I’ve recently begun to get more into creating art.  Saturday night, a group of girls came over to pose for fashion photography in front of my camera.  I looked like a pro with my tripod set-up and didn’t use the flash (doing those two things makes you a pro, right?).  The girls and I had a lot of fun dressing up, posing, and shooting.  During the days since, I’ve found myself reading photography composition websites and editing the photos endlessly.  As I lay here on my couch thinking of my delving into online browsing in a way that I thought only my husband could, I can look right above my computer screen and see a large black and white photograph with beautiful composition.  In the bottom center of the shot is a girl, curled up, knees into body and arms hugging legs, head resting on the woman’s right knee.  Two unique square-painned windows line either side of the girl, and a pulled curtain flows behind her.

This is a picture of me taken by my friend Lindsay.  Lindsay, the girl in the lovely color/composition photo above, was the one who got me into thinking about fashion modeling and fashion photography.  A couple of years back, she asked me to come to her house for martinis and modeling for her eBay store. One night and I was hooked.  It was deliciously fun and made me feel pretty and feminine in a way I hadn’t felt before.  After a few more photo shoots for eBay with Lindsay, she asked if I would come over one morning for her to shoot artistic shots of me.

The morning I was getting dressed to go over for my “shoot,” I had a giddy excitement.  Someone, and not just anyone–a cool, fashion-wise girl, has asked to take my photos for art.  Me, the girl my mom still claims could have looked prettier sooner if I had merely heeded her advise and donned dresses and make-up all those years of middle school and high school she had been suggesting my outward feminization.  Yes, this long-time, self-made tomboy was being asked to model.

There was a bit of a pause when Lindsay asked me to put on a mint green slip dress, or was it just a slip, but I went with it and soon got into the mood of the shots.  From chair to bed to wall, her bedroom became background to some great black-and-whites.  Lindsay is a stellar photographer and has an incredible knack for getting texture on film.  She had several of the photosgraphs matted on foam board and even had an opening with them all in a coffeehouse in downtown Chattanooga.

So as I jump more into photography, and visual creations in general, I’ve got to stop and thank Lindsay.  Frankly, the party Saturday night would not have been dreamt of had it not have been for her.  Hope you are well!

Around my office, the staff has a sort of interest, nah obsession, with a particular personality identification test/system called the enneagram. Before I started working here last summer, I’d never heard the word, nor had I heard so many grown people self-proclaim to be numbers. “I’m a 5.” “Well, you know, I’m a 3.” “Oh,” everyone would say with a look of understanding–some with conceit, others with a scoff.

You’re a what?

On rare occasion, someone on staff gave a small explanation for what all this number-naming meant, but it took me quite a while to figure it out–about 6 months, I’d say. When I finally understood what it was (oh, a personality test…I like those), I began to try to figure out what I am. The enneagram doesn’t work like traditional personality tests. While you can take a test to help you figure out what you are, it’s more like you read a bunch of material to see which personality type (1-9) best suits you–how you think about things, feel about them, and how you deal with things.

For me it’s been an interesting year, personality-wise. With a new city, a new job, and largely new friends, I’ve been in a sort of stress that makes it hard to function very me-like. With a few co-workers, I discussed the fact that I couldn’t figure out what I was. The 7 seemed sorta like me. Then other days, I’m felt more like a 1. I asked David to read the different things and give his opinion but he was as confused as me. Then about a month ago, the two musicians on staff came into my office to work on a musical composition. One of them made a comment about how it might be too much to have 3 “4s” in one room.

“What?” I said.

“Wait, what do you mean 3 4s?”

“You think I”m a four.” And they both looked at each other, then me, blankly and certainly and said, “yeah, you’re definitely a 4.” Then seeing the shock on my face, added kindly…”well, at least that’s what we think…”

The certainty with which they said this statement caused me pause. The fact that they thought they knew what I was when others (myself and David included) were stumped was very intriguing. While they went to work on their musical number, I immediately began to look up the 4. And amazingly, I think it is me.

So, I want to introduce you to me. Maybe you don’t realize I’m like this. Maybe you dont’ see all these parts of me. But this is me. I mean, not totally, not exclusively, but largely…this is my personality. Oddly, it fits me better than any other such personality thing I’ve seen…and frankly, that gives me a huge chocolate mousse-sized drop of comfort in my belly.
What are you?

