"Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also." (Matthew 6:21)

The writer of this verse probably wasn't referring to physical possessions when he wrote this, but it definitely applies. You can learn a lot about a person by knowing what they hold dear to their hearts. Here are three things that mean a lot to me.

My Kittens. Most of my friends don't like cats or are conveniently allergic. I think cats get a bad rap. It is true, they are not at all like dogs. But to say that cats aren't loyal, playful, or loving is a straight up lie. Ellie (left) and Murphy (right) are two of my best friends. They have personalities and are genuinely loving creatures. Sometimes they can sense that I am having a bad day or am upset and they will sit with me or curl up in my lap. At night they sleep next to me. Often I will wake up and Murphy will be snuggled up under my arm so that I am spooning with the cat. They provide me with an unmeausurable amount of joy and entertainment. Almost every day at work I get on Craigslist and read through all the adds of people who are trying to find new homes for their pets. It breaks my heart to see how many people are simply getting rid of their animals. Just giving them away like you would an old pair of pants. I cannot fathom how people are willing or able to do this. There is not a thing in this world that could make me get rid of my kittens. I would risk my life to save Ellie and Murphy. They are my family, my friends, my babies and I need them just as much as they need me.



My Aggie Ring. If you're not an Aggie, you probably won't get this. Most colleges have class rings, but very few students actually ever get one let alone wear it. At A&M you count down the days until you are able to get your Aggie Ring and once you have it, you wear it forever. There are very strict rules about who is able to purchase one. You have to have a certain number of A&M hours, a certain GPR, etc. When you can finally order your Aggie Ring it is a HUGE deal. The Association of Former Students throws a big party at the Clayton Williams building on campus. Numbers and stickers are handed out, people wait in line for hours, family comes in town to see the big moment. (My family did not. I'm the red headed step child. No bitterness.) Its an important moment in the life of an Aggie. Every Aggie Ring looks the same. You have three choices: white or yellow gold, antiqued finish or not, and diamond or no diamond. Every detail of the Aggie Ring has significance.

The Aggie Ring is so important to the Aggie family that each year in the A&M Alumni magazine a whole issue is devoted to it. It always includes stories of miraculous ways Aggie Rings have been returned to their owners after having been lost. Stories of soldiers losing their ring on the battle fields of World War II or Vietnam, only to be returned to them decades later. I got my first Aggie Ring on September 22nd of 2004. Yes, I said first. Somehow I managed to lose my first one. I think it was accidentally thrown away inside a rubber glove when I was working at Bernie's (a coffee shop.) At a little over $400, it took me over a year to save up the money to buy the second one. I'm hoping one day my story can be featured in the A&M magazine after my first ring finds its way back to me. There is also the Aggie tradition of "dunking" your ring. It involves dropping your ring in a pitcher of beer and drinking it as fast as you can, ending up with your ring between yoru teeth, while your friends watch on. (Or hold your hair back while you barf.) Some people do a certain number of shots, a pitcher of soda, a huge ice cream sundae, but most do beer. Stupid...absolutely, but a priceless memory I will never forget! My Aggie Ring represents 6 years of my life (the best I've had so far,) the wonderful friends and memories I made, all of the life and academic lessons I learned, and the school that I love so much.



Charlie the Bunny. In 1999 a devastating tornado hit the Oklahoma City area. A group from my church youth group went on a mission trip to help clean up after the disaster. We took two vans full of teenagers and stayed at a church in Oklahoma. We brought sleeping bags, toiletries and work clothes. All of the girls and women slept in one giant carpeted room and the boys in another. We got up every morning at the crack of dawn and did hard manual labor all day. I spent one day in a field picking up debris - anything from pieces of houses to paper trash. (Did I mention this was in the dead heat of summer.) Another day was spent in a huge warehouse separating clothing donations that people around the country had given. And I spent another day in a food shelter packaging frozen blueberries. My hands were stained blue for several days after that. The work was hard and it was exhausting, but very rewarding. In the evenings we would go out to eat and hang out with all of the other youth groups that had come to help. It was just an all around great time. We had a blast. On the trip home to Arlington we stopped in an outlet mall and did some shopping. It was there that I saw Charlie. The name given to him by the Ty corporation was Hippity, but I named him after the cute boy I had spent that week swooning over. I haven't seen that boy since that trip and actually didn't even remember that he was my bunny's name sake until I was writing this. I slept with Charlie the Bunny every night until I moved in with Keith. Now he sits beside me on my bedside table. Charlie has been on many trips with me, stayed with me through out college, through break ups and crushes, and through times when I didn't really see the point of going on. He is a very snuggly friend and I will keep him forever.

