Dancing Down the Moon

Ten Things I Love, Birthday Edition

Well, here we are again: at 7am Thursday morning, I’ll officially be 32 years old.

To quote every movie Keanu Reeves has ever made:  Whoa.

I’m currently taking a very brief vacation—well, days off from work.  I’m not sure if it really counts as a vacation if you don’t leave town and don’t have any real plans except “not be at work.”  (You’ll never catch me using the word “staycation,” either, except just now.)

At the moment, in fact, I’m at one of my newfound haunts, the Borders café; it’s right across the road from my home, has okay coffee beverages, and most importantly, has free wifi.  That’s right: thanks to Shakti, my new Macbook, I have officially joined the ranks of Those Coffeehouse Mac People.  I’m even working on a novel.  All I need is a messenger bag and I’ll have the Hipster Trifecta.

Oh, wait.  I have a messenger bag.

As you might expect, my impending birthday has brought forth another round of Sylvan Doth Love a Bit of Angst, but I’m happy to say I’m getting over this bout of introspective hand-wringing and am honestly looking forward both to my birthday weekend and to the next year.

Incidentally, Thursday night is my monthly DJ gig at Ecstatic Dance for Women here in Austin at NiaSpace; come help me get my birthday groove on, and I’ll…well, I won’t give you a prize, because I’m cheap and greedy, but I’ll be really glad to see you.

There being no real point to this post, I give you a list of Ten Things I Love right here and now, on the eve of my 32nd birthday, 2009.

1 ~ I love Scrivener, a Mac program designed to help writers organize large projects like novels and screenplays.  It lets you keep your chapters, scenes, research, and notes all together, and you can look at them in outline format or as notes on a virtual corkboard, possibly the neatest thing ever.  Here’s a screenshot.  It’s not a free program, although the 30 day trial is free, but it’s worth every penny for the download.

2 ~ I love birthday parties.  Sure, the presents are great, and who doesn’t love cake, but the best part is having people I love around me and getting wasted celebrating with them.  Plus, presents! And cake!

3 ~ Have I mentioned how much I love my new Macbook?  Yes?  Okay, well, I do.  I love the magnetic power cord connector, and I love Snow Leopard, and I love Time Machine, and the gesture-enabled track pad where I can resize pictures by pinching my fingers together.  I also love that the computer came with two of those Apple decals for my car, so now I can wear my overzealous Mac geekdom with pride.

4 ~ I also love Fishdom, possibly the most pointless game on the planet next to Tetris.  You make matches and earn money to design an aquarium, and they have seahorses! And puffer fish! It’s addictive and mindless and actually helps me clear my head when I’ve got too much brain going on. 

5 ~ I love that Isa and Terry’s new cookbook Vegan Cookies Take Over Your Cookie Jar has a recipe for Fruity Oaty Bars, describing them as “...tightly packed with energy like a flying fist!...These bars will keep you jazzed while ridding the universe of cannibalistic interstellar barbarian hordes.”  They’re great, too; I made a batch for our recent trip to the Texas Renaissance Festival, and they’re not very sweet, but deeply satisfying and chock full of protein, good fats, and fruity oaty goodness.

6 ~  I love Regretsy.com.

7 ~ I love my new Crumpler Luncheon bag, although we’re having some adjustment pains.  It’s adorably green (I sometimes refer to it as Kermit the Bag), and the laptop compartment snuggles Shakti perfectly, but I’m having to figure out where to keep things and how to manage all that damn Velcro.  Still, I’m confident we’ll make it work.  Bonus points:  I got her for less than half of retail price thanks to some strategic Googling.

8 ~ I love funky socks.  Sockdreams.com is one of my new favorite shopping grounds.  My only problem is that I can’t wear most knee socks, because my calves are like oak saplings, not twigs.  Still, I’ve found quite a few fun pairs, and have started a Flickr set for my various fun socks, because clearly I don’t have enough to occupy me.

9 ~ I love frosting.  I look forward to sticking my face in some this weekend.

