Corinne's Blog

So it’s 10:27am on the last day of the year, yesterday was my brothers birthday and I wish him the best in my heart and at this moment my boyfriend David is at work teaching an ACT prep course. I was up all night baking banana chocolate chip bread and cookies because I had nothing else to do and an abundance of resources to do so. I just woke up.

I was thinking about how the year is coming to an end and everything I’ve done in the past year and accomplished and everything that I hope to accomplish in the next up coming year.

So Like I’ve done in years past I’m going to write down some solid New Years Resolutions for the year of 2012.

It’s said that 2012 may be the end of the world because that’s when the Early Mayan peoples stopped calculating on their calendars but I don’t believe that to be true.

But I’d still have to say that my first New Year Resolution for 2012 is to

1) “Simply Survive“…I just want to make it through 2012 is one piece, alive and healthy with a stable enough life like I have now. The next time I’ll be writing a list of resolutions two semesters in school and a Summer would have passed and I may or may not be where I want to be to be able to sign up for the MCTC nursing program. I want to live my day to day without getting super depressed that I’m not making any progress, I want to look at each day in a more positive light.

My 2nd Resolution: Would be to
2) “Not be a quitter”- Whether this is in my relationship with David, at my workplace(s) or in my school work I’d like to keep going with everything I start until I succeed, and if I fail I’d like to know that I made my very best effort.

3) “Enjoy Life for what is has to offer” This past year I can honestly say I didn’t have many adventures, the whole year outside of a time I went to Michigan to represent my church I’ve been in Minnesota, and what I’ve been doing here has mainly been working, going to school and watching a lot of movies. I’d like to be able to get out and enjoy Minnesota for what it has to offer me, I want to explore new parts of the city and enjoy the weather. And create a new outlook on life even during the boring times.

4) Get out of Debt: I recently looked at my expenses again and in order to figure out how much money I’d need to make a month in order to continue living the life I am and still be able to save for a car or a new apartment in the future. I discovered that If I continue on I’ll be able to get out of all my Debt to Hamline University, to MCTC and to the Various Hospitals and organizations I’m a part of that I haven’t been paying by this time next year if I keep my consistent hours at working at Minneapolis Kids at Burroughs and working at my new workplace. I don’t want my pushing to get out of debt to interfere with my ability to do well in school though, this is the only thing that worries me I’m going to get so overwhelmed and wrapped up working that I’ll have no time for school.

5) Learn How to Prioritize.- Most people who know me know that I value strange things and I prioritize things that I value rather than what I should be prioritizing to make life easier on myself. I value my relationships but I don’t value my family, I value what I do with my money now rather than worrying about how I’ll save my money for the future. I also Value work over school which seems to make life harder because I need to do well in school in order to do better work. I’ve learned a lot of these life lessons over the past year and I’d like to be able to say ‘first things first’ and actually know where I’m going to go when I need to place value on things.

6) Lose More Weight: I’m proud to say that though an unhealthy weight I have maintained the same weight for the last few months and over the summer I actually lost weight. This past year I was a member of a gym called LA Fitness and because of some financial difficulty that I’m still trying to get out of I’ve found myself once again without a means of working out. I do do a lot of walking on a regular basis and I find myself jogging to and from the bus stop often but that’s not enough. I want to find some means of exercise which can be incorporated into my everyday routine, maybe it’s rollerskating because I discovered I am good at it and that I enjoy it or maybe it’s just biking like my housemates do 24/7, I don’t know. Part of that is the simple step I can take of eating more healthy, David said that he could help me with that and I’m hoping to get a George Foreman grill because David swears by it. In general I just want to GET FIT.

