Erincita

Fashionista
Thursday, March 23, 2006

I'm becoming a clothes horse, and way more fashion-conscious than I ever thought I might be. I like to look nice but hope that the effort hasn't crossed over into vanity or some superficial nature in me. I have this new plan when it comes to how I dress. Everyone remember when the 3/4 sleeves came into style? Probably five years ago or so. After it became mainstream I started to buy 3/4 sleeve shirts and now I can't get enough of them. They save me from worrying about sleeves being too short. The same thing goes for capris, gaucho pants and skirts. I borrowed a dress from a friend when I was in college that fell to mid-ankle on her. It fell right above the knee on me and still looked like it was supposed to be that way. I've got a few pants that are long enough for me and I've decided that besides those I will forever be clad in capris and 3/4 sleeve shirts. I've put way too much thought into this. Now if I could only come up with a plan for comfortable shoes. . .

I also have come up with a plan to help be deal with this swing shift schedule. First off, I don't really have to "deal" with it because, much to my suprise, I'm loving this schedule! I usually get enough sleep, and I don't need to worry about sleeping in too much with the kids running around and the cats jumping on me to escape them. Since I no longer have to attempt to work out at the ungodly hour of 6:30am, I can take aerobics at 9:30am. Even if I don't make the classes, I still have plenty of time to rollerblade or take the dog for a walk around Greenlake (about 3 miles). I've been blessed enough to find another aerobics instructor who I really like that will push my limits. It's amazing how much fun working out can be when you're awake!

5:09 PM |

Let's meet for lunch!
Wednesday, March 15, 2006

Well, I am now officially a swing-shifter. Today I punched in at 3:15pm and will hopefully punch out by 11:45pm. Whoa. So far it's cool. I mean, I've survived. The new schedule is the least of my problems. Throughout training we'd be on the phones and if we had a question we'd just put the customer on hold and wave a piece of paper screaming "Help!" until a mentor came to walk us through whatever situation we were dealing with. Plus, our stats (call time, etc) didn't count against us. Now I have no one to help me and my manager's already getting on my case for lack of sales offers. No one go feeling sorry for me now. This is to be expected. Everything will be peachy in a week or two. At least it's not boring. Boredom was the reason I applied for the promotion.

Because there's really nothing besides prayer, patience and practice that will help me on the job front, I've been focusing on the new schedule and how I'm going to make it work, since it pretty much negates what we call a life. I mean, one cannot survive on lunch dates. I ran into a friend on Saturday who goes swing dancing on Sunday nights, which is a definite possibility for me considering that I took swing lessons once upon a time and have Sundays and Mondays off. It's wonderful to finally have Sundays all to myself. I can go to church and have lunch with my friends instead of waiting to get off work and barely making it to a service.

As far as workdays go, I think this kind of schedule might have alot of benefits now that Spring is upon us. We all know that I get to sleep in, though I'll try not to indulge on that point. Once the weather dries out I'll start rollerblading around Greenlake again. Yesterday I broke a sweat walking around and I think tomorrow I'll take the dog with me and see how that goes. Something in me is stalling when it comes to hitting the gym again but I'll get around to it.

11:06 PM |

Recovered Post
Tuesday, March 14, 2006

This is an out-of-date post I just found. It was written when I was one week into training and today is my first in the new position:

This is the first weekend I've had off in a long time. I've been promoted at my beloved WaMu, and for the sake of training, we have moved to an eight-to-five schedule for three weeks. I'm sure that this is because those training us have tenure and thereby have the power to refuse swing shifts and/or the loss of weekends. Even though I've always gotten two full days off, the pleasure of sitting at home on a Saturday morning with no obligations to work feels like a luxury. It's also peacefully quiet, since the family went out to lunch. Come to think of it, almost every aspect of my life is inundated by constant chatter and background noise. I seem to do pretty well and it makes me wonder what it might be like to live alone again. I feel more and more like it's time to move on, and though I had hoped that my next move would be into my own place, I am beginning to feel like I've absorbed what I could here. That sounds cold. I don't mean to say that this has been just a learning experience. I love Kate and Marc. I fall in love with Caius and Mira more each day. Kate and Marc--especially Kate--have become very dear to me as friends and counselors, and I'm hoping that this relationship will continue on a different level when I move out. When I moved in I had a goal in mind, though it might be hard to explain in words. I guess you could say that I wanted to be content to take care of myself. My time with Chris had made me extremely comfortable with co-dependancy. For a few months after we broke up I was elated with the freedom I felt, but shortly after that, we had gotten over each other and I was no longer free, just alone. Being with Kate and Marc helped me to deal with lonliness and somehow I've matured to this point where lonliness is rarely an issue. I like my "me time", especially since I'm so busy these days. I'm not into the dating scene like I used to be because I've realized that I get way too wrapped in the person I'm with and completely lose sight of my priorities. I'm not denigrating the whole dating scene, I'm just saying that I'm not built that way. When it comes to meeting the right person, I don't know how I'm built, but the point is that meeting someone is no longer a priority. I have plans and if I meet someone, they might be disrupted, which is how it's supposed to be (I already knew this, I just didn't live that way). I like my job, I want to buy a first home, I have all kinds of people I treasure. . . and I'm amazingly independent where it counts. Of course I hope to get married and have a family someday, but not now, and I see marriage as more of a phase that I will eventually move into instead of a goal and an end-all that I must urgently seek. I've gotten past the point where I'm waiting for marriage in order to accomplish the things that usually go along with it, like buying a house and planning for the future.

