White Orchid Melody Blog

It’s Day 10, and I’m getting kind of sick of all this healthy eating! Ha! Part of that is hormones. All I want to do is eat chocolate and pizza, with a bottle of prosecco on the side, oh, and some fries.

Yesterday Alex asked for blueberry muffins (his favorite), so I broke out the gluten free flour and whipped up a batch using my normal vegan recipe. They were, well, interesting. I didn’t think they were worth the calories, but Alex ate two. I guess as long as he likes them they were a worthwhile endeavor. I think I will stick to my regular recipe in the future though. I’d rather have the real thing as an occasional treat than settle for some sub-par flavor on a regular basis.

I think that is true for lots of things. I am skeptical of any diets that suggest faux-foods. If you want to be vegan, be vegan. Don’t be a vegan eating fake cheese all the time. If you are dying for a grilled cheese sandwich, have one already! I speak from experience. I ate a lot of “fake” meat when I first went vegetarian, but ultimately that stuff is processed food and not healthy for you, at least not on a regular basis. So if you are only having it occasionally anyway, you might as well just have meat (with the caveat that you eat the healthiest meat you can find–raised humanely without added hormones, drugs, etc). We have turkey on Thanksgiving. I have no interest in Fo-turkey or To-furkey or whatever it is. I think if you can make a healthier replacement without sacrificing the flavor, then by all means do so. My vegan blueberry muffins are just as awesome as the ones with egg and milk. Meanwhile, our household is all dying for pizza. I don’t know if we are going to make it until the end of the 21 days!

I have reframed the way I look at meal time while on the cleanse. The extreme shift has been helpful in getting us un-hooked from our junk food habits, but it has also made me rethink how we can have our junk food in more healthy portions. Instead of ordering a bunch of pizza, order a smaller amount and have a big salad with it. Last night I made eggplant parmesan (with just a tiny bit of cheese on top!). Normally we’d have that with spaghetti. Instead, we had a big salad alongside and left the table feeling much less stuffed and much healthier. So, I can see a long term change in our eating patterns even after the cleanse is done.

Another good thing for me has been the morning smoothie ritual. I eat pretty light most of the day. Water first, then when I’m hungry a smoothie, then maybe a snack later if I’m still hungry, then a light lunch, my afternoon piece of chocolate, then dinner. I have found that if I start off eating too early in the morning, before I’m hungry, I eat too much all day long. We like having a nice big dinner, so it is helpful to keep the rest of the day’s food on the lighter side.

Tonight I’m going to try some lentil croquettes similar to some I had at this awesome vegetarian restaurant in Spain. I’m totally winging them, so that should be fun!

It’s day 8! We made it a week, with only a couple “cheats.” My first thought upon waking was, “a cappuccino would be nice. Maybe this can just be a one week cleanse. Or maybe I can keep doing the other things, but add in the cappuccino.” Uh-huh. Nice try. I got up and got on the scale. 5 pounds lost this week! Oh, okay, so maybe I don’t want that cappuccino after all!

In the book, Kris Carr suggests that the 7th day can be a fasting day, either partial or full—having just green juice or smoothies until dinner or all day. I was thinking of doing this, but by lunchtime, I was feeling hungry for something other than a smoothie, so I made some Coconut Curry Soup for Alex and myself. It was so good! So, here’s the recipe:

Coconut Curry Soup

1 small onion, finely chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 Tbsp curry powder
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp ginger
1 tsp chili powder
1/2 tsp crushed red pepper (optional)
1 or 2 cups vegetable broth
1/2 zucchini, very finely chopped
1 carrot, very finely chopped
1/4 bell pepper, very finely chopped
1/4 cup tomato puree
1 tsp salt (or to taste)
1-15 oz can coconut milk
1/3 pkg rice sticks (check the asian section of the supermarket for these)

Saute your onion in olive oil until tender and translucent. Add garlic and saute until it is aromatic. Then throw in the spice mixture and stir well, letting the spices cook a bit. Toss in the veggies and mix with the spices. Then pour in enough vegetable broth to cover the veggies, scraping up all the spices that are stuck to the pan. Allow to simmer until veggies are tender. This won’t take long since we’ve cut them so finely. Add in the tomato puree, salt, and coconut milk. Bring back to a strong simmer. Meanwhile prepare your rice sticks according to the package directions. Mine said to soak in hot water for 10 minutes, then chop. I soaked them until they looked nice and flexible, then chopped them into about 1″ pieces. Add the chopped rice noodles to the soup and allow the whole mixture to simmer for another 5 or 10 minutes. Serve hot and enjoy!

