Getting our feet wet! Officially graduated from college and now onto my next adventure.
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The Tapping Rhythm
I was sitting at a bar in Austin, Texas when the rhythmic sound of metal-soled shoes began to fill my mind and body with a desire—a desire to tap-dance. All they needed was a small rectangular platform; their shoes and feet took care of the rest. The sound, the rhythm, the melody—all emanating from the process of three souls becoming one: two shoe, one dancer.
It was the greatest idea to have live tap-dancing at a bar. There was a small platform, a dancer, and two guys in the background jamming on base and guitar. I hadn’t ever really watched much tap-dancing before. I loved it.
When I got back from Austin, I decided that I wanted to try out tap dancing. I found one fellow student who was willing to lend me her tap shoes and another student who offered to teach me—how perfect! I was shocked to quickly discover how challenging tap dancing is. I had played around attempting to mimic tap before and thought I was onto something, but soon realized that I had been completely off.
The most exciting part for me was after my lesson. My lesson started at 7:30, but I didn’t leave the auditorium until 10pm! I decided I wanted to take the basic steps I had learned and share them with some music. I plugged in my iphone and began to tap in extra beats and rhythms to the music playing. What fun!! Even though I only had a few steps, I was able to use them in a way that interacted with the music I was listening to. I felt fantastic and refreshed after turning off the lights in the auditorium and calling it a night—what a great evening it had been.
Tap dancing is a beautiful art form. What I didn’t know while sitting at the bar in Austin drinking in the tapping rhythm or when attempting to let the rhythm flow out my own souls was that this dancing rhythm holds remains of African American slaves. Each tap leaves a footprint and projects a sound of a hardened soul—a soul, beaten by whip and sun—but a soul that never stopped tapping. I hope I see more of this incredible dance form in my future whether watching it or trying it out again myself.
References:
Peters, Donna-Marie1, dmpeters@temple.edu. 2011. “Dancing with the Ghost of Minstrelsy: A Case Study of the Marginalization and Continued Survival of Rhythm Tap.” Journal Of Pan African Studies 4, no. 6: 82-103. Social Sciences Full Text (H.W. Wilson), EBSCOhost (accessed May 6, 2012)
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See…even the BIG kids got into it!
(Thanks for stopping by Meg, Lauren, and Tannyr…you all are so thoughtful and such beautiful artists!)
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Be proud of your creations!
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We made little gardeners out of everyone last saturday. It feels so good to encourage little kids to grow green thumbs.
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Teaching this little kids art class at The Morean Arts Center has been such a blessing for me. It has reminded me to never leave behind the creative and imaginative little kid I used to be. Let your creative and imaginative curiosity guide you.
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Serendipitous Flowers.
I know, I know, another post about flowers. This time, however, I am posting because just when I was desperate for some flowers to brighten up my life (but wasn’t ready to give in and buy myself some), my green onions started blooming and I arrived home to a bouquet of beautiful sunflowers (my favorite) with a sweet note. Feeling lucky and happy. Thank you Tannyr and mother nature for your wonderful gifts.
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Stress
‘Stop stressing out!’
Oh! Yea, you are totally right, let me just go ahead and stop stressing. Wait, what?? Who can just stop stressing on command? Nobody that I know of.
I have been working to reduce my stress over the past year. I used to be one big ball of stress; now I only am every once in a while.
Here’s the trick: wait until there is actually visible reason to stress and don’t try to plan too far ahead.
Thank you captain obvious.
No, but seriously—we stress prematurely. Perhaps an example is necessary here. Suppose you are my friend who is moving to Australia after graduating from college to live with her sexy Australian boyfriend. You could begin stressing now about finding a job, supporting yourself in a country where everything is super expensive, making friends, missing your family and friends who are on the other side of the world, meeting the boyfriend’s parents. OR, you could just swallow the fact that you aren’t going to be able to do any of the above before getting there so you might as well just enjoy the last month of the college life that you will never have again.
Oh…and how amazing….you happen to live by a top-rated beach, you have free kayaks and paddleboards to take out whenever you want, sunshine every day, a sexy boy to snuggle with every night, friends who live across the pool from you, and you are currently living in a place where the price of everything is a quarter of what it will be when you move to Australia….so live it up!
We so easily miss all the wonderful things that surround us when we are caught up stressing about the future. This may seem like another obvious comment, but it deserves some time and attention. How can we notice anything positive around us if our anxiety is through the roof about something that is going to happen next month, or next year? The time to begin stressing is when you are actually unable to pay your bill this month. Now granted, this post is for those who are prone to stress. There are of course those people who don’t seem to think ahead or care about anything until it is too late—this blog entry is not for you.
Okay, it’s a bit unfair of me to use an example that isn’t a personal one (sorry Tannyr).
I personally catch myself prematurely stressing all the time. I mean, HELLO the only question I get asked these days is, “So! What are you going to do after you graduate!?” Which is totally a valid question and obviously something I am putting lots of thought into (believe me!); but this question is not so helpful for those of us who are still trying to figure out exactly what we want to be doing a year from now. This question is also not helpful for those of us who can easily get caught up in external expectations and perceptions.
Here is what has been helping me: it is actually along the way that I discover what it is I want to be doing, make the connections that inspire me, and spark that inner excitement. Who would have known that this past summer I would end up working at a youth hostel in Budapest, Hungary for a month (where I met amazing people and had the time of my life)—certainly not me!
So here is my plan for after graduation for those who are still asking: I am moving to Cape May, New Jersey and working there for the summer. And that’s where it ends. Sure, I have been brainstorming lots of ideas for after my summer in Cape May, but that’s as far as I’m going right now. Ideas and a will to experiment, explore, and discover is what I’ve currently got in my pocket, and I think that for now, they will help me to get where I want to go (I’ll keep you posted!).
