What love will do to you...

Growing up, I was sure that my future involved being married to a Latvian-American. Maybe a Latvian-Canadian. I was pretty sure that no one else would ever be able to understand me, and what my life was about. Certainly, none of my American boyfriends had really ever been able to.

It wasn't so long ago that I was adamant that I would never date a meat-eater again. Ok, well, it must have been pretty long ago. But anyway...at one point (and I must admit that it seems forever ago, in a really unimportant past), I was sure that I would only ever be able to find true happiness sharing my life with another vegetarian.

I also remember having a conversation with my friend AW sometime more than a year, but less than 2 years ago. It involved talking about her husband's sports-watching habits and how they affected her. It wasn't so much that I cared, but I was glad that that wasn't my life. Sports were always so unimportant to me. She said to me then (don't think I've forgotten!), "Someday, I hope you meet a man who watches every sport under the sun." Or something along those lines. I of course, couldn't imagine ever falling for a guy like that. I mean really, WHAT WOULD WE HAVE IN COMMON?

But here I am now... seriously in love with a non-Latvian, meat-eating, sports fanatic.

But my point...it's not so much about eating my words (although, some people out there seem quite eager for me to do so...and don't worry... I don't mind admitting I didn't know...). Yes, I was wrong. But, at the time I made such statements, I hadn't met Joel yet. I didn't know that a non-Latvian, meat-eating, sports fanatic came in a package like this one. I didn't know that it was possible for us to have so much in common. I didn't know it was possible for us to love each other, even if we had so many things NOT in common.

Love can change you. And not in a pathetic, I'll do anything for you because I can't bear the thought of losing you way...but in the way of, if this is that important to you, then it's ok by me to do it your way, or to accept this in you...in the it's more important to me that you are happy kind of way.

Yesterday morning we rose before the sun (on a SATURDAY!!!) to get down to a hostel-bar to watch the Geelong Cats kick Port Adelaide butt. When the alarm rang at 6am, I thought, as I pressed snooze, of the one thing I would rather do than get up and go watch the Cats...mainly, stay in bed and sleep! But I got up anyway. And we went, and were a couple of the first people in the bar ready for the game. Joel was a nervous wreck. This was REALLY important to him.

Now, I don't get watching sports on tv and cheering right there....to the tv. What's the point? It's not like the team can hear you. But I have noticed that men have an almost innate need to clap, cheer and talk back to the tv. At least they all do it, and therefore do not find each other odd. Works for them. Watching Joel watch the game was fun. He was so excited. And as Geelong progressively kicked more and more ass, it was only more and more fun. It was fun to watch him clap and cheer and call out to the players by name (because yes, he knows all of them). And, at times, I even found myself ready to clap for what I saw on the screen. (Yes, I did also watch the game... AFL on tv ain't bad...)

The final score on the game was 163-44. The Cats cleaned up. It was the biggest victory in AFL grand final history (so I am told). The look on Joel's face when the game came to an end and it was official was the purest happiness I have ever seen on his face. I'm pretty sure that he was actually holding back some tears. I even thought to myself (and might have mentioned out loud) that I could only hope he would look as happy on our wedding day (which I'm also hoping will happen).

This is turning into a long story, but what gets me, and gets back to the point, is that I enjoyed that game, and the morning because Joel enjoyed it. No, if Joel hadn't been there, I wouldn't have been there. But, because Joel was there, there actually wasn't any other place I would rather be. I would have regretted sleeping in and missing seeing him be so happy.

This is what love will do to you (or me actually). It's not that I have put aside what is important to me. But it's that I have found that what is important to me now is different than what was important to me then.

Yes, I cook meat for Joel. That happened somewhere between my love of cooking, my very real desire to provide for him in this way and the realization that he just wasn't going to eat much of my sort of out there totally veggie meals. No, I don't cook him something special every night. Yes, on many nights I make a meal that I can eat, and I cook a piece of chicken on the side. It's not difficult, and I know that we will both be happy. I do foresee that there will be some friction around this subject between us when/if our offspring ever come into the picture. I say now, that I don't think I will be as willing to cook meat for them, as I am for Joel. But again, this is what I say now. We'll see what happens then (but he is forewarned).

