Well, I woke up at six this morning. Pitch Black. not sure why i woke up. i think i just have a lot on my mind. my health. packing. my family. my new home. these are things that won't be still inside me.
I have recently been through a whirlwind of activities and circumstances that have lead me to a new and exciting life! I recieved a job in sales and am moving to Portland. this is not exactly where i saw myself after graduation, but it is looking to be extremely positive and i'm feeling like life has meaning again. I'm at home right now, back from portland, for a little while to pack up the left overs and get a few things taken care of.
i live with two girls i graduated with in college. i waffle back and forth about whether i want a place on my own or a place with them. i think its nice to come home to someone though. its best that way for myself. my own sanity. i tend to be a little bit of a hider in society if i'm not constantly reminded i am a part of it.

Japan apparently has a new softdrink out called "Kidsbeer"
It comes in a brown bottle, it foams up like the real stuff, and contains a ton of Guarana.
My favorite part is the quote on the label: "Even kids cannot stand life unless they have a drink"

Your Fortune Is

Exotic dancer get appluase, call girl just get clap.

The Wacky Fortune Cookie Generator

Alright, here I am at my favorite coffee joint in town. Since I am here you can probably guess that it is Saturday. This has become my summer ritual. Stop by the bakery on my way to work for a sixteen ounce nonfat coffee in a cup for here. I sit inside, surrounded by rich chocolate colored wooden tables and brick red painted walls. I feel safe, secure, relaxed and content all at the same moment. My mom has always described it as walking inside a chocolate covered cherry. And I’ve decided that is one of the best ways to describe it. Deep, rich, and sweet, a real treat.

I’ve never once seen this place less than half full. It’s a constant buzz of conversations with friends, family, and strangers. A co-worker of mine has decided it is THE place to be seen in Spokane. I guess if you live on the south hill it is imperative that you make an appearance here as often as possible. It’s a place to pass time on a lazy Sunday and end a run with your best friend. I, unfortunately seem to make my trip here, alone, most days. In my mind, my life is filled with lazy café mornings with friends and/or lovers. Waking up to read the paper and discuss the randomness of life. I still have hopes that those days will come. If I want it badly enough, it’ll happen.

today, while hiking with my mom and stepdad, a hidden rock decided to get some sort of revenge on my pinky toe. i'm not sure what exactly was responsible for the collision: the rock or 'the powers that be.' now i'm beginning to ask myself why, exactly, i decided to include that last sentence. its almost like there is some reason i should be concerned that bad karma could be lurking behind every corner. And now i'm trying to rack my brain..... i guess i did forget to pay for my lunch at a cafe the other day, but the women who worked there forgot also..... maybe i deserved it. a smack in the toe for not going back to pay.

i've been spending a lot of time, lately, in berry bushes. i know it sounds odd but i quite enjoy my berry bush moments in the sun. There is nothing better than coming home from work and squatting in the shade of our raspberry bush looking up into the leaves for the bright red berries. tasting them from every separate plant stem, becoming knowledgeable of which produce the sweet berries, the big ones, the small ones, and the tasteless ones. Today i gorged myself on huckleberries. oh man did i gorge. if there was ever a time that gluttony comes to my mind it would be at a berry bush. not at thanksgiving dinner, not with a whole pumpkin pie or chocolate cake to myself. but at a berry bush. it is like i'm not physically able to stop eating.

I'm flying to london next week.

Haha, one month later I decided to find time to write again.... and actually it is way past my usual bedtime, by like three to four hours, so i'm sure this one will be quality.....
my past month has involved:
camping at heart lake: nearly dying, smelling wildflowers, spotting a mountain goat.
working at the winery
adventures in eugene, portland
attempting to find a job
haning out with stepsiblings and stepnieces
planning a trip to europe

more to come tomorrow, HOPEFULLY! I need to get back on this train

a quick overview of my day:
*woke up early
*discovered one of my little ducks had gone to heaven
*drove to work in the pouring rain
*bottled wine for what seemed like an eternity
*took shower to clean off bleach spill (oops)
*finished my painting entitled "grapefruit salsa"
*breakfast for dinner
*"it must be a monkey's wedding"
*a trip down memory lane via the making of my sisters 18th birthday card
*chamomile tea

