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feelings

indulgence

abby mumford

a birthday. my birthday. coming soon. i can’t avoid it, so all that’s left to do is embrace it.

*hugs*

yeah, so today, on the eve of my 30th birthday, i’m going to keep this short. i’m not going to wax eloquent about leaving one decade (my 20s) and entering another (my 30s). i’m not going to whine about getting older. nor am i going to brag about how i really am still quite young. i am, however, going to share these with you:

looks like not much has changed in 30 years, except for the fact that i can’t sit like that anymore. in fact, looking at those pictures makes my hamstrings hurt.

ANYWAYS, there’s one little thing i need you to do. one little question i need you to answer…

what is your favorite post from my blog?

that’s it. that’s all you have to answer. dear readers, this is cake. so easy! it won’t take long. consider it your present to me. and don’t forget, i know who you are. i know where you live. i just may come find you if you don’t answer. it may not be tomorrow. it may be today. or a week from now. or later this year, but i will haunt you. you know what a scary thought that is. i know you don’t want to live with the fear that i’ll be just around the corner waiting, watching, ready to pounce, so spare yourself and just answer me now.

indulge me, won’t you?

(oops, that was two questions. looks like turning 30 hasn’t help my math skills.)

(just to be clear: today’s not my birthday. tomorrow is. JANUARY 8. learn it. know it. love it.)

(yes, i share a birthday with elvis. no, i can’t swivel my hips like he does. guess i’ll have to find my fame and fortune another way.)

feelings

reconnecting

abby mumford

i had a gloriously long christmas vacation, but an unintentional side effect of being at my parents’ house and not being at my apartment or at work was that i rarely interacted with technology.

ok, that’s a lie.

obviously, i still used my phone and watched TV and took pictures and checked email and turned on lights and the oven and the stove top and the microwave, but i didn’t spend all day in front of a computer like i do on a normal workday. the hours flew by as we read and ate and entertained baby mac and played games and read and ate and napped and walked and ran errands and talked and ate and played games. it was grand.

i feel energized.

now it’s a new year and work has resumed and thus (after a few minor mishaps with email and voicemail and accidentally closing out of a database), i’ve replugged myself back into the interwebs.

*waves hello*

feelings

NYE 2010

abby mumford

as the celebrations gear up and the year 2010 draws to a close, i wanted to wish you a happy, healthy, and hilarious 2011.

thanks for reading, for commenting, for sharing this blog space with me as i muddle and mumble my way through. your company makes this corner of the blogesphere feel like home.

*raises champagne glass*

here’s to another year together.

feelings

open to interpretation

abby mumford

even if i have the recipe right in front of me, my cooking skills are not top notch. sure, i can complete the most basic of dishes, but don’t expect me to prepare a full color oil painting type dish. it’s best if you only expect a stick figure meal from me.

sister J and i were tasked with completing christmas dinner while mom, dad, and sister E went out to spread the holiday cheer. this is a multi dish dinner and one we’ve helped mom make over the years. we were floating high with the christmas spirit and figured it’d be no big deal. what we didn’t account for was the absence of mom’s knowledgable eyes watching over us. our cooking efforts rapidly distintigrated.

J: should i err on the side of too many cashews or too few?

me: too many. everyone loves nuts. (TWSS)

meanwhile, me: *stirs vigorously* J, this chocolate sauce isn’t so much a sauce. it’s more of a tar. think i should add more water?

J: yes. no. I DON’T KNOW! help! this cashew butter is just a pile of cashews. it’s too salty.

me: *eyes pot* *tastes* *tongue shrivels from excess salt* i think you should have erred on the side of too few nuts.

our laughter boiled quicker than the sauces. eventually i got the chocolate sauce to thin (too much, of course) and J fixed the cashew butter and the dinner turned out almost as delicious as ever, though we did get a few “i’ve never seen it done this way before.” that’s what happens you leave a project open to someone else’s interpretation.

it’s like reading a book. when you sit down to read, you bring your own life experiences and information with you. when the author wrote that scene about a family dinner, he might have meant it to be a minor scene, one to show the dynamics of the family, but when i read that scene, i flashed back to that one time sister J and i had to take charge in the kitchen. neither of us suspected we’d have to call on all of our culinary knowledge and since said knowledge is rather limited, we laughed to cover the gaps because we were down in the trenches together, family style. i automatically think of family dinners as major scenes, not minor moments.

it’s just like my coworker said, “a book is never complete until it’s read.” and that’s because the author writes the story they intended, but i read the story as it relates to my life and you read the tale as it exists in relation to you and he reads it with his rose tinted glasses and she reads it with a cynical slant and on and on. the most successful stories make us all feel like the story was written exclusively about ourselves.

perhaps THIS is why i read. i’m looking for bits of myself. my definition of self is still evolving and so finding pieces of myself as i relate to the story, to the author, to my surroundings, to my family, to my life helps to solidify my view of me.

so in this post holiday haze, i declare we should all keep reading, keep cooking, keep learning, keep living. they’re all noble pursuits.

feelings

santa’s secrets

abby mumford

december 24th has always been a magical sort of day, especially when the stockings were hung by the chimney with care cause we knew SANTA WAS COMING!

GROWING UP. santa’s arrival was SUCH AN EXCITING THING, it was impossible to sleep in. since my poor parents had been up to all hours getting things ready, they refused to get out of bed before the sun was up (how rude), but we weren’t allowed to open presents until they were awake. what a conundrum! and so to contain our energy (read: delay the inevitable), they compromised with us: we could open stocking gifts without parents present. and so. we did. at 5am. and then we’d fall asleep waiting for mom and dad to wake up before the main show (breakfast, getting dressed, making beds, and then OPENING PRESENTS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) could begin.

NEXT. we got older and found out what (or rather who) is behind the magic. at first, it seems a bit disappointing, but then you realize the magic is still there because when you think about it (and you do), you understand that it really does take magic to pull off an event like christmas. (and you thank your parents for the efforts they put in all those years). and you get excited by the holiday all over again.

AND THEN. i was lucky enough to have sister E be born when i was 11, which meant we got to play along with the santa magic, except this time, WE were the magic. i don’t have to tell you how cool it was to be in on the secret. to be the one eating the cookies and drinking the milk and nibbling the carrots left out for santa and his reindeer. to be the one who’s footsteps could be mistaken for a reindeer on the roof. sister E outgrew it, but nieces and nephews catapulted onto the scene and so us being the magic continued. happily.

AND NOW. all those years believing + all those years being means the magic for me is still tangible. probably because i want it to be. and i don’t mean i want it to be true that one man flies all over the world delivering presents and taking credit away from mom and dad. what i mean is that i now know how hard this holiday is on everyone and so i want the magic to inflitrate our worlds as laughter and relaxing moments and shiny lights and warm family moments and getting to sleep in.

thanks for putting on a merry show again this year, Santa, i mean, mom and dad.