Chocolate :)

I love chocolate! I don’t love all chocolate. I like a lot of it, some of it is ok, and some of it I love. I wouldn’t say I’m a chocolate snob, but more of an elitist. If there is nothing else to be had, no name chocolates and very milky milk chocolates are better than no chocolate at all. Hershey’s chocolate falls in the middle of the spectrum. All of their chocolate is good. Their dark chocolate is the best thing that they have to offer. Other higher end brands of chocolate are even better. The best of all chocolates is the dark chocolate. I’m not talking about more than 75%, that is borderline no sugar baking chocolate. However, a nice 60% is just about right.

Another kind of chocolate that I love is Oaxaca chocolate. This doesn’t really compare on any level with manufactured chocolates and overall has a different texture and taste. So next time you are in Oaxaca Mexico go downtown to a small shop called Mayordomo. There you can buy prepackaged chocolate or order fresh. Maybe you like your chocolate with less sugar, how about some cinnamon or almonds in the mix. Then you can watch as they grind the whole cacao bean, add sugar, grind in cinnamon and almonds. Then transfer the gooey chocolaty goodness into a bag for you. Nothing quite compares to a spoonful of chocolate just made. When you get home you will want to spread it out for it will harden in the next day. Traditionally this chocolate is used for making hot chocolate, but I eat it plain. You may have had Abuelita chocolate, it comes in a hexagonal yellow box with a picture of a grandma drinking hot chocolate. This is similar, but ever so much better.

I was inspired to write to you about chocolate because I saw an article detailing the health benefits of eating chocolate. I am usually a discerning, individual who actively looks for holes in arguments. Chocolate is my blind spot. It doesn’t take an article to convince me that chocolate is good for you. I already know that. It merely gives me something to spout to the unbelievers. So eat some chocolate, pick your favorite kind. I have a large costco size bag of chocolate chips in my refrigerator. Its purpose is partially for baking, but mostly for eating by the handful. So I’m going to go fill a small, or maybe a medium sized cup with chocolate chips snuggle into my couch and read a good book.

Time

Time is an interesting thing to think about. I looked up the definition for time at dictionary.com thinking that it would be useful to see a refined description of time. I got a list of 64 definitions and sayings to illustrate the way we use time.

There are many sayings about time and philosophical thoughts about the value of time. It seems like in respect to time there is no in between ground. Either you have too much time or you don’t have enough. Rarely do I hear people say, “I had the perfect amount of time today.” Especially in western cultures people often say “I don’t have enough time” and expressions such as “time is money” are frequently heard. Our schedules are packed so full of things to do and places to go that every minute needs to be filled with something. This creates an interesting dichotomy that when you have to wait for something or have run out of things to do you say such things as “I’m killing time.” It is as if the moments of waiting exist in a vacuum and aren’t a part of life itself. Once the waiting is over living commences because then once again you can be busy and pack time with all sorts of activities. How many hours, days and weeks have we wasted, waiting for the next thing?

 I work in airport gift shops. A common response from people is that the reason they are in the store is because time is burdensome and they want to kill or waste it. The only moment in time that we are promised is the present moment. I think when we get so wrapped up in time either consuming it voraciously or murdering it we lose track of the preciousness of each moment. For all those times we wait how can we enjoy them for they may be our last? For all those times we are so busy we have no opportunity to just stop, are we really getting the most out of them for they may be our last? Whether busy or waiting remember that time ultimately wins and our seemingly inexhaustible source is finite. In business or waiting, live your moments for they are all you have.

 “Time is too slow for those who wait, too swift for those who fear, too long for those who grieve, too short for those who rejoice, but for those who love, time is eternity.” - Henry Van Dyke

Valentine's Day

Valentine’s Day seems to be one of those days that you really look forward to or the one day of the year that you really dread. By mid January the stores turn decidedly pink and red in color. There are hearts and teddy bears everywhere. Extra candy aisles are added overflowing with chocolates and conversation hearts. If our culture was not so consumer based I would conjecture that the reason why Valentine items come out so early is a plot of the girlfriends, fiancées, and wives to give a not so subtle reminder to their significant others to not forget this important holiday of love.

