landslide indeed

After 8 years of being ashamed, frightened, scared, and frustrated with my country and my leaders, I am hopeful, optimistic, proud, and gosh darn excited. I cried like a baby last night. It was the first time I've felt pure joy in a pretty long time.

I was talking about the election with some friends last Saturday and one of the guys I was talking to mentioned that our generation hasn't really had anybody that we've ever looked up to or been truly inspired by. That's one of the many reasons this election has meant so much to us. We admire (President Elect!) Obama, are inspired by him.

I know it's going to be a long hard road, but I have the confidence that The United States can heal.

Thank you to everyone who voted, organized, or just participated. You are what make our country great.

sick

I need healthcare. I have the opportunity for healthcare. I don't know if I can afford it. 

Here's the deal, after taxes my first biweekly paycheck came to a whopping total of $517 and some change. Sweet! I can actually live off of that. Then I was given information regarding health insurance (even the fact that it's offered for a gig like this, kind of blows my mind). Thing is it would skim $96 off of each paycheck. That's 20% of my income. Since my rent is $393, that would leave me with roughly $30 to make it to the middle of the month. With bills, cell phone, and car insurance, I can't afford that. But at the same time, I'm thinking, how can I afford not to? If I, heaven forbid, broke my leg, I'd be in debt up to my ears. But, $200 is a LOT of money when you're only bringing home about $1,000 a month. Sheesh. 

I know it's election season and the rhetoric is 'aflyin, but can I just say that it confounds and saddens me that although we live in the richest nation in the world we can't figure out a way to provide healthcare for our citizens. It's a basic right in my opinion as you can't very well pursue happiness with insurance companies hounding you for premiums you can't afford. Can we just elect Obama already? Please? 

Okay, I'll step down off my soap box, but I could really use some advice. I'm genuinely confused about what to do. Help oh sages of the blog-sphere! Help a woman in need!

make it write.

So, before I get into my post, it needs to be said that momma came down for the weekend and we had a totally stellar weekend. Really a superb visit all around. We stayed busy doing a lot of stuff for the wedding and throwing Laura Jean a lingerie shower (I got totally trashed on cosmos and would be delighted to never see another in my life) and today we saw Barack Obama speak (along with about 75,000 of our closest friends). Beautiful (HOT) weather, perfect weekend. 

Okay, so last week I got a call from Sarah from the Nomadic Theater saying that she'd been working all week with an organization called PlayWrite. Basically, it is an organization that teaches playwriting to at-risk kids, as an outlet for creative expression, validation, and healing. Awesome, right? Then she told me that she'd been working with them last week primarily because one of the students they were working with was Deaf (she signs too), but that she could only work for half of the workshop because she had another commitment. So, she had given them my name and number! More Awesome! So, last week I asked off for the days and times of the workshop, and my boss actually agreed (more awesome). Tonight, I met with Lindsay, one of the founders, to go over logistics, details and their process. In short, I AM TOTALLY STOKED. And?!?! I'm going to get paid. Like $300, which is more than I normally make in a week. So, instead of taking a pay cut for this week because I thought this was a volunteer gig and could only figure out how to get about 15 hours at the clinic, I'm making more money, and doing something totally amazing and important and super fun. My life is freaking rad.