7) Get even More Organized than I already Have- This past year I’ve come a long way in maintaining the clutter that is my room. I have installed and organized to the point where everything now has a decent place. I realized though that when I move in the future that I want a place with walk in closets. Or I want to be able to build myself walk in closets because a bulk of my bulk is clothing and I don’t feel like getting rid of much of it now. My room currently is so small that it constantly needs to be converted for me to be able to do simple things such as play a board game, sleep or watch television on my computer. I’m getting tired of having to move everything around in order to do simple tasks so I want to eventually maybe in the next year find a place where I can have enough room to roam and be able to store what I want to to bring out later. Getting more organized may help me manage my stress better, calm easily maintained environment might mean a calmer me.

8) Maintain relationships: I’m proud to say that unlike last year where I was getting over Craig I have a great man who though he has his faults I’d like to keep around for awhile and have adventures with. I’m not on that search for a boyfriend “Thank God.” and i’m not wondering what the wide world of dating has to offer me, instead I’m in a perfectly good spot in my relationship with David and I’m finally starting the see breakthroughs in how he and I communicate and understand each other as for dating at this point I’m going to keep things open I’m not looking for anyone on the side but David said that if something better comes along that I should take it. So far nothing better has come along that can be long term. I think that’s what I’m looking for now, not just a boyfriend who will be around for a few months who I give a lot to and who leaves, I want something that will last more than a year. David and I have potential to last more than a year, three months have flown by and I think part of it is because we are able to give each other enough space to live our separate lives. Though I’d like to see parts of our lives coming together more like him meeting my family and me meeting his family for now I’m pretty content with him coming over and spending time with me. Anytime at all can be hectic I know with his crazy law school schedule. Part of that maintaining this relationship would be not being so clingy and demanding so much of David, it’s hard because it seems to me that David thinks my wanting anything at all is from him is being too demanding …that’s something we have to work on.

9) Find Church again: I didn’t write a blog about being kicked off the worship team because I thought getting into a big fuss over it all would be a huge waste of my time. I didn’t write a blog about not attending church because of a lack of motivation to do so because I didn’t feel it was something that was worth blogging about just yet and I’ve been busy and haven’t really had the time to blog as much as I wish I could. I was kicked off the team because Matt and Peter think that I need to become reconciled with something in my life that’s going on before I can help lead a congregation in worship.  They think I’m going through some sort of spiritual battle and they think i should seek some kind of counseling. There’s nothing crazy going on in my life right now that isn’t normal for someone my age to be going through, I’m experiencing life as everyone else does and I’m trying to get by. Counseling is expensive and unnecessary in my particular case because anything a counselor might say to me is the exact thing I could discover by making mistakes and learning those life lessons on my own. I accept that things aren’t perfect in my life and that I have a lot to work on but that’s the same for everyone that God put on this planet. I am in a relationship and it scares me that I might be trying to commit myself to a person who might not be meant for me, but I’m experiencing it because even if David isn’t “the one” I’ve learned a lot from the relationships I’ve already experienced and the experiences I’ve had have taught me much about what I am looking for in a partner.

I’m looking for a love in a man and I am looking to love a man just like those famous passages in Corinthians 13 talking about love:

¹ If I speak in the tongues^[a] of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. ²If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. ³ If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast,^[b] but do not have love, I gain nothing.

⁴ Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. ⁵ It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. ⁶ Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. ⁷ It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

⁸ Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. ⁹ For we know in part and we prophesy in part, ¹⁰ but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. ¹¹ When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me. ¹² For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

¹³ And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

I see a lot of good things in David and I hope that over time I will learn to love him or that through my experiences with him I’ll be able to better love another. There is no loss of faith in me in that respect and I don’t need to go to church to know what I should seek in LOVE.

I’m working and my coworkers are frustrating at times when they make my job harder and cause me unwanted stress. They are mean and inconsiderate and lazy and I can honestly say if at times if it weren’t for work and the fact that I might lose my job, I would quickly curse some of them out for acting the way they do. They aren’t the worst kind of people for they do have the abilities to make the children at my work place happy but they aren’t good to me and some of my other coworkers. They do good but there isn’t much love in them but for those who are their own and mean like themselves. I’ve watched and I’ve taken a lot of shit because of their wanting to make someone look worse than themselves. I don’t need to go to church every Sunday to know how I need to deal with them because being in church as I grew up I’ve learned that Jesus instructs me to Love my enemies in Luke 6:27:

²⁷ “But to you who are listening I say: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you,²⁸ bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you.²⁹ If someone slaps you on one cheek, turn to them the other also. If someone takes your coat, do not withhold your shirt from them.³⁰ Give to everyone who asks you, and if anyone takes what belongs to you, do not demand it back.³¹ Do to others as you would have them do to you.