10 ~ I love these jeans I’m wearing.  Lane Bryant has become too expensive (and too…fashionable, ew) for my blood, but I found these jeans on clearance and they rock.  Faded, flare-legged, with seams down the front, they’re comfortable and flattering and make me feel less like a dowdy soccer mom.  (Despite my Hipster Trifecta I don’t really have a very hip wardrobe.)

Ten Things I Love, Early Fall Edition

1 - I love that it's sort of Fall!  Summer here in Texas has been so brutal that even a temperature drop to 89 degrees feels Arctic.  The rains have come, ushering with them a subtle but vivifying change in the air.  By the time September is over we may even need...long sleeves!  (Okay, maybe 3/4 sleeves.  But still.)

2 - I love that it's almost October, for a number of reasons, not the least of which is that it's almost time for Vegan MoFo.  I participated in the Vegan Month of Food created by cookbook maven Isa Chandra Moskowitz, and even as an unofficial blogger I had a lot of fun.  Last year all the posts were on my other blog, Stumbling Towards Ahimsa, but of course this year since I merged that blog into DDtM I'll be posting here.  There'll be recipes, anecdotes, recommendations, cookbook reviews...anything and everything I can think to write about regarding food of the veg variety.  Yay!  (You can read last year's posts by clicking the Vegan MoFo tag.)

3 - I love Starbucks' Pumpkin Spice Latte.   In fact I love that everything's coming up pumpkin in honor of Autumn.  The grocery stores are carrying pumpkin empanadas, coffee shops have pumpkin bread, pumpkins are appearing in produce aisles already. 

4 - Two words:  Halloween candy.

5 - I love that the days are shorter.  I am not a creature of sunlight, and Summer's late evenings bother me intensely.  To me, it should get dark at 7pm.  I was an Autumn baby, which may explain it--we Scorpios do love our shadows.  Autumn is just an overall easier time of year for me; I have more energy, I'm more spiritually focused, and I find inspiration around every corner. 

6 - I love that all my TV shows are coming back on this month.  How do we survive the Summer?  It's too hot to go outside and everything's in reruns!  But now I have Supernatural, Dollhouse, Bones, and even the new teen angst based on my junior high literature love, The Vampire Diaries, which promises to be a guilty pleasure.  (Damon = yum)  (Dean/Castiel = yummier)

7 - I love that as of the end of October my Saturn Return will be officially over with.  I'm sure that on November 1 life will go POOF! and suddenly become easy and chock full of clarity.  *snort*  Still, life since 30 has been an adventure in "it's been lovely, but I have to scream now," but I've been able to feel the lightening of Saturn's downward/inward pull the last few months.  It's a gradual shift like the unfolding of Fall--a lot of things that seemed impossible two years ago no longer feel out of reach, and I think that I've managed to work through quite a bit of mental and emotional sludge, the result of which is that I'm basically the same snarky, occasionally emo, frequently awesome, bitchy, lunatic gal I always have been but now I'm pretty much okay with that.

8 -  I love how busy I get in the Autumn.  There are always places to go, birthdays to celebrate, new things to try.  It's a breathless slide from mid-September through the end of the year.

9 - I love my kitty.  I got him exactly a year ago, and while he's a huge pain in the butt, he's also loving and sweet and hilarious and purrs like a boat motor.  Between Owen and Stella I feel surrounded by fuzzy lovin' and it makes my home feel like a home.  I still miss Cosmo sometimes--seeing pictures of him still breaks my heart--but my two fuzzbutts have nuzzled happily into the lap of my life and I hope they're with me for a long time.

10 - I don't care what's going on in Washington, or what his track record is at this point; I don't care what's gotten done and what hasn't.  I love that I still get a thrill every time I hear the phrase "President Obama."

10 Things I Love, Early June Edition

1 ~ My Nia anklet, which I acquired from this maker on Etsy; it has a tiny bare foot charm, a butterfly, stars, and green and brown beads. 

2 ~ My new yoga mat and its matching water bottle.  I'm thinking of eventually getting another mat and using this one as a runner in my kitchen.  *laugh*

3 ~ The logo I designed for my bake sale goodies, Ahimsa Treats—I’m considering getting it as a small tattoo some time in the future.  Long story.