So if you are fortunate and have a boyfriend, girlfriend, wife, or husband you can expect to spend the 14^th of February surrounded by chocolate, flowers, plush stuffed animals, champagne, maybe a delightful bubble bath, candles with dancing flames, and hopefully love. On the other hand you may belong to a group of people that are single. I would venture that most singles are content with their life most of the time. However, when Valentine’s Day casts its pinkish shadow over the world, being single is a loathsome thing. No other holiday has such exclusivity that points a finger at singles and declares, “You have no one to buy you chocolates for Valentine’s Day. You must not be important.”

I have been single for many a Valentine’s Day. I have experienced the range of unwanted emotions that comes with singleness and have come to view Valentine’s Day quite apathetically. It is a day like all others and it ceases to have much significance for me. I don’t have the energy to loathe it, fight it, cry over it, or really anything. Really all I do now is philosophize about it.

There were several St Valentines who were martyred for their faith and originally this date honored their sacrifice. One of these Valentines was known for secretly marrying soldiers, because it was thought at the time that men fought better if they didn’t have wives. From that Valentine we get our view of Valentine’s Day. Other countries don’t view this holiday with the same mind set as we do. If you are interested look it up for yourselves. I would like to mention one. In Mexico, February the 14th is called Dia del Amor y la Amistad (The day of love and friendship). So as Valentine’s Day approaches I would encourage you singles to not throw parties that center on griping about this biased holiday, but find someone or several someones to do something nice for. Send a card, buy a box of candy or a rose and give it to someone, the child who lives next door or the curmudgeonly gentleman who complains about your loud music and parties. And to those of you who look forward to spending this day with your significant other be nice to your single friends who may be sitting at home eating conversation hearts that someone in the office passed out that say things like “b mine” and “call me”, all by themselves.

The Sales Associate Gauntlet

You are at the mall and a store looks interesting so you duck into it, just to look around. You are greeted almost as soon as you walk into the store. While all you want to do is mind your own business and window shop you are constantly asked questions. How is your day? Can I help you find something? Would you like to look at that? Being the polite person you are you respond graciously to all the inquiries. Good, how is yours. I’m just looking, thanks. Most often you don’t find anything you want to buy so you exit the store. The sales associates wish you a good day and hope you will come back. If you decide to buy something they will almost always try and sell you something extra; a pack of gum, bottled water, or a magazine. You decline, pay for your purchase and leave.

I have worked retail for a couple of places, so let me give you the inside scoop. As you might guess the phrasing of the questions and trying to sell you more than you want to buy is required of a sales associate. The bosses lay down the law and you can get into trouble if you are caught not asking a customer if they want to buy a scarf with those mittens. Also being attentive gives those customers with sticky fingers the knowledge that they are being watched.

These are the superficial reasons. The real reason that it feels like that you are being pounced on is because they are bored. If it is a slow day and there are few customers and no one really buys anything the climax of a sales associates days may be refolding a pile of shirts that was rifled through. As a sales associate there is no place to hide. They must be stand visibly in the store, and sometimes they do just that, stand. They might stand in one spot for several minutes then see that a key chain is turned around on its hook. So they stroll over there and turn it around taking as much time as possible sorting through the key chains and arranging them in some way. They stand a little bit more and then see that someone bought gum. They hope someone else doesn’t spot the absence of gum and replace it before they get there.

So when you go into a store and every sales associate greats you and you are asked every two minutes if you need help. It’s likely because you are the most exciting thing happening in the store at that time.

Rabbit Rabbit

When I was in middle school my family and I picked up the rabbit rabbit tradition. Everyone was doing it. On the first of the month you greeted everybody by saying rabbit rabbit. If you said it first you win. It was always something to gloat about if you rabbit rabbited everyone before they got you. I was thinking about this strange tradition today, mostly because my sister posted to facebook a general rabbit rabbit. I decided to look it up and see where this strange idea got started. I went to the ever trustworthy source of Wikipedia. I discovered that this tradition may have begun as early as the 1800s in England. A phrase was more commonly said “Rabbit, rabbit, white rabbit” or simply rabbit three times. If you said this phrase on the first day of the month you were supposed to have good luck and if it was your birthday month you received an extra portion of luck. In some cases it was considered bad luck not to say it. In order to counter the bad luck you might say “tibbar, tibbar” as you go to bed or maybe “moose, moose” on the second.