³² “If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners love those who love them.³³ And if you do good to those who are good to you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners do that.³⁴ And if you lend to those from whom you expect repayment, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners, expecting to be repaid in full.³⁵ But love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back. Then your reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High, because he is kind to the ungrateful and wicked.³⁶ Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.”

So at work I’m learning to turn the other cheek and so far being nice to those who mistreat me, though it isn’t always easy has kept me my job for the last year and a half.

I’m also in School and though it’s hard I don’t need to go to church to know that God created me to do good things and produce good fruit from all my hard work. I have a good heart because of God and what I produce in the world will be good it says so clearly in the Bible.

 ⁴³ “No good tree bears bad fruit, nor does a bad tree bear good fruit. ⁴⁴ Each tree is recognized by its own fruit. People do not pick figs from thorn bushes, or grapes from briers. ⁴⁵ A good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and an evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart. For the mouth speaks what the heart is full of.

All these things I’ve learned to deal with over the years and God has taught me many lessons about how to deal with people in those settings and in those situations.

Learning about God in church in my life has taught be a lot.

I have enough knowledge to deal with my day to day struggles so I don’t feel I need to attend church every Sunday I’m taking a break from Church for awhile. I need to find myself and reestablish a positive relationship with God on my own and where Gods place in my life is. I want to get out of thinking about church in a legalistic way where I hate that I can’t be myself in church and everyone pretends that life is just so fine and dandy and no one can really says what they want to say to a person’s face.For example: when my mother was planning on putting my cat down I was against it, that was this summer and I vocalized my feelings to her and the cat still lives today and is doing much better than she was a couple of months ago. And when my brother didn’t want to go to college and instead decided he’d rather join the military because he’s afraid he can’t afford to go to school I was against it, and the many soldiers I know (except Jason) were also against it. I want to go to church when I know I can really praise God again and not have to worry about How the way I’m living my life will reflect how holy and great the church itself is. We all make mistakes and God is helping me through mine in his own way and his own time. I don’t need the people at my church judging me. It’s not that I’m no longer a Christian I just haven’t been going to the Christian gatherings because I don’t feel that they are genuine anymore. But this next year I’d like to find a way to come back to church whether it’s a different church or not I’m unsure.

For some reason when I think of the church now I think of what Jesus said : “The Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath.” Meaning that I can do what I want on Sunday as long as my heart is there. And I can have communion with bread and grape juice whenever I want to at home, every meal I have can be my communion…I still pray I still believe I still want God to be in the lives of the people I love and care about. I believe that God blesses me daily. Enough said.

10) Learn to Love myself: Which means taking care of myself and thinking about what I deserve rather than what others think and want. I hear that is the only way I’ll find self esteem and confidence in this world, apparently everyone says I don’t know myself and that I’m afraid of my own company and as soon as I find myself I’ll find where I’m going in life. So that is definitely a goal.

So I can split my social life up into four categories, 1) For me, 2) with her, 3) with them and 4) with him. (Five if you consider how I look at my relationships in view as a Christian and for God.)

