Lengthening the Night, Pushing Back the Dawn

I simply love this particular cartoon from xkcd especially now; I’m a liberal arts major turned law student, but I was math and science genius once upon a time, so the web comic rings true most of the time. Anyway, here’s why this particular comic panel hits me.

One of the hardest parts of being up here is that I am away from all the ones I love. My family and my boyfriend live in TN, while I’m up here in L-ville alone. I come home every night to an empty apartment, and my routine is the same every day. Get up, shower, eat breakfast, go to class, eat lunch, go to class, come home, work out, do homework, eat supper, do homework, try to get some sleep. If I’m lucky I get to have a decent phone conversation or text conversation with them sometimes. I do call my mother almost every night, or she calls me; I am after all a Southern woman. I try to go home every once in a while, but sometimes that’s not possible. Needless to say, I miss the people I love, and time I get to spend with them is very precious to me. Once upon a time I went through this, and I barely made it through. This time is different; this time I’m stronger and the love I share with Wash is more powerful.

I have the same feeling that the girl in the comic does each time I am with my friends and family. On date nights with Wash, as we kiss goodnight, I have this urge to spin counterclockwise in an effort to do just what the comic says. Lengthen the night and push back the dawn and give myself just a little more time with him. It gets extremely difficult to say goodnight and walk away, especially when I know that I will be heading north again and he will remain in the south. Some nights, especially when we’ve had one of our wonderful and deep coversations that always end with us feeling so much closer, its almost painful to leave. Some day I won’t have to leave; some day I won’t have to kiss him goodnight knowing that we won’t see each other again for a while. I look forward to that day. Yes, readers I do love him and if you find me in some parking lot standing to next to a remarkably sweet and good looking Southern man who answer to Wash spinning counterclockwise; I’m just making an attempt to lengthen the night and push back the dawn so that I can have a little more time in his arms.

So Maybe It’s Time

So this is a first for me dear readers. I never blog about religion, ever, and I have many reasons for it. Maybe it’s because I don’t want my comments flooded by people either berating me over my choice of religions or telling me that I’m wrong about religion in general. Anyway, this is not some discussion about which religion you should pick or about how my religion is better than your religion or anything like that. In fact this is one of those really deep blog entries where I talk about something fairly powerful in my life. I haven’t don’t know what has gotten into me that I feel the need to blog about this, cause it’s something I don’t talk about very often really. I know, I know, get with it Zoe and spit it out.

This all started with Wash, well sort of; I guess it started with the loss of the ex and meeting Wash. They say when life brings you to your knees you are in the perfect position to pray. It seems like a silly cliche, except that it’s true. I’d reached a point in my life where I felt lost and heartbroken and completely crushed; I didn’t know what to do or how to cope, which may be a little pathetic, but it’s the truth. And since I had no idea where to turn, I did the only thing I could think of, I hit my knees and started praying.  I asked for strength and guidance and faith and healing and hope and courage; I prayed for answers and for something I didn’t need the way I thought I did. And God answered some of my prayers. He gave strength and helped me heal; He gave me directions and put a man in my life who bring me back to where I belonged. He gave me Wash, and I thank God for that every day.  God gave me a second chance, and He gave me the strength and wisdom to take that chance.  It was a miracle, even if it was a small one.

And Wash brought me back, restored my faith, and took me to church with him. That may not seem like much to you, but it is worth more than I can ever describe. Once upon a time I went to church fairly often, almost every Sunday. And when I was seventeen years old my Pa died of a sudden stroke, he was in very good health when it happened, just a blood pressure issue that was managed well with medication. That summer, I went to VBS with my cousins, and at invitation one night I found myself responding. I don’t know why it happened, but it did. I suddenly found myself kneeling at the small alter in the front of the sanctuary and praying, tears streaming down my face. I’d finally answered that voice in my heart saying “Come to me. I will guide you. I will show you the way home.” That night the preacher asked me if I’d been baptized. I had not been, and he offered. Something happened though, and I never got around to it. I’m twenty two years old now, and for some reason I never went back. I guess maybe I just wasn’t ready.

