Dear Love, (Another Collection)

[If you're new here: This is a continuation of an ongoing series on the blog, written to the imagined but maybe someday real person whom I will call Love. The other installments can be found in the Dear Love label, where you should work from the bottom-up for the full (somewhat cringey) saga.]

So Love,

Where are you hiding?

Sincerely,
-Me

Dear Love,

Okay, but for reals? 

Are you on the scary dating apps? On the scary social media somewhere? In the scary public spaces? 

How am I supposed to find you if I'm too anxious for this dating world?? If I knew where you were, I could just go there to find you and not have to risk having to talk to any of the dating horror story bros, maybe?

I've been hoping that you'll just appear in my life, but this strategy does not appear to be working... My world has gotten even smaller since I wrote to you last, and I like it that way, but I'm also not sure that I know how to open it up again.

If you could just do all of the work to bring us together that would be grand, thanks.
-Em

Dear Love,

I'm curious... have you dated? Or, have you been perpetually single like me?

We're old enough now that you could very feasibly have been married and divorced, which is hard to wrap my little meatball around.

I'm not asking because it would be a negative for me, but I wonder sometimes if it would be to you?

Hopefully not,
-Em

Dear Love,

I exist in a dichotomy of thoughts about you.

I wish you were a part of my life, but I'm not sure how to fit you in to it.

Does that make sense? Assuming that you are also in the part of adulthood where you've had to make decisions you thought you would make with a partner but there was no partner so you just made them with only you in mind, how do you think we adjust to fit another person in now? Like, I wish for cuddles, but my bed is a twin bed, and my living room chair is a chair that fits just me... and it's not like I couldn't buy new furniture, but what I'm saying is: I want you here, but I can't envision you existing in the space that I've created for just me. And, imagining leaving this space is equally difficult. It seemed easier when I was younger and had adopted the idea that we'd find each other before age 25 and build the future together. I've started the future without you and I worry that we've built in different directions, you know? There are parts of what I have now that I would be sad to lose in the making of room for you, but also... I would like to make room for you? It's confusing.

I wish that we would have been together already, but also...

Have you seen where all the guys that I've previously crushed on are now?? WHEW! Did I ever dodge several bullets there, eh? I suppose I shouldn't be surprised -- given that my entire pool of gentlemen to crush on in my 20s came from the conservative bible college students who were doing their "field ed" at my church -- that they are all very cringey in their religious and political views to me now!

I don't know how much you've changed, but I certainly have. So I'm glad in some ways that I've had time to finish developing my character, and my relationship skills, and my values, and my mental health before you and I started anything, because I fear that I might have hurt you with what I didn't know yet. But maybe we would have grown and learned together, who knows? This, it turns out, is also confusing.

And then there's the thought that, though -I- think I'm pretty awesome, I worry that you.. won't like me?

This one is silly, I know, but it spins on the little hamster wheel in my head, nonetheless. There are parts of me that aren't my favorite and I'm sorry in advance that you will have to put up with them. Sometimes I think that I'm glad you aren't here to see those parts of me, but maybe that's just a misguided attempt to protect my heart. Not from you! But from missing you, maybe? It hurts to miss you, but somehow I still have to keep doing the life things? And maybe it's easier for my meatball to worry that you'll be disappointed than it is to worry that you'll never be here at all.

It's all a little/lot confusing.

For what it's worth, though, it would be my preference to walk through the difficult parts of making room for you, and to make up for lost time with you, and to work through the messy bits of being vulnerable with you, over the alternative option where I continue on without you. I think.

Not quite enough to try dating apps, but time will tell.

Someday yours, maybe.
-Emmi

I'll write more soonish, hopefully, but it is past midnight and I must sleep now.

Fighting with the HTML

The old blogger was way more fun for customizing. Yesterday, I picked this theme from the options available just so that the blog wouldn't look so nasty on modern devices. So far so good, except I don't love how the home page of this theme is only previews of each post, and that, for reasons I will never understand, the previews ignore any formatting (like paragraph breaks or font differences) which... just... why tho??

So I'm back today to try to fix it, and I'm fighting with the HTML (which is a nightmare on it's own because it won't work properly with Chrome's Find tool... again, why??) to get it to show the whole post on the home page instead of just previews, and so far I've gotten it to work... but only with posts that aren't the most recent one?? 

And yes, this post has been at test to see if a new post will make that quirk just fix itself.

Edit: It did not. Back to the HTML I go.. pray for me :P

Edit2: I figured out how to search the code! Hallelujer!

Edit3: I saw this time that it was treating the most recent post as a Featured Post and I was able to turn that off in the layout menu. I also switched themes to have a menu/sidebar option. I'm not going to worry about the READ MORE button at the moment, because apparently this theme doesn't work with page breaks, and that's the only way to open up any posts that may have them.

