Screaming Reaction

I am still shaking from the adrenaline rush as I write this.

Currently working from home and with a teams across the globe, I have gotten in a habit of checking email as early as I can.  Afterwards I will do breakfast/getting ready stuff.

Today, today was different.  It is just after 7am.  I am reading through my first emails in my PJs - I haven't even brushed my teeth yet.  I hear tortured screams.  Horrible screams.  At first, I think maybe it is some wrong song choice my Pandora is kicking me off with.  So I mute my computer.  The screams keep coming.  I jump up and look out of my window to see what could be making the screams.

I see a boy laying face down on the ground by a crumpled bike, two houses down the hill from me.  And I ran.  No shoes.  In my PJs.  Hair everywhere.  I didn't think twice about it.  I was terrified of what I may find.  A lady was already stopping in her car on her way to work.

Luckily, the young boy was not seriously hurt.  No blood or broken bones.  There were scratches on his helmet.  He would not let us call his mom or take him back home - but he slowly started getting over the shock and pain of the crash so we just let him recover.  He and I talked about how lucky he was to have been wearing his helmet.

After a few more minutes, he got up and checked out his bike.  Finally, he got back on and rode the rest of the way to school.  I think he is going to be bruised up, but will be fine.

I am so relived that he is okay.  But what I am more excited about - people in my neighborhood all came out of their houses to check on the situation.  I am glad that I don't live in community that passes the buck, assuming someone else will help. 

When someone's car alarm goes off - we check.  When we see someone parked outside of a house, we ask or monitor the situation.  I love feeling safe beyond my house and into my community.  I am grateful for the good people who live near me.

"All that is required for evil to prevail is for good men to do nothing."- Edmund Burke

Are you doing something or nothing? Is your community doing something or nothing?

I'm Ballin'

Suzy Homemaker is officially ballin'!

UrbanDictionary.com offers these definitions for 'ballin':

Ebonics.
1.) To play basketball. (b-ball)
2.) Living in affluence/wealth.

I am 6' tall and get asked if I play(ed) basketball all of the time... No, I have not nor do I actively play basketball.  Thanks for asking.  Do you pay mini-golf?

I definitely don't consider myself living in wealth or affluence, though I feel very blessed. So, how is Suzy Homemaker ballin'? I am sitting on a ball.  Yup, I am ballin' at work.

Let me explain.  I have recently be able to work from home everyday instead of traveling everyday.  Hello yoga pants!  But I digress...  Working from home, I have been spending hours upon hours in the same chair. 

The chair.  It is a beautiful parson's chair.  Straight back, straight seat.  Horridly uncomfortable for long term sitting.  I have noticed that my posture was suffering more than it usually does and my legs were going to sleep on a regular basis.  No bueno.

So, Suzy Homemaker bought a ball.  And yes, I am bouncing/balancing/sitting on it right now.  And no, I haven't fallen off it - yet (I am sure it is going to happen).  Some sources claim that you will burn calories by sitting on it - and I would have to agree.  Now, I am not talking I am going to start skipping my yoga classes burning calories - but I am moving throughout the day, even it is tiny movements without thinking.  I have also noticed that I am correcting my posture and my legs have not fallen asleep once since I started ballin'!

Now this is not some magical or special ball, it is the same ball that you would used in the gym and I got it for less than $20 at my favorite store, Amazon!  It has been a game changer at "work".  Best part, when I am done for the day, I just roll it under my desk!

I may look like a fool sitting on this ball, bouncing as I work on my laptop and lead conference calls - but I feel better, and that is what counts in my book.

Are you ballin'?

Help Me Understand...

I am driving to my yoga class yesterday evening and as I pass through an intersection a young man is walking in the cross walk.  Help me understand this about him and the hundreds of other males I see doing this...

Your pants are SO big that you have to walk with one hand holding them up.  I can see your underwear and all of your butt.  You have a belt on - but it does nothing to hold up your pants as you are still walking with one hand holding them up.  Why? Help me understand this.

...

I often host parties and when I do I typically allow friends to bring their friends.  We are adults and I would never classify my parties as wild.  On New Years, one of my girlfriends came to me and told me, "You have a man hanging in your shower" - I immediately jumped to someone is in my house that should not be there.  Only to come to find out, no, someone had drawn a man hanging from a rope on my shower curtain.  My shower curtain is a large tree, so the man was hanging from the tree.  It was in pen.  It was about at the level where you can tell someone grabbed a pen while they were on my toilet and proceeded to deface my house.  Help me understand why an adult would draw on something in my house? 