If this phrase was said on the January first then you were the lucky recipient of year long luck. I think I must be a very lucky person under this supposition. I stopped saying rabbit rabbit to people exactly eleven years and one month ago. You see on that particular first of the month I beat everyone: my parents, my sisters, my aunt and uncle. They were the only ones in the house. We were playing an exciting game of phase 10, if my memory serves, and eating jalapeno poppers. You see I won because I’m very competitive. So when everyone else is yelling out “Happy New Year” and giving hugs. I proclaimed “Rabbit rabbit, everyone.” This of course set off a chain reaction of rabbit rabbits amongst my immediate family. My aunt and uncle simply looked confused. That is the last time I played. That particular first was extraordinary. It was the first of the month. It was January making it the first of the year. It was the first day of a new decade and it was the first day of a new score. It was the first day of a new century, which some people never get to experience and it culminated as the first day of a new millennium which is a very rare thing to experience. Yes, I won the rabbit rabbit game for all time when I beat everyone on January 1^st of 2000. So spread cheer and fun by telling your friends rabbit rabbit, but as for me I think I have enough luck for a lifetime.

Airports

I am starting a new job this week. I will be a cashier at an airport store. Cashiering isn’t the sort of job that I would ordinarily go for. Its location is what drew me to it. I love airports. The first time, I think, that I traveled by airplane was when I was three. That was 23 years ago. Air travel was not nearly as common as it is now. I don’t remember that first time, but have been on innumerable flights since that day. One of my more memorable flights was from Mexico City to Los Angeles. We flew with Malaysian Airways. I remember the food being good and that the flight attendants gave us packs of cards to entertain us on the flight.

This blog, however, is centered more on airports. Airports are a place bursting with potential. People buzz through airports impatiently waiting to board flights. Every person has a story. All those stories in one place and reasons for going places are what make airports so wonderful. There are people going home, people leaving home, people traveling to vacation destinations and people on business trips. There are feelings bursting behind the polite publish masks of the waiting travelers. There is lots of hope and excitement as new adventures begin. Sorrow, sadness and nostalgia also abound for many people are leaving loved ones after being home for a visit. If I were not so reserved I would talk to as many people as I could, to discover their story.

I love stories. Every person has his or her own story. I love discovering stories and figuring out what makes people do what they do. Airports represent for me a fabulous feast of stories. I feel them in the air and even when I don’t talk to anyone I am inspired by creating the stories of the people around me. Airports are a place that to most people is an inconvenience that must be endured to reach a desired destination. I see them bursting with energy and potential. I love airports.

There is no such thing as a dragon

While I was eating lunch today, I read several of my childhood books. I started thinking about the importance of stories in my life. I grew up surrounded by stories. My dad used to make up stories to entertain us on long car trips. Most days my family would gather together for an hour or so. My dad would read for a while from a for fun book and then we would have a devotional time. I love stories in any form. I started to really read for myself when I was eight. I was at my aunt’s house with my mom and sisters and as I recall quite bored. I picked up C. S. Lewis’ The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe. I started to read. My aunt let me take it home with me when it was time to leave. I read all the way home. I read the very last page as I walked through the front door. I have been passionate about reading ever since that day.

Anyway, today I read some of my old favorites. I found that these stories that I loved so much as a kid still make me smile as an adult. I love them for the memories, but I also love them for the stories. This one book I particularly loved. It is about a dragon who just wants to be noticed. The little boy and mom in the story pay no attention to this dragon because there is no such thing as dragons. In order to be noticed this dragon begins to grow until it is so big that no one can ignore it anymore. Once acknowledged it shrinks back to its original kitten size. This story is great, but what I like best about this book is my attempts to claim this book solely as my own. The book is mine and always was. My name is written in the “this book belongs to” spot by an adult hand. This, however, wasn’t enough for me. I scrawled my name on every page up to about half way through where it looks like I grew tired of writing my name. My s’s and n’s are backwards and sometimes I left letters out. There is no question that this book belongs to me.

I wonder if this was a desperate attempt to claim something as mine where, most everything was shared with my sisters. I didn’t have the responsibilities of being the oldest or the attention of being the youngest. I was indelibly stuck in the middle. Maybe this was an attempt to state that I am me and this is mine. I exist apart from my sisters and what we share. On the other hand, I could have simply been practicing writing my name and what better place than a book that is mine.  I feel like I had something else to say about these cherished books, but I can’t think of what it is. Maybe these books will at a later date provide more interesting thoughts.