The week from H-E-double-hockey-sticks...

Enclosed are a myriad of gifs that I feel scratch only the surface of how my week at work went:

Overall, pretty dang crappy. Many many tears were shed and my coping mechanism took the form of a sarcastic monster. But I am sending a resounding MUCHAS GRACIAS into the Ether to my favorite chat-pal. Without you, I would have gone down in flames on Day 1. 

And I get to see my family in a week, so things are looking up :)

Magazines and Other Things

For my English class (of all classes...) I have to create a magazine spread about the topic that I have spent my entire semester researching. I have written about this topic in every context and form you can think of. I've chosen parental responsiveness and its effects on attachment and later prosocial behaviors. Super interesting, by the way. And very handy for real life! Anywho. I have started putting together this spread. As I love design, I've already created the layout and I haven't even started the writing the article yet! It's a work in progress, but I'm getting rather proud of it. Just wanted to show you all a little glimpse of what I have been working on! 

That image is blurry... Sorry about that. But I think it is really coming along nicely. Still need to add a couple call-outs in the circle at the bottom and at the top of the right page, as well as, you know, my actual text... But hey! I'm a fan so far. 

In other news, I have a professor who is really trying to convince me to go to Grad School... The only problem is that I hate research and that is all you ever do when getting a Masters in my field. As a sort of compromise, I have agreed to do research with him this next semester. I think he is hoping that it will be a gateway drug to convince me to apply for the program, but we'll see. Technically I will already have graduated, but that doesn't really matter apparently! 

So here's to continuing education, I suppose! 

Design

To those who have not given up on me through my hiatus from blogging, I thank you. I have found that I am THE worst at keeping in touch or writing things down. An optimist would say that I am living in the moment, but I'm afraid that just isn't good enough. It just doesn't do anyone any good. 

Over the last year, I've really grown to recognize my love for design. I'm drawn to things that are aesthetically pleasing. I love interior design and graphic design most of all. If I could decorate homes for a living, I would. If I could dress sets for a theatre every day of my life, I would. If I could create branding and logos for companies all the live long day, I would. I love bringing elements together that create a beautiful whole. I love knick-knacks and old things. I love fonts and graphics. I love color schemes and office supplies. I love it all! 

I tell myself that if I could go back and start school over again, I would do graphic design. Unfortunately, I'm afraid I'm lying to myself. I'm not confident enough in my abilities to throw myself into such a competitive field... But I keep finding my thoughts drawn to design. So, I'm looking for an outlet. I decorate my own home and luckily I get to do a little graphic design for my job. But I wanted to try my hand at some other things as well. So yesterday I threw together some images. Nothing awesome, nothing that even takes skill. But I loved it! So I thought I'd share with you guys. Don't judge haha

  

Charity

It wasn't anything huge, but it keeps coming back to my mind and I smile every time I think about it.

Today I was sitting in my wee little cubicle (typing that out it looks like it reminds me of icicles... like ice cubes and icicles combined! Those would hurt... And I digress...) doing a project that my supervisor had assigned me. I was pretty content with my life because special projects make me feel special! And I didn't have to be on the phones while I was doing it so it was great. I had my headset on, listening to some awesome possum music while I mundanely typed a bunch of numbers into  Excel.

Whilst I was doing so, some of the new trainees walked past me on their way out the door. They had finished for the day and were heading back home to enjoy their afternoons, or whatever was left of them. Let me describe for you the average person that works here: young adult, usually students. Most of us are young and single, engaged or newly married. If you are older than 30, it is just barely and you have a young family, but that is pretty rare. Most of us pretty much fit into the same category, which makes for a lively office. I find it so interesting to watch all the training groups coming in and seeing the new personalities that are being brought to the company. It surprises me every time who gets hired, and yet everyone somehow seems to belong once they get on the phones.

This time I was doubly surprised however. In this current training group, there is a very.. I don't want to say old, but he is quite aged, man. He has tiny hearing aids in his ears, only visible if you look closely. His hair is all white, but neatly combed despite the fact that he is thinning out. He stoops over a little bit, but not much. He walks slowly, and carries a briefcase with him to work. At first I was very skeptical, wondering if he could even hear the people on the phones. He sat in the cubicle next to mine one day while he was shadowing my co-worker. He sat hunched in his chair with his hands pressing his headset closer to his ears so he could hear. My skepticism continued until he spun around in his chair to face me in order to make a joke about the last call he had listened to.

He has the sweetest face, his wrinkles marking every smile, laugh and good time he ever had in his life. His eyes sparkled as he joked around and his mouth broke into a little grin. There was no trace of being old, except for the slight crack in his voice. He wasn't slow of speech, he could remember things very well and could hear us perfectly fine. I didn't worry about him after that. I didn't even really give him a second thought, until he walked past my desk today.

Briefcase in hand, he slowly walked past on his way out. Before we left however, he stopped at my coworker's desk, the one he had shadowed, to ask her how she was doing. I don't know what it was, but a sudden wave of love for this man came over me. He wasn't even doing anything but being himself, but I just wanted to hug him and tell him he was great and that I admired the kind of person he was. I started tearing up people, that's how strong this was! I got a little taste of how Heavenly Father feels for each of us. Unconditional love. No reason, no earning it, just there. And I am so grateful that I could feel that for just a moment for one of my brothers.

Update

But

I'm sure all my avid readers (Mom and Joe) really want to know what I've been up to, so here is a little update :) What have I been doing you may ask?

Nothing.  A fat lot of nothing.