And with that (plus a whole bunch of other things I did :P) I think it's time to call it a day.

Tread with care.

This is your warning. Past this point, you are going way, way, way back in time.

It's been eight (gasp! 8) years since I blogged last, and... a lot has changed. Too much to put in a blog post. I know this, for I have tried to write a summary of 2015-2023 many, many a time to my great fatigue at the sheer magnitude of the task. *faints dramatically*

Silly hyperbole aside, if you continue below this point, I humbly ask that you have compassion on wee baby 22-25 year old Emmi.

She's cringe at times, but I'm reluctant to hide any of her posts, somehow.  What she wanted to say here still matters to me. Even in her undiagnosed anxiety, not yet deconstructed, naive, insecure state, I love that silly goose that was me in another lifetime. I think she'd be proud of where we are now.

Obligatory Time Jump Title Card

 

Letters to Anxiety

Edit from the future for some context:

Summer of 2015 I learned that I had been living with undiagnosed anxiety. And not just for a few years, but likely for my whole life. To say that the coping mechanisms that I had learned in those 25 years were "bad" is a significant understatement. It took me 3 years from this point to learn enough healthy coping mechanisms to -start- to tip the balance in the right direction, and another 2 years before I stopped using "failure" as a label for myself.

Of all the posts on this blog, this one is the one I've wanted to delete the most. Just look at it! It's so cringey!! But, for better or for worse, I've decided that it gets to stay. It was an honest moment in time, and I don't have the heart to hide it.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Hey Anxiety,

You suck.

Sincerely, Me

P.S. I'm going to start writing you letters. I won't say daily (because we all know that isn't going to happen!), but I'm gonna start a collection on here. Like, on this single post. This will either flop or be really interesting to look back on.

P.P.S. Either way, no need to reply.

P.P.P.S. Srsly. Don't.

P.P.P.P.S. Putting in a line break thing so that only those who want to have to read the post that will maybe get really really really long.  You have to click on the clicky thing to read more.

[Edit from the future to remove the page break because it doesn't work on the new blogger anyway. It didn't end up being all that long of a post, but brace yourself: this is the cringey part :P]

2015-Dec-27
Hey Bird-Breath,

I think I found our song...

Didn't think we could have a song did ya?

Me neither.

But I heard it today and I realized that it's perfect,  I've been singing it with us in mind all evening.

Landslide by Fleetwood Mac

Right?!?

...you don't get it? You say that has nothing to do with anxiety?

You'd be wrong. Behold, the lyrics (plus commentary):
.....
I took my love and took it down
[You're my "love"] [Not in the romantic sense, gross. But somehow, my brain has a connection with you that it is unwilling to let go of... perhaps you can see where I'm going with this already...]
I climbed a mountain and I turned around
And I saw my reflection in the snow-covered hills
Till the landslide brought me down
[This feels like it has literally happened in my figurative emotional/mental space, like, daily. Climbin' those little mountains that look like success to mostly just me when BLAM! THANKS FOR THE LANDSLIDE, ANXIETY] 

Oh, mirror in the sky, what is love?     [Well, mirror...?]
Can the child within my heart rise above?     [... ... But really, can it...?]
Can I sail through the changing ocean tides?     [... .... But really, can I...?]
Can I handle the seasons of my life?     [.... um. You know this is starting to sound like one of those thought spirals I get into... I bet you wish your doubtsy lies were as pretty sounding.]

Well, I've been afraid of changing     [HA! You don't say?]
'Cause I've built my life around you     [...This is becoming undeniable.]
But time makes you bolder     [I hope so.]
Even children get older     [Truth! ...and that child I once was has become ME]
And I'm getting older too     [...I've changed a lot more than you want me to believe, haven't I]

Well, I've been afraid of changing     [But apparently I've done more than I realized!]
'Cause I've built my life around you     [And you are a rotten life-core, f'reals.]
But time makes you bolder     [Wow! This has been a really powerful 5 seconds of song!>
Even children get older     [Yeah they do!]
And I'm getting older too     [Yeah I am!]
Oh, I'm getting older too     [Repeating it for emphasis! I totally am!]

I take my love, take it down     [YES!]
I climb a mountain and turn around     [This mountain is way better than that last mountain, too.]
And if you see my reflection in the snow-covered hills
Will the landslide bring you down?     [Oh, I hope so!]
[I need to repeat that to give me time for pondering how to cause a literally figurative landslide]
And if you see my reflection in the snow-covered hills
Will the landslide bring you down? oh, oh  [uh oh for you...?]

The landslide bring you down     [*evil grin*]
.....

OH YEAH!  Feel that light shining into this darkness!! MM FEELS GOOD!