4 ~ The new live Broadway DVD of Rent, which is way better than the movie and almost better than seeing it live, which I also did (for the second time) on May 14th with my BFF.  The new DVD was filmed on the final night of the show’s Broadway run, and it's fabulous.

5 ~ This recent writing spree I've been on.  "What writing spree?" you may rightly ask, as I haven't been updating my blogs much at all, but I believe last 10 Things list I mentioned the novel I’m writing.  Well, I'm about halfway through it now, and I'm still in love with it.  Not only am I enjoying the writing itself, I feel...dare I say...passionate about the story, the characters, and the world they inhabit.  I've tried in vain for ten years to get a novel started, but I think it was just a matter of waiting for the right story at the right moment.  So much in life depends on good timing, doesn't it?

6 ~ I love that I've gotten over my trouselastiphobia (fear of stretchy pants).  As a young fat girl, I developed a pure and utter loathing for what I deemed "fat lady pants," those knit pants in all the colors of the rainbow (nowadays they come in Capri length) over which we were encouraged to wear a shirt with an anchor, a splash of roses, or a birdhouse on it.  No! I decreed.  It's jeans for me or nothing! And for years, I've worn jeans every day.  Luckily my job has practically no dress code, so this works.  But since I've been dancing more and doing Nia, I've come to understand the value of comfortable, flowy dance clothes.  I had S1ren make me a pair of dancy pants with big flared slit legs, and they've been one of my favorite garments for months.  I've even started wearing them around town when I want to feel more...like my dancer self.  I want my dancer self to be my everyday self.  This means I'm gonna need more pants.

7 ~  The music I’ve been listening to lately:  Bombay Dub Orchestra, Desert Dwellers, Chicane, Brandi Carlile, Lizz Wright, and the new Vienna Teng CD Inland Territory.

8 ~ Martha Beck.  I’m planning to do a full length review of her book Steering by Starlight soon, but for now suffice it to say that her work has changed my internal life drastically since I read Finding Your Own North Star.  As much as I hate to admit that one of Oprah’s Dial-an-Experts is made of pure awesome, well, it’s true. 

9 ~ I love that I have a long-term goal for the year.  I’m working on saving up money to attend the Nia White Belt Intensive here in Austin at the end of October; I’m pretty far from my $1600 goal, but I have faith that one way or another I’ll find a way to afford it.  I’m thinking of it as an initiation that I have to work toward.  For most of my “adult” life I’ve had trouble thinking of the future in any concrete way without panicking.  I lived purely for instant gratification because I didn’t think I was going to make it long enough to reach any sort of long-term goals.  Now I’m moving into my 43Things era and thinking of life as more than just getting through the next day. 

10 ~ My kitties.  Even though I routinely want to pitch Owen off the roof.  My fuzzbutts are much, much better roomies than people could be.  Well, except for the shedding.  And the litter box smell.  And Owen knocking books off the shelf into his water bowl.  But still—love the weemews.

Ten Things I Love, 42nd Edition

1 ~ I love the novel I'm writing.  Well...to say "writing" is a bit of an exaggeration; I've got three chapters written and am stuck.  However, it's a story I've been wanting to yank from the gaping maw of fandom and turn into an original novel for more than ten years, and I'm enjoying the feeling of slipping back into the world I created and remodeling it after a decade of experience has given my fiction a much more mature, toothier feel.

2 ~ I love my kitchen.  This past week I gave it a low-budget makeover, and I'm so happy with the results that sometimes I just stand there and stare at it.  It started with a set of white Ikea dishes, a can of green paint, and a screwdriver.  Lord knows I needed something to rekindle my zeal for cooking, and I do believe it worked; not to mention, it inspired me to really clean the rest of the house, brushing down cobwebs and giving away old belongings to people who could use them and love them and call them George.  Here, if you're curious, is the before and after.  (I may do a longer post about it on Stumbling Towards Ahimsa, with more detail.)

