Mitten Pride

If you read my blog yesterday, you know that for a while now I've been in this awkward "transition" period oh wait that's called 20something life in general. Now that all the right things have been tied up neatly on my end, I'm so happy that I can finally share with you the big change coming my way:

I'M MOVING BACK TO MICHIGAN!

I am SO excited to get back and get going on this next adventure called grad school! 
For your daily dose of Unreal awkwardness, please visit the lovely Patricia over at Kisses and Croissants. She's put together an awesome Throwback Thursday post about "The Craziest Thing You've Done for Love." Some of them are crazy stupid, some are crazy romantic...either way, they're all such a fun idea. So. Want to know what the dumbest thing I've done for love is? Here's a hint: it involves one of my favorite things ever, road tripping. Go check it out!

Dogwood Days

(You should know I struggled to push publish on this. They come here for sass, not sentimentality I told myself. I said the story wasn't good enough, wasn't big enough, wasn't worthy enough. It was trivial and childlike and meaningless, I argued. So here's me, pushing publish anyways.)

We're gettin' sentimental up in this joint today. 

It's springtime. It's sunny. The trees are in full bloom. And here's what I'm thinking of. 

The dogwood trees of Hillsdale College.

When I see a dogwood, I think of you. And you. I think of a spring haze leading to a summer daze. I think of finding you, of losing you, of first meeting you. I think of the early days when everything was happy and bright and our story was just beginning. I think of how those dogwoods looked like relief. Sweet, sweet relief. They looked like a hurdle overcome, a past left behind, a future open before me. I think of sending you away in front of those dogwood trees to war, to deserts, to people who wanted to hurt you. I think of being renewed. I think of the college that shaped us, the times that tried us and the love that relieved us. They've always been kind to me, the dogwood days.

**

The scent of the dogwood trees was a drug to their senses, guiding them, goading them. In the bright clean heat of a springtime afternoon, when the world was tinted pink and lovely underneath the loaded branches of the dogwood trees, they had made such a tiny bet. One buckeye bite per every flower. She, a part-time feminist who stood unnecessarily tall in her desire to never reduce herself to a baking, cooking, husband-hunting girl. He, an overly large, bulging, heavy football player who preferred the little moments to grand gestures. She wanted a grand gesture. 

But somewhere in the middle of finals, summer plans, interviews, offers, acceptances, graduation goodbyes and sentimental sisterhood moments she snapped. She didn't want flowers because they were part of a bet. She wanted flowers because he wanted to give them to her, not because she had made him something. She told him as much on the phone in a 30-second tirade  to which he promptly responded "take a nap and call me back in an hour." 

But she didn't take a nap. Her Catholic guilt washed over her in an instant, and she huffed and puffed her way into the kitchen. She dropped the four ingredients--powdered sugar, peanut butter, butter and chocolate chips--onto the counter with a loud bang and got to work. She would be the bigger person here. She would make them because she cared, not because anything was coming from it. 

That night was harder than she imagined. They said a terse and strained goodbye for the summer. Neither one of them wanted to budge, neither one give the first inch. She pulled back from his arms and propped herself up on his chest. 

"New bet," she said.

"What?" He didn't know where this was going.

"In the next 5 minutes, I bet I can surprise you more than you can surprise me."

"What?"

"I'm going to surprise you."

"I don't believe you."

"Wait here."

She scrambled off the bed, down the stairs and into her car. Back at the house, she threw the buckeyes into any container she could find, and drove back there in a flash. He was half asleep when she popped his door open and she sat down softly on the edge of the bed. 

"Close your eyes."

"They are closed, I'm sleeping."

She punched him. Softly, of course. "Close them. Open your mouth."

He obediently did as he was told. She popped a buckeye into his mouth, and watched as his face lit up. He grabbed her in a bear hug and threw her on the bed, showering her in kisses and compliments. 

"I thought the bet was off?" He grinned mischievously. 

"It was. I just did it because I care." He smiled in response, and rolled her back on top of him. 

After a few more minutes, it was time for the next goodbye. The real goodbye, this time. She gathered her things, and was surprised when he got up too. He grabbed his car keys. "You don't have to, I drove here." 

"Well I can at least walk you to your car."

"It's fine. You have an exam at 8 am, get in bed."

"No, I'm going to walk you to your car."

She would have been happy with just that. They walked in silence, hand in hand, down the stairs, their arms pulling apart as she veered right to her parked car. He let their arms extend fully before pulling her back into his side, wrapping his arm around her waist. "I told you, I drove here! What are you doing?" He pulled her along with him towards his car."What--"

"Shhh."

"I--"

He clicked his key fob twice, and the back gate of his car lifted up, triggering the overhead light to shine down. 

Dogwoods.

Everywhere.

Back seat laid down, dogwoods stretching as far as the eye could see. Bathed in the overhead light, the beautiful pink petals shown brighter than any star in the sky. Branches and branches of dogwoods. There must of been hundreds of flowers on those branches, and they were beautiful and bright and light and sweet smelling and simple and grand and perfect and all hers. It was a carpet of dogwood flowers and it was for her.

"I thought the bet was over," she whispered.

He nuzzled the top of her head. "I think I won."

Somwhere between that setting sun
I'm on fire and born to run
You looked at me and I was done
Well, we're just getting started

A Letter to My Workout via GIFS

Dear Eternal Optimists:
This post is not for you.

Dear Workout Class Instructor:
No. Just no. I'm not feeling you. And no, I will not "find the burn" and "just give in to the burn and stay there. stay in the pain."

