I Am Inspired

By YOU!!!!

Really.

I put together more profiles of people today for AmericanLifeToday.com and am inspired by your story. Everything. All of it. Thank you.

Please be sure to submit your 5 answers today if you haven't already.

Look at you!

You're incredible!

Finish What You Started

I had this idea last fall about introducing you to your fellow Americans by asking each person 5 questions about their life. I launched www.AmericanLifeToday.com on January 1st, 2009 with the idea of profiling a person each day of the year, for the entire year.

That was my hope.

I am not one to quit, so I will continue to search for people to introduce you to. It's simple to participate and I hope you do.

Answer the questions below and submit your answers to AmericanLifeToday@gmail.com Please incude a picture. If you know of someone that we should meet, plase forward this post to a friend on the button below. Thank you so much! I can't wait to learn more about you.

Name:
Age:
Sign:
I grew up in:
I currently live in:
Occupation:
You can find me:
You will never find me:
Your website or Charity you are passionate about:

1.) Who or what Inspires you?
2.) What would you want to change about yourself?
3.) What is your most prized possession?
4.) Who has been the most influential person in your life? Why?
5.) How do you want to be remembered?

Life and Coffee

I love coffee.

I drink it everyday.

I was never one to go out for coffee until recently. Dave and I would chat about drinking coffee and how we thought that we could change the world after 3+ cups. Or, more along the lines of how brilliant and creative we are after 3 cups. I am sold. Why not?



So, after 3 hours sitting here in the same spot, my mind started wandering to the people that came into the store rather than what I came in here for...

Actually, I wanted to get out of my head and I did just that. I crawled into the heads of everyone else.

People hang out here all day. I had no idea. This is all new to me. It makes me feel smart to hang out at a bookstore, so why not? Feeling smart with a caffeine buzz is not a bad thing, well...until later. We won't talk about that now.

It's like an airport. People coming and going, wandering, sitting, reading, staring, thinking, drinking, eating.

Living.



Found out a refill is only 50 cents. It's why I am here for 3 hours. And to stay out of the house. Yes, I still have Maggie's beds all over, food and bowl still out. Being away gets my mind off of it for a little while at least.

Students, retirees, mothers, kids, me. We're all here.



This blog isn't much of anything but to say I am "being."

I am here.

I am aware.

Home Away From Home

I want to start off by saying that I continue to miss Maggie everyday. She will forever be in my heart. The past week I went to my home away from home (Chico, CA) to help mourn her loss. It was a nice to have a change of scenery for a few days.

I love it there.
I went to college there.
My college room mates and best friends live there.
It's home to me.

I tried to take it slow and not do much. I did for the most part. It was relaxing to see everyone and doing simple things that I enjoy. Since I arrived during the week, everyone was working so I met them in different places to share their life with them.

I did spend moments alone in the park (trying to avoid snakes)but I had no idea about the other fun activities that were in store for me.

I walked with Rose and Jake, went to Hannah's (John and Heide's daughter)softball game, and had the privilege to attend a "clothes party" at someones house with Heide. I was oblivious to this "secret club."

Women gathering in a home, watching a clothes paring demonstration, being served wine, and once it's completed...off come their clothes! It was a flurry of half naked women grabbing articles of clothing...shoving and pushing, screaming at each other, falling on the floor. Pure chaos!! Well, sort of.

They didn't appreciate me being there not partaking in the wine, taking pictures and not stripping, but I had an entertaining time watching all of the fun. To protect the innocent, only photos before the strip down will be included.

Here are some pictures to give you an idea of the excitement. :)

Presenting the clothes...

Starting the wine and cheese fest...

Heide and Connie with their game plan...

Hannah (on left) and friend at their softball game

Up to bat (with dad coaching in background)

Jake running in the park

Jake

Enjoying Bidwell Park

Bear Hole

NOT enjoying a new friend I almost stepped on:

I am so thankful that they are in my life and that I can go visit them on a moments notice. Until next time...

Love

Thank you.