3 ~ In the same vein, I love my salt cellar, the same model used by Alton Brown on Good Eats.  It was the crowning piece I bought for the kitchen, and opening it makes me smile. Such a silly small thing, but it makes me feel like a grown-up cook.

4 ~ I love Hannah Kaminsky's recipe for Chai Spice Cheesecake, from her book My Sweet Vegan.  I'd never made a vegan cheesecake before, and was brave enough to try it out on my Witchy ladies.  Good gracious, it was fabulous!  If that cheesecake were a man I would get naked and do dirty, dirty things to it.  I still might.

5 ~ I love the Temperance Brennan mysteries by Kathy Reichs.  I'm a longtime fan of the Fox show Bones, but this last season has really ticked me off in a lot of ways, and it was great to find the source of the characters (even though they're nothing alike) and read something that took me back to when the show was an intelligent, character-driven drama with dark humor and believable science (mostly).  The novels are somewhat formulaic, but they're fun and a quick read, and not an insult to intelligence the way so much popular fiction is these days.

6 ~ I love smoothies.  Those who've bought my ebook Bowl, Book, and Spoon have my smoothie "recipe," such as it is.  I've been making them for breakfast almost every morning with a banana, frozen strawberries, vanilla soy milk, soy protein powder, and a bit of ground flaxseed, and they're delicious and stay with me all morning.  Yum yum.

7 ~ I love Billy Joel's "River of Dreams."  Something about that song always makes me bouncy on the inside.

8 ~ I love the new statue from Bell Pine Art Farm, Radiant Health, which now occupies a prominent place on my altar.

9 ~ I love when I get random good memories of my grandparents, like this evening, while I was snapping the tips off a pound of fresh green beans to steam for dinner.  I used to sit and do the same thing with both of my grandmothers, and for a moment it felt as if they were with me, my Grandma in her rocker on the porch, my Mamaw at the kitchen table. I loved both of those women fiercely and wish I'd told them so more often before they passed.  I should make a point of telling my mom more often, too--she's still here.

10 ~ I love that there are people who continue to support this blog even though I don't post here nearly often enough; those donations, and the emails I receive (even though I suck at replying, so please don't feel slighted) have kept me going through some seriously rough times, and I appreciate every thought, every dollar, and every iota of energy.  

This week, in fact, marks a year since my beloved Cosmo kitty had to be euthanized, and it was during that time that my readers here showed me what kind and compassionate people they are; their donations ensured that I could make the best decision for Cosmo's welfare with respect to his suffering rather than my finances.  I can't tell you all how much that meant to me, and still does.  I went a bit insane after all of that, and I'm still trying to fully come out of it, but knowing that the universe--and humanity--was filled with such generosity was more helpful than anyone can know.  My most humble gratitude to you all.

Ten Things I Love, Convalescent Edition

1 ~ I love having a DeviantArt account, because now I'm thinking of new bits of art to try--and I already created a new one, the Mandala on the front page, this week.  Anything I can do to get my creative energy flowing positively is welcome.

2 ~ I love curling up in the Death Star with blankets and kitties and the pillows off my bed and spending long hours watching season 3 of Bones or season 2 of Torchwood on DVD.  A hot beverage, sometimes a book, a bit of snack, and you have Sylvan's Post Raging Bacterial Sinusitis Convalescent Ward. 

3 ~ I love soup.  I've been living off Amy's Kitchen's canned varieties, most of which are vegan, and a handful of Progresso canned types that are also veg, like their Lentil soup.  Yes, I can make my own soup, and soup is insanely easy to make, but I haven't had the energy to deal with actual food prep.  Right now I'm enjoying anything that reminds me of chicken noodle, the go-to soup in most Southern families for colds and flu.  Potato soup ranks high on that list too. 