Today is one of those days where I'm wondering "Whats the point?" Actually, its been one of those weeks. I'm overall frustrated with life. I'm a sad panda, if you will.

#1. I'm really happy that I'm back in school studying something that fascinates me. I'm excited about my future as a designer. However, I'm not excited about my present. This quarter I'm taking Life Drawing I and History of Art and Design. I am the opposite of excited about these classes. So far we've spent two classes drawing skulls and skeletons. I'm not very good at it, so its been 6 hours of utter discouragement. Do you know what its like to be forced to spend long periods of time doing something you're not good at? Its kind of like someone repeatedly kicking you in the stomach. On top of that, its so damn expensive. At the Art Institute it costs $437 per credit hour. Each class I'm taking this quarter is 3 credits, 6 total. So thats $2622 in tuition, plus about $200 for books and probably another $150 in supplies. That is so much money that I don't have. I'm willing to take out the student loans for the end result. But right now, it is grueling. AND, on top of it all, I feel like there is no end in sight. I'm in my 4th quarter now. I'm taking 6 hours per quarter, because that is what I can "afford" and that I can handle, time wise. I started with 37 transfer hours from A&M. The program I'm in is 180 hours.

So...

180 total credits needed
-37 transfer

-24 credits earned

119 credits still needed

At this rate...

6 credits per quarter

4 quarters per year

24 credits per year

4.9 years left of school!!

I'll be 31.4 when I get out. I know, I chose this. And I really am excited about it. But right now I'm overwhelmed.

#2. Keith and I are in one of those seasons where we are getting on each others nerves constantly. I feel like he doesn't help me out enough around the house, he's bad with money, he's not motivated to change his dissatisfaction with his job or his financial situation, he's never going to grow up and stop wanting to go out with his friends and drink all the time, and he will never want to marry me. He feels like I never want to do anything or be social, I sleep too much, I complain too much that he doesn't help me with things, and when he does help I complain about how he does them. I'm condescending, I nag him about money, I'm pressuring him to get married. I'm sure there are a million other things he could say. I'm at a standstill and I want change. But I don't know how to get it. It takes two to tango and I'm the only one who wants to dance.

#3. I started this "new" job on May 21, 2007. I had my one year review today. The whole reason I got this job was because I wanted to move to this part of the metroplex so that I could be closer to Keith so that we could see each other more thinking that would lead to marriage. Nope. Originally I was a Project Manager. I started out with a huge pay increase from my previous job and excellent benefits. About 4 months in I decided that I wanted to go back to school. A few months after that I decided that it was way too hard to juggle school and working full time. I approached my boss about decreasing my hours. I explained the whole situation to her. This was in March of this year. She offered me a new position as an Assistant Project Manager where I could decrease my hours to 32 per week. This decreased my pay by 20% which is the percentage I was decreasing my hours per week. Totally fair. What she didn't tell me was that due to this change I would not be eligible for a raise at my one year review. In fact, she did say "You do have a review coming up." Which made me think she was saying "I realize we're decreasing your pay quite a bit, but with your one year review coming up, you'll likely get a raise which will make up for the $8000 less a year you'll be making." I was wrong. They told me in my one year review that because of my change of position I would not be getting a raise and that I am actually over paid.

Again, I chose the change in position and decrease in pay. I know this. The decrease in hours is awesome and I'm not sure how I'll ever go back to working full time. But I was really counting on getting a raise of some sort. Its so disheartening. Keith and I can barely afford to eat.