I want you to know how much I am touched by your thoughts, comments, well wishes, and words of kindness. I am truly blessed. My friend, Caroline made this piece for her memory.

I was lucky that Maggie chose me 10 years ago.. We had so many adventures together, especially last summer. I put together some moments she had in the last year on this slide show.

She loved you all.

I am healing. It's a day at a time. I miss her everyday.

My Bed

For the past few days, I have not left my bed. I don’t ever remember doing this before.

I need to do something different.

I did it. It was hard, but I decided to take my happy pill.

At first, I was hesitant. Why not? I know it will be good for me. Once I did it, it was ok. Then after a while, my breathing got harder, my throat started to burn, I started sweating…yes, it felt gooood…. Ahhhh…

The hardest part about not having Maggie around is coming home. I look forward to it so much because I see her head through the cut hole in the fence greeting me. If not there, she is slowly waking up and walking through the dog door.

Now it’s silence. I walk into the house looking at her half eaten bowl of food.

Thank you all so much for the kind words and well wishes. It is so appreciated! Even though I haven’t been out of the bed, I will get there soon. I know it. There are too many things in life to experience and blog about. Thank god for blogs.

I miss her terribly. Here’s a video of her trying to swim (She HATES swimming, but likes to bite water) at Lake Vermillion in South Dakota. We stayed there 3 nights in the most beautiful campsite on our trip. School was out so it was empty. Just us and the lake.

At least one of us looks like we're having fun in this picture.

Her favorite is barking at waves. Here we are on Lake Erie in Ohio.

My Best Friend

I lost my best friend today. She died of a cardiac arrest after surgery to take out a massive growth on her spleen. I thought I was going to bring her home today. She looked great yesterday. Life is precious.

There is so much to say about her. For now, I hope you visit her my space page here (www.myspace.com/travelingmaggie) to see the trip that we took through her eyes.

I miss her so much

I am devastated.

I Love Maggie

I love my dog, Maggie. I adopted her 10 years ago at the Santa Monica Animal shelter and it was love at first sight. A few months ago, we spent 120 days on the road traveling across the USA in my little 4x9 teardrop trailer. These pictures are from that trip. I rushed her to the hospital today and found out that she has an enormous growth in her spleen. Tonight, she is having surgery to remove the growth. I don't want to project. This is all I know so far. I will keep you updated on her status as I know more. She is my baby. I miss her being out of the house already.

Skinny or Die

I am not skinny. I am 6 foot tall and wear a size 12.

I hate to shop. I especially hate to go to the mall.

Now that we have established that, the other day I went to the mall to go shopping.

Big Mistake.

At first I was horrified. After a coffee(magic in a paper cup), I became amused. We, as Americans (yes, I am going to clump you into this generalization) are obsessed with “skinny.” In our society, it’s a compliment to be skinny. I have curves. I thought all women had curves. But, we can’t have curves in the clothes being sold today. I know that this isn’t a scientific study, but I went to 3 retailers browsing around with my coffee in tow, looking at what styles were in today. All I saw were descriptors of clothes as “skinny,” “toothpick,” “pencil,” and my favorite…”destroyed.”

What? I can see the conversation now with a 16 year old to her mother…”can you stop at J.Crew to pick up a pair of destroyed pencil skinny jeans for me? Pleeeeezzzeeee…. Oh yeah, and a pair of toothpick destroyers in a size 0.”

First of all, if you wear a size 0, you are already skinny. You can’t get any smaller. Is there a negative 0? Certainly I wouldn’t know. Usually, sales people walk away from me or I have to flag them down to find my jumbo size in “the back.” Have you ever even seen “the back?” I have no idea what is there, but a lot of the time, even the salesperson is scared of it. You can tell it’s a nightmare there when they sigh and say,” oh, everything is out here” and turn to chew their gum, twirl their hair and carry on the conversation with another employee on how so and so did this or that.

