YOLO

Let's be honest here: 2013 was kind of a slump year for me.

After five years of some combination of school, working, and traveling, I found myself back at the other end of California, employed at a more demanding job and working on obtaining my CPA license, playing less soccer than we used to but also coaching a youth girls team, living in a bigger apartment for lower rent, in a town with limited culture and nightlife but overflowing with nature opportunities. After four years of living in the greater Los Angeles metropolitan area and four months abroad, this period of settling down in my old hometown has definitely been a change for us. And we've adjusted without any major hiccups, really. We appreciate everything we have, and have not wanted for anything since we've been here (except maybe a closer international airport and some legit Thai food).

Yet all year long, I couldn't shake this feeling of.... discontent, if you will.

Every year since I moved out of my parents' house after high school, I was working towards something: a college degree, a wedding, an amazing backpacking trip around Central Europe. But 2013?

That was the first year that I didn't have a specific goal to work toward (although my current lack of a CPA license begs to differ).

Settling down has been an odd transition for me. I've struggled with a lot of frustration and anxiety at... I'm not really sure how to describe it. Not having a goal? Not having a major goal, I suppose. It has been hard for me to live without direction, I guess.

Anywho. I have decided that I have had enough of being robotic and unmotivated. I wasted enough days in 2013, and I love life too much to let myself do that again in 2014. From here on out, I vow to make the choice to be happy, to do more fulfilling things with my free time - like hiking and cooking and bonding with old and new friends. I'm going to write more and I'm going to put in more effort coaching our girls team instead of just sitting back while Steve does all the work. I'm going to cook delicious things and get back in shape and finally finish unpacking all the boxes in our place that have sat untouched for over a year now. I want to be able to blog about adventures, and about thoughts that are important to me - not about my struggles and frustration (or nothing at all, as you may have noticed last year...). I resolve to be more proactive about improving and enjoying my life instead of just living it. I demand more from myself, and the way I lived in 2013, simply put, wasn't good enough.

To put it in the words of Mae West:
"You only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough."

Swamp Crack.

While in Louisiana, Steve and I went on an airboat ride through the swamps in search of gators. Little did we know, we came at the perfect time, because the day we went was the day before alligator hunting season started. Which means the gator were plentiful!

Can't say that we have this in California....

Notice the lack of insects buzzing around? We expected there to be bugs everywhere, but we only saw dragonflies.

Billy keeping his distance.

Nom nom nom.

Whenever someone found a gator (usually Steve), our tour guide would stop the airboat and pull up right next to it so we could get a closer look.

[SOMEONE IN THE BOAT]: "What are you throwing at them?"

[GUIDE]: "Marshmallows."

[SOMEONE]: "......Marshmallows?"

[GUIDE]: " Yeah. Everything in the swamp eats marshmallows. That's why we call it swamp crack."

RibbFest

DISCLAIMER: I stole all these photos from Iris' Facebook. :P

The last week of August was a busy one for Steve and me. We started off with a drive down to Sac to visit our friend Korea (and eat at Gunther's Ice Cream, delicious), spent the night, then woke up early to get to So Cal in time for RibbFest/friends reunion.

The proper way to drink beer during RibbFest

Rib toast

Reunited with our college friends for a pre-RibbFest soccer match

Nomming with Lindsey, one of the RibbFest hosts

The bone pile

In short: we played some soccer, swam a little bit, ate lots of ribs, drank lots of beer, and hung out with lots of friends. The following day found us at an awesome gourmet bratwurst place in Orange County with Greek Matt and Jessica for brunch and at the movies + Dave & Buster's for a double date with Steve's brother David and his girlfriend Jackie before heading out to see Steve's mom that evening.

The following day (Monday morning), we hopped on a plane heading out to The Big Easy - New Orleans, Louisiana!

Beertown USA

This post has been a long time coming, since we visited Bend back at the beginning of August.

Bend, Oregon has the most breweries per capita than anywhere else in the United States - approximately one for every 9,000 people. I also happen to have an aunt who lives there, and the girls soccer team that Steve and I coach happened to have a soccer tournament there at the beginning of August. So, Beertown USA, here we come! (Or came, since that was over a month ago.)

Our girls were put in the Gold division at the tournament, and unfortunately did not move on to the championship game. But they played hard, scored some goals, and have definitely improved from the first tournament back in May - so we are very much looking forward to the rest of the season. (More on coaching in another post, I promise.)

