Ideas

I got swagger. Do you?

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I heard someone say this yesterday: “I got swagger.” I thought to myself: “I got swagger, maybe not today, but I got swagger.” Yesterday was a strange day. I felt an array of emotions, from anger, frustration, to laughter, sass, and yes swagger.

How do we keep our swagger? I think of all the people who I have looked up to in my life. Those that have inspired me, made my jaw drop, or just had me often say: Wow. They are the people who make us think differently. A professor in college had swagger. She had a way of making you enamored with her. You wanted her opinion, craved her attention, and missed her when she was not around. She had swagger.

My niece has swagger. I have been watching kids on and off since I was nine. From all the kids I have taken care of, to the 6 week old and up children I took care of at a day care during college, to my friend’s kids, my niece has got it. Of course I am biased, how can I not be, but that kid lights up a room, makes you laugh, and has something very special about her. I mean look at this photo. (She is the blond at the back of the circle of girls that all want to dote on her.) Swagger.

My husband has swagger. I cannot handle frustrating customer service situations. I have lived in that world too long, that when I have a shitty experience I go volatile and cannot handle the fact that I get sub-par service. He handles it with poise, firmness, and patience. That man has swagger.

A friend is going through a hard time in her marriage. She is working it through in her way. She is so selfless at work and with her child. She makes us all laugh, keeps it real, and tells it like it is. She has swagger.

I tell it like it is almost always (I do have a tiny filter when really needed). I suck the life out of my day. I love people, helping them, listening, and doing what I can to be there for them. I am a bit sassy. I got swagger.

Do you?

Jeans: Wash ’em or freeze ’em

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I love learning new things. It is actually one of my favorite things. What is not to love about growing your mind with information and letting your universe grow a bit each day? Even if the new knowledge is a bit on the random side. A few days ago I learned something new about jeans. Some of you may say: Wow, how clueless you have been all these years, how could you not know about it? Yet, it is a fascinating dilemma for me. I have known folks that dry clean their jeans and others that iron their jeans… but this is different:

Freezing your jeans.

Yes. I mean it. I mentioned something to Chris the other day about fading jeans and he said: “Maybe you should freeze them.” Huh. I was a bit stunned. He said he knows someone at work that does it. How have I been on this earth for well over three decades and I have never heard of freezing your jeans? It is real. No joke. There is an entire movement around not washing, but freezing your jeans. Seriously. If you do a Google search you will find countless articles about how and why you should freeze your jeans. They are quite descriptive. Levi’s has even been promoting it.

Maybe I am old school but it kind of grosses me out. I think about all the places we sit, I think about the crotch, and I think of all the places we eat and that our jeans often absorb the smells of our surroundings. I would want to wash them just as a sort of detox from where my jeans have been. Not to mention that I wash them because after one wearing they get stretched out. A wash brings them back to the shape that I want, and while my many washing might mean the color eventually fades, what is wrong with that?

Who thought of freezing your jeans? Have you ever tried it? What is next… the microwave?

Favorite holiday tradition: coffee cake

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Holiday traditions. I am a bit of a Scrooge. My sister and dad were always so much more into the holidays, and somehow that gene did not find its way into my veins. Call me crazy, or extremely practical, but oftentimes the holidays are just another day in the grand scheme of things. I appreciate them as a day to relax, recharge, and be slow.

So, having said all that what’s your favorite holiday tradition? We both love to sleep in (who does not whenever possible). Maybe it is because we do not have kids yet, but we do not really have many/any holiday traditions. The one thing we often do is make my mom’s coffee cake. I like it, Chris likes it, and it is easy to make. It is nothing fancy, just a Betty Crocker (Picture Cookbook circa 1950) recipe that I doctor and adapt to my own liking, but something about it reminds me of my childhood. Somehow my family (and often my grandma) split a 9 x 9 pan of coffee cake (how did we ever do that!)? We would get up on Thanksgiving or Christmas morning and have it right away (before presents or anything). I have my mother’s Betty Crocker cookbook copy. The hole punched page has ripped out and the page itself is worn and splotched.