4 ~ I loved the movie Wanted with Angelina Jolie and Morgan Freeman.  It was a cross between Fight Club and the Matrix, and I didn't figure out the ending beforehand, which is rare for me.  And the main character was just a badass all around.  (Did you see those pecs?)  I didn't like the whole exploding rat thing, or the shooting of dead pig corpses, but it didn't horrify me as much as it might have, mostly because it was pretty obvious the rats were CGI.  I'm not a huge Jolie fan--I honestly don't get the attraction, the woman is a sack of antlers with big lips, but back when she used to eat, she was much more attractive to me.  Still, watching her as the assassin Fox was rather sexy indeed. 

5 ~ I love my Northern Nights flannel bedsheets.  They're warm, but lightweight, and keep me toasty and soft all through the winter.

6 ~ I love waking up pinned to the bed by two cats who've velcroed themselves to my legs to keep warm.

7 ~ I love my two silly winter hats--one crocheted by S1ren, black with kitty ears; the other floppy and shaped like Maggie Simpson's head, made by Jewel.  I'm becoming qute a closet fan of silly winter hats.

8 ~ I love having health insurance.  I realize what a huge blessing that is when so many people can't afford it.  But though coming up with the money to go to the doctor and get my infection taken care of was stressful, at least it was a lot less with my insurance.  Generic drugs, hallelujah.  This sinus infection has cost me about $100 if you total up doc visits, prescriptions, OTC drugs, and soup.  But without the insurance it would have been much much worse.

9 ~ I love that I'm finally having small breakthroughs that I hope will add up to some real changes in the next Turning.  I'll have more to say about that later, both here and on Stumbling Towards Ahimsa. 

10 ~ I love Broccoli Kitten.

I Tried to be Patient, but it Took too Long!

When I'm expecting visitors to my home, I fidget.  The last hour before they're supposed to arrive I spend tidying up things that are already tidy, and doing piddly things like lighting incense and putting just the right music on the stereo.  I try to settle down and read a book or work a crossword puzzle, or occupy myself writing, but I tend to wander from room to room as the minutes tick by, not sure what to do with myself. 

God help me if they're late.  Then I sit and stare at the clock and keep shifting positions in the chair:  legs to the left, legs to the right, legs crossed, curled up in a ball, knees bent, feet on the coffee table...argh!  I finish one crossword and start another, or end up reading the same lines of a book over and over.

That anticipatory restlessness essentially describes how my entire life has felt lately.  I know something is about to arrive, and I am tired of waiting.  The question has evolved from "what the hell is going on with my life?" to "what can I do to get this thing moving?"  I don't believe in sitting back and letting life happen, even though that's basically what I've done since moving out of my parents' house at 18.  I keep thinking that the universe is waiting for me to do something, or that we're waiting for each other--that the catalyst is my doing and the rest will follow. 

Unfortunately I have no idea what that catalyst is, and hints are not something the gods seem all that interested in providing.

It's like when you feel a sneeze building, and building, and you're really looking forward to a good sneeze, but...no.  No sneeze.  Not yet.  Just an itchy nose. 

Actually a better description would be four hours of sex with no orgasm.  Almost, almost, almost...damn it.  Someone's fingers get tired or your batteries wear out or the bed collapses or the police arrive, and you end up screaming with frustration rather than abandon.  I'm at the place about five minutes before that happens.

Eight centimeters dilated.  Bottom of the ninth with bases loaded and the pitcher gets a cramp.  Midway through the seventh Harry Potter book--how much longer is this damn story going to go on?  Stuck right between the inhalation and the exhalation.

I don't know what I'm expecting, and I don't know what I'm supposed to be doing, and it's maddening.  August, the signs seem to say.  August is when things start to change, for real this time.  Late summer.  Am I sure?  No.  I have lost the ability to be sure of anything.  But I have, as I've said, hope--hope in God, and hope in my own intuition. 

Nevertheless I am very bad at waiting. You should see me in line at the DMV sometime.

It occurs to me that I should perhaps be concerned whether the Oncoming Storm is a good thing, a bad thing, or a Time Lord (gods, the BBC has eaten my soul).  At this point, however, I have decided to simply have faith, or perhaps extremely vehement hope, that the universe has something in store for me that will floor me with its pure awesomeness, or at least be the kind of pain that I know will count for something in the end, like a tattoo.

