OMG

I went a whole week without posting! Eeks!
I won't do it again I promise.

Memory

I leave tonight for a work trip to England. I'm not complaining at all because it will be a good trip BUT, it does mean no three day Memorial Day weekend for me. I was feeling a little bit sorry for myself that everyone else was making plans to be somewhere fun and I would be packing and finishing up a presentation all my lonesome.

Fortunately my New York friend Traci needed a little break from her Manhattan craziness and she caught a train to me on Friday evening. We ate good food in the South End, cooked a leisurely breakfast, did some shopping along Newbury and then took delicious Saturday afternoon naps before we headed over to the House of Blues to see the sold out National show. Turned out the show was teeming with cute boys so we did some flirting. Then we headed back to my house for midnight BLT's. She left early this morning and I got to go to church in the beautiful old stone chapel the kind folks at the First Church Cambridge are letting us use for a bit. I'll hop a plane this evening and spend the week getting to meet my UK team members. Life could be worse people.

If you have never heard of The National, that should stop today. This song was so incredible live I might have cried a little bit.



Peace out.

The Best

Tonight I probably should have gone to the gym but instead I did this.



Summer rules.

Things I Love

This song.

Cleaned out

I was on my way home from the Cape this weekend after a little overnight getaway when Linda in the backseat got a message that THIS was happening at our little chapel in Cambridge



Stunned silence and then furious texting as we sent the news out to friends with Boston ties all across the country. We went straight over to Brattle street when we got back to the city and stood with our fellow ward members for a bit.

There is a window in the chapel that pretty much anyone you talk to about our building will mention. I've stared at that window and felt incredibly blessed, I've stared at it and wondered bitterly why I'm still staring at it-that window has been staring back at me through some of the most eventful years of my life, good and bad. When I looked at it today and could see the trees where there should be a wall I was surprised at how emotional I got.

It's just a building, I know that. And no one got hurt and they'll figure out where to send all of us for church while they rebuild. But as an adult, I have gone to this building longer then anywhere else. As I was making calls this morning-to Huntington Beach, to Salt Lake, to Washington D.C.-I thought about this little building on Brattle Street and how connected all of us who have passed through it feel. I will be heartbroken not to drive through stately old Cambridge every Sunday.

But I guess it's another reminder at how little is permanent and how important it is to just dig in and love things as much as you can while you can. I'll miss you little building.

Write On

I got to have dinner last night with a woman from my church congregation who I have admired pretty much since I moved here. She had a really fantastic career in Journalism and then gave it all up a few years ago to raise two darling kids. She was a single mormon female until well into her thirties and she was nice enough to spend some time talking to me about her experience. As we talked our conversation drifted to the letter writing project I mentioned a few weeks ago. All of the sudden I was hyper aware that in many many ways I was sitting across from myself ten years from now. She understood so clearly the frustrations and fears I was telling her about and as she gently shared with me the advice she would have given herself at 32 I couldn't stop crying. What she said wasn't anything I hadn't heard before but somehow, to get it from someone who really did know almost EXACTLY how it feels to be where I am-it was a jolt like I haven't felt in a long long time. It made me feel even more passionate about getting great women to write letters to themselves and then share them with each other. We just have no idea when the hard/good/funny/awful things we dealt with can end up being just what someone else needed to hear.

So. I've sent emails to the girls I know and gotten a good response but I want to cast the net wider still. I'm posting the instructions for writing and submission here so really anyone can do this. Feel free to forward this along.

Hello and welcome to the Dear Me project!

Dear Me is the collective wisdom of a group of fabulous women to younger versions of themselves at crucial points in their own personal history.

Here are some guidelines to help you write your letter.

-Your younger self can mean 6 or 16 or 46! There are no rules about how old the recipient of your letter should be-just younger and in need of your older and wiser perspective.

-Pick a specific moment in your history to write about. For example, the day you left for college, the night of your first break up, a moment you said no when you wished you said yes…the more context you can put around your advice the better.

-Don’t feel pressure to be profound! The best advice is usually simple!

