To do or not to do. That is the question.

When chaos characterizes me and I find myself endlessly scribbling away mile-long to-do lists, I have the overwhelming temptation to rebel by doing NOTHING. It's fool proof. I get paralyzed by options, requirements, assignments, expectations.... Here are somethings that I should be doing:

-packing for a Labor Day weekend away (I'm with Kevin McAllister on this one. "You mean I have to pack my own suitcase?")

-planning for the next couple of events coming up at work

-transcribing two 3o min (+) long interviews. (bleh)

- catching up on emails and reading the bajillion entries on my Google Reader

-cleaning my room

- organizing my life

Instead, I'm:

-reading home decor blogs

-craiglisting

-making dinner plans

Instead, I'm doing this. Gloria Steinem once said, "Writing is the only thing that when I do it, I don't feel like I should be doing something else." Amen, sister. Though the world and its demands awaits me on the other side of my final punctuation mark, I chose to lose myself in this now.

Creative Musing

I've been poking around ALL day on artists websites, lusting afer their creativity and wishing that I had an outlet for my own. Quite serendipitiously, I was offered the chance to design some filler pages for a special holiday section we are doing at work. While I don't know if my ideas will actually be used, I had a big ole time fiddling around on my way-ghetto version of Photoshop today. The above is one of my creations. Double clicking my way into an afternoon of timeless bliss, I spent hours lost translating my visions into tangible realities.

Signed, Sealed, Delivered

Your very lives are a letter that anyone can read by just looking at you. Christ himself wrote it—not with ink, but with God's living Spirit; not chiseled into stone, but carved into human lives—and we publish it. 2 Corinthians 3:3 (the msg)

I'm in love with thinking about the verse above. The Author of All has taken pains to masterfully, beautifully pen out my existence with His Spirit. I am an expression of His own hand.

Put into practice what you learned from me, what you heard and saw and realized. Do that, and God, who makes everything work together, will work you into his most excellent harmonies. Philippians 4:9 (the msg)

Not only does he care enough to write me out a life, he writes me into a story that involves others. He winds my little life in between hundreds, thousands of others. Some will leave their indellible marks on my thoughts; some will pass me by unnoticed. I am a collection of the ones that have stayed long enough to mean something to me. My music collection is a sum of my memories and those that influenced my tastes. My humor is an oratory scrapbook of the friends that have shared laughs with me in different cities, states and countries. My wardrobe is a mix of personalities, both mine and those of my fashion icons. I am the result of those that have meant something to me. I am a letter, transcribed first by Christ and fingerprinted with the lives of my friends, my heroes, my worst enemies.

Snap Happy

Old schoolhouse in Smithville, TN

My friend Elaine calls it "peaceful decay" when barns like the two pictured above fade and dilapidate from unuse and neglect. I call it beautiful. For some reason, I've always been unreasonably attracted to these idyllic crumbling remnants. They're untouched, left alone to communicate their past. I'm led time and time again to capture their roadside statements. I will forever regret my failure to photograph the lean-to on the corner of Buice and Old Alabama roads near my childhood home. For years, I drove past it, the sun setting behind it's worn-wood walls. It is a picture I will have to preserve in my memory, for I wasn't able to get there with my lens before it was bulldozed to make way for the un-neccessary, over-priced, over-sized, too-close homes that now sit on it's foundation. Why are we obsessed with ripping down memories so that we can replace them with shiny, clean-lined newness? There is untold beauty in the used, the formerly-loved.

Your Box

I went to hear Alabama's 7th Distric U.S. Congressman, Artur Davis, speak at a luncheon this week. He spoke, and the room of hundreds fell silent. His challenge was to each person to think outside of his/her box. We may or may not be directly influenced by the problems of this city, but we are charged with caring for the wellbeing of those less privileged who ARE. The Birmingham school system has problems. Your kids aren't students in it? You don't have kids? Step outside of your box. If you have the ability to affect change, vote for those who can't.

Dolce

Calories aside, I love cupcakes. I love them. They're cute, diminutive versions of the mothership cake. They're just the right amount of sweet. The following is an ode...

Schmear me with sweet

Oh, cupcake of mine

I'd rather be messy

From your flavor divine

A crumby display

left on fingertips

A sugary smile

You paint on my lips

Sweet Haven

My new street! On which sits my new house! In which live my new friends and I! It's a glorious, glorious thing, about which I can't help but exclaim in glee! Check out a few of pictures below. They are of my favorite spots and details of this most precious gift of a house. (I think you can click on them to access my flickr account where they are all published. Until I'm able to post them all here, please forgive my technological ineptness. )

Casa Mia

IMG_1258, originally uploaded by corybo.

Isn't it grand?

Big girl bed!

IMG_1248, originally uploaded by corybo.

Love-it-seat

IMG_1236, originally uploaded by corybo.

My favorite spot in the house

With a view of this...

IMG_1235, originally uploaded by corybo.

...my wall-o-art, a work in progress

The Glad Game

I realize that I've been dwelling on the glum here lately. I've had a change of heart. I'm forcing my chin up,and I'm joining Pollyanna in playing The Glad Game. I really do have a lot to be glad about. For example:

1. I just moved into the most extraordinary historic home in a lovely-beyond-lovely part of town. I live with three other precious girls in whom I have highs hope to find dear friends.

2. My walk score is 68 out of 100, meaning that I can walk to the grocery store, the weekend farmer's market, the pharmacy. AND, that trusty website didn't even pick up on the fact that I can walk to my friends' house in just five short minutes. If you ask me, that'd boost my score by at least ten points.

3. I have restored hope that church can be and is both inside and outside of four walls.
4. I have been blessed with incredible, sit-on-the-couch-and-do-nothing friends that will still be friends, no matter what distance separates us.
5. I have restored confidence that to be slightly good at lots of different things is just fine. In fact, it's great.
6. It's sunny and hot. Sweating profusely is nearly enjoyable when followed by a cool shower or bath.
7. My new sunroom. Not only is it home to my craigslisted loveseat (which I LOVE, appropriately), but it's also the blank slate for my "salon style" wall.

8. I'm reeeeeellly excited about my new bookclub and the burgeoning friends it promises.
9. Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants comes out this week. Beautiful Greece. Rory (or Alexis Bledel, rather) and a coming-of-age plot. Love it.

10. The workplace is on its way to becoming a more peaceful harmonious place, and I couldn't be gladder.

In an effort to stay upbeat, I think it'd be beneficial to think of at least one glad item a day. Here's to rediscovering joy.