If I wanted to TORTURE MYSELF I would get some whips and chains and handcuffs for my bedroom. That's painful and cardio all at the same time, biatch.

Dear fellow workout classmates:
DO YOU SEE THE FACES YOU'RE MAKING?!?! Why do you insist on inflicting so much pain on yourself??? This is WEIRD. I want to go back to the days where we didn't have to torture ourselves to STAY IN SHAPE. When you just walked everywhere and just the activity of being alive was a workout. How weird is it that we spend an hour every other day(ish) literally TORTURING ourselves and RIPPING our muscles apart...only to go sit down for the rest of the day???? I DON'T UNDERSTAND THIS AND I DON'T WANT TO UNDERSTAND THIS.

Dear workout classes:
You should be separated not by experience levels but by bra size. All these girls who don't have to wear any form of sports bra and just prance around in their neon colored twenty-criss crossing-straps-just-for-decoration are really pissing me off.

And this? Not happening. Let me tell you what happens as soon as you bend remotely halfway over to pick up a weight or I don't know, workout...those puppies are gonna fall right out. This picture is filled with lies. 

Dear Missourah:
You try my patience like no other. I do not know what our deal is, but we are not sympatico. Every day I wake up with less and less patience. I lived in a house with 40 other girls for three years in a row and never wanted to cut a bitch run away screaming more than I do from you.

Dear Easter weekend:
You were more fun at college when we camped out in our sorority house, sun bathed on the roof, partied a little too hard, stayed up till 5 am 'watching movies,' and got to see one of our sisters welcomed into the Catholic Church to be followed by the world's greatest Catholic party of wine, appetizers and visiting priests. I miss you.

Dear Michigan:
Miss you too. Good thing we'll be reunited soon.

Dear Mackinac Island:
You've been stuck in my mind lately and I don't mind. I could use your sunshine, bicycles, boardwalks, beaches, fudge, and lakeshore anytime right about now. I think it's time I start recruiting friends to take a trip up there with me this summer....yes? Yes.

Dear spaghetti:
Still planning on making you. Except instead of noodles I'll use bacon and instead of red sauce I'll use cheese sauce.

I Am My City

The other day I was reminiscing about my city (this is a common occurrence for me. I am torn between a great love of Grand Rapids and a great love for travelling and trying the new. Some days, my love of Grand Rapids wins out.).  I started talking with a coworker about "home" and what does "home" mean. Is it ever fully possible to make another city your "home"? Or will your heart always have a tendency to draw you back to that first home, because it was there that you learned about yourself, shaped yourself and grew the most. In a way, going "home" is going back to yourself.

This led me to start thinking about how much where you grow up affects who you are. This is obvious on a continental and country level, but I challenge you to think even about the city level. Grand Rapids got in my heart and my blood and my bones and my soul and I couldn't be more blessed. Honestly. If you have to have a city that shapes who you are, count your lucky stars if it's Grand Rapids. From the city itself, I learned how to approach my life, interact with others and hold myself. Here are the ways my city and I are alike:

1. Young
While Grand Rapids has been around since the 1840s, it was only within the last 10 years that we earned our well-deserved spot of the No. 2 largest city in Michigan.

2. Religious
When you drive through the city, you will see office buildings, skyscrapers, art-deco glass buildings, hospitals, schools, clock towers...and steeples. We were founded with a church on every corner, usually one for each ethnic group that moved to Grand Rapids. Instead of destroying that part of our heritage, Grand Rapids built around it. Every building twists and turns and juts out in perfect geometry to allow these churches to continue existing. They are exquisite, and often overlooked. They are the heart beat of our city, and of our people. The city runs around them, but without them--it's people, and then the city, would suffocate.

I spy with my little eye one, two, three steeples...and this is just on one 5 second stretch of highway. I can think of at least 15 steeples off the top of my head that I saw on a regular basis driving through downtown.

3. Charitable
GR has consistently been ranked among the top 10 most philanthropic cities. We celebrate helping our own, and teach it to our children from an early age. Philanthropy is everywhere.

4. Adventurous
GR is always trying new things. New festivals, new markets, new community initiatives. We're a young city, and we use that to fuel our desire to try new things.

Lantern lighting as a city. Beautiful.

5. Growing
Like me, GR is growing. It has its hiccups, it has its moments, its debates, its wandering...but still it grows.

6. Quirky
GR is composed of a number of different "neighborhoods." East town, Heritage Hill, Downtown, Medical District, Finance District, Gaslight Village, Homeless Row, Ghetto. They're all these very distinct parts, with different people, businesses and restaurants marking them as their own. You can travel to one and get a gyro in the back of an Arabic convenience store that only sells imported Arabic foods, to a preppy, pretentious, Yacht Club neighborhood in ten minutes. There are silent lines. Distinct, but complete. Because at the end, we're all part of this great city. I think that this is similar to the way I am filled with quirks and juxtapositions. I'm smart, but funny. Love books, but also the Kardashians. Could be happy in the city, happy in the country. Introvert, extrovert. It goes on and on.

7. Unapologetic
But even with all its different neighborhoods, GR never apologizes. It never apologizes for putting homeless row behind the bankers. Or the chic bars and nightclubs right next to the churches. It never apologizes for being new and growing. It is what it is. And from that, I've learned to stand proud and be unapologetic (except when necessary, obvi) as well.

My city is vibrant, hopeful, charitable, eclectic and growing. And so am I.