-Funny advice is just as welcome as serious advice. If you really think your teenage self should have ditched the blue eye shadow (paging teenage me!), tell her!

-Be genuine and be honest. It’s OK to admit that you weren’t always as smart and put together as you are now.

-Keep it focused. Remember that other people will be reading so make sure details and background are truly relevant

-Length is up to you. But short and sweet is advice I would give to MY young self.

-Invite your friends. We want as many letters as possible so please pass this opportunity along!

Submission

Please send your letters to katieclifford AT gmail DOT com. You can attach a word document or just lay it into your email.

Letters will then be posted to the Dear Me website at http://dearbabyme.blogspot.com/. I will inform you when your letter has been posted.

I will start posting letters on June 1 so let's get after it ladies!

Matter of Time

HAHAHA! Well I knew this would happen eventually. I write the blog for my company website as well and in a big rush tonight I put that post here. Who wants to take bets on how long it will be before the work site gets a photo of a Morgan or Garrett on it? Just for kicks, here is the post that is now over there as well.


Today is National Golf Day and guess what we found out?

The Golf Industry provides 2 million jobs and $61 billion in wage income. Golf also generates more than $3.5 billion annually for charities across the country.

So the next time you get an eye roll when you weasel out of some other plans to get in your 18 holes, rest assured that you are TOTALLY doing your part of keep the economy humming.

You're welcome.

Insomniac

I'm THRILLED that the seasons are finally changing and it's been warm and sunny here in Boston. However, the change sometimes means my sleeping patterns need a few weeks to adjust.

I'm trying to spend less time on the computer before bed (which is actually cutting into my blogging time and I miss it so...I have lots of things to learn to balance!) and for the millionth time in my life I'm trying to cut way down on caffeine.

I'm also bringing back the nighttime soundtrack. I stopped listening to music at night for reasons unknown but it really does help me relax if I pick the right stuff.

I found some real lovelies that I had forgotten about and wanted to share.

Avril 4-Aphex Twin...just a shortie but long on the pretty



Honey and the Moon-Joseph Arthur...my Home Teacher in HB introduced me to this guy back in the glorious summer of '03, still one of the greatest summers of music of my life...



Romulus-Sufjan Stevens...if you haven't listened to Sufjan Stevens then I don't even know what to do with you. He's wonderful. I got this CD when I was first in Boston and sorta kinda falling for a boy who suggested it during one of our many cross-country-before-I-went-to-bed-and-he-went-to-watch-24-telephon-conversations. Occasionally miss the boy, still LOVE the CD.


Be Be Your Love-Rachel Yamagata...once upon a time my little brother brought his girlfriend to California. She was lovely. We rode bikes to Starbucks at the pier and he told me was going to marry her. She went through my iTunes and we bonded over shared Yamagata love. I'm glad she decided to be my sister-in-law.



Little Trip to Heaven-Tom Waits...if you are sweet on a girl and you send her this song I'll betcha she'll like you back. My brother Christopher and my mother Jayne are big big BIG Tom Waits fans and I think you shall see why...

Safe and Sound

G.I. arrived in San Francisco this morning weighing in at 9 lbs 3 oz. Big baby!

I was just a wee thing myself when Sterling was born but still, I have known the guy his whole life. He teased (and still teases) me to death like brothers are supposed to but we've been good friends since we were little. Right now I really want to embarrass him with stories about how wonderful he is and how proud I am of the adult he's become but Ster-dog is probably our most private Clifford and me blabbing on my blog might not be the best baby gift. I'll just leave it at how lucky I think Garrett is that my brother is the one who will be teaching him how to be a man. When I look at the many and varied reasons I have managed to say single for so long I lay lots of blame squarely on my brothers. They have just ruined any chance I have at being realistic with my expectations of what one should be.

Congratulations Sterling and Megan!!!

PST

WE GET A BABY TOMORROW!

NEPHEW NUMBER TWO!


WOOT!

You have to click this to make it bigger but I just realized that all of my facebook interaction with my sister is 30 Rock quotes.