Author: 2chicksandapen

perspective

Observation Overload

2chicksandapen

I was thinking about a title for this post for a few days. I wasn’t sure how to title it. Being stumped is not something that normally happens for me when it comes to titles. I’m a headlines girl for sure. Wonder why this one stumped me?

Nevertheless I found the title. Now I have to explain it. The observation deck can have multiple meanings for me. For some it’s a view point of sorts. From higher ground. Maybe it’s a skyscraper in a big city with an observation deck. Maybe it’s an observation point hanging over the Grand Canyon. A perch of sorts where one observes people, places, things, sports, and so on.

Recently I was at a tennis match and there was an observation deck filled with spectators. The elevated viewing area offered a different vantage point on the games as compared to ground level. This had me thinking about perches, overhangs, elevated surfaces which I might classify as an observation deck even if not elevated. An observing point for me. The list was endless.

The exercise bike on the second floor at the gym is a perch in my world where one can silently people watch. The bleachers at my kids’ sporting events. I always seem to pick the highest row to see the best view. Then I thought about other perches that may not be so elevated but that I would still consider an observation deck or platform in my life.

To give an example I have this photo below for you to visualize.

The bike view. Can you think of other moving observation platforms? A car. A plane. A train. A motorcycle. While moving what can you see different or up close to? Do you really need to be in a nosebleed section of the baseball stadium to observe the game?

I guess whatever platform or observation deck you have is fine. That’s why I named this Observation Overload. One thought spun in a million directions. For the purposes of this post, my observation point was ground level. Oddly enough I was in the muck of it all when I started observing busted biscuits. One here, one there, another over there. There were no Slim Jims just busted biscuits, the girl nearby noted. What on earth could I be talking about? People. Girls. Females. Fitness enthusiasts. Fun seekers. All with busted biscuits in different variations.

I was observing a bunch of girls, ladies and mature women actively participating in a movement activity outside. All from different backgrounds. Some thicker than others. Some more toned than others. Some older. Some younger. To my surprise, they all had busted biscuits of sorts. I didn’t coin the term but I’m sort of in awe of it at this point. A little distraction of sorts when I was served biscuits at the restaurant I was at the day I wrote this. 

One gal had busted biscuits thanks to all the beers she drinks.

One had busted biscuits because of child rearing.

One had busted biscuits because she recently lost a lot of weight.

One had busted biscuits due to settling over the years. Pretty sure she was in her 70’s. 

So many life reasons for the excess baggage also known as busted biscuits. Interesting odd way to phrase things but I was intrigued. I dazed off a bit in observation mode. Thinking. Wondering. Being curious in general.

Who cares about the busted biscuits? These ladies were moving. Some faster than others. Some with more giggles than others. Amazingly what they all exemplified was beauty. Beautiful stories. Beautiful memories. Beautiful people behind the busted biscuits. Beauty of being a woman with lived-in skin.

As a southern transplant one knows what busted biscuits look like. The container that opens up and oozes out with biscuit dough. I mean a southerner makes biscuits from scratch but a transplant can opt for the container or can of biscuits. The ones that ooze. 

Most people can’t get enough of a good biscuits. Well as a thick girl myself, I have busted biscuits. You know that troublesome area that seems to hold only all your bad choices, stress, aches and so on. Normally right below the belly button. Some call it a pooch. Some call it flab. Today somebody referred to it as busted biscuits. The term made me giggle. Why did I never think of that. It truly is busted biscuits. But nobody throws away the biscuits when they ooze out. They prep them for baking. They enjoy them.

Then I thought to myself I have busted biscuits. But so does every other woman out here. And that’s what is beautiful. Each container of busted biscuits oozed out their own way just the the special person carrying the extra ooze. They didn’t get thrown to the side. They were living their best busted biscuits life in their own skin.

As I drifted in the mind this day. I thought how much I like my busted biscuits. Unique to just me. How lucky am I? How cool is it that all these women get together, busted biscuits and all and just move. Just move that body in the fitness kind of way. Just because you have some extra biscuit ooze upon you doesn’t mean you can’t move or you’re not athletic. 

It just means you have a body that’s lived in. We are all made in different shapes and sizes. Everyone should embrace their appearance whether you are a Slim Jim or you carry busted biscuits.

Hope you enjoyed this lighthearted post about biscuits and observations.

health, healthy hacks

Just Breathe

2chicksandapen

Such a simple statement: just breathe.

There are many times now-a-days I think about this simple statement. In the morning when my coach programs deep breathing in my warmup. It’s almost a time to put me back to sleep but it doesn’t. It settles my mind. It gets me ready for the crazy day ahead. Just simple breathing.

Then I think about the many I know near and far struggling with their breathing. Just breathe is hard for them. They could be having issues with Covid or they could be just aging or they could be dealing with an asthma flare up. Just breathe for them takes on a totally different meaning than my just breathe in the morning.

Then there is deep inhale and long exhale of breathing I do in times of stress. When the calendar is full to max capacity. When everyone needs you in different places at the same time. When life is crazy amidst a pandemic. When you need to make choices. Just breathe. It’s simple but not so simple.