On my birthday last week, David and I went swimming in Walden Pond. It’s the most idyllic setting to swim–beautiful green trees, a large lake with soft, cool water, hundreds of chipmunks huddling about on paths trying to dodge feet that come trampling through. And it’s the former home of good ole Henry David Thoreau, legendary American author, naturalist, and philosopher, best known for his work, Walden (named after the pond, no doubt). After our swim, David and I walked over to the plot of land where his little house used to sit. There we looked up to read these immortal words, carved into a stone beside the little square of dirt: “I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.” To which David promptly improved on by proclaiming, “I went to the woods because I wished to live deliciously,” and tossed another handful of barbecue corn nuts into his mouth.

Now, a week later, that phrase (Thoreau’s not Thaggard’s) “to live deliberately” comes to mind with an odd new meaning for me.

A few weeks ago I attended a retreat in West Cornwall, Connecticut. It was a personal/spiritual retreat for 5 days. I went alone, to join up with a group of people who also wanted to have a cleansing session with God and from their environment. It was wonderful to be out on my own, something I haven’t often done since I’ve been married. I really enjoyed not feeling pressure to be friendly with anyone because I didn’t know anyone. I went there for me and I was going to spend time with me.

On the second day, we were asked to take a self-test; “Am I codependent?” it asked. I read the title and thought, “of course not.” But as I answered “yes” to many of the questions I began to wonder two things. First of all, what does codependent even mean? And secondly, am I codependent and if so, is that soooo bad? I finished my quiz and kept the idea in my head that I could be. The test told me that if you answered 5 or more questions with “yes,” then you should probably consider that you might have codependency issues. I had 17 “yes”s. I put away my quiz, determined to ask one of the retreat leaders about it at a later time.

In my small group time the next day, I did a sharing my story, of sorts, and a theme arose in my sharing time. I take responsibility for things…I’m a good friend to have in crisis b/c I’ll work hard to fix it, and I’m also a good friend to have b/c you can depend on me…I’ll do it for you even. Also, I tend to think that things are my fault. I’ve known this but it was interesting to see that this thread of taking responsibility and being responsible wove through my life; even more ironic, was the thread that braided in beside this: powerlessness. I think I have felt very much in my life powerless to change things I see are harmful, bad or hard…yet I try to take on everything so that I can change it. Or better said, I work really hard to change things by taking responsibility and when they don’t change, I feel totally powerless and give up.

On the way out of small group that day, I mentioned my quiz score to one of the leaders. To him, it seemed to fit very much with what I had discovered in group, but I still had my doubts. I didn’t see how I could be codependent and even if I was, how this was bad. So I cared for people. So I cared a whole lot for people…So I become a sort of caretaker to people sometimes when they couldn’t really take care of themselves…So I obsessed and worried about everyone else’s problems…So what?..Isn’t that active kindness?

Besides having some active confirmation of this through the material we were working on, I actually felt better being away than I had in quite a while. It felt very restful for me to be in nature and for me to be taking care of myself alone. I spent more time with God than I have in years. In the afternoons, we’d have free time and I’d go for a walk and pray. At night at the end of chapel time, I’d sit there and let God speak to me. I felt a lot of encouragement and closeness with God and it felt good. I actually had time to just sit with him and put my problems out for him to take, for him to work on, instead of sitting there with an overflowing bucket of everyone else’s problems to give to God. I found that I had a freer mind and a more relaxed body, but of course everyone feels this way on vacation, right?

When I returned, I mentioned the codependency question to my therapist. I told her about feeling responsible and then powerless and how this thread ran throughout my life.  She recommended a book for me to read…Codependent No More by Melody Beattie. I wrote down the title and tucked it away inside my calendar book, inside my purse.

Fast forward to this past Sunday: I was not having a good day. Ever since I got back I’ve been feeling wearier and wearier. I’ve known that I need to pull back (mostly on the inside) from some relationships because I let other people take over my life, and I forget to do what I really want to do. I overworry about people (you can ask my husband if you have any doubts). I obsess over mistakes I make. I think constantly about how to make a situation better. And I get tired easily. And I don’t feel peace on the inside often. Every couple of months I have to take a sick day because how I feel mentally & emotionally starts to take a toll on my body–headaches, tummy tenderness, body aches.