I could continue on with the compaints, but I'm too sad to do so. I need a nap, a good cry, or a strong drink.

I am very much looking forward to this weekend. It is 4:30 now and I am finishing up the last few things I need to get done at work. (Billing my time in "Web Time Sheets", cleaning up my office, etc. You know, the really fun stuff. Ugh.) The day has been dragging by. If I can just make it through one more hour...

Tonight Kareah is coming over and we are going to watch the new MxPx dvd she got in the mail this week. We are both pretty psyched. MxPx was one of our favorite bands when we were in high school. We went and saw them several times and were always so stoked when we would actually get to talk to or even stand near one of the band members. I had a particular infatuation with Mike Herrera. In fact, I still do. He's on my top 10 list!


Saturday I'm meeting my dad at his apartment at 10:00 am. Which is a little earlier than I'd like to be up and moving around on the weekends, but thats okay. I know at this point you're thinking that 10:00 am is so late, and that I'm spoiled. But I'm unmarried and have no kids and that is one of the luxuries I have for "choosing" to be 26 and "alone". You get to claim children on your taxes, I get to sleep late. Anyways. I'm meeting my dad at his apartment and then we are meeting my uncle Jon and two cousins, Jessica and Elizabeth, at Wet N' Wild!! (I refuse to call it Hurricane Harbor. It will always be Wet N' Wild to me.) I'm super excited about this. I haven't been to Wet N' Wild since....well, since it was called Wet N' Wild, which was when I was still in high school. Kareah and I used to go somewhat frequently. And my friend Amy and I spent a good portion of the summer of 99 or 2000 there. When your 17ish theres nothing better then spending the hot summer days in the Lazy River being hit on by the boys who would stand on the little bridges waiting for girls to float by. Those were the days. I'm exceptionally excited this time though. I rarely get to hang out with my cousins. They are about 11 years old and are just the sweetest things! I know when I was 11 I enjoyed hanging out with older girls and young women, which is the category I think I fall into. I'm young enough to where they still think I'm cool, and I'm glad that I can share in some of their happy child hood memories.

This picture was taken during Christmas of '06. We were all showing off our new watches. My uncle Jon is the man in the picture, Jessica is in the red shirt and Elizabeth is in the black shirt standing in front of me.

Saturday night Keith, Lou, Mike and I are going to see the Dark Knight. I have been looking forward to this movie for months!! I have been counting down the days ever since I saw the first preview (a few weeks before Heath Ledger passed away.) I am still really sad about Heath being gone and I really hope that the Academy will honor him with recognition for his role as the Joker. Granted, I haven't seen the movie yet, but from what I hear he is supposed to be incredible.

I defy you to tell me that that is not one of the most beautiful men you've ever seen.

Chaos

I know I've been on a bit of a blogging hiatus lately. This is why...

I like moving, but man is it a lot of work.

Picture of the Day, July 8th

Beauty for beauty's sake. Because I need a little in my life right now.

The mind does strange things to the body...

A few weeks ago I was packing up the mass quantities of books that Keith owns and I came across one that looked interesting to me. A couple of days later, as I was home alone, I decided it would be a good time to start reading. It is called The Night Stalker by Phillip Carlo and it tells of the murder spree, capture and trial of Richard Ramirez (aka the Night Stalker) in the Los Angeles area in the mid 80's. It is a true story, it is terryfying and yet it is so interesting that I haven't been able to put it down. I won't go into any detail because I know that one of the few people that actually reads my blog is my cousin Kareah and she doesn't need to hear any of the scary stories that have kept me awake for the last week.