Recently I’ve had a lot of fun outside of work hanging out with Adam Maarschalk from church.
My time with Adam can fit into two of my social categories. The first one being number one “for me”, and the second one being “with him”. Adam and I started hanging out mainly after Heidi became a flake on me when it came to working out at the LA fitness. Adam became my new workout buddy and he committed to working out with me on Mondays, Thursdays and Fridays from 10am till 11:30ish. It’s a win win situation for both of us because his being there has made me feel more comfortable in going to the gym because he is a great person to talk to and I really enjoy his company. Adam makes going to the gym more of a social fun gathering than a chore. Since I began working out with Adam I’ve lost a quick fifteen pounds and I’ve gain a lot more confidence in myself. I’m working for the improvement of my social “me”. After we workout sometimes I go to a coffee shop and work on my novel which is coming along nicely, or Adam and I go out to eat (we’ve been trying a lot of different worldly cuisine), sometimes we just end up at Adam’s apartment which is usually calm and quiet in the afternoons and a great place for me to work on my novel or just plain and simply sleep. Adam’s apartment is closer to my work so it’s more convenient for me to go back to work from there and home after work than for me to travel all the way back home just to turn around and travel the whole distance on the bus to head back to work. Because of my feeling for Adam and the way he teaches me about God and God’s messages I feel that my social time with him also fits in the “with him” category twice. My time with Adam is “with him” and my time talking about God and meditating on what is being said and learned is also my time to be with God, so in a strange sense with my father in heaven who is also a “with him”.

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My social life has also become my time with Heidi, even though we haven’t been working out and hangout out together as much as we were a few months ago I still am able to invite Heidi over and talk to her over the phone. A week ago we were able to get together and hangout at the Lyndale and Lake Street festival where we listened to some great bands and socialized.

Heidi is a good friend because she understand me when I’m desperate for attention from men. And she is a great inspiration for me as I write about my characters in my novel. I find inspiration from her and her friendship because she gives me confidence that I am worth something more than I value myself being alone. She also gives me a major friend high.

Through my interactions with Heidi I’ve been able to meet and reconnect with a lot of people from my past. So my interactions socially “with her” have become interactions with other and “with them.”

For example after last Sunday’s Lyn-Lake festival I joined Heidi and some old friends from the pasted that we bumped into at Heidi’s house for a bonfire. Before that we had gone shopping for ingredients to make fun over the fire pit kabobs that ended up tasting out of this world good. It was nice to be able to socialize with people my own age late into the night, drinking responsibly and laughing and making memories.

Also at the Lyn-Lake festival because I ended up staying to wait for Heidi to show up I was able to bump into some of my coworkers out of our co-working element. Because of my being sighted at such a cool and hip event now I’ve earned some street cred’ with my coworkers and they’ve been treating me as more of the team and less of the geeky outsider.

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I need someone who can accept my geek and my outsider. I’ve been on an up and down journey to not look toward the past in my personal relationships with men and to try to fly full speed ahead to the future.

I’ve gone on a couple of dates and went to see the movie Thor with a cute boy.

I’ve taken the time to make myself available to men and I’ve been hit on …I’ve been asked for my number and given the numbers of others.

I’ve given myself for time for times “with him” and I try to get Craig and my relationship with him out of my head. He’s moved on I should also.

So far my looking for other men has been good at times and bad at times…for example, my timing with some of the men in my life has been really bad. My friend Vince and my friend Jeremy both told me they had feelings for me, I didn’t act on their offers to be more than friends with them because I felt that I wasn’t ready to get my heart broken again and both men ended up finding other woman. They both still claim to love me but I’ve missed my chases with both of them.

There was a date I was supposed to be on today but I was stood up…but, I got out there and I actually showed up which I wouldn’t have had the guts to do months ago.

I’m actually acting on the crushes I have though some of them have been harder for me to act on than others. Having feelings for single men at church has been the hardest…do I act on my impulses to give a guy my number or do I only treat him as my brother and watch as a good man passes me by?

At times I need to stop focusing on my times “with him” and make them times “for me” and “with/for God”

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Speaking of “For God” a all encompassing social category. I’ve been taking on more responsibilities at my church and I’m actually feeling like I’m finally becoming an adult.

I’ve been asked to represent my congregation in a worship convention in Michigan come June 14th-16th. I will be in school at working my summer job at this time and I’m hoping that I won’t miss too much.

But it’s nice to be able to take on more responsibility and be available for my congregation to do more work “For God”.