Best wishes (but not actually), Me

To Read, in the Event of Engagement

If ever I'm in the position of planning a wedding, there are some things I want to remember.

In the grand scheme of marriage, the wedding is really the least interesting :). Keep it fun, keep it casual, don't get stressed.

Speaking of stressed, I think the worst thing would be to have the day be surrounded by stress. Who wants to look back on their wedding day and remember how stressful it was. Keep it fun, keep it casual, don't get stressed.

Trying to please everyone will leave someone disappointed, it's inevitable. Be careful to not constantly have that person be you. Respectfully let others be disappointed too. Keep it fun, keep it casual, don't get stressed.

Break the mold. Who says your public commitment has to look like everyone expects it to? Those people don't need to be invited and/or they can be disappointed. You do not have to spend a lot of money on "wedding things" that you don't even want or need. Keep it fun, keep it casual, don't get stressed.

Speaking of money. Don't try to save money by "delegating" the costs to family and friends. By this is I mean, don't ask people to do things for free, don't ask them if they would bring 12 veggie trays but oh hey do it with their own money, generally just don't ask people to spend money on you and if they offer to spend money on you be hella grateful because that person is a lovely person.

Keep it fun, keep it casual, don't get stressed.

As an extra, maybe try to not make a date until you have collected all/most of the things that you need to spend money on. You know, like set a moderate monthly wedding budget and slowly collect the goods, THEN set the date so that there isn't a deadline and you end up spending more money than is wise to. But who am I kidding, I'm a procrastinator, I'll leave everything to the last minute whether I wait to set a date or not :P

Sewing, Day Who Even Cares Anymore?

So I was reading back through old blog posts...

Once upon a time, I was posting progress pictures as I created a purse. (I'm not going to bother linking them, you should be able to find them by the Craft Addict linkything a the bottom of this post.)

Once upon a more recent time (but really, still over a year ago), I made a Random Things post (Random Things linkything in the side bar) where I promised I would make THIS post "soon"...

Yep.

Hilarious part is that that purse is already broken and has been for a long time... I tried, I really did, to design a strap that wouldn't be the first thing to fail... still the first thing to fail.

But still, a promise is a promise :P

Now I just have to figure out what's happening in all of these pictures...

Seriously though... what's happening in these pictures??

Well!  I am 100% making this up as I go. Hold on.

Possible Step One:
Start working (HEY NEW CRAFT ROOM IN NEW HOUSE!!)
Realize picture taking is a thing you want to be doing, take picture of messy craft room.
As you can see the thus-far-completed portion of the purse is sitting on the chair, and if I am recalling correctly I had to iron ALL of the OTHER PIECES because I just shoved them in something during the move... Please refer to the post where I cut out all of the pieces for some perspective on how many pieces there were.  I think I stood at that iron for like an hour :P

Oh hey look! A progress picture of the ironing!

What do you think this picture is supposed to be about?

Possible Step Two:

Realize that the top of your bag is floppy, and floppy just won't do!

Make the decision to add structure to the lining pieces.

Side Note: Quilting those together took FOREVER. I remember that. It sucked.

Possible Step Three:

Sew the inside pocket things onto the front and back linings.

Look! This one has a secret pocket! Such a sneaky pocket.

Possible Step Four:

Sew the sides and bottom of the lining into a long strip.

I think I maybe also added pockets on the side panels... you can maybe see that in this picture... maybe you can't... I don't know,,,

Possible Step Five:

Basically stop taking pictures... apparently.

Sew the front and back lining pieces on to the side-bottom-side strip... leave a hole for turning later.

Stuff the completed purse part (aka the outside) inside the lining.  Line up the top edge for sewing next.

Take a picture that looks really weird and confusing and most just reminds future you that the quilting took FOREVER and sucked :P

Sew the top of the lining to the top of the bag. Think to yourself, "Hey! For once, I didn't make it have so many layers that the sewing machine nearly couldn't handle it! Go me!"

Turn everything right side out and sew the turning hole in the lining closed.

Realize you need to top stitch the top part so that everything lays nicely. Think to yourself, "Crap, I hope the sewing machine can handle this... I shouldn't have gotten cocky."

Possible Step Six:

Success!!!!  Be finished!!!

TAKE PICTURES!

Closed.

Open. Pockets!

Inside. Pockets!!

Front of Inside. Pockets!!!

Outside, Back. ZIPPERED POCKET!!

The end.  I think there's a picture buried in the archives somewhere of the strap being broken. Not actually the strap, but the piece of light grey cotton material holding the strap on to the main body of the purse. Turns out the metal things I used there had sharp edges that slowly, but surely sawed through the flimsy pieces of cotton that were the only thing keeping the strap attached to the purse. 

'Twas a shame.