my beautiful, fun, loving, funny niece Nina Anne is TWO today. oh how time flies. Happy Birthday Neens. auntie col loves you to the point of cardiac explosion. xxxoooo!!!!

Gratitude is a quality similar to electricity: it must be produced and discharged and used up in order to exist at all. – William Faulkner

All that we behold is full of blessings.- William Wordsworth

Gratitude bestows reverence, allowing us to encounter everyday epiphanies, those transcendent moments of awe that change forever how we experience life and the world. – John Milton

Happiness cannot be traveled to, owned, earned, worn or consumed. Happiness is the spiritual experience of living every minute with love, grace, and gratitude. – Denis Waitley

going back about 20 years to the sweet 16 parties of yore. i wore crushed velvet dresses and danced to the point that my feathered bangs and perm wilted. “pump up the jam” by technotronic

Friday night was a throwaway. I got mentally stuck on an esoteric issue and kept thinking and thinking and not really figuring it out. Fried of brain and deplete of energy I ended up skipping yoga (never a good idea – especially when you are overthinking something). I came home watched Portlandia and hit the sack early. (I really love Portlandia this season). What a wildwoman I’ve become.

Saturday a.m. I saw Lamont (my trainer). We’re going strong as a trainer/trainee duo – it will be 6 years in march. Nutty! Came home, showered, napped a bit and then headed to pick up my car and head out to NJ for my Mom’s birthday dinner.

Nota bene: my Mom is a youthful, healthy, funny, active, positive-minded
independent senior citizen. I should be so lucky to follow her example one day.
I just adore her and am so blessed to have her.

Now, when I got to the garage I discovered that my car battery was dead. The guys tried to jump it for me, to no avail. So I had to miss the evening with Mom, Bri, Ali, Liam and Nina. Bummer! But rather than sit at home sulking and bumming out, I decided to take myself out …

Went to a Greek restaurant and then saw Dragon Tattoo. The movie was meh. Long. I had tried to read the book but couldn’t get through it… Plot alone doesn’t do it for me – I need fiction to be well written for me to bother with it. And the film too was missing the nuance, texture and emotion that makes it worth the time. I still love Daniel Craig though and liked seeing him in his little black underpants.

Today (Sunday) I slept late (8:30) and took Rufie to the dog park. It was idyllic. The pups were all happy and lighthearted. No drama, no fights. A cute guy chatted me up. Rufus befriended a skinny mutt who was obsessed with squirrels up in the trees. It wasn’t too hot or two cold. I left when I got bored and needed another coffee.

I came home, drank coffee, took a nap and did some work for a few hours. It was a continuation of the Friday night project, and progress was made (mentally if not physically). I went to Yoga and got into a much better mental zone. There was a student in the class with only one and a half legs. For all my kvetching over dumb shit, hell I have two legs, my family is happy and healthy, I have tons of people who care for me. So it ain’t that bad.

In fact on Saturday night I surpassed my $2,500 fundraising goal for the MMRF Empire State Building Run Up. 42 different friends and family contributed. I am so utterly humbled and grateful for the love and support. When I realized how quickly I had reached the milestone, and how widely I had been embraced and supported, I felt like Sally Field!

After Yoges I went to see The Artist. It was wonderful. An archetype for life. I loved it. Didn’t hurt that the pup reminded me of Rufus (though Rufus is way less obedient). And now, Sunday night, we meet again. I look forward to the week ahead and all the adventures it shall hold!.

Hope

Sometimes when I’m lonely,
Don’t know why,
Keep thinkin’ I won’t be lonely
By and by.

- Langston Hughes

there was a weird long message from google when i logged in this morning. i promptly ignored it. yeah i know they have a window into my brain and all that and are selling my demo and preference info to the highest bidder. whatevs. then i saw this article in the Business Insider and decided to take a look at how the Google Gods actually profile me. they got both my gender and age wrong but the categories were on the money (and are probably also why they got my age and gender wrong …)

Last night, in keeping with my YES Woman mantra, I attended an Aspen Institute Leadership Series event with some colleagues. It was a Q&A with Walter Isaacson covering his most current book, Steve Jobs.

The biography was the number one bestselling book for all of 2011, despite having only been on the market for less than two months. Obviously Jobs’s demise and huge public profile had a lot to do with the book’s popularity. For myriad reasons, it was as a story whose time had come.

That said, Isaacson’s esteemed profile as a journalist, storyteller and biographer long preceded this particular subject. Undoubtedly his masterful biographies of Albert Einstein and Benjamin Franklin are what prompted Jobs himself to seek Isaacson out to write his own life’s story.  I read the Einstein bio years ago, and have had the Jobs one on my list, though I’ve been tabling it until I got around to it. I like to read and enjoy at my own pace and not be biased by all the press chatter and book reviews.

Turned out the conversation last night, conducted by SPY magazine co-creator Kurt Andersen, echoed a lot from the 60 Minutes interview from last Fall. Not that I minded – it was fascinating both times I heard Isaacson recount details … and will be once again when I finally get around to reading the book.

The evening of spirited conversation reminded me of how exciting it is to be around fellow intellectuals. Over the past few years I have downplayed this aspect of my personality. It doesn’t fit neatly into my current professional and social existence. I work in mass communication — speaking and catering to the mainstream on a daily basis — and am leery of elitism and snobbery. Yet we are all multi-dimensional beings, and being a THINKER is a fundamental part of who I am. Time to get back to feeding the brain by reading more and participating more in events of this sort!

it’s jan 23 so i am still allowed to feel that new year refreshment. one of my resolutions/goals/desires for the near term is to say YES to more opportunities instead of weighing them all for the utilitarian/cost benefit. i am a person who loves fun, hijinks and adventure. at the same time i am practical, realistic and responsible at my core. it makes for a weird, interesting and often exasperating mix (for myself and others).

sometimes the two sides counteract one another and immobilize me, which is neither fun nor productive. but i never stay in the bad place very long. right now what i need to do is indulge the fun/risky/open side and say YES to the unusual. like in this cheesy jim carey movie my shrink told me about:

am pretty proud of my progress over the past 23 days. some of it shall remain unspoken on the interwebs (privacy is the new celebrity, you know), but what i CAN report…

1. i finally attended CRINGE and scoped it out.  i had talked about reading at one about four years ago and never got the balls to do it. now i am ready and looking to book my reading soon. stay tuned!

2. i signed up to do the MRFF Empire State Building Run Up it is coming up frighteningly soon and i’ve barely trained but i’m still stoked.

3. i’ve accepted social invitations i normally would have not and have ended up really enjoying myself. rather than the default answer being NO, how weird/exhausting/challenging/un-Me, it’s now YES.

Bottom line: so far so good. Patting myself on the back to keep it up. Gotta be my own biggest cheerleader cause all I’ve got is me. YEAHDOG!