On days like today I take a few minutes to breathe in and breathe out. Appreciating each breath for what it is. An opportunity. A chance to take on a new day. For me the fresh air breathing outside is much more appreciated than indoor but some days I take what I can get.

Don’t underestimate the value of breathing. It can be therapeutic. If done calmly with purpose and thought it can be a reset button of sorts. Just breathing has hidden values.

Take a walk in in the park and inhale the scents, exhale the worries of life.

Sit in your yard and listen to the birds chirp while you inhale and exhale.

Take a trip to the mountains and breathe the crisper mountain air. Exhale the toxins of the city hustle and bustle.

If you are near the the ocean, enjoy calm breathing with the mist of the sea. Exhale any negativity in your life.

Go to your special place. Close your eyes. Just breathe. Remember a loved one. Cherish memories while you breathe in and out. Just breathing slowly with purpose allows up time to enjoy the simplicity of breathing and reflection.

Just breathe. Just breathe as you wait for the big news you are anxious about. Just breathe as you stress about the days ahead. Just breathe as you tackle the the new you that’s on the horizon. Just breathe. It’s simple enough but sometimes we all need that reminder to just breathe through it all.

I’ll leave you with this clip of my morning routine today. Give simple breathing a shot for five minutes. Let me know how this 5 minutes of your day worked to your advantage.

author moments

Cranky Pants 2.0

2chicksandapen

Today I did something funny. I spun the dial on my app to revisit my blog posting from 1 year ago. What was my mindset? What was I writing about? Was I even writing?

I was indeed writing about being cranky and the post was titled Cranky Pants hence the title of today’s post. Now here is my update for today. I am not cranky at all. I am feeling purposeful, strategic and I glow.

Today I had a great day. It started out with my sweat sisters doing what we love. Working out in the early hours of the day pushing our body and mind to the limits. I had some play time with my pups which always takes any stress away. I met some great people at an event I hosted and I was able to make and impact today in my work. The work that I classify as my purposeful work. The work that simply provides joy for helping others. In a nut shell, I’m floating in my own little happy cloud celebrating the day.

Now I got a little curious to see what was on my mind in 2019, pre-pandemic. Well I was writing again. This time I was writing about my new-to-me black beach bike. I still love the bike but it has a flat tire so I don’t ride it as I should and I have a newer road bike that seems to get more mileage than the beach bike. I guess this is a reminder to book a beach trip so I can pack up my bike and take for a spin in some beach town. What a fun reminder.

Ah the beauty of blogging over time. I have check in points to see if I have grown in some way or maybe I’ve been stuck in a rut or maybe I was just at a loss for words and not writing. Now that I circled back to 2018 just to see what I was up to. I was writing about dreaming. Creating a vision. Working your plan. I can safely say I live that model day in day out. Just this week I spent time planning. Preparing for big steps of progress. I use a white board to post ideas and revisit them. It’s an ongoing process. What a great reminder it is for me to spin the dial on my blog posts from time to time.

Where am I going?

Where have I been?

What have I learned?

What am I in the process of learning?

Who’s been along for the ride?

Who’s jumped ship when the waves got rocky?

When will I stop writing about stuff?

When will I publish my next big book?

So many questions.

Life is unfolding and the future is a mystery. This blog is a placeholder. A keepsake for people to read over time. For now I’m living in the moment. I’m choosing the virtual writing platform of this blog as we seem to be in the digital world right now thanks to Corona. 

This isn’t really a fancy post it’s merely a look back for me. A reflection I can openly share as I have published pieces over the years that share a sliver of me. Make no mistake when I say a sliver. My life is full of many twists, turns, and tangled webs. Some who know me well don’t even fully grasp what makes me tick or a ticking time bomb of sorts. For that reason alone you have a sliver. A glimpse. A snapshot of what’s hot or what’s not.

Until next time. Enjoy my twisted sliver of today and yesterday. I guess you will just have to visit this blog often to seen when I spin the time dial again. 

3Splitz Farm

Flowers Don’t Care

2chicksandapen

The first summer season as a flower farmer. The triumphs. The trials. (I’m looking at you, weeds!) The lessons.

Flowers have their own time. On the back of each seed pack, it tells me about how long I’ll be waiting to see their blooms. For so many, it’s weeks and weeks, even months, before the blooms begin to peek out. Seems like forever I’m just waiting and waiting, thinking they’ll never get here.

Then, driving in through the trees, into the wide valley, I crane my neck and finally see…

color.

Red, pink, yellow, orange, purple, white, and more. Color after color exploding in the middle of the wide green field. The flowers are here!

And from that point on, every time I make that crossing into the valley, I hold my breath. Will they still be here? Are they still coming? And every time, the answer is a bright, explosive YES!

Yes, we are here. Yes, we are growing. Yes, it’s time to cut us so we can make more more more more more.

It’s a lot of work, the whole process of growing and cutting flowers. It may seem simple but it isn’t. So many steps from dream to plan to ground to stem to vase to the recipient’s smile. It’s worth it in the end, but the middle parts can be wearisome.