As for the sports... he's out there watching some American football game now... I could care less, so I am in here writing and reading. I do have other things to do, and way better ways to spend my time than to sit by his side for every game he watches (please!). But, when it comes to the Cats, and the grand final, I'm there. When it comes to his basketball team, I'll be there too. Last season I figured out most of the rules, this season I'll get em down. It's not about the game, it's about being there to support him. And he doesn't mind if sometimes I bring alog a book to read. :)

The thing that makes it all ok is that today we shared the most amazing do-nothing day ever. We slept in, laid around in bed talking for an hour or so. Then he got up to watch the first half of the game again, and I read in bed. Then I made breakfast (at 2pm :) ). Then we curled up back in bed and watched 5 episodes of our favorite shows. We laughed and cuddled and relaxed. I said to him, "I like today." Then, even though he had a plan of staying inside the whole day, he took me to the grocery store because I needed fruits and vegetables for the week. Pretty soon I'll be getting in bed for the night, and as soon as I'm there, I'll need something (this happens often). I'll call out, and Joel will get off the couch and come, and he'll get me a drink of water, or plug in my phone to charge, or turn off the hallways lights, just because I don't want to get out of bed since I'm there already.

Love can make you do things that you didn't think you would. And it makes you fight for things that you always knew you would. And it helps you let go of things that aren't really important, and opens you up to things that are. Love is, as I've always said, a gift. And for this love, this particularly unpredictable package of love, I am very very grateful...even if, by appearing in my life when it did, I had to eat my words. It's a small price to pay really.

(Oh, and obviously, I might as well worry about the color of Joel's skin, if I am going to worry about whether or not he is Latvian. In a way, he's more "latvian" than lots of the Latvian-American guys I dated back in the States, just for having lived here for a few years. But THAT is a whole other story...)

Why I love this man

Just heard (Bumbi heard it!) in our living room:

Joel is watching a show called Dirty Jobs on the Discovery channel. A segment is currently showing about a bee-keeping family. They were showing how they get the honey.

Me: You don't even like honey.

Joel: Yeah, but this show rocks. It's like going on a field trip every week!

I love this man. I really do.

Contacting the Mother Ship

Yeah. Every morning, from 5-6am. This is what is going on in my bed these days. At least, it's what I assume. I'm woken up by sounds that I can't make sense of in any language I know (I don't generally speak in clicks of the tongue, snores or grinding of the teeth). So I have decided that my beloved must be indeed having some sort of very important communication with someone or something out there. I mean, why else would I keep getting woken up every morning around 5?? I try to get back to sleep. I try to silence the communication by nudging the body or literally holding the jaw of the communicator. I've even attempted early morning communication in English, but apparently, the section of the brain that understands English is switched off from 5-6am.

The thing is though... I'm not really complaining. We've made progress here. When we first started sharing a sleeping space, we struggled with adjusting to one anothers sleep needs. Me, I'm a cuddler. I'm happy and quite willing to be enveloped or enveloping the whole night through. My dear communicator, not so much. It used to be that if I touched him in the middle of the night (which I'm sorry, but I really did quite unconsciously) he would practically jump out of his skin. Needless to say, he was NOT used to me being there.

These days though, we have a bigger bed, but we're not using as much of it. Somewhere along the line, *someone* got used to another warm body...and now, must apparently REALLY like it. I sleep on the edge of the bed these days, with my boo snuggled up quite near me (mostly still in what might technically be called "my side of the bed"). But, this is pretty much a dream come true for me (no pun intended! :) ). I sleep wonderfully, knowing/feeling that other body is there, and also knowing that if we roll, and I end up throwing my arm over him, it will no longer be the end of a good night's sleep for him.

So...as I said, I'm not complaining. I guess I just wish that the communication with the mother ship (or whatever stage of sleep it is that elicits this sort of noisiness from him) didn't have to happen in that very last hour of sleep, when I look at the clock at 5 and disappointedly think, "Oh, I only have an hour left to sleep!" and then lie there desperately wishing and hoping that I could ignore the clicking, the grinding, and the snoring.

Ah well... let's hope that this need for communication with the mother ship is just a phase...and pretty soon the message will get through, and we'll return to cuddled up, uninterrupted sleep for the lot of us. That would be nice.

UPDATED LATER THAT DAY: I thought, and someone else mentioned, that this could be stress related. Yeah, ok... but if you know Joel, you know that generally, he kind of lets things roll off his back. He doesn't tend to get too stressed. It's just not his style. Well, this really has been happening like just this week. And it just hit me like a ton of bricks that the Grand Final is this weekend, and Joel has been able to think of little else besides his beloved Cats. Could it really be that the things that drives Joel to have disturbed sleep is worrying about a football game? Why is it, that I feel like I might actually have hit the nail on the head? :)

Ah....

A sigh of grateful, satisfied relief.


Between school starting, realizing that my class is made up of who it's made up of and how much that takes out of me, grad school classes starting as well, and the rainy, cold dreary weather I've been finding it pretty unattractive to get out of bed lately.

Today was our annual all school field trip to the Open Air Museum outside Riga. I have to admit that for the past two years I have dreaded this trip. I didn't know why before...I just knew that I felt it was a miserable long day without much focused academic purpose. I figured out why I felt that way today. The last two years the day of this trip was cold and mostly rainy. I remember the first year it wasn't actually raining...it was misting. But that meant that basically it was like walking in wet air...it was thick, and you couldn't protect yourself from the rain...it was everywhere. Last year it was slightly better...it rained in the morning and was really cold, and then the sun only came out for a little while just before we left.