Life is pretty simple here - I wake up, I go to work, I come home and I sleep. Same old same old, day in and day out. Wahoo! So exciting, right?

Right.

The thing is, I like routine, I don't mind it at all! I also thought that I would like an office job, and maybe that is still true, but answering phones is definitely not what I had in mind I don't think. Give me some memos to type up, have me organize stuff, I'm great at that! But I have a hard time convincing myself that I love answering the phones when people just yell at me and there is legitimately nothing I can do for them, which is the majority of the time here.

Don't get me wrong, I love talking to the nice people! That's just fine and dandy. I don't hate my job, I just hate parts of my job... That's okay, right?

The worst really is Sunday mornings though, bright and early. I don't even know why they need me here because no one ever calls. It is dead as a doornail and there are three people manning the phones. If I fell asleep at my desk, would anyone notice? No. Shhhhhh, don't tell anyone!

In other news, today is actually the last day that I have to do this 5am shift! They are taking me off Sundays starting next week, and I will work Saturdays instead. Huzzah!! I cannot even tell you how excited I am :)

I also have been painting a globe! I tried to tell my mother about this, but I don't think she really knew what I was talking about... It sounds kind of crazy now that I think about it. Who has even really owned a globe in real life? Like no one. So I could understand her confusion. Mine will look something like this:

But mine is black and it doesn't say "this" it says "Adventure is out there!". It is turning out a lot better than I thought it would! I'm pretty excited. I'll post a picture when I'm done. I just bought some paint and brushes and I'm free-styling the rest so cross your fingers it works. My OCD kicks in whenever I do crafts though and it is bad because it has to be perfect, which makes things very difficult.

So that is pretty much all that is going down up in here. Nothing too exciting or extravagant. Just the quiet life for me! weeeeeeeeeeeee

Gradumicated.

Can we please talk about something for a minute?

My sister just graduated from high school. Yeah. That's weird.

I look at the pictures of the whole event and I still don't believe it. It doesn't seem real! She keeps telling me she is "going away to school", that she "has to register for classes", that she's all "grown up" and I'm over here like "uh-uh sister! (literally) I don't think so! You must stay perpetually in high school forever by royal decree."

Is that fair of me? No.

But it would still be nice...

There is something scary to me about the thought of my younger siblings growing up and leaving home and being adults and stuff. Why? I don't know. It's not like it makes me that much older, I'm still pretty young over here. It's not like I think they aren't going to be able to take care of themselves because I'm sure they'll be just fine. It's not like by them going away to college it really affects my life whatsoever since I don't see them ever anyways!

I don't know what it is! But I think I am in denial about the whole situation. It weirds me out. But I need to learn to accept it because just a hop, skip and a jump down a couple months she'll be leaving home. Little Broski is going to be an only child! Weird...

I'm so proud of my sister for accomplishing what she has. She is an amazing girl and I can't wait to see what she does with herself :)

Sunday, Sunday, Sunday!!

(to be read in a big trucker, announcer voice)

Well, here we are again folks! Round two of the early Sunday shift! There is some sort of adrenaline rush I get from getting up early before the sun and getting ready before anyone else is up and driving away into the dark night. BUT it has to be early enough because 7 o' clock? Not early enough to give me the rush but still way to early to be awake in my opinion. Same with 6 o' clock and almooossttt 5 o' clock. That is pushing it. But anything before then, there is definitely that excitement of "oh this is new! I have to be real quiet! I'm like a spy..." kind of a feeling.

I blame this feeling on the many times that we would get up early to go on car trips and whatnot not. Those were the best days because we would get up super early, everyone would be freezing because we were used to our warm beds and then were thrown out into the blistering cold nights (it wasn't really that bad... it just felt like it) whereupon I remember much shivering was done. But it was exhilerating because we were going on a car trip! We were going somewhere new! Somewhere fun and different and exciting! And so now, when I get up early early to go somewhere, I get the same feeling, like wherever I'm going is exciting and the rest of the world is missing out on this wonderful secret because they are asleep so I alone get to enjoy it.

Until I realize I am going to work, at which point I realize that the rest of the world has got it right and I should have stayed in bed.

But you know? Sometimes these mornings are still my favorite, even if I'm not excited about where I'm going. I can't help it! Family vacations were my favorite thing growing up! We took so many car trips, we had the system worked down to a science. Boys in the back, wherein much gaming and contortion-izing occurs; girls in the captain seats, with pillows up against each of the windows for numerous naps; snacks at the foot of the girls, accessible without too much trouble by all except the boys (mwahaha); random stuff shoved between the middle seats for extra storage and all items meant for entertainment (that the children hadn't already packed in their individual backpacks) were located by the foot of the passenger seat where my mother could distribute them as she pleased.

Every car trip now, we immediately fall into this routine, no matter how old we are. It took us a while to figure it out, especially because the boys couldn't accept their fate of being in the back seat every time. But they figured it out eventually :)

I miss those days. I'm afraid it might not happen ever again.. With Cam and I off to school and Laura too in the fall, we are all over the place and not together enough to all get in the same car and go! Even this summer, if we do end up going on a certain vacation (that I'm pretty excited about if it works out...), Cam and I will be coming from school and meet our family there so it won't even be the same! But I'm grateful for the memories and the times we were able to all cram into our van. I'm grateful for the experiences that brought us closer together as a family, both emotionally and proximity wise (I'm telling you, sometimes there is just not enough breathing room in there!). Those trips will always have a very special place in my heart.