Re: Actual Required Viewing

I know I can't actually make you watch it. But you should. You really, really, really should. I mean it.

Actual Required Viewing

Please, please watch this. Please spread it around.

The Advocate:

Writer Dan Savage is reaching out to LGBT teenagers to let them know life may be difficult now, but "it gets better."

The "It Gets Better" Project is inspired by the suicide of 15-year-old Indiana teenager Billy Lucas, who hanged himself last week in his family's barn after enduring bullying from his classmates. After writinga post on The Slog about Lucas's death last week, one commenter expressed a desire to have spoken to him to tell him that things get better.

Just Sayin'

via Married to the Sea

Re: Hellllllllo, Broad Street!

Yesterday, we had a most excellent housewarming party. Some of my very favorite people were there, and I was so happy. Superb friends and family, Jessica & Sung, tasty foods, David & Dan, good wine and beer, Amanda & Jamie, old and new friends, Mark (& Stacy) old and new memories, Eric & Tiffany, catching up, Mom and Dad, gummy bears, Lauren, Uncle Richard, Apples to Apples. 808 1/2 Broad Street has never had a better day. Thanks, thanks, everyone!

p.s. why were there so many cameras but not one picture? nuts!

Re: Fall 2010

Here's what I'm actually taking (not this) this semester:

• Social Justice
• Holistic Health Practices
• Child Welfare Policies
• Community Leadership & Development

I've finished my second week of classes, and I'm pretty sure this semester is going to be a good one. Here are some neat things coming up (I don't care if Christopher Moore says bulleting things isn't blogging. He hasn't written anything good since 2006.):

• I'll be attending a local training on Child on Child Sexually Aggressive Behavior
• I'll be on a research panel for a study on body image in young women
• I'll be attending a workshop in Syracuse on LGBTQ Teens and Suicide Prevention
• I am in the process of writing a research brief on LGBTQ teens and suicide
• I have an interview at Planned Parenthood for my Spring 2011 internship
• I'll be researching the Southern Tier Aids Program (STAP, one of my favorite local organizations) and SayIT intervention team, a part of the Crime Victims Assistance Center

I feel energized and excited to be involved in more than just my required class work. I can feel that my interests are sharpening and that soon I'll have a good sense of which population (LGBTQ teens, women in crisis) I'm most suited to advocate for and work with.

I definitely have a bee in my bonnet about going to grad school next year. I feel like I'm really amping up and will definitely be ready to flourish very soon. The question is whether or not we can afford it (we can't). If we figure out a way to pay for it (LOANS!), by the time I'm finished and start a career, will I have time for a baby? Which is more important to me? What if I forgo grad school for a baby and my parts don't work? It may seem as though I'm getting ahead of myself, but I'm not. This is the exact semester during which I need to do all sorts of work about grad school. I feel like if I don't do it now, I may not ever; I don't know if that's ok with me.

Smaller Than a....

Yesterday, I was listening to "A Way With Words," an NPR show (I listen via podcast) about words and grammar and language-all things that I love. On this particular episode, entitled "Sufficiently Suffonsified,"A Japanese woman called to ask about the expression "happy as a clam." As the hosts, Martha Barnette and Grant Barrett, were talking to her, they asked her about other Japanese colloquialisms. The caller shared that, when describing something that is very small, folks from her area of Japan often say that something is "smaller than a cat's forehead." Isn't that great! You know where this is going, right? I want to start saying that very small things are smaller than a bunny's forehead! That's pretty small!

p.s. This isn't exactly her forehead, but Olive is only so amenable (which is to say, not very).

Overheard in the J and L House: A Bunny Edition

Lisa to Jesse: Can you get Olive to come out, and can you take a picture of her forehead for me, please?

Say Your Goodbyes and My "Dream Job"

While purging my inbox, I happened upon some emails from my dear friend and mentor, Kirk Shreve. I realized that he's been gone for exactly four years to the day, less than a month before my wedding (I had been waiting impatiently for Kirk and Alex's RSVP. His August 15, 2006 email said "of course" he was planning on attending). Further, I spent a couple hours yesterday ruminating on the possibility of a return to funeral service (Some days, I think my "dream" job would be doing only body prep: embalming, dressing, make-up. No removals except the gross or interesting ones, no dress clothes, no arrangements, certainly no property maintenance. All embalmings and prep, all the time Weird that that sounds perfect to me, huh?).

Ordinarily, I would have chalked these deliberations up to trepidation regarding recent contemplations about grad school. Now it's perfectly clear to me that it was my "Uncle" Kirk. He was a generous, loving and wise friend. I'm sure my life would be much different than it is now if Kirk was still around.

Overheard

Binghamton University Office of Commencement to Lisa:

Dear Lisa, Welcome to your senior year!

Lisa: Thank you, BUOC!