’s true and authentic.

I might take it to an extreme at times. For example, I have a friend who used to say “LOL” a lot on IM conversations. And I would always ask him, “Ok, are you literally laughing out loud, or do you just mean that you think what I said is funny?” So we started using the well-known and more specific IM acronyms EBL (explosive burst of laughter) and CL (courtesy laugh). I guess it’s stupid, but I don’t know. It’s just important to me to be able to take words at face value.

When people ask me how I am, I often respond with “Fine, thank you,” instead of the traditional “Fine, how are you?” I’m not going to ask how you are unless a) I actually care and b) I have the time to listen to your honest response.

Something Christians say a lot is “I’ll pray for you.” When you say you will pray for someone, you’re actually saying something quite significant. You’re saying that you will go before the throne of God and ask for something on someone’s behalf. And it’s not that it’s hard to do, or that it takes a lot of time, but it is significant.

I find myself being guilty of saying this to people and not really meaning it. And I need to knock that off.

Saying you’ll pray for someone shouldn’t be a reactionary response. It should be a committment.

Ok, now where did I put my label maker…

This blog has been a long time coming. (And it’s wonderfully ironic that it’s a blog instead of a discussion group. But that’s me. Wonderfully ironic. And sometimes inappropriate. Not this blog; just me. Look – shiny! What was I talking about? Oh. Right.)

You all know that I’m a big fan of the idea of living in community. People were created to be together, and we’re better when we surround ourselves with people who can encourage us, laugh with (and at) us, give advice to us, challenge us, and be real with us.

And along came Social Networking.

(If you know me well, you know that I am philosophically opposed to random acts of capitalization. But Social Networking has become such a huge thing that I think it deserves the capitalization. Just wanted you all to know that I thought this decision through. Sometimes I don’t think things through, like last night when I was talking to Aaron about the love songs medley he put together for his church, and I twice called it a love songs melody. I know the difference between a medley and a melody. I have a Bachelor’s degree in Music, for crying out loud. I jUst wASn’T thINKinG, ok?)

Social Networking is a big part of my life. I’m on Facebook, Twitter, and I’ve got this here blog. I play online games with friends on my iPhone. I text a lot. A lot of my life involves interacting with friends without being in the same room as them.

And you know what? I don’t really think there’s anything wrong with that. I actually think it can do great things to help enhance true community. Like, with touching. In the same room, spitting your iced coffee in someone’s face because they made you laugh so hard, throwing the Catch Phrase game into their lap because you know it’s about to buzz, getting cheek to cheek with 5 friends to try and squeeze into a picture where one of the subjects of the picture (usually the one with the longest arms) is also the photographer. I have many friendships in my life that I absolutely know have been deepened and strengthened through Social Networking.

When I get a random text message from a friend, it makes me smile. It lets me know that they were thinking about me. When someone comments on my blog, mentions me in their Tweet, or likes my Facebook status, it gives me a sense of affirmation. When someone leaves a note in our Scrabble game that they want to cut me in into tiny pieces and scatter me across 7 states so that the cops will never find my remains because I’m beating them by 150 points, it brings a smile to my face.

But here’s the thing. When any of these things begin to take away from true community instead of support and foster it, then it’s bad.

If I am only finding my worth and happiness in faceless interactions, then I am missing out on a huge important part of life. And although I love the texts and the mentions and the thumbs up and the violent death threats, the times in my life when I am the most happy, the most fulfilled, and the most joyful, are the times when I get to sit in the same room with those people who I’ve thrown many a sheep at and enjoy their true community.