In the meantime, here are ten things I love which are helping keep me sane in this liminal, fox-like, cosmically anorgasmic time:

1 ~ Alanis Morissette's new CD Flavors of Entanglement.

2 ~ The fact that I can now get a decaf soy milk mocha Frappuccino.

3 ~ Hannah Kaminsky's blog, Bittersweet, and her new cookbook My Sweet Vegan.

4 ~ Joshua Bell's Romance of the Violin.

5 ~ Fresh cherries and raspberries.

6 ~ My slick-as-hell new Apple keyboard here at work.

7 ~ As alluded to above, I've become quite the fangirl of the Doctor Who universe (Ninth and Tenth Doctor, and let's not forget Torchwood, YUM).  Thank the gods for Netflix, which really should qualify as #8, but I want to leave room for:

8 ~ Feeling inspired to write, even if it's not a book (or a spirituality blog, for that matter)--I haven't enjoyed writing fiction the way I am right now in years.  No pressure, no deadlines, just me having a good time with my weirdo plotlines and my pornographic interludes, and having people email desperately wanting more.  Good for both the muse and the ego. 

9 ~ My artwork adorns several people's bodies, most recently the aforementioned Oldest Friend who came to visit; she asked me to design her first tattoo, and it turned out lovely, both visually and symbolically.  It was a simple sort of thing but I was really pretty proud of it, another sign of progress on my part, as most of my life I've been unable to look at anything I create without ripping it apart with self-criticism.

10 ~ The fact that Stephanie Law's Shadowscapes Tarot is nearly complete.  Thus far my favorite cards are Death, the Page of Wands, the three Queens, and the 8 of Pentacles.

Ten Things I Love - Post-Bad-Week Edition

I know I've been scarce this week--as you can imagine I'm pretty worn out, although Cosmo is healing up and behaving pretty much like his old self.  (Meaning bitchy, grouchy, and demanding, just like his Person.)  We're almost done with the last round of antibiotics, much to our relief; I've about had it with having to chase him out from under the bed with my Hitachi Magic Wand.  (It scares him.  I might think it threatens his masculinity in some archaic way, but really, what has he got to threaten?  He's got no balls.)  Overall it's been a genuinely crappy two weeks. 

At any rate, since I haven't had much time this week to write, I give you a list of things that have been keeping me reasonably sane lately, mostly in the realm of mindless entertainment.  More spiritually juicy posting will resume shortly.

1 ~ I love that Geoffery Chaucer Hath a Blog. 

2 ~ I love Annie Lennox, in particular her albums Bare and Songs of Mass Destruction.

3 ~ I love that Garfield is much funnier without Garfield.

4 ~ I love that Juno will be out on DVD in two weeks.

5 ~ I love Alton Brown.  I want to have his geeky babies.  I've learned more from watching Good Eats than I learned in culinary school. 

6 ~ I love that there's a sequel to Hellboy coming out in July.  Guillermo del Toro is a freaking genius...although I wonder what kind of scary landscapes exist in a mind that can invent terrifying monsters like the hand-eye demon from Pan's Labyrinth. 

7 ~ I love Chipotle's veggie burrito bowl.

8 ~ I love that doing lots of Nia and ecstatic dance is having a noticeable effect on my body.  Things are shifting around.  I'm becoming more flexible, which is saying something, and my legs are getting stronger.  The only thing I have to watch out for is my knees; the left one has been injured a number of times, so it's weak and prone to being yanked out of shape.  However, Nia teaches you to become aware of the feelings in your body, to listen to tightness and discomfort and work at a level that challenges you without stress or pain.  I'm learning how to sit back into my hips instead of leaning forward over my knees, and learning what it feels like to stretch the joint without going too far.  I've never had this level of body awareness before, and I think it's fantastic.

9 ~ I love the agonizing sexual tension in television shows like Bones.  I love to yell at the screen, "Kiss him, dammit!  Throw him down on the autopsy table and ride him like Seabiscuit!  AUGH!!!" 