Since I've got a lot of catching up to do on this blog, here's our Bend trip in pictures:

Look at all the pretty colors!

Chickens at my aunt's house :D

Billy relaxing on my aunt's back porch during the sunset.

Since my aunt lives in the boonies, with beautifully clear skies and absolute quiet, I wanted to see the sunrise. So Steve and I got up at 6am, only to find too many clouds to really see it. Oh well...

Brew Werks was probably my favorite of the 7 breweries we visited in the four days we were up there.

Billy wanted to come rafting with us. Despite his little plastic bag poncho and my semi-waterproof shirt, he still got soaked! The first time he's had a bath... ever. :P

                      

We went rafting on the Deschutes River - Before picture of Steve and my aunt Leslie.

Before picture of my dad and me. Neither of us had ever been rafting before.

About five minutes after we set out, it started HAILING.

The raft behind us.

After picture of Steve and Aunt Leslie - soaked to the bone.

After picture of my dad and me. A wave knocked me off my seat! Luckily I ended up in the middle of the raft two people back, instead of in the river.... (Also, my waterproof camera had water on the lens, which is why my dad's face is blurry - he is not a ghost, I promise.)

Billy met some friends while strolling along the banks of the Deschutes as it ran through the town.

There was a car show going on downtown while we were there.

In case you can't tell: this police car has been turned into A GIANT BARBEQUE! They are grilling in the front, smoking meat in the middle, and adding wood in the trunk.

And yet more beer.

A Short Thought.

Steve and I were reminiscing about our Europe trip last year, so we brought up the blog to fill in the memory gaps. And I realized that I haven't touched this thing in almost three months.

This time last year, I was blogging every other day to fill everyone in on the goings-on of life out of a backpack. I was constantly behind on blogging because I had too much to do and not enough time to type it all up. And now?

*sigh*

That's not to say that we haven't been enjoying ourselves here. Work is going well and we're having a lot of fun coaching a youth girls soccer team and occasionally we find ourselves on stage at karaoke night at The Red Lion. The area is beautiful, even if it is lacking in culture. Steve brews beer with my dad sometimes, and so far everything has turned out pretty good. We celebrated Steve's birthday with a keg of beer, home-made carrot cake (made by yours truly), and lots of good friends. [A step up, perhaps, from shoveling manure on a farm like last year?] We are healthy and getting fitter by the day (at least Steve is); our apt definitely has a sense of "us" in it, even if it is a bit messy sometimes [or a lot messy a lot of the time]; and we have a trip out to New Orleans coming up soon. Not much to complain about, right?

Life has been treating us well. But I miss laying around on secluded beach coves and exploring the city's massive farmer's markets and spending every minute with my husband. I even miss playing charades with the waiters at restaurants and having only a few outfits to choose from - it definitely made getting dressed in the morning a lot easier.

More details on life these days later - right now I plan on dreaming of future adventures over a glass of wine.

Driving.

So this is my second Blog Every Day in May post, even though it's not May anymore, and even though it's been quite a few days since my last post. The next prompt I chose was this one: 

Day 12, Sunday: What do you miss? (a person, a thing, a place, a time of your life...)


When Steve and I were in Europe last year (I can't believe it's been a year since that trip!), we spent four glorious months walking, biking, and taking public transportation. The only time either of us drove was when we were working on that farm in Hungary, and then it was only a tractor. The only times either of us sat in a car was when we were hitchhiking back and forth from that farm to a music/arts festival a few villages over. And there wasn't a single moment in that whole four months that I thought to myself, "Man, you know what I wish I could do right now? DRIVE."

We never had to. The places we visited were all made for pedestrians - everything was within walking distance from everything else. After the initial shock of observing our Polish friend Anna walk us the long way back to her flat IN HEELS, we realized that, yes, anything that is three miles or less is in walking distance. Any place that was farther away or that we wanted to get to quickly was reachable by bus or subway. Occasionally we would ride bikes to places. Looking around us, we soon realized something that was the opposite of how life is in the United States: if you want to get anywhere in Europe, driving is probably the most inconvenient way of going about it.

Within an hour of arriving back in the United States, we hopped on a six-lane freeway heading home from LAX and passed by at least four accidents. Which is three more than we saw the ENTIRE TIME we were in Europe. A few days later, we were driving with a friend of ours to another friend's soccer game, and she asked us this completely absurd question:

"So did you guys miss being able to drive around in your own car while you were gone?"