Tami’s Adapted Betty Crocker Coffee Cake Nostalgia (Circa 1950), page 82

Stir together thoroughly:
3/4 cup Sugar
1/4 cup unsalted Butter (or shortening):
Note: I only use butter and it should be soft

Stir in:
1 Egg
1/2 cup Milk

Sift together and stir in (I never sift though):
1 1/2 cup Flour
2 teaspoons Baking Powder
1/2 teaspoon Salt

Streusel Mixture:
3/4 cup Brown Sugar
2 teaspoons Cinnamon
2 tablespoons melted unsalted Butter

Set oven to 375 degrees

Spread batter in greased and floured 9″ pan. Sprinkle with desired topping. Bake until wooden pick thrust into center of cake comes out clean. Serve warm, fresh from oven.

Baker note: I go on instinct for the amount of brown sugar, butter, and cinnamon I put together. I sprinkle it on top of the batter and then cut tiny sized chunks of unsalted butter and place them randomly all over the top of the streusel. It makes for more of a crunchy, yummy topping. It is my adaptation. Also, I use the above topping, there are other options for toppings in the cookbook.

Recipe note: Be sure that your “wooden pick thrust into center of cake comes clean” (who uses the word thrust)?

What are your holiday favorites or traditions?

#holidayinspriation

It takes energy to be angry

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Yesterday was a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day. It started as I was getting dressed in the morning. I was talking to Chris in the bathroom and I proceeded to rinse my contacts with my contact cleaner, not my saline solution. I scream in absolute pain, and Chris had to help me try to get the contact out of my eye (my eye shut completely and I had to pry the contact out). Eventually I was able to get the contact out, and flush my eye, but then it closed completely again. Ugh. What a way to start the day.

This event makes me incredibly late for my first meeting. I am frustrated and cranky that selecting the wrong bottle means for a painful and late morning. I go to a few meetings, and meet a friend for lunch. As I am telling her about my morning I look down and find a bug nestled in my salad. Yes, it was in my first bite too. I am starving and I do not have much time, so I pull out the piece of lettuce move it aside and proceed to eat the rest of my salad. Over our lunch conversation we talk about the days where there is a domino effect where one aspect is off and it continues throughout the rest of our day. She says: “It takes energy to be angry.” What an ah-ha moment for me. At the moment I do not have time and space for lost moments.

After lunch we walk back to our building. It is absolutely pouring down rain. She is trying to steer me away from a puddle I do not see. Yep, just like the rest of my day (contacts, bug) I do not see a puddle that is a foot or two deep and I walk through it and there is no way out. I was all in. So frustrated and discombobulated I think: “maybe I should just go home.” I do not. I move on and go to my next meeting and the one after that and proceed to maneuver through the rest of my day, slightly grumpy, slightly frustrated. I still remember my lunch and her reminder: “It takes energy to be angry.” I have to laugh it off and let it go.

It is hard though. While the events of my day are “first world” problems, these are the days when I think: “why me” or “why do I even try?” The good news is today is a new day. It is fresh, different, and I get to try it all over again. I will be more aware about my contacts and the puddles from this crazy amount of rain we are getting. As for bugs, well I am not even sure what to say. More protein?

Listen More, Talk Less: Part Deux

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How often do you formulate what you are going to say while someone else is talking? How often do you truly listen to what the other individual is saying to you? How often do you check out, get bored, or have too many other things going on in your brain? I am definitely known to have way to much going on in my brain, to the extent that sometimes the words that come out of my mouth sound like babble and do not make sense to others. Maybe it is information overload.

We all could listen more, but we can also talk less. They go hand in hand. It makes me ask the questions: “Do you listen to get to the next part of your day, do you truly care when listening, and do you talk to talk and be heard, or because you have something to say? Sometimes I think that some people talk to fill the open space. They are uncomfortable with silence, and quiet moments, so they do what they can to fill that silence, to fill that space. However awkward it might be, for them and everyone else.

Here is a thought (not grand, or new, or cutting edge). What if you listen more? Truly and intensely listen. Ask questions. Explore if you truly understand what someone else is saying and take the focus off you. Hard? Yes. Worth it? Yes. I care about each individual I interact with and I want them to feel that care. I genuinely want to listen, and I want others to give me the same respect and focus. Is that so hard? Are we asking each other to do too much? Hell no. We just need to get rid of our brainless distractions and “be” with another. Listen, go deep, be present, and get rid of mindless chatter, pointless conversation, and focus on what really matters.

I am going to make it a focus to keep working on how I listen. Let my mind slow down from all the elements of multitasking, breathe, and be in the moment where I truly focus on the other individual and give them my time.

Will you join me?

Want to read, List More, Talk Less (Part One)?