10 ~ I love raspberry sorbet, it turns out, which is weird, because up until about a month ago I hated all things raspberry.  Funny how your tastes change as you age.  Next thing you know I'll be eating avocados.  *shudder*

Enjoy your weekend.  I hope the weather where you are is more inspiring than what we've had here this week.

Ten Things I Love - Body Sacred Edition

1 - I love the color of my eyes.  Sometimes they're a sort of sea-grey, sometimes almost brilliantly blue.  They have been described as "mischievous" and "mysterious," which pleases me.  I also have dark lashes, so I don't have to wear mascara--good thing, too, as I am apparently allergic to it and most if it is made of dead bats and gay baby whales and other horrifying things.  (Actually I hardly ever wear makeup at all, thanks to #7.)

2 - I love my feet.  They're cute, and small, and I have nicely-formed toes that I always keep painted some form of dark red or purple.  Even the blisters and calluses forming on the soles are good to me, for they mean I've been dancing and am toughening up.  When I was a kid I ran barefoot on hot asphalt all summer long, so I had very tough feet.  I still go barefoot in places I probably shouldn't, like my apartment parking lot, but my feet enjoy it.  My feet have carried me throughout my life and hopefully will continue to, bad ankles and fat girl knees and all.  As they say in Nia, your feet are "the hands that touch the Earth."

3 - I love my shoulders.  They're strong and have a graceful line, especially when I'm standing up straight and proud (which thrusts my breasts forward, so it's a win-win situation, really).

4 - I love the overall shape of my body.  I have an hourglass figure with about four extra hours poured into it (I have time on my ass), but regardless of size I like having a defined waist and serious curves.  My torso is short and my legs are comparatively long, so long skirts with slits look outrageously good on me.

5 - I love how flexible I am.  It always surprises people that I can bend myself in so many interesting shapes despite the tummy and thighs in the way.  I've always been flexible; I was a gymnast as a child, and actually won ribbons and such on the balance beam.  Then someone told me I was too fat to ever be a real gymnast, and I took it to heart, unfortunately, and quit.  It took me decades to regain my love for movement--this time on my own terms.

6 - I love my hands.  They do my work, and the work of the Goddess and God, in this lifetime; they're also small and cute like my feet.  The only problem I have with them is that I have Essential Tremor so they shake almost constantly, which makes it very hard for me to paint in detail or handwrite for long periods of time.  When I'm really tired I look like a traveling earthquake.  They do so many other things, though, that I don't mind so much.  I even like the v-shaped scar on my left ring finger from a kitchen shear incident when I was 18. 

7 - I love my skin.  I was blessed with remarkably clear, porcelain skin that has miraculously few blemishes and only develops mild acne right before I bleed.  I freckle like a redheaded stepchild if I'm out in the sun, but I try not to do that, as I like being pale and creamy like the flesh of a cherimoya.* 

8 - I'm not as fond of my internal organs, to be honest--my digestive system is afflicted with IBS and I have a sinus arrhythmia that makes life a bit hairy sometimes--but I must say I love how my body is able to adapt to whatever insanity I put her through.  She'll put up with crap food and no sleep for a while, then start sending out reminder notices that I need to get my accounts balanced or there will be hell to pay.  When I take better care of myself, she responds with praise and rewards galore.  People talk as if the mind is smarter than the body, but I think the body has its own wisdom, a wisdom that reaches back much farther than the development of the human intellect.  If I give my body half a chance, she'll step up to any challenge.

9 - I love my hair, though it drives me crazy.  I have a lot, lot, lot of hair.  Always have.  The older I get the more I appreciate it.  Several stylists have gotten panicky when they stuck their hands in it, and the usual line is "Damn, girl, you have a lot of hair!" Even though I've dyed it every color you can imagine (I have no real memory of my natural color except that it's mousy and uninteresting), it's still healthy and soft.  We argue constantly about its refusal to pick a direction and that one spot that tries to curl no matter what, but overall, Iove my hair. 