I actually worked on Sunday and so I took Monday off. I went to the library at 9 am, right when it opened and I got the recommended read from my therapist, despite some embarrassment at the library check-out counter. I figured I might as well see if this book could help me out at all. At first the book was quite off-putting for me. It talked about codependent people being manipulative, controlling, blaming, anxious people who were usually married to alcoholics. This didn’t seem to describe me at all. In the second chapter, I found that I could relate to a few different women in their stories even though I have never lived with an alcoholic…for instance Patty tried so hard to make her husband not drink; she worked so hard to keep things safe and together by keeping her husband in line; she found herself tired and weary all the time; she became worried and then obsessed and then frantic that something was about to happen. She tried to control the situation and her husband to keep things from getting worse.
I continued to read yesterday, nearly 100 pages, and felt sadly yet hopefully connected to the ideas and traits the author described for the codependent person. And then…she said something that was really weird…she said, Codependents are reactionaries. They react to others’ feelings, they react to situations, they react to problems, they even react to their own emotions. At this point, they have lost control. They are actually being controlled by the people and the situations around them. Codependents may even find it hard to be in large groups of people, she continued, because their reactionary habit goes haywire with so many people to react to.

And somehow it clicked…it all clicked. I am such a reactionary. My mother and my father were reactionaries too. I react to a missed green light; I react to an upset feeling in my body; I react to a word from David; I react to everyone around me. It’s not bad to react; it’s totally normal in fact, but I think the things about codependents is that their reacting is out-of-control. They react way more than they act and they [we] make decisions in our reactions which is not a very good place to make decisions. It means not making decisions in a calm, peaceful space but making decisions in franticness daily.

I’m still trying to figure out what it all means but this morning as I left for work, I encountered a good example of this. Back story: I’ve been on antidepressants for about two years. Recently I started taking them less and forgetting to take them, and phasing off them (I don’t like being on medicine). I don’t know whether this was a good decision or not, but I started doing it and just went with it–I suppose you could say it was my reaction to the fact that I was forgetting to take them. So this morning, since I’ve been feeling down the last few weeks, I blamed it on my medicine. I decided to take a pill and call my doctor and ask for more. And then I thought about it (taking medicine or not aside)…I’m reacting out of this feeling that I’ve got to get medicine b/c I’m not okay without it. I am reacting to my feelings which are not so happy right now and trying to do something in franticness b/c I fear things getting worse. And just like that, I realized…I don’t have to react; I can act; I can live deliberately.

So I put down my phone, resigning to call my doctor when I’m in a better space. And I headed off to work trying to let this line sink in in a new way…I want to live deliberately…to live deliberately…I want to take control of my own life and live it actively instead of being a buzzer waiting to be sounded; a marionette string waiting to be pulled; a balloon waiting to be deflated; an applause button waiting to be pushed…I want to live deliberately…

When my friend redid this site for me about a year ago, I wanted to be able to have a page where I could keep up with the books I read and possibly write reviews for some of them.  At times, I get into long stints of reading crazy amounts of books and it can be very hard to remember which ones I’ve read.  Today, someone sent me a link to this thing called goodreads.com and it’s just what I was looking for.  Click here to see my profile and join in the fun.  You can log the books you read, review them, and see what you’re friends are reading.

Well, today we finally had our yard sale. Despite the fact that the tables look practically untouched, we made about $150 which isn’t bad. Hopefully we can make more off some clothes I’m going to take to consignment. It’s really great just seeing all the stuff our of my house, and welcoming it out of my life. Now that it’s out on these tables (we have yet to clean up, even though we’re hitting 6 pm), I don’t want it to go back into my house. Any of it. So I’m planning to load it all into the car, and take it away…away to consignment, away to Goodwill, away to the dumpster.

And then….packing!

Check out our rockin’ yard sale ad.  Wish all you out-of-towners could come and sit with me on a lawn chair, drink tea, and sell stuff with me!

Clothes/Dishes/Lots More in INMAN SQUARE

YARD SALE - LARGE VARIETY OF ITEMS - TABLES OF GOOD STUFF

May 19th @ 8am - 2pm
412 Norfolk Street, off Camrbridge St. in Inman Sq.