Mornings are definitely the most difficult for me. To say I’m not a morning person is putting it lightly. Cappuccinos are pretty much my only motivation to get up in the morning. Sad, isn’t it? So, without the cappuccino happiness, I’ve been extra grumpy. But I’ve been sticking to tea and smoothies. I think maybe today was slightly better on the coffee deprivation front. I’ve been really tired though. I guess I’m still exhausted from our vacation. Combine that with being decaffeinated, and well, I need afternoon naps and early bedtimes.

Yesterday I went out to the big American grocery store, which is always a chore. But they have a good selection of gluten free items and I wanted to stock up to help us through the cleanse. I bought some gluten free baking mix just in case we have a craving for baked goods in a week! I don’t want that to be a reason for giving up on the cleanse. And so far, cutting the gluten from my diet has made me feel much better! So, I’m already seeing the benefits of the cleanse. It has really helped having Brian doing it along with me this time, too. Last time I had to smell his coffee in the morning. Oh, the agony!!! Plus he’s always so positive and cheerful, and that helps me stay motivated.

We’ve been having salads for lunch, smoothies for breakfast, and fruit or nuts or rice cakes for snacks. Last night we had a date night and went to our favorite local restaurant. That was a challenge. The owner/chef prepares everything to order and I knew she’d be most likely to prepare food that was close to the cleanse guidelines. We normally pig out on bruschetta, fried appetizers, grilled veggies, pasta with cream sauce, bread, dessert, coffee, and of course wine. So last night, I ordered a green salad, grilled veggies, and zucchini risotto. That was a huge improvement over our standard fare! It’s really crazy how easy it is to overeat in Italy. Just reading that list of our normal meal is kind of embarrassing. We did, however, succumb to a bottle of Prosecco, which is truly my wine-weakness. We ordered a glass and they brought us a bottle (this is also very typical in Italy). And of course I can’t just have a glass when there is a whole bottle sitting right in front of me. So, we slipped up. But we acknowledged our failure and got right back on track today.

That’s a big deal for me. Normally, if I gave into the temptation of something not on the cleanse, I’d just say to hell with it and go back to status quo. It felt good to realize we’d made a bad choice and get right back to making good choices. Oh, and we both had heartburn after the Prosecco. That helped to remind us that it was not the best choice!

Today we went to the local produce stand for our fruits and veggies. The fruit and veggie prep is really a lot of work! I chop up all the salad veggies and put them in separate containers so that they are ready to go for salads for the next several days. It’s convenient for quick lunches, but it takes a lot of time up front. I’ve been doing it for awhile just for me, but for the two of us it’s a twice a week chore.

At the market, I bought some pepperoncini picanti (hot chili peppers) to make fresh salsa. It turned out really spicy, but so good! For dinner, I served the salsa over polenta slices with lightly steamed green beans and homemade refried beans. It was the first time I’d ever had polenta. I bought a premade pack that you just slice and cook. The label said to fry it. I tried that it, but it was a mess–sticking to the pan and all mushy. So, the rest of the slices I baked in the oven. That worked much better and without the added fat! Awesome! But I think next time I’ll try to make the polenta from scratch.

So far, so good. We’re on track. The vegan and gluten free thing is pretty easy. The wine and coffee, a bit harder. But I’m committed to seeing it through–especially since I can already tell a difference!

Today was tough, though not necessarily because of the cleanse. I woke up in the middle of the night last night with my allergies flaring up. My mouth and ears were itching like crazy, so I got up and took some benadryl. Well, I guess it was nearly 5am then because when my 3 year old came in with a big “GOODMORNING!!!” at 6:15am, I could hardly open my eyes. I begged for mercy, but no luck. I tried to convince him to let me sleep for awhile longer, but it’s hard to convince a 3 year old who is so excited about life and NEVER tired that you are still tired and want to sleep. So, in my sleep deprived state I wanted a big cappuccino (or three) and a chocolate chip raspberry muffin. I drank my green smoothie instead.

I did have a cup of black tea later, which perked me up a bit. Then for lunch, red bean and vegetable curry with a bit of rice. And tonight for dinner we had a big salad and some fresh corn. Interesting thing about the corn. I specifically asked at the market if it was sweet corn– “mais dolce”.  He said yes, but apparently he and I have differing definitions of sweet. It was really starchy, so I fried it up like my grandma used to fry up field corn (minus the crisco!).