But, no matter how tired or busy I am, the flowers don’t care.

They are driven. They have a mission. They bloom and bloom and bloom.

If it’s raining? Bloom. Sunny? Bloom. Come wind or any other weather.

If I have a busy social calendar? They don’t care. Bloom. If I’m tired? Bloom. If a family member is sick? Bloom. They must.

It’s kind of a beautiful thing, with all the ugliness in the news, the poison and pandemic and pessimism, they just keep on blooming, totally unaffected by the goings on. Their whole job is to make the farm and faces light up with color. And next year we will have even more of them.

When I don’t feel like making the trip, I remind myself that the day will come when I will crane my neck coming into the valley and the color won’t be there. I’ll miss them when they are gone. So I continue on, enjoying the blooms.

author moments

The Doorstep

2chicksandapen

My doorstep has been an interesting place lately. More traffic than I want. More unique visitors than I ever anticipated. Unexpected. Unwanted. Unsolicited. Just some of the u words that come to mind. Some visitors had two legs while others had four. Oh how life throws you curve balls just to see how you react. 

Below I will give you a sampling of the randomness. Think about how you would react. These scenarios are not in any particular order.

  • The Uber delivery. Yes Uber dropped people at my doorstep. Directly from the airport. Dressed in their cultural attire. Did I mention I am at least 50 minutes from the airport? Limited English spoken. It’s a hot summer day. Sun is beating down. They are so hot. I’m offered water but they nodded no. They may want to rethink my kind gesture but I’m sure they are so nervous. Unknown place. Unknown person. So many stressors.
  • Nobody could pick them up for what seemed like an eternity but it was just an hour. I offered water again. Finally they took it out of desperation. I texted their family members from their phone even though I could not read the language in the text. Arabic maybe or something similar with symbols vs letters. I felt responsible for the cargo left on my doorstep. Complete strangers but dumped at no fault of their own. What would you have done?  Would they know how to tell their family where they were if I didn’t help? What would you do if Uber dropped you in the wrong place. So much to think about. They were understandably nervous. 

Nobody was harmed in the taking of the photo and faces were covered to not embarrass anyone. How many might think this situation could have played out so differently in today’s world? I had to document this bizarre event.

  • The landscape supplies is the next unexpected doorstep instruction. Home Depot was oh so gracious to deliver me a truck load of landscape supplies to my driveway and a few heavy boxes of additional yard items to my doorstep. Everything from heavy landscaping pavers to pesticides to fly catchers. According to the receipt it was worth thousands of dollars. They left a packing slip. I actually inventoried it because I’m that anal retentive. What would you have done if this happened at your place?
  • While verifying the order, I saw the recipient’s phone number and called it. This made for an interesting call. Stranger on other end of phone was wondering why I am calling and why I have his goods and his private information. That’s understandable I suppose. All I wanted was for him to get his stuff off my property so I could leave my driveway. Big sigh. 
  • He drove past my house many times. How could he miss it with me standing outside? I had to stay on the phone to make sure he stopped. He was old. He couldn’t lift the pavers or the heavy boxes. I was already the receiving department. Now I was the shipping department. Off I went to load his car. What would you have done? On a funny note, the delivery ticket clearly stated do not leave without a signature. Guess what? The driver just left it all without a signature. I guess that is contactless deliveries for you.
  • My four-legged friends. One night it was a family of deer passing by and lingering for a bit with their bold eyes. Last night it was two black stray dogs. They started out back then moved to the front. I’m sure they smelled my dogs but geez do I have a sign that says everyone is welcome that translates in multiple languages and across animal sound waves? I shake my head but the more I think about my odd visits, I let out a deep sigh as it’s hard to believe. Of course I can’t make this stuff up. It’s as real as it gets. I’m sure I know plenty of neighbors that wouldn’t be as gracious as me in these scenarios. Some may opt for shoot first ask questions second, unfortunately.
  • I can’t forget the past residents of the home who send a child translator with the mom to pick up her mail repeatedly. This blows my mind when the postal service offers a change of address service. Even the furniture company got it wrong. Their driver delivered a new homeowner’s enormous floor rugs to my doorstep. Those I just left as a large item and said someone can figure out where they got delivered and come get them. They were big enough to see from the road and they lacked packing slip information for me to identify the correct owner.
  • A day later the doorbell rang. The man said I know this sounds strange but I think that’s my set of large floor rugs. Nope, not strange at all.  It’s yours because it’s definitely not mine and they are too heavy to move so I figured somebody would claim them soon enough. 

Most days seem a bit crazy in my world but these weird visits in mass quantities have me thinking I’m good for the rest of the year or maybe two years.

No more random doorstep deliveries for this girl. I guess I need to get a large address sign for the lawn to make it ever so obvious what address one is stopping at. If you have any better ideas drop me a note.

And then…the extra Amazon deliveries. A new trend. Somebody must have moved into a newly build home with the same street number as mine yet the street itself is wrong. Another delivery gone bad and I’m left to do the right thing over and over again.