Here are some of the items available:

Lots of clothes (Banana Republic, American Eagle, Gap, Urban Outfitters, and some other fun stuff. Lots of women’s clothing!)
Big set of china
Additional dishes (mugs/plates)
Gardening set
Video cassettes
Metal CD tower
Metal coat rack
Picture frames
Working cell phones

…and MUCH MORE! We’re still pulling stuff out of the basement this week.

We’re really trying to lighten our moving burden, so it’s a lot of stuff that we like, but just have decided we don’t NEED it all anymore. Stop by, check it out, and hang out in Inman Square for lunch. We’re right there, so you won’t blow your day should you not find anything you like.

617-639-3096 if you have any questions.

I got such a kind email from my friend Anna this morning. I met Anna when I was doing YWAM in New Zealand back in 2001. She’s really cool, and I’ve been doing a bad job of keeping up with her. This morning, she wrote to say how much she’d been missing correspondingshapes and just wanted to check in on me to see how things are. So, Anna…this post is for you!

It’s that time again. Time for the Thaggards to move. Somehow, it’s become an annual event. We’re really hoping that this place will be one that we can live in for three or four years, possibly until we can afford to buy a house around here (outrageous but not totally impossible). Click here to see pictures of our new home. As you can see the kitchen and bathroom and the hardwood floors are the highlights. The kitchen and bathroom are totally remodled and rival any rooms I’ve ever seen. As our realtor said, “this landlord doesn’t f#@%^ around.” The location is also great. We’ll be in Ball Square right behind this really great coffeeshop, which David and I have recently discovered and grown to love. As I was telling a couple of friends the other day, I’d taken them there so they’ll get hooked as well, and then once we live right around the corner they’ll totally feel obligated to invite me up for coffee when they go there. In addition to being right behind Ball Square, we’ll also be a 20-minute walk to Davis and a 25-minute walk to church, which for me also means to work.

We move in a couple of weeks. In the meantime, I’m trying to reorganize our things and get rid of somethings the good ol’ way…yard sale. Like we were saying the other day, it seems that cellphone are really here to stay. Looks like we should finally get rid of those regular phones. David found this yard sale kit online so if you’re interested in having your own yard sale; you can do this easily with the click of a button (well, a few buttons).

Moving for me always means some sense of loss. I’m a very forward-looking person so I get caught up in what’s next. So naturally, right now, I’m very excited about our new place. But for a moment, let me take time to reflect on what’s been good about the place where we’ve been living since August and what we’ll miss.

• I’ll miss waking up to the noise of Keith doing the dishes in the morning.
• I’ll miss the late night talks in the courtyard with Kate.
• It was so good to have a place to move into right from Tennessee, instead of having to look around.
• I’ll miss our family dinner night (we had a few really successful ones!).
• I’ll miss the window seat that our cat Simon loves to lay in.
• I’ll miss the space…for the price. So much space for a great place, gosh that has been nice!
• It’s been really good to have close friends right upstairs. On more than one occasion, I’ve made my way up there to cry and pray with Kate.
• Keith has really inspired the fix-it man inside of David. Together they’ve fixed our car (multiple times), our television, our speakers. And Keith, thanks for randomly fixing our sad microwave.
• I’ll miss having a local gathering place for other friends. We’ve hosted a few very successful events at our apartment, including a bachelorette party, a bridal shower, a killer Thanksgiving week o’ fun, and an Easter brunch party.
• I’ll miss having friends who will love and care for our cat while we’re out of town or staying over at a friend’s place.
• It’s been good to be in Inman Square. I’ll miss you Inman Square. You’re a great part of town!
• And I’ll miss having Cambridge as our address. It’s been so wonderful to have you written on every piece of post. I’m not too sure that many people have had the opportunity to live in both Cambridge, England, and Cambridge, Mass.

An inchworm visited the church on my arm today.