6:58 PM |

Chuli'na!!!
Thursday, March 09, 2006

Has anyone else seen Paraguay in the news lately? Iguazu Falls definitely caught my eye when I turned on the news the other day. Apparantly the border between Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay (marked by the falls) is a known safe haven for terrorists. There's more to the story of course, but it's just so confusing for me, because this place that is so other-worldly to me, the only place where four years scarcely changed a thing, has been brought to the forefront of U.S. politics. It just proves my theory that no one takes notice of a world beyond our borders until it begins to affect us.

Since my last visit to Galeano Cue, Paraguay (December 2000), I've probably written just once. I doubt I'll ever go back. From the end of high-school through the end of college, "going back" consumed me. I ended up using my Chilean Christmas vacation to experience the holidays Paraguay-style, when the heat is so unbearable that all celebration takes place after the sun goes down. I spent Advent going to a different house every night in Galeano Cue. We'd have a little mini-sermon from a visiting pastor (Gregorio, he and I developed a friendship while I was there) followed by fresh mango juice and cookies. I remember that juice better than anything. For Christmas Eve I went to visit a friend the in the capitol, Asuncion. Laurie and I went to a catholic church and then went home to change in to more "appropriate" attire for the discoteca. I danced and drank sangria into Christmas morning. I stayed with her and the family for almost a month.

One weekend we were invited to her sister's boyfriend's beach house. I know I spent the night there but besides that, memory doesn't serve too well. Lying in a hammock swatting away mosquitos and jet skiing come to mind. The lake water was so muddy that you could scoop up a little puddle with your hands and not see skin. I think I must have spent alot of time writing in my journal while I was there. It's funny that I don't remember the food because it's the one thing I never seem to forget, no matter where I go.

On a different day I was invited to her sister-in-law's place for lemonade and a Gloria Estefan DVD. "Oye, mi cuerpo pide salsa, y de este ritmo, vamos a bailar..." That's pretty much the only part I remember. All the other songs were the Spanish version of English hits and my mind, as inundated with Spanish as it was, kept inserting the English lyrics of the songs I knew so well. All those nice homes in the capitol were surrounded by 15-foot high white-washed cement walls. I can understand why. All you had to do was walk out the gate and there would be beggars leaning against the other side of the wall. Paraguay didn't seem to have a separation between residential areas and urban areas. There was the countryside, but that was different (and not appealing in that particular country). With no residential street to live on, homes were either in the center of large private estates or surrounded by walls, like Laurie's. A mile to the left of Laurie's house was the mall, and across the street was the grocery store boasting ready-to-bake Toll House cookies ordered direct from the United States. We bought some in honor of my visit. A couple of times I walked with Laurie to her aerobics class, in a building with no air conditioning. I nearly died and wouldn't have been able to keep up even if it was cooler. We walked home and all of sudden she chirped, "I want practice my English." "Okay", was my reply. And she told me the story of some guy in Terre Haute, IN who was obsessed with how she said, "chocolate chip cookies" (she pronounced both "o"s in "chocolate"). Laurie and I had actually met 4 years earlier, on my flight out of Paraguay. She was on her way to Indiana as an exchange student and was ecstatic to meet an American who shared her love of rowing. I was probably the first U.S.-born English speaker she had met that she could somehow relate to, and I was thrilled to meet her because she was someone I could keep in touch with for a long time. My "family" in Galeano Cue rarely received my letters.

*This has been another installment of Erin's nostalgia, more to come--if you can stand waiting a few years...

3:45 PM |