this blog is coming to you with an electric feeling flowing through my body. one that encompasses hope, anxiety, excitement, and fear. a combitation of emotions that can only lead to.... well... SOMETHING!
this past friday was my 23rd birthday. last week proved to be a difficult week with a big black splotch looming at the end of it-- a day that is supposed to be special but was turning out to be a disaster as far as i could tell. as of late, i've been in a horrible position of loneliness, depression, and overall lack of motivation for life in general. i know that i'm bringing all of this on myself. i had a friend once who was so convinced that self-fulfilling prophecies was the way to live life. her life is amazing. filled with famous people, opportunities, and joy. i suppose her theory is right. anyways, in my own self pity i was spiralling deeper and deeper into a state of lonlines, depression and a further lack of motivation for life.
in order to not be alone on my birthday i called a friend in seattle to see if i could stay for the weekend. i almost didn't end up going. the series of events leading up to the weekend became so stressful for me that i felt like my body was going to shut down on me. there were thunderstorms, lost sisters, windstorms, forest fires near the house, mice in my room, long physically demanding days at work, a general lack of sleep etc. that compiled on the fact that i realized how fast life goes by etc, etc. on friday morning i almost decided that curling up in a ball in my bed for the weekend was the best possible decision i could make for myself.

but i ended up travelling to seattle where a handful of my college friends have settled down this past year and gradually the old "me" showed herself to the world. the one who was known for always smiling, who walked with pride, who realized how damn lucky she was in life, who loved being around her friends, and the one who let things roll of her back rather than dwell on them. i had the BEST weekend since i've been back in the US. And i didn't do anything really very special at all. I went out to lunch with one of my best guy friends. we walked around the city center-- people watching and shopping. Bought some wine, drank, made dinner. went out to a bar with my two bestest girl friends. got into bed around 345am. woke up hungover as all hell the next morning. spent the day trying not to vomit, feeding my veins plenty of coffee. rallied when the sun poked through the clouds in the afternoon by heading out to a sunny deck at a friendly little restaurant on the waterfront. drank mojitos in the sun. ate a caprese salad with beatifully grilled eggplant. ended up at a reggae concert with handsome men and music that filled my body with pure pleasure. it chased away any negativeness that was residing with in and chocking me. i could breath again. i smiled a smile that used muscles i haven't used in at least a year. it felt so good to stretch them again. a relief. happiness. JOY.

i am back home now. with a new energy. but i keep crying. sobbing. i see something beautiful or hear a good story and start balling uncontrolably. i can't quite figure out where this emotion is coming from. its like everything is all too much at once and the only thing i can do is cry.

my life is....... well my life. i wish i could use an adjective to describe it, but i really just don't know one. i wouldn't know to use a postive one, or a negative one, one that suggests contentness, or one that reflects annoyance. i've never been this aware of life before. never thought about the idea of being alive and what exactly that state entails. sometimes its all too much for me to think about and i get an adreneline rush through my body followed by, what feels like, a slow process of shutting down of the body. an aweful anxiety. i don't want this feeling anymore. i want to be excited and mainly proud of my choices. i odn't really know how to get there and i think that is what bothers me even more.

i woke up this morning and went to work. i worked in silence. well, the room was quite noisy but the people inside were all quite contemplative. i had thoughts of europe, new zealand, math problems. all of this going on as the corker machine hissed and groaned, bottles rattled, and boxes roughly stacked. now that i think of it, not a whole lot went on in my head. this is a sad realization for me. just one year ago, i would have had a million different semi-intelligent thoughts running through my head. things i had read, conversations with friends i was expanding upon, topics in class. now my life is null and void of any intelligence. i think my brain is going to die from lack of use. perhaps if my brain goes then i won't feel quite as guilty for not using it.

i thought about fathers a lot today. i didn't come to any major conclusion on my thoughts on fathers. i mainly thought about the different fathers i know in my life. the topic of fathers began, i suppose, in the fact that father's day was yesterday. these thoughts were also triggered by working beside a father-daughter team today. our wine maker has i believe four different children from four different women. an extremely bizarre situation if you ask me and one that seriously leads me to suspition about his character. yet, when i watch him with his children he is an amazing father. he never argues with them or lets them feel inferior, or stupid. he just goes with the flow. they call him at work and he just listens and listens and listens and when he's done he gives his opinion and tells them he loves them.

i don't have a great relationship with my father. i don't even think i could say that a relationship actually exists between my father and me. yesterday i called him for the second time this year. it was bizarre for me to utter the phrase "happy fathers day dad." what!? forced happiness towards my father. wait, can i call him father? does he deserve that title? the conversation lasted about three minutes, all of which i asked him questions he didn't ask me any. we talked about the weather, his work, his mother and then i said goodbye. i think my mom thinks that i'm completely broken up over my life without a dad. but the thing is, i feel complete apathy towards him. call it what you will-- good or bad-- but i just don't have any feelings of any kind towards my father. not hatred, not love, not longing for him to be around. hes not in my life and i'm doing fine without him.

