the busy heart

Tonight we had a visit from our very sincere home teacher (a man from church assigned to visit once a month and make sure we're doing okay, ask if we need anything, etc). He sat and chatted, managed to work in a message on prayer, and then asked: "Is there anything I can do to serve you guys?" Sam looked at him, looked down at his feet as if deep in thought, and then said, deadpan: "Well, I could really use a pedicure."

Confession: Internet, I am no longer vegan. Gasp. I know. You are shocked, dismayed; you care. Or not. I care, anyway. I've been sheepish about admitting it to my blog, since I was so, all, like, "I'm VEGAN." But whatever. I loved veganing; I feel like some day I'll go back to it, but for now I'm concentrating on other elements of my nutritional life. I still make a lot of veganish recipes, like the following: Raw Cinnamon Raisin Toast . I heard about it on one of my favorite foodie blogs, Heather Eats Almond Butter . Technically, the recipe calls for a dehydrator, but I just put my oven on 170 (lowest setting) and kept the door propped open for a couple hours. I failed to buy raisins, and I couldn't really taste the cinnamon, so it's turned into just regular old bread. Well, to the extent that this can be called bread ... But it's working like bread. Today, for lunch, I brought an enormous salad, and made little open face sandwiches wi...

Since this new job involves reading all day (I mean, literally, all day. Finding stuff to put in anthologies. It's not a bad life, I tell you.), I've been posting things on the other blog that catch my eye/heart. But somehow, this belongs here. Maybe because of subject matter. Anyway, my dad loves this book, Eternal Man , by Truman G Madsen, and he got me reading it. It's short, but fathoms deep, and I feel like I'll have to read it seven more times to "get it." But this part, I think I get. On freedom and commitment: "We talk as if freedom consisted in having the greatest variety of options and that a 'once-and-for-all' decision coerces our initiative. But is freedom increased by every new flavor of ice cream? "Actually, it is only when we rise above trivial options and ask ourselves in the depths, 'What do I want to be ?' that we emerge from the bondage of a flitting and faceless mode of life. The most majestic wonder of our fr...

Don't know if I can capture this experience, but I feel compelled to try. A few weeks ago, when I first started taking the train, I told Sam that watching people wasn't that interesting, because in Boston everyone's a student or young professional, and they pretty much all look the same. I've felt guilty ever since I said that. I knew it meant a piece of me was buried. It didn't mean they weren't interesting, it meant I couldn't see them, and that made me and my writerly self feel very sad. So last night, on the train, I was listening to a podcast ( RadioLab's latest: Animal Minds), and somehow, since my ears were occupied and not my eyesight, I could see how incredible everyone was. It was a crowded train, and I was up higher than about a dozen people, and there were these three kids, three young men (student ages)--and this is the part where I'll fail to describe what happened--they had eyes . I mean, all three of them had these insanely uni...

Don't know what to say about my days, now. I get up, get ready, walk to the train. Sometimes I get a seat, and then I read. Sometimes I don't get a seat, and then I despair and listen to my ipod. I'm starting to get aggressive about seat-getting, well, passive aggressive at least. Then I work. And I like it, but it's work, and I doubt it's interesting to anyone not working there. I come home on the train, reading some more. I walk up the wee hill to our apartment, and discover I've missed Sam so much that I nearly follow him around, telling him how much I like him. (You'd think this would be charming, but my suspicion is that it gets old.) We eat dinner (We've just developed a clever system that is FINALLY helping us not go out to eat every 35 seconds. The system goes like this: Sam's in charge two days out of the week. It's brilliant.) I conduct my elaborate routine so I don't have to do much the next morning to get myself out the ...