Maybe being at the convention I’ll meet some nice Christians and create some lasting friendships.

For all I know maybe my future prince charming will be there at the convention…though that won’t be my motivation for going.

I’m really happy to be putting myself out there and taking more risks with myself socially.

Picking up books that I find scattered across the floor of my room I see the author’s names and I can’t help but imagine my own name on the cover of my own book one day.

As many of my readers may already have known I’ve been working on a novel that I began after telling my little sister Cynthia a bedtime story. I’ve been working on this novel for a few years now and the sad fact is that even though I have the whole plot down I am having a hard time just getting it out of my head and into the computer.

Originally I’d had plans to post the whole story on my blog for everyone to be able to read but because it isn’t copy written yet I want to keep it safe and out of the hands of evil people who might try to steal it and get it published themselves.

I’ve begun to give it to more and more people to read (at least what I have so far) and they tell me that it’s a great read and that I should hurry up and get it published.

I’ve begun reading it out loud to the children I’ve begun babysitting on Thursday and Saturday nights. The children are a set of male twins age 6 and their ten year old older sister. I love reading my story out loud to them because it makes it easier for me to go back and change spelling errors and sentences that don’t make sense, plus I’m getting a lot of positive and constructive criticism from the children and a lot of fun Ideas that I’d like to add to my story (they don’t just listen to the story…they yell out what they’d like to see happen or said in the story as I’m reading it and I can easily add things when I hear something I like.) The ten year old is really eating the story up but I’m kind of nervous about how far I want to go with my character’s relationship as they get older. In my story my characters begin their friendship as children and that friendship grows into a deep connecting love. After the characters grow up they eventually get married and have children together. (I apologize if this is a spoiler.)

The problem with my novel is the fact that It has the potential to become quite the steamy romance while at the same time it is a really cute bedtime story as it’d been originally told. The question I am asking myself is Do I want to keep my storyline PG or do I want to make it into a teen romance or adult romance for a more mature audience?
Personally at first I thought it would just be a romance novel. I remember I began reading romance novels when I was around eleven and in middle school and my obsession with romance has continued to now. The thing about romance novels is that there are a wide range of them and the ‘innocence’ levels as I like to call them are very different. Some romance novels have slowly budding love that becomes friendship then eventually the people get together, others start passionately as soon as the protagonists first meet. In Christian romance novels the main characters usually get married before the novel writes about any steamy consummation sex. When the first romance I read I believe was ‘forever’ by Judy Blume shows the reader that sex isn’t always part of what love and being loved is.

I don’t really remember the last romance I read because I went through a stage where I was more interested in reading all of the Carl Hiaasen collection. Carl Hiaasen is my favorite author and i find that his style or writing along with my love for romance has been part of what sparked how I’m writing my characters. Though Carl Hiaasen doesn’t really write direct romance he has many aspects of romance in his novels. His characters usually find love or something like it by the end of the books though they originally hadn’t intended to. It’s Carl Hiaasen’s characters that keep me intrigued and my characters in my novel are what the ten year old I babysit says are her favorite part.

My characters have the potential to keep any audience entertained and I’m hoping I’ll be able to continue to write them in a manner that makes them appropriate for people of all ages.

I wrote most of my characters based on people I know or have known in my life. The characters have changed as I’ve met new people and I’ve changed the development to fit different personality traits I’d like my characters to have. As I’ve changed My characters have also.

For example Craig used to be the basis of one of my characters Oliver and as I was writing Oliver’s character and back story I literally just took things out of Craig’s life and I took Craig’s mannerisms and I even asked Craig exactly what he’d think in certain situations. Sadly though Craig and I are no longer together or talking and Oliver’s character has kind of become the embodiment of the kind of guy I’d like to see myself marry one day. Oliver has become a little bit of everything I admired in my past boyfriends and I wished I’d be able to one day obtain.

Since Craig and my love story didn’t have a happy ending I’ve been debating whether or not to give my characters a happy ending or a realistic human ending that has the potential of not being positive.