Trying to plan out everything is actually counterproductive and only induces unnecessary stress that can have a serious effect on overall health—so stop stressing out—and then you’ll find what you were looking for all along.
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Everyone seems to have a clear idea of how other people should lead their lives, but none about his or her own.
—The Alchemist
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For the girls party Tannyr and I hosted at our house, I decided to make my favorite Sexy Flourless Dark Chocolate cake extra special by adding some homemade caramel drizzled on top.
The caramel recipe I used was just about as simple as you can get:
-sugar
(I used a combination of brown sugar and confectioners sugar…brown sugar gives it a bit of a grainy texture though so if you want it completely smooth without any sweet crunch then just go with only using the confectioners sugar)
-butter
(not sure of the exact amounts I used of each so go with your best guess and add more or less of each and perhaps a bit of water to make it the consistency you want)
P.S. with your leftover caramel, put it into a silicone cube tray, sprinkle it with some coarse sea salt, stick it in your fridge or freezer and you’ve got salted caramel candies!
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Expectations
Can being generous set you up to be taken advantage of?
More importantly, are we simultaneously generating expectations for those we are being generous towards? When I let my housemate use my butter or my coffee, am I expecting him to buy the next ones? Yes—and I expect him to buy the exact same brand. Are these expectations only visible to us? Or, are they even visible to us—are we aware we are creating them?
Lastly, and most importantly, are we actually curtailing the effects of our kindness by creating underlying expectations? How can you label your generosity as genuine kindness if you are expecting something in return?
I have been thinking a lot about expectations lately. I wasn’t aware until recently of how many expectations I am constantly generating. I like to follow The Golden Rule—‘one should treat others as one would like others to treat oneself’—but it is hard to practice The Golden Rule and not expect reciprocity.
It’s a bit of a dilemma. Initially, I am being generous because it makes me feel good to be generous. As time goes on however, I become resentful; when generosity is one-sided or if people now anticipate the freshly brewed coffee and muffins hot from the oven, I loose my enjoyment. My generosity is no longer genuine. It is here (I think) that expectations build and become reinforced. This is not good.
So how do I get around this dilemma? It’s obviously not going to be solved by eliminating generosity. Are my expectations misleading or misplaced? Do I no longer qualify as a ‘kind’ person because I don’t enjoy doing unto others without others doing unto me? Am I expecting the wrong things? Are my expectations what should be eliminated, or are my expectations what prevent me from being taken advantage of?
As is apparent, I do not have answers to these questions. Fortunately though, I think the importance lies in asking them and not in attempting to answer them right away.
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Sesame Citrus Polenta Salad with Mint: (this salad is for those who are looking for a significant change in their daily salad—definitely not the typical salad and perhaps a bit of a bizarre combination, but I enjoyed it!)
-Mixed Greens
-Sliced oranges
-Sliced sesame-citrus soaked quinoa polenta (slice polenta, pan-fry with toasted sesame oil, soak it in the citrus juice that is on your cutting board from slices the oranges, cut it up and put it on the salad)
-Walnuts
-Sprouted lentils (I sprouted these myself!)
-Red pepper flakes
-Mint
-For the dressing I just squirted a bit of lime, Braggs soy sauce alternative, and olive oil.
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I’m Sprouting!
Who knew that it was so easy to sprout! Perhaps I’m just late in my realization, but it’s so quick and easy—and actually I think I would go as far as to say that it’s exciting! Just as an experiment, I took a quarter cup of lentils that I found in my pantry and stuck them in some water with cheesecloth to cover. I let it is over night and already the next day I noticed that the outer shell was coming off. Over the next 1.5 days, I periodically rinsed them (whenever I would remember) and in less time than I expected, I had produced some serious sprouts! How exciting! Now my lentils have extra digestive enzymes in them and I have a great new salad topping.
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Morning Clouds
This morning Jack Johnson and I went for a short jog with the morning clouds. Instead of picking out a particular jogging route, we let the clouds lead us; wherever we saw hints of cloud around a corner, we followed them. I didn’t recognize this was how I was being guided until now.
My jog this morning wasn’t really about getting exercise; it was about leaving behind the somewhat crabby Fran that I have become these past few days. I looked at my clock around 6:30AM and decided to get out of bed around 6:50AM—lets get this day started with the right attitude.
Towards the end of my run, Jack and I stopped jogging to admire a small pond that had caught our eyes. The pond was motionless. Except for the occasional bug-induced ripple on the surface, the pond provided a perfect reflection of the sky. As we came out from underneath a large tree, we were surprised and awed by a small section of bright tangerine-pink that stood out from the larger billowing cloud above. We went back and forth—sky to water, watching the clouds dance with various shades of purple-elephant-grays and tangerine pink. Jack and I felt very lucky to have found the one very small section in the sky that projected such a bright tangerine-pink. As we stretched, we watched the tangerine-pink slowly creep its way into the rest of the cloud. Dark purple-elephant-gray juxtaposed with tangerine-pink is a beautiful combination.
When we left, both Jack and I felt refreshed and rejuvenated—lucky to have seen what we did while on this short jog.
Although I didn’t have my camera with me while on my run, I was still able to capture a few morning clouds before they disappeared into the buttery-yellow of post-sunrise once back at home.
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Tree Oysters (or at least that’s what I would call them)!
I found these while on my run the other day and stashed them behind a tree so that Kermit (my bike) and I could go pick them up in his basket. Aren’t they cool looking!?
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