As much as I have loved living in Italy, the charm is starting to wear off. We said goodbye tonight to some friends who are moving back to the states. (oh, and we had a shot of limoncello with them…totally NOT part of the cleanse. oops.) Seeing them all packed up and heading off, I was a little jealous. I’m ready to be back on familiar ground. Of course, there are many things I will miss about Italy. My memories will almost certainly reflect the good things most prominently and the bad things as just quirky and amusing. But, seriously, being able to do more than one load of laundry a day will be awesome!

It’s the first day of the Crazy Sexy Cleanse! Several months ago, Brian and I did a 21 day vegan indulgence. We made it almost 21 days before life made it nearly impossible to continue. But really, I didn’t feel much different for it. Since then, I’ve read Crazy Sexy Diet by Kris Carr. In the book she describes how your body processes foods–either alkaline or acidic. It’s not the same as the natural state of the food before eating. For example, lemons are alkaline to your body, but they are obviously very acidic. Citric acid anyone? So, it’s a bit complicated, but the gist of it is this: raw plant foods have living enzymes which aid in digestion. The less work your body has to do while digesting your food, the more energy it can spend on other things, like healing what ails you, renewing cells, etc.

Dead things don’t have enzymes. So when you boil your green beans for an hour, you’ve killed them. Additionally, meat and pasteurized dairy are acidic and difficult to digest. (Raw dairy, however, has it’s enzymes intact. Some folks even eat raw meat. Ew. But anyway.) The best stuff for your body are enzyme packed fruits and veggies. The Crazy Sexy Cleanse is designed to break your addictions to dairy, sugar, caffeine, and alcohol and streamline your digestion by adding gobs of live enzymes. It also eliminates gluten from your meals. I never would have thought I had a gluten intolerance, but a couple months ago, I tried the CSC for just over a week and could tell a huge difference in eliminating gluten! I was really shocked, but as soon as I ate pizza crust or pasta, I felt awful. Since then, I’ve cut back quite a bit on my gluten intake, but man, is that difficult in Italy!

My nutritional philosophy is this: a varied, seasonal diet heavy on plant foods. I’ve discovered first hand over the past couple years, that when you eat the same foods all the time, you can develop a food intolerance. I think this is what has happened with dairy, gluten, and even wine. If I eat dairy more than once a day, I feel bad. I was really over doing it when we first moved here, what with the pizza and pastas full of cheese, but after cutting back quite a bit, it isn’t bothering me as much. On our trip to France we were eating boatloads of bread and I felt HORRIBLE. Not sure if it’s the gluten or the yeast, but it’s not healthy for me. I’m doing the cleanse as a way of purging out all the things that might be making me feel so tired and bleh. Then, I’ll add back one thing at a time and hopefully learn more about what my body does and does not like.

We are all unique beings, and I do not believe one size fits all when it comes to nutrition. However, I do think there are some general guidelines that apply to all, i.e. “Eat your veggies!” But when I think about food intolerance, I think that seasonal eating makes a lot of sense. You really shouldn’t be eating spinach every day of the year. Your body needs a multitude of nutrients that simply cannot be found in one or even 20 different foods. This is bad news for most of us Americans since the supermarket looks pretty much the same year round. It can be difficult to discern what is truly “in season”. I think this is also one of the reasons so many people don’t like to eat fruits and veggies. They taste terrible out of season, or even in season when shipped 2000 miles. There is some of that even here in Italy where so much is local and seasonal. My local produce stand had zucchini out of season (don’t know where it was coming from) but it tasted bitter and awful! Then I remembered that it was April. Zucchini doesn’t grow in Italy in April. Right. Zucchini in July? Yes please! It’s the sweetest veggie ever!

Day 1 Menu:

breakfast: 20 oz smoothie: banana, green apple, nectarine, melon, zucchini, carrot, spinach, a splash of lemon juice and a teaspoon of honey (for my allergies)–we actually made a big pitcher of it to share between the 3 of us (alex likes them too!) so all of this made more than 20 ounces.

snack: hot green tea, green apple with peanut butter

lunch: big raw food salad with red and green lettuce, baby spinach, tomatoes, carrots, zucchini, red and yellow peppers, pumpkin seeds, chickpeas (cooked canned), tossed with a splash of orange balsamic vinegar, soy sauce, and olive oil.

snack: 85% dark chocolate square, hot green tea

dinner: bell peppers stuffed with herbed potato/cauliflower mash with onion-tomato gravy; lightly steamed green beans and sauteed fennel with balsamic and raw garlic vinaigrette.  Yummy! (I haven’t made this yet and I can’t wait for dinner!)

and of course, water, water, water! But did you know that drinking water with a meal dilutes the natural enzymes in your stomach? So, it’s best to drink a glass or two of water about 20 minutes before your meal, and then wait an hour or so after your meal before drinking up!