On Friday night Keith and I were doing the last minute packing and disassembling of things so that we could move the following day. We disconnected all of the TV's, DVD players, computers and radios. He had to work the next morning so he went to bed around eleven o'clock and I stayed up to get some more things done. Keith was in the next room sleeping and I was scurrying about the rest of the house in absolute quiet with no TV or radio to keep me company. Our old apartment has two large sliding glass doors whose blinds don't close all of the way and three windows whose blinds I keep partially up so that the cat can look out the window. A few hours earlier I had read several chapters in my book and was a bit on edge. In the middle of packing a box I heard a very loud bang which sounded a lot like someone kicking in my door. I jumped about three feet in the air and I swear to God my heart stopped beating for three whole seconds. My darling cats had chosen this time to chase each other around the house causing chaos and knocking into the door. The adrenaline was pumping through my body so intensely that my chest literally hurt. I calmed down a bit and got in the shower, poking my head out of the shower curtain every few seconds to make sure there wasn't a serial killer in my bathroom. I barely slept a wink that night.

Over the weekend Keith and I were together pretty much every second of the day and night so I had little time to be scared. But as he left me at home alone yesterday to go to work and again this morning, I couldn't help but feel afraid. I jump at every noise at night and triple check the locks on all the doors and windows. As the elevator doors open up into the parking garage I get in ready mode in case there is someone waiting to attack me. But I still can't stop reading. It is amazing to me that the mind has so much power over the body. The things we read about or watch on TV really can take a hold of us if we let it. It makes me realize how important it is for parents to not only take an active role in what their children allow into their heads, but also effectively teach them how to deal with the bad things that will inevitably get in. Perhaps if Richard Ramirez's parents had done that, he wouldn't have killed so many people and I wouldn't be reading a book about him today.

Picture of the Day, July 3rd

In 2005 I went to a reunion in Collge Station with my best friends. We had a blast reliving old memories and drinking too much. This picture was taken the first night we were there at the Chicken. It reminds me of good times and happy thoughts. I think its the perfect send off into a holiday weekend.

Todays the day the teddies will have their picnic!

In a few hours I get to pick up the keys to my new apartment. I am psyched!! I have a vision for this new place. A decorating vision, that is. Now if I can just come up with the money to make it happen. It won't take much, but as I've mentioned before, I don't have much. I've been watching a lot of HGTV and other decorating shows lately and I have some good ideas. Stay tuned and I'll eventually post some pics of the new pad and the decorating process.

FYI, I still haven't talked to my dad. I will do it soon and I'll let you know how it goes.

Picture of the Day, July 2nd

I wish I were there instead of at work. Actually, I just wish I were on a beach, not necessarily this one in El Salvador. Perhaps Fiji, Hawaii, Australia or California.

At Any Given Moment

If you flip through the top 40's/pop stations on the radio you will hear at least one Justin Timberlake song. It could be NSync, a collaberation with Nelly Furtado or Madonna, or perhaps one of his solo songs. It could be from 1998 or 2008. The man is everwhere and I am a big fan. Go ahead, turn on your radio, try it out. It is truth.

Picture of the Day, July 1st

This is my baby dog, Macie. I miss her horribly.

The Knot In My Stomach

I'm moving again this weekend. My dad offered to help, which is awesome. It presents a problem though. My dad doesn't know that I've been living with my boyfriend for a year now and that I'll be moving into a new apartment where my boyfriend will again reside.

At first I chose not to tell him because I just didn't want to deal with 1. him knowing that his only daughter was no longer a virgin, and 2. the judgment that his side of the family would place on me. For the past several months I've wanted to tell him. But everytime I'm with him I chicken out. My dad is a good man. I can't really remember a time when I felt like he was judging me or that he was angry at me. He has made plenty of mistakes in his life so I know he will understand. I'm not really sure what I'm so afraid of but I'm still so nervous. So now I'm in a position where I have to tell him within the next three days. The sooner the better. Now, not only am I a sinner who is having premarital sex, I'm also a liar who has been dishonest to my dad and his whole side of the family for almost a complete year. I don't even know how to begin the conversation. I've been thinking about it constantly for the past few days and everytime I'm aware of the thought, I get a nautious, sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. When it comes down to it I'm an adult. I'm 26 years old, I fully support myself and even if he were to get furious and stop speaking to me (which I know won't happen) I would survive. I've psyched myself out now and I'm freaking out.

I'm going to call him when I get home from work and tell him. Wish me luck.