I start voice lessons next week.

My voice is a mess. It will take months to get it to a place where it can start to improve.

But still ... I START VOICE LESSONS NEXT WEEK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :)

I'm going to be in a slightly elevated emotional state for the next few weeks because I'm so so happy.

Soap Box

"The need is constant. The gratification is instant. Give blood."

I feel so strongly about this: if you are eligible, you should try to give blood. You may not be eligible. You may have lived too long overseas, or recently gotten a tattoo, or your iron might be too low, or you might be at risk for certain diseases that make your blood undesirable to the Red Cross. But! You might not be not eligible. You might have good blood. And if you do - if there's even the chance that you do have good blood, you should try to donate.

Why?

People need blood all of the time. And there is absolutely no substitute for it. The only way for someone to receive blood is if someone else has given it.

When you give blood, you make yourself uncomfortable. You allow someone to stick a needle into your body and remove a sizable amount of a fluid that keeps you alive. It can be scary; it can be intimidating; it can feel not-worth-it. And there aren't any obvious benefits in it for you. You don't make money, you don't get gifts or coupons or immunity from certain diseases. But you do come away with the awareness that you've done something selfless for another human merely being. I think that is Valuable. I think it is Worthwhile. I think it is Important.

Life is Precious. What if you could give something of yourself to help some other Person hold onto it? You can.

Give blood.

Wild Geese, by Mary Oliver

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
For a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting --
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

I'm meditating on this beautiful poem today. and the concept of "meanwhile". "Meanwhile" means that other things are happening while I am wrapped up in my own angst, or joy or petty selfishness. Meanwhile, the world goes on. Life continues. I am but a piece of the intricate and facinating puzzle.