I was trying to describe you to someone a few days ago

I was trying to describe you to someone a few days ago.

You don’t look like any girl I’ve ever seen before.I couldn’t say “Well she looks just like Jane Fonda, except that she’s got red hair, and her mouth is different and of course, she’s not a movie star…”

I couldn’t say that because you don’t look like Jane Fonda at all.

I finally ended up describing you as a movie I saw when I was a child in Tacoma Washington. I guess I saw it in 1941 or 42, somewhere in there. I think I was seven, or eight, or six.

It was a movie about rural electrification, a perfect 1930’s New Deal morality kind of movie to show kids. The movie was about farmers living in the country without electricity. They had to use lanterns to see by at night, for sewing and reading, and they didn’t have any appliances like toasters or washing machines, and they couldn’t listen to the radio

They built a dam with big electric generators and they put poles across the countryside and strung wire over fields and pastures.There was an incredible heroic dimension that came from the simple putting up of poles for the wires to travel along. They looked ancient and modern at the same time.

Then the movie showed electricity like a young Greek god, coming to the farmer to take away forever the dark ways of his life. Suddenly, religiously, with the throwing of a switch, the farmer had electric lights to see by when he milked his cows in the early black winter mornings. The farmer’s family got to listen to the radio and have a toaster and lots of bright lights to sew dresses and read the newspaper by.

It was really a fantastic movie and excited me like listening to the Star Spangled Banner, or seeing photographs of President Roosevelt, or hearing him on the radio “… the President of the United States… "

I wanted electricity to go everywhere in the world. I wanted all the farmers in the world to be able to listen to President Roosevelt on the radio….

And that’s how you look to me.

The end of NDJ, Nicki Minaj moments, and NOT freaking out

Well, No Drink January is over and I still don't know how to juggle or use chopsticks and don't even have 100 miles logged yet. I'm nowhere near ready to run my 5k, let alone to do it in under 30 minutes. I didn't lose a lot of weight nor did I finish reading an entire book and my skin does not look extremely hydrated. However, I did accomplish not feeling like a complete alcoholic and I also got an iPhone. We'll call it even and just move on to February.

It is Sunday evening and I am not crying in my bathtub, I'm not sitting on the floor having a panic attack. This is the greatest gift this year has given me and I am so very grateful for it. I can get up and go to work and not worry that I'll have to go cry in my car after 30 minutes. I feel hopeful and that working hard might mean something again. I get to learn and use my brain and am treated like an adult. I could really do this, I could be happy and succesful.

The “Nicki Minaj moment,” which is basically any real life version of that line in Nicki Minaj’s song that goes “Yes I did, yes I did, somebody please tell him who the eff I is” that in my mind loosely translates to, “YOU BEST BELIEVE I’M DOING THIS CRAZY ASS THING. BAM!” -@nicoleisbetter

We're doing this, we're really, really doing this.

So this is the new year...

2011 was not a terrible year but it was not an easy year by any means. For the most part I just feel so, so lucky.

Here are my goals for 2012
1) Run a 5k in under 30 minutes (April 14, 2012)
2) Complete No Drink January (aka NDJ)
3) Learn to juggle
4) Learn to use chopsticks
5) Complete 1,000 miles in 2012

So this brings us to No Drink January. Some people call it Sober January. Anyway, I'm not drinking any alcohol during the month of January, except for my going away party on January 13th (MLK Weekend!). I am sort of concerned about how it's going to go because I am sure going to miss my wine. But I am excited about making positive choices and moving forward with my life.

Here we go!