...

I look around and I see so many things that don't make sense.  Why would anyone steal?  Why are kids bullying each other? Why would someone kill a stranger?  Why do people claim to be on diets and them post all of the unhealthy meals or liquid calories they eat on Facebook?  Why do people say they are trying to save money or have no money - yet they have cell phones, fake nails, name brand clothing, or they smoke and drink on a regular basis?

Now, I know that I do not always act logically - but I try.  I try to act with compassion and kindness.  Help me understand why it appears that I am living in a world were so many people aren't?

Can you tell that I have started reading more news lately?  Maybe I just need to cut that out...

Cutting the Cord

I did it years ago.  I don't regret it - and I don't miss it or the expensive bills that come with it.

I don't have cable/satellite television.  I have a digital antennae which cost less than $8 to buy from Amazon.  I also have Hulu Plus and an Amazon Prime account which gives me access to free movies and television shows. So I pay approximately $8 a month to watch television. (I am not including my Amazon Prime costs as that pays for itself with all of my free shipping and book rentals!)

Here is my antenna from Amazon (it just plugs in where you would plug in your cable cord):

http://www.amazon.com/RCA-ANT111-Basic-Indoor-Antenna/dp/B000HKGK8Y/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1359040609&sr=8-4&keywords=digital+antenna

What is the exception?  I absolutely love Walking Dead.  That is AMC and not available through Hulu Plus.  Now, if I was a patient person, I would wait and get Netflix for a month and watch it there a year from now.  But I am not.  So, I make dinner and go over to a friends house and we watch it together - which I prefer.  I get to see the show, but I also get to enjoy watching it with friends.
I have heard so many people talk about how they couldn't live without it - the biggest excuses typically being need for kids programming and need to see the game.  I can say that there loads of kids shows and movies on Prime and Hulu - and you will get them will no or fewer commercials (a big plus).  Now, regarding the games - you will get the local channel games - but if it is on ESPN or some special cable show - find a friend and go watch with them, aren't games better watched that way anyway?

See, even Clark Howard is telling people to do it:
http://blogs.ajc.com/atlanta-bargain-hunter/2013/01/24/clark-howard-its-not-so-easy-to-cut-cable-or-satellite-tv/?cxntfid=blogs_atlanta_bargain_hunter

More importantly, shouldn't we be detaching ourselves from the television and getting off of our couches? So, try it - cut your cord or ditch your dish - you will save money and maybe you will like a life less dependent on television.

Leaving a Legacy

Yesterday was MLK Day - it was also a day off of work for me.  So after I got done working for a few hours (isn't that how it sometimes goes?) - I started freaking out. 

Why? I had this day off and nothing to do.  You see, I am rarely satisfied with just sitting on the couch or taking a nap.  I feel like the world has so much to offer outside of my house and is spinning so quickly that if I don't move quickly, I will miss out.  And no one wants to miss out in today's world of over-connected, reading updates while talking to someone on blue-tooth while driving in rush hour traffic, right?

So I went to Fernbank - to see it's Ghensis Khan exhibit.  It was really well done.  I am sure I learned about the Mongol Empire in school, but sadly, I didn't retain it.

I (re)learned from this exhibit that the Mongol Empire was the largest empire in our recorded history - which is quite impressive to me - as I generally think of Alexander the Great's conquests or the expansion of the Roman Empire.

I learned that the Mongol expansion was known for its religious tolerance, development of the a postal and passport system, and that they were the first to make hamburgers (but they used horse not cow!) among other things. 

To walk around and see artifacts and effects from this empire that started back in the 12th Century - well, it took me a moment to absorb it all.  This man lived as a nomad with no permanent home base.  He had no modern way of communication or any modern conveniences or "necessities" as we see them, yet he ruled the largest empire in history.

This is a huge legacy to have created in his 65 years.  Dr. King lived less time than that yet made a huge impact on today's world also. 

I can pretty confidently say that I will not be making legacies that are even a breath of what these men did.  Maybe no one will know my name in 100 years.  I am okay with that.  But I do know one thing about my life - I want to live it to the fullest and make sure that I have a positive impact.

What will your legacy be?

My Practice, My Acceptance

I think we are still seeing all of the diets and workouts... for those of you in gyms, I hear we still have some New Year Resolutioners trying to stick with it.