If the peppers turn out as fabulous as I expect, I’ll post the recipe tomorrow!

I have a confession to make: I really like being a housewife, a.k.a. Domestic Goddess. Okay, so I don’t like to clean, but other than that. And yes, I need time to paint and write and read (which is what I do instead of cleaning), but I really like being able to stay at home: having the time to make my home a “nest”—a warm inviting place; having the time to cook nutritious meals; being able to watch my son learn and grow. I would be missing out on a lot of these things if I was working full time outside the home. When I worked full time, before my son came along, dinner was a hurried affair. Home from a long day, tired and drained, I wasn’t exactly up for getting creative in the kitchen. I relied heavily on processed foods. Even after I went vegetarian and had to learn to cook more things from scratch, soy-based meat substitutes were frequently on the menu.

After I quit working, I really struggled with the idea of just being a housewife. Even though our quality of life improved with me at home—better food for one thing!—I still felt like I wasn’t making an adequate contribution to our livelihood. I made several attempts at small craft-type businesses, but I was never passionate enough about any of them to get past the initial creative surge. I felt defeated and frustrated, yet at the same time I couldn’t bear the thought of another corporate job. Once we had a baby, my staying home was more “justified”, but still, I couldn’t really let myself go. I couldn’t let myself enjoy it.

I was brought up to be a career woman. From a very young age, I was taught that the most important thing for me to do was to have a career. College was stressed as essential, but really the education was only a means to the career. Perhaps I didn’t show any natural tendencies to nurture, but it wasn’t encouraged either. I don’t remember playing with baby dolls, only full-grown Barbie dolls. I never really had pets to nurture. It was all about growing up and being an independent woman. Parents always want their kids to have a better life than they had, to skip the hardships and enjoy life. And that truly was the spirit behind the lessons. My mom wanted me to have the freedom to choose a life of my own making. She didn’t want me to get tied down to a baby before I was ready.

Unfortunately, the lesson really REALLY sank in. So much so, that I had a hard time enjoying it once I did have a baby. I felt like I wasn’t cut out for being a mom. I definitely had hormonal issues, but looking back now, I think a lot of my depression stemmed from my inability to fall into the situation with grace. I couldn’t let myself go. I couldn’t let myself enjoy something that had been so devalued my whole life. I didn’t see myself as tender and nurturing and I didn’t think it was okay to be that way either. Maybe it was okay for other people, but not for me. Wasn’t I supposed to be doing something more with my life?

Three years later, I am finally realizing this about myself. (Slow learner?) Being in Italy, not being “allowed” to work here, has really let me off the hook. It has allowed me to enjoy staying at home. There is no pressure to be doing something more important because legally, I can’t. I have really figured out what I do and do not like to do with my time. But even here, for the last year or so, I’ve been thinking of how to make one of the things I like to do a career. I could go back to school for a Master’s in Painting and teach, for example. But honestly, I don’t want a career. That is so hard to admit after a lifetime of conditioning, but it’s true. I want freedom and flexibility in my life. If I do teach, I want it to be part time, on my terms. I don’t want to invest a ton of money in a degree and then be a slave to a job to pay back loans. No way, man.

In some ways it is easy to admit that I like being a housewife. After all, it means I get to do whatever I want all the time, right? But then there’s that whole being a mom thing. My husband, my mom, my in-laws, friends and other relatives have all said that I’m a good mom. But I still feel like I’m not cut out for it. I’ve been very resistant to the idea of having another baby because I was so miserable for that first year. But now I wonder how much of that was just my resistance to the situation. Can I own my experience and say “Yes! This is what I want!” and have a more positive experience next time? I actually love being a mom on most days. I love the experience, though, not the label. The label still has negative connotations in my mind. But the day-to-day of playing with my son, watching him learn and grow, is actually pretty awesome. There is a delicate balance, of course. When things become too heavily weighted towards everyone else’s needs, I start to get crazy. But as long as I get some “me time”—painting, reading, writing, running—I do alright. This is true for every other mom I know.