Typically, I drive my car to work.  If my roommate isn’t going to the gym in the morning, I ride with her.  But for a week now, our car’s been in the shop with some belt broken, then waiting for the belt to come in, and now waiting for it to get mended.  In the meantime, I’ve been either walking or taking the bus.  I walked to work for the first time last Monday and found it pretty enjoyable.  It was about 45 degrees out and I allowed myself a stopover at the best scone place in Boston, Pepsi Pies for a banana chocolate chip muffin (yum!).  The walk took me about 50 minutes and I felt pretty good that day at work.  The temperature continued to be nice the early part of last week, even reaching 65 on Wednesday, so I continued walking to work.  This took some finagling of my usual work attire.  I’m pretty set on my cute shoes really contributing to the outfit, and walking for long distances requires my grey Sauconys for maximum comfort.  The payoff was pretty good though…I felt better and had more energy.  On Thursday is started to get cooler and by Friday, there was a major snow storm predicted.  Friday morning came and I completely planned to catch a ride with my roommate.  As I was putting on my makeup at about 9 am, Kate came in stating that they had declared a snow emergency in Somerville already, and that meant that one site of the street was now a tow zone.  She went on to ask if I wanted to walk to work. “Walk to work?” I said.  And I know I gave her the you’re crazy look.  But we ended up walking and it wasn’t too bad.  Walking and talking with her makes the walk seem shorter.  The only downside–numb thighs.  Ouch!

Well, today I noticed that the temperature was still in the low thirties and felt like it was in the low twenties.  I could feel the burning in my thighs as I considered the walking option (my roommate was at the gym), and thus chose the bus.  I walked out to the bus in plenty of time and was delighted to see that two others were also waiting on the bus.  It’s a comfort when people are at the bus stop.  It makes you feel like you must have been there at the right time, and that the bus hasn’t come yet.  Well, I took out my book and started to read.  After about five minutes, I heard them mention that the bus was indeed coming.  I finished my sentence put my book away and looked up.  The 83 was heading into the left lane to turn at a green light.  “Is she not stopping?” I said to my busstop companions.  “Oh, we’re waiting for the 91,” she said.  Shocked, I starred.  But what about me, I thought.  She began to go into some reverary about how they had missed the 91 earlier and were now waiting for the next one.  I began to wave my hand frantically for the 83 to stop, but she just swept on by.  Reactionarily, her head moved in my position b/c of all the motion I was making, but she quickly looked away in a vain attempt to act as though she had not seen my monkey arms waving frantically at all.

I ran down the road a bit trying to catch up to her, but the green lights were against me and she soon was out of site.  I swore.  So irrating!  The busstop folks who has easied my mind were now the ones who had caused me to miss my bus by waving her off.  I began down the road.

“Walk?” I thought.  It was my only option.  I called my husband to see if the people he babysat for happened to leave him the car (they do this on occasion) but no luck.  So I began to walk.  And I walked and walked.  The temperature actually wasn’t as bad as the other morning and I switched off taking my hat off and putting it back on, and taking my gloves off and putting them back on.  I allowed myself to stop in a bookstore along the way and pick up a gift I’d been meaning to get a friend; and also to stop at a drugstore to pick up some easter stickers for the new kids who visited our church on Sunday.

I had almost forgotten how furious public transportation can make a person.

Shawna contemplates in puffy stripes

Originally uploaded by The Miles.

And today is her birthday. So HAPPY BIRTHDAY SHAWNA! I wish I was near you to celebrate with you, but I hope you have a totally amazing fun birthday today! Boston and I miss you terribly.

amycat cat

Originally uploaded by beelerspace.

I was just looking through some photos of a friend of mine’s and I found this. It’s a picture of the day when we first found Simon. He was a lonely, ratty looking kitty found in our friend’s backyard as we played croquet on the day at our July 4th picnic.

Welcome home, buddy!

Our cat Simon

Originally uploaded by The Thaggards.

For any of you who haven’t seen a picture of our cat Simon here he is.

Back in December, David started telling me that he had a really great idea for out Valentine’s Day. In the past, we’ve traded years thinking of something fun to do for one another. One year I had a picnic on my dorm room sky with pasta and red wine; another year we sat in our hallway cafe style with our deck chairs and painted on another’s portraits; and last year, well last year, I got all these ideas but they never actually happened. Thankfully, this year it was David’s turn again.

In late January, David admitted to me that he hated sitting on our Valentine’s Day secret this year. I’m a girl who goes gaga for secrets, so he generally squeezes in as many as he can get: someone left you a piece of furniture, someone sent you a package, he got a bonus, etc. It’s like I’m Margo Tenebaum. But this secret was just too exciting to keep to himself. So he let it fly: I got us this really nice hotel downtown for a night and a dinner reservation at a chic modern wateringhole.