Before I had my current job which requires travel, I kickboxed.  And I kickboxed a lot.  For nearly 2 years, I was crossing, upper cutting, side and forward kicking.  I was up and down and jumping and kicking.  I was faster and faster and then even faster.  I was in amazing shape.  Kickboxing was an amazing practice for reducing stress.

When I started traveling, I could not afford the expense of kickboxing and not being able to attend at least 4 classes a week.  So I stopped.  Over the past 2 years, I have tried traditional gyms, walking, running, Zumba, and at home DVDs (you can borrow anything from Tae Bo to the Brazilian Butt Lift, I have them all).

Nothing stuck.  I always felt like I was not getting a great workout because I was not pushing myself - or even worse - I just wasn't doing anything.  I didn't like anything that I found.

Then, I found Yoga.  I think I went onto my mat for the first time thinking, this will be easy.  It is basically sitting, breathing and holding some poses.  No problem, I used to kickbox.

Wrong. Very, very wrong.

As someone who has little balance, is out of shape, and has been leading a mostly sedentary life, my first yoga class rocked my world.  Sweat was pouring off of me like rain.  I felt like I was hit by a truck I was so sore the next day - and I never moved out of my 2'x6' mat!  There was no running or jumping jacks. 

Now, I am loving yoga at the moment because it is helping me gain my flexibility back (that is going to be long road) and it is helping me tone and strengthen my body.

But why is yoga working for me when nothing else did?  Yoga is more than toning the body - it is about working out your mind and it is about accepting whatever you may bring to your mat and practice that day.

Learning to accept me - what I can and cannot do, forgetting that the person next to me is not sweating and is doing something 3 levels more complex than me, letting go of what I cannot control in my life and at work, focusing on what is going on in my body and what is happening now... learning to accept and acknowledge all of this while making your body move and stay in poses is well, it is relaxing.

So when I fall out of a pose or can only do the beginner stage of a move - I don't get mad and quit.  I don't get frustrated and judge myself - and I don't feel judged by others.  Yoga is about me and my individual practice.

Now - sometimes this is harder than others.  I had a rough day earlier this week at work - it was crazy and I didn't want to go to yoga.  But I did.  I could tell I was not focused on my practice as I struggled through every pose, messed up flows.  Slowly, I forced myself to focus on the breathe of yoga.  Focusing on in and out, one with each move.  I stopped trying to keep up with the class.  I flowed to my own - and it was fine.  I let go - even if only for a moment.

And at the end of the session - I felt better - regardless of what comes and goes in our lives - the good times and bad - we have to keep moving forward.  We must continue to breathe - in and out. 

That is what I love about yoga.  I find something different in it every time I step onto the mat.  For me, in this part of my life - it is the exercise I need, physically and mentally.  No judging, just accepting what I have today, but pushing myself to make it the best that I can make it.  That is yoga.

A New Year Mix Up

Wow. It is 2013.  The holidays came and went. The New Year came and went.  I watched with bittersweetness as someone finally hauled off my Christmas tree yesterday. Now, it is diets and workout commercials. Everyone wants to lose weight that we gained last year, and the year before... and the year before.

Granted, I am definitely trying to eat better - but that is always a uphill battle.  And it always will be for me.

This year I will continue to work with my church's youth group - and we have planned out the first quarter for them over the past two weeks.  As I did this - it struck a cord with me... we always do the same thing the same way - and the kids are happy with this idea.  However, when we do something new, they love it and that becomes the new normal.

I feel like I am on the same ride now, on a repeat loop.  Why do we make the same resolutions every year?  Why do we do the same x y and z all the time?  Granted, the known is comfortable and usually easy.

As a child/teen/young adult - there was a striving to get better and push myself towards that next goal or milestone or to build up my resume or some new adult task (like buying a house!).  But once you are an adult - what is next?  Do we live from event to event, holiday to holiday, new years resolution to new years resolution? Do we look forward to the weekends when we don't have to do anything so we can sleep in?  Is this the "good life"?

I am content, which is perfectly acceptable (I guess).  How do we find new ways to push ourselves to be better than we were next year?  What real resolutions should we be making - or more importantly - should we be keeping?

Now, I am not sure of what I will do to make 2013 different.  I want to find a way to mix it up this year and push myself to be better.  I was to challenge myself and ensure that I make real goals that help me grow as a person.  Honestly, I think this may be more of a challenge than losing weight - maybe they are linked.

What are you doing this year?  How are you mixing it up for 2013?