Gifts, Part 2

Have you ever had someone take issue with your words?  Believe it or not, it's happened to me once or twice.  Shocking, I know.

The time about which I'm writing here concerns words I once wrote in this blog.  You're welcome to look them up, but for our purposes I'll be content with summing it up.  I had written something like "I shudder to think what people think of me..."  

A dear, wonderful, and loving Friend read that and wasn't about to let me get away with it.  She wasn't about to let me assign to the eyes and minds of others any ridicule of me.

And she went behind my back and asked people who know me to describe me.  And then a flick of her magic wand...

No, it wasn't as easy as that.  She carved out time from her very busy life with her very busy family at a very busy time of year, and invested that time, along with her talent and treasure, in me.  My own caretaker, my steward.

In the 12 Days of Christmas, she presented me with the fruits her labor.  Here it is:



What you're looking at is a print, a composite of words people used to describe me.  My friend tells me that the frequency with which the words were used correlates to the size of the font.  That means the words that jump out of the print are the words most often said about me.

Wow. 

I've been wanting for some time to publicly thank my Friend for everything this print stands for -- for all that went into it, and for all that it gives me on a daily basis.  When doubt or self-loathing creeps in, I grab this lifeline of love and pull myself out.

Thank you, my Friend.

Gifts

I'd like to say that I was tidying the basement this morning, but the fact is that I was doing the pre-tidy stuff: going through boxes of things I've shoved out of sight real quick! before company arrived.

Here's a picture of something I discovered.



I saw it, and I recognized it as something having to do with 50.  I asked myself, "Did someone give this to me when I turned 50?"  Since I'm only (wait, let me do the math...) 38 years old, that wasn't likely.

Then I remembered: Oh yeah!  I know what's in there:





Now don't go peein' your pants or planning to rob me: these aren't dubloons from a sunken chest.

These are 50 half-dollars.  If you took 'em to the grocery store, you could use them to purchase twenty-five dollars' worth of goodies.  These aren't hyper-valuable to the general population.

So why do I have them?  Why have I kept them, rather than spend them?

They were a gift from my sister, a way to congratulate me and commemorate my losing 50 pounds.  These coins are a symbol of her thoughtfulness, support, and love.  And my holding on to them is my holding on to her thoughtfulness, support, and love.

Uncovering my 50 half-dollars reminds me that I lost 50 pounds, have kept most of them off, and can lose the more than 50 pounds I still have to go.

Springing Back to Life

If I could put a bumper sticker on my bicycle, it'd read something like this:  "Want to stick it to the gas companies who are bleeding us dry while they feed off that blood?  Ride a bicycle whenever possible.  And always wear a helmet, even if you feel silly, because it sets a good example for little ones.  And try to make sure your bike and helmet are American-made, or at least purchased from a local bicycle shop rather than a big box store." 

This is why I don't write bumper stickers.

It's spring, and I weigh more than I did last fall (or last spring for that matter!).  I've distracted myself with reading and learning new skills and undertaking some volunteer projects and eating whatever, wherever, whenever.

The good news is that I have a 3-legged dog who needs exercise, and a bike which is way less stinky and way more fun than a car.  So at least I've been propelling myself once in a while.  But I haven't *sigh* exercised (dripping with "Do I have to?"). 

If it weren't for Dear Laura tapping me on the shoulder today, I might have continued fattening myself up while spreading myself too thin.

If this blog weren't named after the contest from which it originated, it'd be called something like "Balancing Karin."  That's what I need to work on.  Balance.  It keeps me up and going on my bike, it keeps my three-legged dog from tipping over, and it's the key to me being healthy in mind, body, and spirit.