What does that have to do with Wash? Well, a great deal actually. The love of my life is a good man, and a good Christian, and he has done for me something I can never repay. He led me back to God and to church. When I went to church, I went to a Baptist church, a very small one, and Wash is a Church of Christ man through and through. Now when I get to go to church with him, and I consider it a blessing that I do get to go with him sometimes, I go to a Church of Christ church. But the building is not the point, not really. The point is that I’m pretty sure that the man I love more than words was not only sent to heal my heart and give me a second chance to love again but sent to me to bring me to back to God again. I have not always been the best of people, and I have a great many flaws.  Living up here by myself gives me plenty of time to think and to talk to God. I’ve had time to consider the person I want to be, the kind of life I want to live, and the kind of partner Wash deserves. He deserves a partner who can be as devoted to God as he is, and the woman who stands beside him should be as a good a person and as good a Christian as he is. I strive to be that person, and I am trying very hard to make the changes in my life that I should in order to be able to be the kind of good person he deserves as a partner, a friend, and someday a wife. Wash’s patience is a gift because I’m often difficult, and I’m not always polite or positive or proper or appropriate. I can rude, and my language choices are not always the best or nicest. I’m slightly stubborn, willful, and resistant to changes in my essential me-ness or at least what I think is my essence. I am a work in progress, and maybe it’s finally time for the progress.

There is no quote of the day here because I cannot come up with a quote that fits just right.

Julie & Julia, or the Last Date for a While

So after reading a friend’s blog entry about this one, I finally decided I had to see it. I’d been thinking about seeing it for awhile, but I didn’t want to subject Wash to another chick flick, though it seems the only decent movies lately have been chick flicks. It saddens me because I love movies of all kinds, but there is some serious fail out there in movie making land. But I digress. Wash and I are pretty sure that we are not going to get another date night for a while due to the fact that I am getting to be a very busy law student and between work and class he’s going to be pretty short on time. Also, Wash brought my ring back from the jeweler’s, which makes me a very happy bunny. It was supposed to be a dinner and a movie kind of date, which is fairly normal for us, but he had some trouble getting off work on time and that made us run a bit late. That meant that we went to a movie about cooking and food, and we were starving because neither of us had eaten.

The movie was great actually, and if you haven’t seen I highly recommend that you do so immediately. Both Meryl Streep and Amy Adams were incredible, and Streep was absolutely dead on really. I did find Julie’s obsession with Julia a bit strange, but it didn’t take away from the overall effect of the movie. In fact I sort of understood why she clung to her the way she did, considering the effect of the stew dish she mentioned. Honestly, I identified with the film because I love to cook, and I would love to learn to cook as well as the two leading characters could. There was also the fact that Julie was a struggling writer with an unfinished novel. We left the movie starving, and I really had the urge to cook something with lots of butter. If I had the time and the fundage, I would definitely love to embark on the challenge of cooking my way through some famous cook’s cookbook in a year. But alas, law school makes you both broke and busy. Over all I think this is definitely on my list of movies I will require on DVD when it comes out. Also, while I may not buy it since I have a mad long list, this is also on my books I must read list. I wish that I could write a blog that spoke to people the way that Julie’s did or that I could write something important at all. I guess maybe I can hope for doing something important in the legal field instead.

Also, not to spoil the movie or anything, but I’ve decided that I want a marriage like Julia and Paul Child have in the movie. They were so very much in love and no matter what happened they managed to get by and were always supportive of each other. They had a very strong relationship that allowed them to live happily in most any situation. I want that very much for Wash and I. I want us to be able have a relationship that strong and be able to support each other no matter what. Even if life is difficult, as I know it will be when we are starting out, if we cfan have that kind of strong supportive and happy relationship, I will be a very happy woman. And I think that Wash and I can have that. We already have an amazing relationship, and life for us is not exactly easy, especially while I live in KY and he remains in TN. We are managing to be supportive and encouraging even though we are 200 miles apart. We maintain a powerful connection, and we remain very much in love regardless of what life throws at us.

Quote of the Day: Paul Child: What is it you REALLY like to do?
Julia Child: Eat! - Julie & Julia

What keeps Zoe Going

So I’m sitting here at the laptop in my new apartment, the one I really wanted in the first place, having gone for a 30 minute work out on an exercise cycle and had an awesome hot shower. For the past three weeks I’ve been dieting and since I’ve moved into my new apartment, which has a fitness room, I’ve been working out. When I was in the old apartment all I could  really do is use  my aerobics DVDs, but I’m not sure that they’ve done much good. But now I go down to the fitness room and work out after class. I’ve tried to work out and get in shape several times in the past and sort of failed. I’d get impatient or busy and just give up on it. I think it was partially because I have never had an easy time losing weight or toning my body for some reason and so it takes a lot of effort while lots of people around me, mostly other women, seem to be able stay trim and lean and pretty even though they eat twice what I do and don’t have to work out as often or hard as I need to. I just sort of get frustrated with myself I guess. So what is keeping me going this time? Well several things.

