Well hello, old friend.
It's been exactly 4 months yesterday, since the last time I came here to scribble something - and if I remember correctly, it was something menial. Let me open this then with a bitter admission: I've accepted the fact that my days of blogging for the dual purpose of chronological time-mapping [for my future self]
and flexing my penmanship.... are long gone.
Because not all change is bad, right?
I'm not sure where it came from, but I've felt a weird tug for the past couple of weeks that it was
time to revisit this blog and just start writing. If there's anything I've learned about myself in the past 30+ years, it's to
never ignore that tug. This morning, I didn't have one singular thing weighing on my mind, rather that weird cloud of
all the things that just sort of hung around the outskirts of my thoughts. By the afternoon, smaller, focused thoughts, and by the time I left the gym tonight, I was floating in a mental pond of Cori.
.... what a wretched analogy,
sorry.
So let's see. Since the end of March alone, the universe has taken full liberty of reminding me that what
I have planned is a laughable rough draft of what I'll get. My agenda has very little to do with my life in realtime, other than positioning myself at a when-and-where.... and even that's iffy.
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| damanji. ♥ you, friend! |
For starters, immediately after my last entry, Damanji shipped off to Turkey for the next year[ish]. We dressed up as mannequins from a Gadzook's display and sent him off with a night of drinks, dancing and a blur of 90s-inspired plaid and Converse. Born from that were some new friendships [both a broccoli-hater AND a
Liverpool fan made the ranks,
I KNOW, it's been a weird year...], rehashing favorite old memories and accepting that Damanji won't be physically around to annoy and humor us for at least the next 11 months.
And then Angela moved to Boston.
And Nick to Croatia.
And Megan to Ecuador.
At least Becky came
back from New Mexico, even if it's just for the Summer.
Speaking of Summer, I can't remember the last time one felt like such a blur.... of
everything.
Here's [more for my future recollection of and proof that I didn't zone wholly out for the duration of] Spring & Summer 2017, as they've transpired so far:
April: Damanji's 90's themed going away party was the perfect kickoff, complete with friends, libations and really loud bass speakers :).
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| ali. shawn. cori |
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| ♥♥ |
A few weeks later, Ali celebrated her birthday by spending it here in Cincinnati, and a small host of some other favorite friends moved away, varying from temporary to full scale relocation. At the barking protest of my pride, I resumed physical therapy after intentionally avoiding it for.... a while, and found that although I now have one of the best DNS wizards in this hemisphere, I still. hate. PT. Oh, and the Fountain in our driveway has been officially traded in for an Eliminator, because ya know, it's practical to own a Catamaran when you live in Ohio.
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matching tattoos.. because that is what we do...
happy birthday, ali!! ♥♥ |
May: I returned to Panama with Chris and a roster of 13 other people from Ohio, Vermont and Arkansas who rendezvoused in the Atlanta airport 24 hours before we embarked on a pack-hike into the remote mountains of Balsa, Panama for a week. Run on sentence, you're welcome. We spent that week constructing a physical church building, under the direction of a foreman whose approval of any given task could be determined only by whether or not he was shaking his head at you. A good exercise of trust building in a team setting - I've found - is to incorporate 3 languages, 3 countries and 3 separate U.S. states' worth of team members onto one construction site, provide them with gas generators, power tools and a living blueprint [aforementioned foreman], with the understanding that this structure will be mapped out and finished within four days. An OSHA rep would've been escorted off this site, likely by an ambulatory pack-mule, from the heart attack they would've suffered trying to document this project. BUT, for and by the Glory of God, it came together at the midnight hour, and I had the honor of singing praise music next to one of my best friends [for the first time], in the first service ever held in the new Balsa church. Not a bad trip. In other May news leading up to Panama, Sydni finished 2nd grade, lost a tooth that same day, and we spent much of the month catching up with family and friends.
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our favorite 2nd 3rd grader!! |
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| climbing with kalyn & brian | red river gorge, ky |
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| hang times with jennica | columbus & dayton, oh |
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| family biking | loveland, oh |
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| panama 2017 |
June: The Employee Month of the Year as the count should stand, derived from my entirely made-up metric system: Surprise Factor, Relief Induction, Joy Increasing and Overall Mental Health Appreciation. I returned from Panama with my usual post-missions acute awareness of just how much stuff we have, and talking myself off the ledge of donating everything but the clothes we need for the week. Fortunately, that tirade was lessened by a trip to Chicago for a book festival & Britta's birthday, followed by a long weekend at Norris Lake with some of our favorite friends from Illinois. Oh, and lest we forget that in between those two, I got myself kicked off a sinking ship by the tempest itself, and found myself onboard a 5-star ocean liner the next week. Yeah, I know it was a crap analogy, but it was a crap situation that did a cartwheel and ended up better than ever, so whevs. Life on the professional front did a full reset, which forced me to realize how poorly I'd been just existing before everything changed. Another one of my best friends wound up here in Cincinnati for her birthday, which we celebrated in true Mare & Cori fashion: a soccer game, a piercing session, food, laughing, coffee... and more coffee.
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| britta boooo's birthday!! ♥ | chicago, il |
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norris lake 2017 | norris lake, tn
cori. jess. taryn. liz. rob. matt. kenny. jesse. |
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| ♥ happy birthday, mare!! | cincinnati, oh |
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work fam :)
jess. stef. cori. chris. [missing deb]. tonya. rami. kelley. nick. ashley. brandi |
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nick & rami! ♥
[taken 7.13.17 ;) ] |
July: I fully immersed myself back into my old-but-new job, realizing to no small amount of surprise
least once every couple years. I've just accepted this as who I am at this point - perpetually scattered :).
just how neglectful I had been of my inner well-being where my professional life was concerned. Rob's birthday came around, which put us in Illinois for a weekend bash with some of our favorites. It happened to be the same week that Nick & Rami (two of my coworkers) had their wedding! Sydni and her friend Mattie had their first weekend sleepover here at the house, and I managed somehow to lose my entire wallet somewhere between the grocery checkout and my house. Don't worry guys, this is like an annual thing for me at point. Fortunately, everything was handled quickly, and with the exception of an MIA Kate Spade, all is well. OH, and July was the month we really kicked it into gear with the FC games. Now that Cincinnati has its own USL (we're aiming for MLS) team, we now have something to do every random night of the week and weekend ;).
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| 2017 objective: pet all the dogs. these are matt's. |
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birthday bash for rob's 31st!
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| liz! |
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| alejandraaaaa .. or ali, if you're a regular mundane ;) |
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| jay & cindy came out too! |
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| ladies ♥ |
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| ridiculousness, in motion. |
Oh, and some certain folks went and got baptized this month, too.. but that deserves a separate entry, so give me a few more days to rally all those pictures :).
So that brings us to now, in a nutshell. I've said before that I'll be more consistent in daily updates, and after having written just this one day's slew of stuff-scattered as it is, I know- reminds me why I need to flex the blog muscles at least weekly, and eventually daily, like before.
I promise I'll start stringing together more cohesive trains of words and thoughts, too, once I get back into the rhythm of this without a 4-month hiatus.
Thanks for tuning in, blogbots :)
xo |
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