Umm. No. Absolutely not.

For the last year and a half (ish) that Steve and I were in school, we were interning (then working FT) at places that were 30 miles away from where we were living. Luckily for us, our jobs weren't too far apart from each other and we usually carpooled. But those 45+ minutes of driving each way, five days a week? Awful. And we were going against traffic. Our commute would've easily been doubled or tripled if we'd had to drive in the other direction. Suffice it to say that before we went to Europe, I already disliked having to drive anywhere. And if I didn't like it when I had to do it, I sure as hell didn't like it after living for four months without it.

I don't know how people do it. I don't know why Americans insist on doing it. So to answer the question of "What do I miss":

I miss not having to drive. Ever.

Driving sucks. Cars are expensive, for one thing. Between gas and maintenance and insurance, not to mention the actual purchase of the vehicle, it's a lot more trouble than it's worth. The hectic times of the day traffic-wise are the times when people are already cranky and pissed off and ready to just GET HOME. So what happens when you put a whole bunch of annoyed, restless, irritable people in vehicles and stick them all on the road at the same time? Road rage, and accidents, and horn honking and cursing and middle fingers everywhere. Not to mention it's bad for the environment, having so many cars on the road all at once.

I work about one mile from where I live, and I still drive to work all the time. Why? Because I suck at waking up early and in the afternoons now it is too blasted hot to do anything (it's supposed to hit 110 degrees this weekend) and basically because I am lazy. And I need to change that, because seriously? I. HATE. DRIVING.

So this is not so much an answer to the prompt, but more of a declaration:

I am going to drive less. Because walking or biking is less offensive to my mental health, my waistline, and the environment. This means no more waking up ten minutes before I need to run out the door and jump in my car to get to work on time. This probably means packing a lunch for work (unless I can convince Steve to bike over and bring me food :D ). This means sucking it up when it's hot outside, because you know what else is hot? The steering wheel of a car that's been baking outside all day long. And the car key after six minutes of being in the ignition (I can't count the number of times I have burned myself pulling the key out even though it only takes a few minutes to get home). I vow to spend less time rolling my eyes at other drivers and more time soaking in the beautiful sunshine. I vow to alleviate stress by both avoiding the maniacs driving down Market Street and getting some exercise in every day. I vow to spend less money on gas and more money on fresh produce at the farmer's market, which, now that June has hit, will be open on Thursday in the Promenade, which is on my way home from work. I vow to think happy thoughts on these walks, which will only take about ten minutes more than it would to drive. I vow to admire all the trees in my town and remember that by walking, I am helping the environment that those trees grown in.

I miss not having to drive... It's time to remember what that's like.

Summary of My Life.

So my cousin was participating for a while in this challenge called "Blog Every Day in May." I didn't realize she was doing it until about two weeks into May (and realized that going from hardly blogging ever to blogging EVERY DAY was a bit too ambitious), so I figured it was too late to jump in.

But I looked at all the daily prompts and I really like some of them. So I'm cheating, and just doing some of them, and I'm not going to write every day because really, I probably won't, and this will probably extend past May since we've only got a week of it left. So here goes -

Day 1: Story of your life, in 250 words or less.

I’ve done the typical life things for a twenty-something: graduated college, held down a good job, become financially stable. But those things don’t define me. They don’t really represent anything I stand for as a person.

 I love to see beautiful things, taste delicious things, and do incredible things. I am a world traveler and a wife, a planner at heart, a soccer player and coach. I have tattoos that are a statement to the kind of life I try to live, I love wearing lipstick even though my husband doesn’t like to kiss me when I do, and I don’t brush my hair very often. I have learned to fear nothing and sometimes find myself crying, not because I’m sad but because this world is so beautiful and life is so short. I am a decent writer, despite my tendency to use too many run-on sentences. I am no longer a picky eater. I often suffer from book hangover. Some bucket list items are to see as many countries as possible, learn another language fluently, get a six-pack, participate in a polar bear plunge, compete in an amateur ballroom dance competition, take a trapeze class, pay a stranger’s dinner bill, and jump in a taxi and yell “follow that car!”

I think my husband is the handsomest man I’ve ever seen, I prefer to spend money on experiences, not things, and I ALWAYS dance like no one is watching.

Above all things, I am a WOMAN. Happy and alive.