My mom suggested that I write two sequels where I go through what life had been like if Oliver and Isabel got divorced. Or if Oliver and Isabel had had a good life and continued on with the happy ending.

Though it’s hard to show a person’s love story without getting into aspects of reality I’ve found that the hardest thing I’ve had to teach myself to express in writing is the way a person feels when they first encounter that initial mental and physical attraction to their counterpart. The fact is that sometimes people just get horny and I’m having a hard time determining what would be appropriate to say if the audience has the potential to be fairly young.

Hopefully I will find an answer soon and get this baby published.

There was a box of cake left outside on my neightbor’s deck.

I don’t know why they left it out and on the front deck that sits right across from my window…but they are kind of messy people who don’t clean after their dog when he poops in their ‘front yard’.

And from my window I watched as this cake which was still covered and entirely in it’s clear box attracted a cute little squirrel.

This cute little squirrel did everything in his power to get the cover off this cake…he spent hours banging his little body against the cake box so the box would break open, and I actually thought that might work…but it didn’t.

So the squirrel left for that day.

And the next day comes around and at the same time the squirrel is back…and this time it has decided against removing the cover off the cake that is tempting it in the box but instead it will make a hole big enough for it’s little arm to reach through to get to the cake inside.

So on this next day I watch while for hours this squirrel gnaws itself a pretty small hole, but the hole isn’t close enough to the cake for the squirrel to reach in and grab some, so the squirrel leaves.

All of this working on the cake has attracted quite the crowd of other squirrels and I am extremely interested in watching this smart little squirrel myself.

The following day I watched as the squirrel made no progress on the cake box but instead stood guard over the food it had discovered.

Then yesterday it went back to work and made the hole in the cake box big enough so it could wiggle inside…when it came out it was utterly covered in frosting of different colors and after cleaning itself I watched the squirrel go on a crazy jumping rampage as the sugar worked through the squirrel’s little system.

Last night it rained and sleeted then finally and sadly…snowed. And this morning I wake up to look out my window and I see the squirrel clearing the snow off of the box with it’s front arms and then I see the squirrel diving into the hole again. For almost a half hour it is inside and I realized that it was probably warmer in the cake box than it was outside in the wind and cold.

I also watched as one of my neighbors came out to retrieve the box that had been sitting outside now for about a week and a half…and it was great to watch them pick up the box (squirrel still inside) and begin to walk it back inside.

It was the most hilarious thing when the squirrel jumped out and startled this fully grown man right in front of me and got frosting paw marks all over his black suit jacket.

It was so funny I had to type it down before I headed off to work.

Squirrels are smart, and they’ve adapted to living with us in the cities.

This all starts I guess with the fact that I bought a gym membership.

no, this all starts with the fact that Heidi dragged me to LA fitness to try a special three day trial on February fifteen and they had a special half off on memberships deal and it was the last day of it so it was either buy a membership or remain unhealthy and unhappy.

So I got the membership with guest privileges which means that Heidi and I can go to the gym whenever we want and Heidi comes as my guest for free. I can also bring someone else along because I’m allowed to bring 2 guests.

We had gotten into the habit for the last few weeks or so of going to the gym Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays. We figured that it would be best if we spent our Mondays and Fridays recovering.

Well Heidi and I got into a little fight on Wednesday while I was hanging out at her mom’s house and we didn’t end up going to the gym together on Wednesday or Thursday nights. We needed to take a little time away from each other to cool down. But on Friday I really felt guilty for not having worked out those days and I really wanted to see Heidi again so I called her up and she said that she could pick me up from work.

So here I am at work on Friday afternoon and she’s really late…I call her up and she tells me that she isn’t far and that she’s on her way.

There’s this really good looking custodian who works at my building whose name is Mike. I see Mike all the time while I’m working in the mornings and afternoons but I’ve never had the guts to just walk up to him and ask him out. So here I am all alone sitting after my shift when everyones gone watching Mike clean the hallway and really enjoying my view. I’m also working on my Novel because I’m hoping to get it done before my birthday in July.