When I think about the future, what appeals to me is having a life full of things I value—time, art, good food, family, friends. Having a career and all the stresses that go with it is not part of that picture. I want a handmade life—one made of all the beautiful pieces that I can assemble together, like a quilt of joy, love, and creativity. It’s not about expecting everything to be perfectly happy all the time. It’s about accepting the challenges as necessary to the whole, feeling the pain so that you can feel the joy, not numbing oneself to the human experience. It can be whatever I want it to be. Each of us has the power to create a beautiful life for ourselves. We can make this life whatever we want it to be. It doesn’t have to fit into anyone else’s idea of a good life. It’s your life. Own it.

My new(ish) tattoo:

We are divine beings seeking the human experience.

It’s all about owning that experience, whatever it is.

Sometimes I feel as though I’m behind the power curve, like it has taken me too long to figure out what I want in life. Shouldn’t I have realized that I wanted to be an artist when Art was my favorite subject in grade school? Now I’m 30 and starting over. Well, technically I’ve been “starting over” for several years now, which is further evidence of this being a very drawn out process. I guess what I’m saying is that I wonder sometimes where I’d be now if I had just acknowledged my true desires much earlier on.

For sanity’s sake, I like to think that it had to be this way. I had to try it “their way” in order to be absolutely certain that’s not what I want. Suppose I’d gone the starving artist route right from the start, would I have had the courage to persevere? Or would I have been tempted by all the comfortable trappings of the path well-traveled?

The fact is that I have no idea what it would have or could have been like. I only know where I am today. Whether I like it or not, it has taken me thirty years to face myself and the world and speak up for what I really truly want. And after all, late is better than never.

I was inspired this morning by a tweet from Tricia of Joyologist:

Whenever I find myself irritated I remember that they or it isn’t irritating me. I am irritating me. I am always in control.

This is really quite profound if you think about it. The barking dog behind your house isn’t annoying you. Your husband not taking out the trash isn’t annoying you. You are annoying you. You are choosing to feel annoyed by things that you could choose to feel differently about. It is easy to say that you deserve to feel annoyed about those things. And maybe that’s true. Maybe your annoyance is totally justified. But do you enjoy feeling annoyed? Is that really how you want to go through life?

Do you want to be annoyed or do you want to be happy? You own your emotions. You are in complete control of how you feel at all times. You can choose to feel differently. You can choose to feel sorry for the dog being tied up all day. You can choose to be amused by the fact that your husband is so absent minded. Feel what you WANT to feel, not what you think someone is making you feel.

“Wow, your hair looks awful today.”

“Have you been binge eating or what? You look really fat.”

“I hope you don’t think you are going to wear a bikini to the beach this summer because that would be embarrassing.”

If your friends or loved ones said any of those things to you, you would probably be pissed off, or at the very least you wouldn’t want to be around them much. Yet we say similar things to ourselves all the time (well, I do anyway, and I imagine some of you do, too). Why do we beat ourselves up like this? There are lots of reasons, not the least of which is the social messages we see every day that say those same things to us. We’re never good enough when we compare ourselves with airbrushed models. We know this, intellectually, yet we still give ourselves over to the self-hate.

A while back, I was thinking of a hurtful comment made years ago by someone close to me. The person didn’t mean to hurt me, but the comment was not exactly supportive. Thinking of it years later, I still felt hurt. And I realized suddenly that I was angry with someone else for saying something negative about the way I look, but I say things like that to myself all the time.

So, shouldn’t I feel just as hurt and outraged when that voice in my head starts up with the insults? And worse yet, that voice is not just some other person over whom I’ve no control. I own that voice, and ultimately I can control what it has to say. I can CHOOSE to be either supportive or detrimental to my own mental health. I’ve been choosing to be mean to myself. How stupid.

So, now when those negative thoughts creep in, I say to myself, “no one talks to me that way! I am beautiful, strong, healthy, creative, _____” etc, fill in the blank.

Beating up on myself mentally never helps me to improve anything about myself. It discourages me, if anything. Self-loathing is no ticket to self-improvement. Self-love, on the other hand, can create a whole new person. Why would anyone take care of something they hate? But if it’s something you love, of course you want to take care of it. So, love yourself, take care of yourself, remind yourself daily of all the wonderful things that make you who you are. And remind that inner mean-girl that if she doesn’t have anything nice to say, she shouldn’t say anything at all.

