A White Girl Post

White girls take quite a beating about our love of all things pumpkin spice and fall. If you are on any form of social media, you'll see things like this:

I don't really get it. Don't people (both male and female) of other races like fall? Don't white men like fall? Should I be embarrassed to be writing a post about fall? Since I'm a white woman and stuff? Well, I don't care. I'm about to write a post about how much I love fall.  UNABASHEDLY!

I'm going to even go ALL out and make a word bubble about my favorite parts of fall:

I've been oohing and ahhing over the gradual changes in the leaves. Orange, yellow, and red are starting to take over the outer edges of the trees and it nearly makes me gasp to see it. I love the fall colors. But part of me mourns the leaves dying. There are so many trees around here, and I love their canopy.

But for now I'll enjoy their colors. After sending a snapchat to a friend out west of a tree changing colors, he wrote back, "you have a crush on fall." I totally do. It's just so gosh dang cozy.

I've expressed similar feelings probably every year on this blog so I won't write a full length love letter to fall in this post, but I might not be able to refrain in a future post so you've been warned!

Signed,
A white girl (am I allowed to stereotype myself? or is that racist?)

On Stress

I've been thinking a lot lately about living with stress. I have had some changes in my life that have left me feeling stressed out, all the time. It's not a "bad" stress, by which I mean, things are going well! My stress isn't due to things going badly. But it's stressful to take on more responsibilities and learn new things. Keeping track of all I have to do is a real juggling act.

I dropped one of the balls recently (a small one - not a big deal) and was accused of having a blonde moment. I guess if you're not a blonde you never forget anything? LUCKY!

ANYway, I digress. Living with stress. I talked to my doctor about it yesterday when I was in his office for a checkup. I asked him for tips on living with stress. He said that one of the things people who are very stressed neglect is self care - ie, getting enough sleep, spending time with friends and family, cultivating faith and spirituality, pursuing hobbies, and so on.

As he was saying this, I guiltily thought back to a lunch I had at work last week that consisted of a bag of Doritos and a diet Coke. I also thought about how I've been neglecting a lot of dear friends because I feel so drained when I get home from work that I let the Netflix wash over me. I thought about how I hardly slept at all last week then on the weekend, slept for 15 hours straight.

I don't mean to make it sound like I am any more stressed out than any of you. I know when someone talks about how stressed they are, it brings out people's competitive nature. You're stressed too, I'm sure. That's why I thought I'd write a little post about dealing with stress.

My dr. has a lot of elderly patients, including my grandma. He told me that when he saw her recently, she was lucid at first, but got confused after a few minutes. We talked about her for a bit, then dementia in general. I told him about a study I'd heard once that was done with a group of elderly people with Alzheimer's and dementia. One of the groups was shown a funny movie and the other was shown a sad movie. Later in afternoon, after they'd forgotten they'd seen a movie, they were asked how they felt. The group who'd seen the funny movie felt happy. The group who'd seen the sad movie felt sad. Neither group knew why they felt that way.  But the feelings generated by the movies they'd seen lingered.

My dr. mentioned that this study could apply to my situation as well. Expose myself to happy situations - doing the things I enjoy, spending time with friends and family, reading funny books, watching funny shows - and the happy feelings will stay with me.

It wasn't the first time I'd thought of this. When I heard the study, I thought the same thing. But it's so easy to forget, isn't it?

So last night, when I got home I worked on something that needed to be done, but I did it in a creative way, while watching a funny tv show (the Goldbergs on DVD - SO funny). And this morning, even though I had a busy, stressful day ahead of me, I felt happier.

How do you deal with stress?

Full disclosure: I had a bag of Doritos and a diet Coke while writing this post. It's a process.

Catching Up

Due to life pressures, and the exhaustion that's come with it, I haven't blogged in awhile. And because of that, I've really missed some good opportunities for blogging. Notice I said good, not great. I make you no promises. But I know that I would have been amused by these topics. Here's a little of what I missed blogging about:

1. Sharing the inappropriate pictures that could be leaked from my iCloud (does anyone even know what the cloud is!?!?! I don't!!!), such as:

Filthy. Just filthy. Oh my gosh, I want that so much right now.

2. The opportunity to share this picture with you and tell you how much I love the movie "Forrest Gump." But here's the thing about Forrest Gump - I only watch it alone. I can't have anyone elses emotions and reactions mingling with mine when I watch this movie. It has to be a pure experience - just me, alone, experiencing all the many things Forrest did. Running across the country with him, yelling, "JENNY!" at the National Mall, getting shot in the buttocks, having leg braces... I can't get into everything Forrest did. It would take me all day (Or at least 120 minutes).

Also, I don't like crying in front of people and how can you NOT cry during this movie!?!? I recently visited a traveling replica of the Vietnam Wall Memorial, and I thought about Forrest searching for Bubba and saving several soldiers and getting shot in the buttocks and I got all emotional.

In conclusion, I love Forrest Gump. And I now I present to you this image:

3. I went geocaching with some friends for the first time. Have you guys ever done this? I know some of you have (Brady and Emily! Hi!). It was very fun even though I ALMOST PUT MY FACE IN A SPIDER WEB. DIRECTLY INTO IT! It was dusk and I didn't see it until I was ALMOST IN IT! Gosh, I can't handle even the memory of it.

Anyway, we geo-ed our way to the cache (that's the correct way of saying it, right?). Here are a couple pics:

4. Have you guys seen this current picture of Anya and Xander from Buffy, The Vampire Slayer? Humina humina, Xander, am I right?

Before (cute):

Now (even cuter):

They both look great! Sidenote: Remember when Xander dated Cordelia? What was that all about? Dumbest couple ever but NOT as dumb as when Buffy dated Riley. I just can't get into all of that right now but I have a lot more to say.

5. Lastly I wanted to reminisce about time spent up north this summer and how beautiful northern Michigan is. Luckily I'll be spending a little more time up north this fall and possibly winter, so I don't have to wait till next summer. Here are just two pictures from Labor Day weekend in northern Michigan:

And now I guess I'm caught up! Well, caught up enough. What's new with you?