And here finally comes Heidi into the parking lot. While I’m gathering up my things and heading out with them I see Heidi get out of her car, walk around it and putting both her hands over her mouth gasping upset she looks at something the front right side of her car. At the time as I walked up I assumed that she’d been hit or that she’d hit something by the look on her face. As I approach the car and look at the tire I could tell right away that there was something terribly wrong. The car’s front right passenger tire was completely deflated and the car was literally sitting on it’s rim.

Worst flat tire I've ever seen!

“What happened?” I asked Heidi and she explained to me that it had begun to wobble on her a couple of blocks back and she’d driven really slowly with her hazard lights on in order to get to my work.

Heidi doesn't even know what happened!

I thought about what we should do, should we call Jimmy? Was there a spare tire in her trunk? Should we park it, call a cab and come back for it later?

All of this was really swell and good and I asked Heidi if she wanted me to call a tow truck or see if anyone was inside who could help us change the tire.

She was so in shock that she just said yes to everything and I went inside to find someone who could help us.

Low and behold there’s Mike just come down the hallway and I asked him if he knew anything about changing a flat tire. He said yes and I asked him for his help.

Heidi was right behind me and she reminded me that the tire was located in the truck of the car and that the only way a person could get into the trunk was to use a screwdriver to shimmy the trunk open.

So Mike being free and really friendly got a screwdriver for us. Since it’s the middle of Winter and really freaking dark and cold out after 6pm on a Friday he also offered to open the school’s garage and dock area for Heidi to put her car into while we changed the tire.

So, Heidi drove around the building and into the heated the garage. We then tried to open the trunk but we didn’t really know how we were supposed to do that, so here are me and Mike using trial and error trying to get this screwdriver to open her trunks lock.

“If only we had more light and could see what we were doing.” I said

And then Mike said he had the perfect thing, he was gone and came right back again with a mini blow torch. It was the coolest thing ever and after lighting a cigarette for Heidi who was pretty much praying and freaking out Mike and I managed to work together to get the truck open.

After we got the trunk open and the spare tire and jack out, Mike loosened the tire with a little help from me and it was time to put the jack under. We were all really nervous because the bottom of Heidi’s bar was extremely rusted so we were unsure if the little car jack would hold long enough for us to change the tire.

Nice Butt Mike :P

“I really hope it doesn’t fall down on top of me” Mike said

“YEAH! What if it squooshs Mike!” Heidi repeated frankically

“Well,” I said “I have 911 on speed dial”

we all had a really good laugh.

We tried once with the jack while being really cautious about how much we cranked it and how fast we cranked it. We stood back to admire our work on the jack so far when the jack began to collapse and we realized that the place we’d put it wasn’t stable enough to handle the weight of the olds mobile.

Strong man! yow!

So that began a little debate between me and Mike about where the best place would be…here we are laying beside the car in the puddles caused by the melting ice in the middle of this school’s garage feeling around on the bottom of the car for where there was less rust and more metal in which to put the jack.

We didn’t come to any agreement and I suggested that we ask an expert. I called my friend Jimmy and explained that we had a flat tire and that we needed to know the correct place to put the jack.

“Kiddo, I’m not going to instruct you where to put the jack on the car,” Jimmy said “I’m just going to come down there and do it myself.” He finished.

Jimmy had completely surprised us and blew us away. He once again was showing up to bust his butt to save mine. He’s truly a great friend.

So we gave Jimmy the address and he knew exactly where Burroughs school was. And while we waited for him to come we stood outside and had a smoke break and got to better know each other. It was nice to learn things about Mike and also it was nice when he told me that he’s only 23. He was so easy to talk to that I felt bad that I’d never had the guts to just go up to him and tell him that I found him attractive. We talked about cars and parties and being a smoking or nonsmoking person. We talked about family and jobs and how I got deported. Mike also talked about his job and how surprisingly that day Friday was his last day at Burroughs and that he was transferring to another school after Saturday.