If you want to smell like you made out with a used car salesman while being deaf from going out all night, take a stroll through Abercrombie & Fitch. You are greeted with a 10 X 15 foot black and white picture of a man reaching in his pants looking for something. What are we selling? Jeans, yeeeah…right… So, the music is loud, the stench comes at you before you get in and obviously by the looks of the 12 year old salesgirl (wearing a top no bigger than one you would put on a barbie), I greatly surpassed the age maximum to get in the store and for them to care. Doesn't matter what you need or want, the music level is loud enough they can pretend not to hear you. Anyway, they don’t have my size and there is no “back.” I had to laugh at the men’s jeans with holes all over it selling for $100. At $8 an hour, that kid has to work 12.5 hours + to buy those jeans. In this day and age, do you think kids think like that?

Why did I even go to the mall, you ask? I wasn’t going to say but I went through a drawer of postcards from Aveda offering free trial sizes of items if you bring the offer into the store. Needless to say, I haven’t been to the mall in years. I had about 10 postcards. The sweet salesman looked at the postcards, looked back up at me...smiled. He looked back at the postcards and then back at me. Under his breath, said, “um… wow, this is from 2002...we don’t even carry this product anymore… (Smile...nervous laughter), this is expired (as he ripped the postcard in 10 pieces), and then finally, “this I can do!” He said that just about when I was starting to walk away...whew...saved.

I scooped up my 3 samples and off I went.

Until next year…

O Magazine Photoshoot

I grew up in Southern California and have always lived close to where the “magic” happens. I am 6 feet tall, but I have never considered modeling or anything of the sort. Well, once my mom took me to a model agency when I was in 6th grade I think (because I was a foot taller than everyone else) and they told me I needed to lose around 20 pounds. What??? I’m 13 years old! Needless to say, I left and never went back. I would rather play sports anyway. Humph! I showed them!

An opportunity came my way through a friend to participate in an Oprah Winfrey (I guess I really don’t need to put her last name here) Magazine photo shoot. Of course I was going to say yes! I did and they decided to include me in the shoot! They needed a male model in his 30’s so I asked my friend Dave (livesinavan.com) to come and join me in the fun.

For some reason, I was nervous leading up to the shoot. I mean, we’re talking OPRAH! Hello!!! They told me to bring swimsuits and wear beach clothes in brown, beige, and purple. Ah! Just what I have in my closet! Every pale skinned woman has a flattering beige swimsuit on hand. Hummm, this was going to be challenging. I threw all of my pasty colored clothes in a bag and off we went!

I have to be on time…to everything. Dave and I were going to be 2 minutes late and I started to panic. Obviously, I have never done this before. Dave (the veteran to photo shoots and being an extra on tv), told me not to worry and that we would be sitting around all day. What?? Nonsense!!

We sat around all day.

For this shoot, there were about 15 models posing to recreate “Sunday Afternoon on La Grande Jatte” painting by Georges Seurat for the 21st century. I was cast as one of the women in the background sitting on a picnic blanket. We started the shoot about 3 hours late in overcast, cloudy and windy conditions. Was I complaining? Heck no!

One of the children in the shoot decided that she had enough. She didn’t want to stand in the freezing beach weather in a swimsuit anymore. At the last minute, they pulled me from the back and put me right in the middle of the shot, holding an umbrella and a child’s hand with my purple dress on.

I did my best to try and pose to the side. You know what I am talking about. Most women know that doing so will make you appear thinner. Well, the secret was out and I heard, “hey, woman in the purple dress...please stand straight on to the camera and stop turning” over the megaphone. Who me? I didn't do anything...

I don’t know what issue this photo will appear. It was an experience for sure. Even though most of the models had agents and were complaining about the long day, I didn’t mind. I was fortunate enough to have been invited. I look forward to seeing the end result. At least I will have photographic evidence of me in a dress…holding a child’s hand no less.

Sorry to say that David did not make it in the picture. I sure did enjoy his company, though! Thank you Dave for making the drive down to experience this with me. I look forward to visiting you up north and watching you doing stand up comedy!

Here are some pictures I took to give you an idea of the day... yes, that's "Niky Stevens" from the L Word.