Ignoring Facebook

I should know better than to ever get on Facebook during the month of May. It's the same reason as to why I've stopped getting on pinterest on a regular basis.  It makes me feel terrible about my own life.  With with all the graduations, relationship status updates, etc., that are littering up my news feed, it's really hard not to look at my own life and say "huh." May seems like to month for big life achievements and this year my life is continuing on in the same way it has been for the last several months.

And I know that is fine.

It's fine.  Yep, Anna, it's fine.

But this week has been particularly challenging with working a ton of extra hours at work (including Saturday), suddenly feeling like I cannot catch up with all my office work (which is really ironic), getting lectured (again) for tying to be more environmentally conscious, being female and acting crazy for no particular reason, and watching my cucumbers die.

It is often to easy for me to focus on the negative, (which is why I need to quit facebooking all the time). And even though I've already used half of this post to complain about things that don't even matter, that's not what this post is about.

This post is really another installment of slowness, which, I've found is really easy to practice when it is so lovely outside. A big key to "practicing the art of slowness" for me has been tuning out technology. Obviously, not in the sense of going "straight-up Amish style." (I am clearly using a computer to blog right now). Instead, this is a process of turning off the things (like Facebook) more often - things that have been distracting me from real relationships, becoming a writer, and generally making me feel incomplete. Why should I listen to strange media outlets that tell me my life is not good enough. Why do I let them control who I am? Just because I don't have "cool enough" updates to post on Facebook does that mean my life is inadequate? As I write that out, it sounds ridiculous. Who would possible think that way? But, on some level, I think we all buy into that a little bit. I know I do. And it is making me extremely grumpy and crazy.

That is not who I want to be.

So instead of being on facebook when I am home from work, I've been trying to do other things. I've tried to pay attention to the world around me. I've tried to not let my dutiful gardening agenda become a stressful thing. I've been trying to hold "my schedule" more loosely and be open to spending more time investing in relationships instead.

Here is my "slowness" list from the past couple days:

1. I've talked about my peas a lot on this blog. When I first noticed their beautiful little blossoms, I was ecstatic. Up until a few days ago, all of these little flowers were white. And then on day I walked out back and noticed a new batch of purple ones. I don't really know anything about peas or why this is the case, but it was a cool surprise.

2. There is a house near where I live that has this odd collection of animals in the backyard. They have this giant flurry black dog (who we refer to as "back bear," since there is a good possibility it is actually a black bear), two hound dogs (which I dubbed "Sherlock" and "Holmes") and a rooster. I often run by this out during my workouts. I've noticed that black bear and the rooter are BFFs. One day they were sitting so close to each other, they looked like they were cuddling. Awesome.

3. This past Wednesday, our supper club had a cookout in the park. (The big highlight from this was the cow tongue Todd and Julie brought with them, not that I ate it, but it was hilarious - and gross- watching it cook and watching people try it). Spending the whole evening hanging out with friends in the park was great. And it wasn't even the weekend. Also, I made this Mexican quinoa salad*.

4. Leah and Jeron recently had their front lawn re-seeded. They currently don't have a sprinkler so every evening someone must go out there and water it. Since, thanks to reading No Impact Man, I've been trying really hard to significantly limit my electricity usage (more on that later), I've been trying to spend  some of the evening outside. This is not very helpful, but whenever Leah waters the lawn, I go out there and chat with her for awhile. This usually happens at twilight and I've been discovering that the natural digression of light is really relaxing. Being outside during this time is sometimes the best part of my day.

5. One of the best things about spring/summer is city league softball. Watching it, that is. My brother-in-law and a friend are on the same team. They had a game on Friday. So great. Even if I spend the entire time socializing or just enjoying the evening that I forget to watch the game.


6. After work on Saturday, my friends and I had a LOTRs party. But before we watched the movie, we  headed out to the country to shoot off Ethan's potato gun. Yep. That's right. (Oh life in a rural area is so...interesting).

7. Speaking of holding "my agenda" loosely, this morning I had planned to go the Perk and work on writing projects. That was the goal until I found out the Litwiller's were coming over for brunch. Even though I need to find more time in my life to actually be a writer, it's hard not to choose hanging out with great people on the deck over writing inside all morning. Besides my general "stand-off-ish" attitude towards pancakes, it was a great choice.

See? When I take the time to break down the past few days like this it is way easier to let my grumpiness dissolve. It is also easier to realize that I am content, not matter what Facebook might try to tell me.

---

*Mexican Quinoa Salad

Dressing
1 1/2 T olive oil
2 T white (or red) wine vinegar
salt and pepper to taste

Salad:
1 cup dried quinoa, rinsed well through a fine strainer
1 c halved cherry tomatoes
1 can corn
1 can black beans, rinsed
1/4 c finely chopped cilantro (optional)
Fresh lime juice
salt and pepper to taste

1. Whisk dressing ingredients in small bowl and set aside.

2. Cook quinoa according to directions on package. (I happened to had some quick cooking quinoa, which was very helpful. Otherwise, I usually follow these cooking instructions whenever I make this at Mojo's)

3. Toss cooled quinoa with the rest of the salad ingredients. Add dressing and toss well.

Recipe adapted from RecipeGirl.com