What really matters in life anyway? What is it that you’ll be so glad you did when you are on your deathbed? It most likely isn’t your job. Unless your job is doing something for which you have a true passion, but that is very rare. I think we all want to feel like we’ve contributed to the world in whatever way we best could. For some people that’s as simple as being a good mom (I said simple, not easy!). For others it’s advocating for the rights of those less fortunate.

Several months ago, I read The Art of Non-Conformity. It’s a great book about living life outside the rat race. Want to go back to school? Try his plan for a one-year independent study MBA, and save yourself a boatload of money. One of the things he brings up in the book, though, is that in order to really be fulfilled, you must find a way to give back to the world. We all want that feeling of having made a difference.

I’m not yet sure what that means for me. I have some long-term ideas about how I can make a difference by helping to motivate others to pursue their creative dreams. But the details of how to actually do that are still fuzzy. I’ve been of the mind recently that grad school is the way to go. If I get an MFA, I can teach. I really enjoyed the teaching I did before Alex was born, but do I want to do that full time? As far as jobs go, academia is pretty awesome. Summers off, anyone??? But one thing I know is that I’m not comfortable going into debt in order to get that degree. I value financial freedom more than any further education.

I fall into the trap of thinking, oh if I could just get that advanced degree then I could have a job I liked and make enough money to get by. But is all that really, truly, necessary? Or is it just an excuse to take the easy route? Degrees and jobs and career paths are the way things are done around here. It is a life script that we are all familiar with; it’s comfortable. To think of the alternatives is scary! No job? How will I survive? (Yes, I do have a husband, but the goal is for him to do what he loves, too!)

Our goal is to both be living our passion on a daily basis. And since we are two pretty headstrong people, our passion doesn’t involve taking direction from any one else. Not that we can’t. We’re both good at playing along with the corporate racket, but at the same time it kills one’s soul a little bit more every day. I know I could never have a corporate job again. Maybe I could handle academia. But do I really want that? Or do I want to have my days to myself and decide what I’d like to spend my time doing moment to moment?

Well, when you put it like that….

Another great book we read is Your Money or Your Life. The authors write about some unconventional approaches to work/life balance, with the general idea being to reduce your spending to the point of not needing to work as much. We’ve read other simple living books that espouse the same principles. And with that knowledge we have simplified our lives. We don’t buy so much useless crap. We choose quality products that will last a long time rather than what’s cheapest (this is also good for the planet, by the way). We aren’t perfect, and we definitely aren’t what you’d call thrifty, but most of our purchases are thoughtful at the very least. And we’ve come a long way from where we were when we first got married.

When I think about what I love to do, it’s obviously painting and writing. It’s not teaching. So why would teaching be my full time job when what I actually want to spend time doing is painting and writing? Teaching is something I enjoy, but it is secondary to painting and writing. So, it would make more sense for that to be the part time endeavor, rather than the other way around. So then, what is the degree actually worth? Education is always valuable. But you don’t have to always pay a lot for it. I had a full tuition scholarship for my undergraduate degree and I still walked away with a ridiculous amount of student loans for supplies, books, and living expenses. Having only recently paid all those off, I’m not too eager to get back into debt. It goes against our larger goal of financial freedom.

In a perfect world, we’d both be able to read, write, and create as much as we want. Our home would be paid for; our other expenses would be minimal; we could easily make enough money to pay for what we needed. We could grow some of our own food (well, Brian could anyway. I like the idea of gardens much more than the reality!). The simple life really appeals to me.

I went back to the states for a visit before Christmas. While there, I went to visit a friend who is living with her grandmother for awhile. Her grandmother is about 80, I think, and she is a prolific painter. When I walked into the garage from the driveway, I had to stop and stare. All the walls were lined with paintings. It was amazing. And there in the corner was her little studio. I talked to her about her paintings, naturally. I asked her if she ever sold them.

“No,” she said. “I don’t want to deal with that. I don’t want someone judging my work and saying it’s not good enough. It’s good enough for me. That’s what matters.”

I love her attitude. I don’t think you can ever really create something great for any reason other than because it is what your soul demands that you do. I’m not sure where I’m going with that other than to say that I wonder how much of my desire to get a degree is just my ego. I wonder if I’d be just as happy to paint and write, no matter what anyone else though of my work. Is it enough to just create? If you take away the financial pressure, is it enough to just create whatever your soul demands?