saturday supreme

what a day
i feel like so much was packed into yesterday! i went for a run in the morning [~4.5ish miles on the bolin creek trail] while listening to a very fitting and powerful tara brach podcast. it was all about the fleeting and temporary nature of our lives, and how trying to exert control where control is impossible only causes suffering. her description:

Only by opening our hearts to change and loss can we live and love fully. Yet much of our life is organized around finding ground– avoiding the insecurity of change, loss and death. This talk explores how our ways of grasping and resisting remove us from the spontaneity and aliveness, the love and wisdom, that is our human potential.

it felt like she was speaking right to me: i do think there are a number of things i am still spending a lot of energy resisting, and it is not doing me any good. i need to accept: the [slow] pace i was running; the [slow] path towards our TTC goals; the changes that accompany getting older and entering a new season of life.

anyway. i don’t mean to get so serious on a weekend morning, but i think there was so much applicable wisdom in tara’s words. it was the perfect prelude for . . .

attacking the closet conundrum
as i wrote before, i knew that i had to do something about my closet chaos, and i knew that it wouldn’t be all that much fun. however, josh helped me a great deal and i pulled out item after item. we separated things into two piles:

a) items that i love but currently do not fit [to be stored under the bed]

b) items that i do not love/do not wear, whether it fit or not. in addition, anything ripped, dingy-looking, or out-of-date was an automatic candidate for this pile. [to be ebay’d or donated]

after the great weed-out, josh grabbed my trusty rhodia list-making pad to create a list of what i needed. as it turns out, i really was left with a pretty empty closet. since i already tackled the jeans issue and i have a decent collection of casual tops, i was most in need of work clothes: pants, shirts, layering cardigans, maybe a skirt. we wrote down the stores we were planning to hit [banana, gap, jcrew, anthro, ann taylor loft] and headed out the door.

i made the decision in my head NOT to play mind games over sizes [women: you know what i mean], and that i wouldn’t worry too much about price. this sounds reckless, but honestly when i try to stick to sale pieces — well, they often end up in category b), above. i knew it would not damage our budget significantly if i just got what i thought i needed, within reason, and i wanted to end up with pieces that i actually liked and felt good in.

here’s a little taste of how we did:

i think our trip was a big success! what i ended up with:

✰ a pair of black pants and orange-pink cardigan from banana republic

✰ light tan pants, 2 short-sleeved button downs [white + teal], 2 cardigans [black + lavender], and a skirt from benetton

✰ pink pants from j. crew

i don’t think i’ve gone on a shopping trip this large in years, but it was needed. i can ditch the med-school-era pants and tops and i will no longer faced with a row of clothing that doesn’t fit when i am getting ready for work in the morning.

oh, and these?

i wore them ALL around the mall and was totally comfortable! i think they are going to be the official sandals of summer ’11.

since josh was so nice and patient (waiting nicely for me outside of all of the fitting rooms and offering a thumbs up or down), i indulged his request for dinner:

in his element with a five guys burger
i really feel uncomfortable eating fast food chain burgers these days [just blame food inc.], so i got a grilled cheese with tomato:

no healthier, i assure you, but i didn’t have to worry about mystery meat.
after all of that shopping, we even had time to fit in a movie!

[source]
i definitely recommend it, though my oscar pick still would have been black swan.

today’s adventure
we are going to take a look at a potential durham apartment! we’ve been on the waiting list at this complex for months now, so i’m really excited to see it. we are still planning on moving (back to durham) in may . . . closer to work, the yoga studio, and local yogurt. come on, i have my priorities straight!

ps
GO DUKE!!

——————————————————————-

3.19.11

workout: 4.5 mile run (or thereabouts). i have decided that sadly i need to take some time away from yoga classes. i will resume yoga (at home) today but only doing things that don’t aggravate the injury.

excavation question:

is there anything in your life that you are actively resisting or trying to control?

that one isn’t via baron baptiste — it’s just from me 🙂