It seemed like we covered a lot of bases while we stood there and eventually we moved back inside and to warmth. I liked how the whole time Mike was drinking a carton of chocolate milk. It made me smile.

So eventually Jimmy showed up with his industrial size car jack that he unloaded from his car and he also brought along with him Collin and Caylie…which made me positively elated. I introduced them to Mike and told him their ages and he told me that he had a little girl about Caylie’s age. ‘A little girl at 23 who is two years old?’ I thought ‘Then he must not be single.’ I thought sadly.

Collin and Caylie looked cold because they hadn’t had enough time to get gloves and hats and snow pants on before Jimmy had rushed them out the door and the garage door was standing wide open. So, Mike gave me his custodial keys and he told me that I could take them into the kindergarden classrooms to let them play. So I went where I was comfortable and I took them to the mpls kids classroom and watched them play. It was so nice to have them in a school environment and see how they reacted to the stimulus I felt like a mom watching her children in a classroom for the first time. It was fun seeing how they played with the toys and explored their imaginations. Something I rarely saw them do when I babysat them in their home. I thought of how much I wished I owned a daycare so I could help children develop instead of working in one.

Collin playing

Collin and Caylie Playing

Caylie with My little pony Collin Smiles Caylie plays

Eventually Mike and Heidi came by to get me and we closed up the classrooms and returned to Jimmy in the garage. I got to show Heidi where I worked and she said she wished she worked with me.

Jimmy said he’d follow us to the gas station to get air for Heidi’s doughnut and we got ready to leave and say our goodbyes. I strapped the kids into the car and asked Heidi to get Mike’s number for me. But she refused so when we went back inside to say goodbye I got the courage up to ask Mike for his number. I think my meeting him the way I did was fate because I would have been sad if he’d gone and I’d never be able to see him. I’d have noticed that he was missing because I often looked forward to seeing him in the building while I was on my shift.

So before we left I got his number and we all agreed to get together and hangout soon.

It was the coolest thing, I sent him a text to say thanks again and he actually invited me out.

We left and getting to the gas station We filled the tire and on top of that Jimmy checked all Heidi’s tires.

I decided to stay with Heidi for the night and we said goodbye to Jimmy. Driving really slowly Heidi drove towards home talking about food almost the whole time. Then I realized that I was super hungry and we both decided we’d stop into cub foods for some provisions on the way home. We bought some stuff to make Chinese food and we made it ‘slowly’ back to Heidi’s house.

YUMMY!

Back at Heidi’s place she took my cellphone and sent Mike a message telling him that I liked him.

I didn’t know she’d done it but he encouraged our hanging out more even after that…I WAS SO HAPPY TO HEAR THAT!

After making the chinese food and watching a movie we both drifted off to sleep at 4 or so am.

We both slept in till almost 2:30pm we were so tired!
Then Tom, Heidi’s boyfriend showed up and he offered to drive Heidi to work for 4:30. And she suggested that we all go out to Buffalo Wild Wings where she works and have a meal before her shift.

It was all so great and I got to shower before I left Heidi’s house. While I was in the car I got a text asking me to babysit at a clients house. I agreed and after eating and saying goodbye to Heidi Tom drove me to my clients house.

I babysat there till late tonight and then I took a taxi and a bus home.

I think I really had a mini adventure these last few days…doing new things and meeting new people.

-I want a house that smells like a home.
-I want a family that sits down at one table together for dinner every night.
-I want a family home that glows at night from the inside out.
-I want to ban cellphones and electronic devices from my breakfast, lunch and dinner table.
-I want to have a family room where both video and board games can be found.
-I want a family that is honest with each other.
-I want both the adults and the parents to be responsible for cleaning.
-I want everyone to have their own things…computers, spaces, and belongings so they don’t have to wait or fight over what belongs to who.
-I want to have a family date night…one night a week for family no exceptions.
-I want my family to be able to give my children an allowance.
-I want to develop a college fund for my children.