So last night we headed downtown on the subway to the Faneuil Hall area. We checked into our fancy Millennium Hotel at 3 so we’d have all afternoon to luxe it up before dinner. We had an oversize tub and a balcony overlooking the Faneuil Hall. That night, we ate at Sanctuary. I had sole stuffed with shrimp and crabmeat, and David had a steak. It was total decadence and I absolutely loved it. It felt so fancy and special to be downtown, especially since we don’t go down there much anymore. After dinner, we walked around for a bit, heading over to the North End for a cappacino and a canoli. Yum!

This morning before we headed back, we had a really nice breakfast at the hotel’s restaurant. It was totally a V-day to remember.

Amy and David- what a cute couple

Originally uploaded by The Miles.

My darling husband, whom I adore (as you can see in this photo from Christmas) turns 27 today. May your day be filled with a happy Trevor and a quiet, peace-giving joy. I love you!  And my birthday gift to you this year is …. no surprise party!

For the past week or so, we’ve been sleeping with our door shut.  This may not seem like an odd thing to most of you, but we’ve got this wonderful/ansy cat who cannot stay in one place for long.  Anytime we have our door shut and he wants out, he scratches (with his nonclaw paws) at the door.  When he does this, it makes this repeative high-pitched noise that is at a volume to lead you to insanity, not loud but impossible to be ignored or blocked out.  The jury’s still out on whether he thinks this will actually cause the door to miraculously open on its own, or whether he is trying to alert/annoy us to the point of letting him out.

Well, I’ve been feeling a bit space consious around my house, so the other day, I just told David that we’ve got to start sleeping with the door closed. We’ll have to endure Simon’s scratching as long as he does it in order to keep the door shut at night, I said.  We’ve decided that we’d rather have him in with us, so each night we cox him into our room, which he almost always seems naively happy to enter, but then having entered, and seen the door shut, he quickly reverts to his helpless “Get me out of here”  morse code.

While this has caused some sleeping annoyance-at night we have to endure some scratching and then in the morning, he wakes us around 6:45 wanting to get out and have his breakfast, which unfortunately plays right into my weakness (as soon as I awake, I’ve got to pee, so then he gets to get out and have his food too, lucky kitty)-there is also a pleasure that I didn’t think of before.  Now Simon sleeps on our bed at night.  When I wake up he is there, and he’s happy to stay there well into the day.  Instead of coming home after work to find him on his favorite red striped chair, he is often sleeping on our bed.  Even now, a late morning when I’m home and still in bed, he’s laying in bed with me.

It is so nice. It’s been sad for me when he wants to be in the other room from me constantly, always sleeping on his chair, and allowing me to pet him for only a few minutes before he saunters off into some other room.  I think my insecurities cause me to feel, almost everytime that he’s purposely spending time away from me, that he really doesn’t like me.  And that makes me sad.  I figure if my own pet doesn’t like me, what hope do I really have in life.

But thankfully, this morning when I’m feeling extra tender inside, he’s laying at my feet, completely laid out and relaxing.  He has no pose indicating a quick exit.  In fact, he has the direct opposite, a lazy body sprawled out for a long day’s nap next to me in my favorite spot in the house-my bed.

Check out David’s here.

Despite the fact that my New Year’s holidays tend to be uneventful, I love new years.  I love the idea of getting to start fresh with a new year.  I love the idea of getting to have a clean slate and think of new things that I’d like my year to be about.  I love beginnings (which is why I’m super good at starting things but no great at finishing them, oh well).  I also love analyzing things.  This can get me into trouble because I’m an overthinker, but it can also be so fun.  It’s great to stop, to reassess, and then to begin again.  It’s so nice to think about what I want for myself in this next year.  So to start, here are a few of the things (call them resolutions if you wish) that I’d like for the new year:

*More time with God, in prayer and reading my bible.  I’ve been missing out seriously on just good-ole God time and I would love to get back into doing this.  I was asked today what is the thing about Jesus that is so great to me, that makes me choose to give up everything for him, and I said, it’s the companionship.  He’s always there with me to talk to, to help me, and to be with me.  So I’d like to spend more time being with him too.

*More time at the gym.  I have seriously been non-priortizing my physical health, which is in direct relation to my emotional health, which has been over priortized this year (in my most recent opinion).

*And less time worrying and stressing.  I really need to work on that one.

What are yours?