my mother remarried when i was sixteen years old. as a sophomore in high school i was displaced from my hometown (of 16 years) and moved into a city not far away. my stepfather has given me so much in these past seven years that i quite often refer to him as my father to friends and people i meet. sometimes its really not worth bringing up my biological father.
i don't really know where i'm going with this and am now finding myself quite bored.

quite tired as well.

today was a fairly long day. but i knew it would be. i woke up late this morning, not on purpose. my body used to be rhythmically programmed to wake up everyday between 630 and 700. no alarm necessary. however, a few weekends of travel and staying up late, drinking with friends, has caused my natural arousal to go awry. so i woke up, got dressed in my trusty carharts and looked out my bathroom window. cleaning ladies car. its friday. now, most fridays its alright to see mrs clean early in the morning. the woman is a talker. and this morning i just didn't feel like talking. but she's got this uncanny ability to always be down in the kitchen whenever my stomach starts grumbling.

so after a chatty breakfast, i escaped to my subaru and lost myself in the decemberists lyrics while attempting to leave the hill for work. its june seventeenth and i had to use my windshield wipers today. it was a gloomy day, but i suppose gray is an acceptable color for a funeral, no matter what month. work consisted of "racking-off" our 03 vintage. i take the "barrel wand" and pump all of the wine out of barrels and into the tank. 30 barrels. i then spin the barrels upside down to drain them. washing the barrels outside in the rain today. soaking wet. the reddish purple grape solids made iridecent swirls in the rainwater while racing towards the drain. steam rose up around me as i washed the barrels with scalding hot water. my shoes stained purple. my carharts spotted red. all very somber. i accepted it all though. no complaining. it was the way it was.

this evening my sister and i got in an argument over fathers day. i'm doing all this shopping for my stepdad and she's going to sign her name to the card. seriously NOT okay in my book. i know i'm being a bit bitchy. a bit too edgy about all this. but hey, you'd be unpleasant too if you were in my shoes.

my hands are stained burgundy. they are dry. cracked. and i am ashamed. i hold them behind my back and attempt to keep them a secret from strangers and friends.

i am an NPR nerd!
but i love it. I love that right now i'm listening to archived recordings of "this american life." I love that today i listened to NPR while labeling bottles of super-tuscan style red wine. Lately, i'd rather listen to people talk at me than people sing or play an instrument at me. i don't know why, but music has recently sounded more like noise than anything else. i'm not really sure why and i feel very saddened by this current trend. maybe its because i'm sick of all my music and most music today i find pretty mediocre. i wish i could find something that shakes me to the core. its funny, lately i have been comforted by the voices on the radio. i think its a way for me to space out, let the voices overtake any thoughts that could form in my brain. stressful things about life, like what the heck am i going to next year... grad school? where will i live? what will i do? how do i make my life worthwhile?
i guess at this point i just need to take things a day at a time.

Blahgue

I suppose since this is my first blog i should explain why exactly i have created my very own blog space. see, i recently obtained a new laptop computer. why, exactly, i am still contemplating.... I have been out of school for a year now, don't see myself going to grad school for at least another year, and my job (hauling wine around in five gallon buckets) doesn't exactly call for the use of microsoft word or excell. so after downloading all my music, photos and sufficiently surfing the web i decided i need to come up with some use for my new favorite toy. (lately it has been listening to previously aired NPR shows). Another reason for this blog is because i need to write. i recently went to new zealand for eight months; where i journaled daily. this process helped me learn so much about myself, what i was actually feeling and thinking. it gave me a moment to completely concentrate on what was inside. unfortunately i always got a massive hand cramp when writing in my moleskin notebook, so i reckon typing will allow me to get a lot more mileage out of my elementary writing ability.

i suppose another reason for blogging is my loneliness. i'm a recent college grad with a biology degree, living back at home after spending eight life-changing months in new zealand, working as a cellar rat in a local winery. my high school friends are long gone and most are married. this is NOT where i ever saw myself at the age of 22. never. i have no one to gossip to or about (besides my mom, step-dad and sister). i have no one to tell when i see funny things on my drive home or to rant to when my mom is driving me up the wall.

so here it is, in all its glory....