10 - I love my tattoos.  I want more.  Lots more.  At present I have three:  a butterfly on my right shoulder blade, a spider on my left shoulder blade, and a snake on my left upper arm.  I'm a one-woman zoo over here.  I'm thinking of getting tattoos to celebrate dance on my feet, and possibly "ahimsa" on my right arm with a lotus or other symbol, but those designs are all in development and I'm not in any particular hurry.  I love that I deliberately took on the pain in order to seek beauty.  A friend of mine often says, "make the pain count."  As with skin, so with life, I pray.

All right, it's your turn.  Go forth and make a list of ten things you love about your body, inside or out.  If you love the little mole on your elbow that's shaped like Missouri, or the way your eyes crinkle, or your mastectomy scars, or your right pinkie finger, say so.  We spend too much time talking about what is wrong with our bodies, what we hate, what we wish we could change--let's talk about things we love.  Your body will thank you for it.

* - You must try a cherimoya, also known as a "custard apple," sometime if you find one and can afford it.

Ten Small Things I Love for No Big Reason, 4th Edition

1 – Dagoba’s Organic Hot Chocolate mix.  Vegan, dark, and just sweet enough when heated with vanilla soy or almond milk.  Warm, sexy comfort in a mug—not to mention it’s also available in their famous Xocolatl flavor with chiles and cinnamon!

2 – My new tattoo.  I posted a picture a few entries ago.  I loved it even as I was having it done, but now that it’s mostly healed I love it even more!  I designed a snake in black and red with spiral markings in honor of the Dark Goddess as well as the transformative power of Fire.  It covers almost my entire left bicep.  When I’m in the kitchen chopping vegetables in a tank top with a bandana on my head and my tattoo showing, I feel tough as nails and powerful as all get out.  Every woman should have a big tattoo.

3 – Catnip.  Any legal, natural, healthy substance that makes my cat do the backstroke across the living room floor is more than all right with me.

4 – Victoria Moran’s new book Fat, Broke, and Lonely No More.  Pretty much the opposite of what it sounds like, this book is a spiritual guide to letting to of  unhealthy habits and self-image and embracing a more positive outlook on health, money, and relationships. 

5 – Irises.  Don’t bring me roses; bring me deep purple irises, and I’m yours.*

6 – My new Laptop Lunch!  It was an extremely thoughtful and unexpected birthday gift from my friend Nadia.

 
7 – Kiss My Face Chinese Botanical Moisturizer.  Lightly scented, gentle on the skin, and cruelty free, this lotion has been a lifesaver for the aforementioned Big Tattoo.  My artist told me to use something unscented, but the unscented lotion I had made me itch (I found out later it has lanolin in it, which, EW, and also tends to irritate me).  The Kiss My Face lotion is soothing and lightweight, and the scent seems to loosen some of the knots I habitually carry in my nerves.

8 – Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab’s Blood Amber perfume oil.

9 – Chococat.

10 – Two Lumps, especially these three strips.

* - Some restrictions apply.

Ten Small Things I Love for No Big Reason, 3rd Edition

1 ~ I love, love, love the Six of Water from Joanna Powell Colbert's Gaian Tarot deck.

2 ~ I love "500 Miles" by The Proclaimers.

3 ~ I love the Harry Potter Quote Conjurer from The Leaky Cauldron. 

4 ~ I love Pilot P-500 Extra Fine black pens.

5 ~ I love Dagoba chocolate, especially the Xocolatl and Mint bars.

6 ~ I love beagles.

7 ~ I love the memory of sitting by my father in the pharmacy, on a high stool, using one of his pill counters to count Skittles into a prescription bottle while he counted actual pills. It was there, behind the huge window overlooking Wal Mart, that I learned how to spell things like "acetylsalicylic acid," which would make me look both precocious and pretentious in second grade.

8 ~ I love my two stuffed frogs, Rupert (who lives on my monitor at work) and Neville (who lives in my car).  They both have beanie feet and winsome expressions.

9 ~ I love the word "frangipani," particularly in Tori Amos's song "Datura," which is another thing I love. 

10 ~ Go ahead and scoff if you must, but I love the movie Practical Magic.