First of all, I’ve discovered that I don’t hate everything about my body.  I have great legs that will look even better when I tone up my thighs, and my butt, while sort of huge,  looks pretty good in the right pair of pants. Mostly I need to sort of tone up and reshape my body. I’m accepting that I can’t change my natural bone structure, which is sort of wide and heavy. I’m not only exercising, but I’m eating right, which gives me more energy and makes me feel better. It keeps my body going and I don’t feel hungry or tired. Physically and mentally I keep myself going by treating myself right. If I don’t obsess over what I perceive as flaws and problems that are insurmountable, I can focus on keeping a steady pace.

The second thing that is keeping me going is the way I’ve set my goals. Instead of having some hard to reach ideal, like getting bikini ready in 6 weeks, I’ve decided to set small attainable goals that I can accomplish over time. My first goal is to work out at least 3 or 4 times a week every week for three weeks and to get a steady rhythm going. My next goal will be to keep that up for three or four more weeks. My ultimate goal is a summer goal; I do intend to lose about four or five pants sizes by this summer, which is more than 20 weeks away, giving me plenty of time to lose the weight and tone up at a healthy pace. I’d like to be down at least a size or two by April for the barrister’s ball, and then by summer I want to be trim and lean and swimsuit ready since I promised Wash that I would go to PCB with him.

The third thing that keeps me going is the support I’m getting from Wash. He’s trying to work out too, and so we are sort of in it together, even though we are miles apart. He reminds me that I can do it, and he gives me strength. His love helps me move forward even when I’m tired or frustrated. While I am losing the weight and getting slim for myself, knowing that Wash has back, so to speak, helps beyond words. You see I hope to marry him someday soon, and another goal I have involves that day. I don’t intend to be fat on my wedding day. I don’t want to go through what I did when I was hunting a prom dress, having so much trouble finding something that fits. It may be silly to think about that now, but if our luck goes well that day may come sooner than later.

Now my dear readers, I need a good exercise for tummy toning.

Quote of Day: “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” Philippians 4:13

I’m Leaving on a Jet Plane

I went for a forty-five minute jog today, and it was amazing. Nothing but me, my iPod, and some time to think; I love the fact that I can go off on my own and just jog and think. It’s raining now, and so I’m sitting in my room enjoying the quiet and the fact that my room is slightly clean. Anyway, back on topic. In case you are wondering about my fantastic John Denver reference in the title, it’s from the CD set I gave Wash for his birthday along with some awesome fudge. I will do a culinary adventure post on that one.

I only have a week or so before I move to KY, and I must say that I was not anticipating the way it sort of saddens me. I’m really excited about law school, don’t get me wrong, but at the same time I am nervous and scared. I also know that it is the beginning of difficult year for Wash and me. For the first time in our relationship, we will be apart for long periods of time with only phone and Internet to connect us. We’ve always had a date night, even if it was nothing really exciting, and we’ve always been able to finagle a way to see each other. It’s not going to be easy, not at all. I’ve done the long distance thing, and I survived; it’s not something I look forward to at all because I’ve discovered that even after a day I miss him. I distinctively recall that its a feeling that comes with being in love. Absense makes the heart grow fonder, or so they say. He’s something else dear readers. And I love him very much.

Having time to think is not always a good thing because it lets me find too much negative. We won’t see each other much; he will work a lot, and I will only be coming back to TN on weekends and holidays. I find myself hating the thought, and knowing that there is nothing I can do about it. Be strong, I remind myself. Have faith, I say to the mirror. I know there is nothing to be afraid of, but there is a part of me who is a little scared. There is after all that who, tried and failed business, which at times haunts me. Not that I don’t have faith in Wash because I do. I’m still a touch damaged, and Wash, who is amazing, has done more repair work on my heart, faith, and spirit than he will ever know. I was reminded that I am not invincible, and it has left me a bit gun shy at times. I’m better than I was before.

I don’t want to leave everything I have here, but if I’m to grow and meet the future, I have to go. Tears well up, every now and then; and readers I swore I’d never cry over a relationship again. It’s not like it’s forever, but it’s an awful long time, at least that’s how it feels; to be honest readers, I don’t know what’s wrong with me lately. It seems the closer I get to moving day, the more I cling to home and to Wash. Yeah, big strong Zoe melts like ice cube on the sidewalk at the thought of distance again. I guess it’s because I’ve gotten so close to him, and I like it that way. I’m so used to knowing that I’ll seem him soon that I don’t know how to handle not. I’ll adjust eventually, or lose my mind.

I didn’t mean for this to be a sad entry, but they can’t all be happy.

Quote of the Day: “So kiss me and smile for me
Tell me that you’ll wait for me
Hold me like you’ll never let me go
Cause I’m leavin’ on a jet plane
Don’t know when I’ll be back again
Oh babe, I hate to go” – ”Leaving on a Jet Plane” John Denver