Today, Mother Nature threw me a bone. THANK YOU!!!!

Here are some pics of what we saw today....

A beautiful, beautiful blue sky spotted with fluffy white clouds. This provided enough sunshine to actually cause the sensation of warmth! :)

Some ducks who swam to shore possibly because they thought we would feed them. No, but I did snap a photo! :)

Golden reeds blowing in the wind.

This picture doesn't really show it, but the pictures that do have kids in them, so I can't post them here...but there was this area by the lake where we walked that was SO green today. It was almost glowing. Between the ridiculous amount of heavy rain we've been getting lately (which comes down so hard it must really be like a massage for the trees and grass...if there is such a thing as a massage for nature...) and the sun being out today, I think that everything alive was shining out its inner light. :)

I have to add, that some people in Latvia like the saying, "There is no such thing as bad weather, only being inappropriately dressed." I realized today that I just DO NOT agree. I DO think there is such a thing as bad weather. If it's cold AND rainy...that is BAD weather. I don't care what I'm wearing...it's still bad weather. My cousin has invited me out to her country house this fall, and I have to say, I have NO desire. Hanging out in the country where there is nothing really good to do but BE OUTSIDE, and having it be bad weather outside... just doesn't sound good to me! Not to mention that I have tried to get warm out at country houses before when it's not exactly warm outside...and after wearing two shirt and a sweater, jeans, thick socks and I'm still chilly...then I'm sorry...but I just don't see the point, when I have the option to be in my properly heated warm city apartment. Clearly, I am not a country girl. Give it to me in the summer...I'll take it...not in the BAD weather. :)

So, thanks Mother Nature for this gift of beautiful weather on this day where it made such a difference. Even though when it was times to line up today Miss E's class lined up in a quiet paired straight line, but mine were still running around screaming like banshees and wrestling each other....even though when all the kindergarteners were supposed to be building little houses out of the materials they had collected on their nature walk, two of my boys ran away into the woods, so that I actually had to go look for them because other children were telling me they were "lost"...even though... even though all of this... it was still a wonderful day, it flew by, and it felt so much like NOT a school day, that I just about feel like I've already had one day of weekend. And God knows THAT is a good feeling. :)

So... this morning when I woke up...

I was all confused, and I couldn't decide... shall I wear a dress, or pants (trousers that is)? Well, I just couldn't decide, so I wore both!

If you know me at all, you know that this was the line I would utter in a stupid girly-bimbo-voice anytime I saw this "ridiculous" fashion walking the streets in the last 10 years or however long it's been happening. Don't know what I'm talking about? Wearing a skirt or dress over pants? Well, there's an example at this link. Very nice skirt. Very nice pants. Should they be worn together? I don't see why!

But alas... today's fashion trends are doing me in. I want new clothes, and since I live where I do (and maybe even if I lived elsewhere) I have only a limited choice of what I can buy. Mostly, I have to get stuff that follows the latest treads because they don't carry too much "classic" fashion round these parts.

The worst thing is that most of today's fashion trends involve waistlines that make size 0 girls look pregnant (never mind me, who regularly gets asked when I'm expecting even when I'm NOT wearing these fashions) and shirt hem lines that reach mid-thigh, so when you're in the store, you're thinking to yourself, "But is it a shirt or a dress??? HUH???? Which is IT???" And let me tell you, I know I'm only a kindergarten teacher, but generally, I pride myself on being able to tell the difference. So not only are today's fashions confusing, but, they aren't exactly made for every body (I guess hottest trends never have been). So it seems I am losing the battle at not wearing things I generally don't think I look good in, simply because I want to wear something new!

I fear that at my ripe old age (what? Sarcasm....) of 27 I am actually already looking down on current fashion, and thinking back on the "good old days" when we used to wear clothes that I find more comfortable and flattering. Could it be??? Am I already that old (meaning, not hip and cool anymore)? That out of touch with what's hot? Is it just that as I do age, I couldn't give a rats about what's on the runways, or what today's hottest stars are wearing, and do just want to be comfortable? Jesus... I have no hope once I have a baby, huh? Am I already one of those people whose clothes date me, because I obviously didn't buy most of what I wear THIS decade?

Well, whatever it is (and I do feel it must be SOMETHING)... I can no longer make fun of people who wear dresses over pants because this morning I actually got up, and I couldn't decide what to wear...and so I wore both. Yes it's true...as I write, I am wearing jeans and a black baby doll dress all at the same time. Or wait... maybe I'm not... who knows! This could just be a long shirt I have on... :)