Showing posts with label friends. Show all posts
Showing posts with label friends. Show all posts
Karen Mello Burton 1 comment

yes, please

Posting on the go as we head to the temple.  During this month of daily blog posting I have chosen to post everyday from my phone, using photos I have only taken mobily. It's another cool way to document my life.

Last night I went shopping and to dinner with my best friend. It was a nice night after a kind of soul-sucking week with all I am trying to balance.  We ate curry noodles and laughed our way through multiple trips to multiple dressing rooms.  So fun.

Karen Mello Burton 1 comment

soft spots

We had friends from the old neighborhood over tonight for family home evening. There's something about people that you've raised your kids alongside. They understand you a little more. Maybe we just see into each others' souls a little deeper when we have done hard things together, like raise teens or vicariously suffer through sin and repentance or even just struggle in general. It was nice to have them here at our new place.

We had family scripture time after they left,  during which my oldest son texted and told me one of the Bible videos he is in came out (see my fb page). Cool to see that.

Karen Mello Burton 1 comment

peopled

We had our first gathering at the house tonight. We feel all christened or something. Good food. Good company.

Tomorrow my son and DIL will come for Our dinner. We will eat and talk around the big black table and then Mindy will trim my mop before I head to Christmas chorus. 

When was the last time you had someone over for a nice dinner?  Open up and feel the blessings of connecting.

Karen Mello Burton 12 comments

Little Water Fairy

I saw her born and live right across the street from her.

Sometimes she runs up to me and says, Can you give me a cookie? And then I have to, yes have to, give her one.

She holds my hand and likes to look through my purse. She asks a lot of questions, like, Is Jesus coming back today?

Today she stood on the bank as her mom swam her leg of a triathlon. She was a little water fairy.
Karen Mello Burton 19 comments

seeing a soul

Sometimes it just rips right through your bones and skin and reaches out.  It is like an extension of your heart that can grip things and pull them toward you.  And then you can look square into someone's eyes and see beyond the color and the reflection.  You see intention and concern and soul.

This is true connection.  It is love and friendship and empathy.  And the real trick, for me, is tucking those things back in when it is time to do something else.  Ungrip.  Unlook.  Unsee.
Karen Mello Burton 17 comments

it's time

image from doobybrain.com

My friend turns 50, and right on her birthday she receives a phone call. 

It's time, said the caller. 
Time for what?
Come over, now.

So she grabs the keys and drives the few blocks to the caller's home, figuring out who it was by voice recognition alone.

She climbs the stairs up to the studio, where she is greeted by her bohemian, painter friend, who says, Come in.  You need art therapy.

Obediently, my friend sits down, open to the idea of being healed.  From what?  She doesn't know, but it seems like art therapy is a general cure-all, so she goes with it.  As I am sure I would too.

She gives her a big white board and a bowl full of paint tubes and then says, Have at it.

Wait.  No direction?  No anything?

Nope.

In the next 20 minutes my friend reverts back to kindergarten, squirting paint onto the board and massaging it in.  No direction.  No anything.  I channeled Jackson Pollock, she said, as she told me this story last night.  And I still have it, along with other pieces I have done since.

I asked if she has gotten more formal lessons from her friend, and she says, No.  We just sit there and paint.  And she has never called them lessons.

And that sounds like some pretty fantastic therapy to me.
Karen Mello Burton 17 comments

GNO

Sometimes a Girls' Night Out is just what the doctor ordered.  As my husband is busy getting his presentation ready for an academic conference this weekend, I am packing his suitcase (yes, I am kinda old school that way) and making plans that have to do with dinner out with girlfriends, maybe a movie, maybe some window shopping.  Sure, I will miss him, but I try and be efficient with my regenerating.  So while he is away I will power up with some girl time. 

I am a people person.  I like meeting new people.  I like hearing peoples' stories.  I like laughing with people, crying with people, working with people.  It is not only a fun way to spend time, but has become essential to my mental and emotional well-being.  I know that about myself.  When I start to get a little jittery about my life it is usually because I have slipped into some kind of isolation mode, with school work or paper work. 

Anybody with me on this?
Karen Mello Burton 16 comments

losing and winning

Tonight I enjoyed a little female comraderie around a nice big dining room table loaded with games and cards.  I managed to avoid the M&Ms as I lost two out of three games, and that was a pretty nice accomplishment.  Gotta keep the streak going on the whole "no chocolate and no eating after seven o'clock thing." 

Now, as I was sitting there playing Rage, I got this nice warm feeling about my neighborhood and the friends I have made here.  We are working on our 17th year here in our little shire, and it is nice to be settled and to develop long-term relationships with people that I respect and enjoy keeping company with.  What a cool blessing.
Karen Mello Burton 11 comments

sound waves to chicago

My BYU bff and I must have texted back and forth for over an hour steady tonight.  She just dropped her oldest baby here at the Y and I feel like a godmother who needs to make sure all is well.  After a few minutes of checking in, we ended up "talking" about the music I have recorded and posted right here on my blog.  She was texting with one hand and flying around my Musical Monday posts with the other. 

Once her husband joined her we started to brainstorm about how to do a long-distance duet together.  Adam has been learning to play the guitar, and he likes to sing.  So we hashed it out, and then rehashed it out, and decided to do something soon by swapping our own recorded mp3s until I get it all mixed and sounding good.

Some people like to think technology was invented for things like keeping up on current world events.  Me?  I like this music stuff.  *fist pumping and roof raising*
Karen Mello Burton 11 comments

day 303: a collector

I am an accidental collector, pretty sure that most of the things I have collected have just somehow, subtly, become important to me.  While some people are always on the lookout for things like coffee mugs, or those little spoons from different cities, the things that have mattered to me have been scooped up and treasured, and even cataloged, subconsciously.

The things I have collected that have changed me can't be touched or looked at through a glass case.  They can't have a sticker slapped on them with a date and place of origin.  And they definitely cannot sit on a shelf and gather dust.

I am a collector of relationships.  I enjoy people.  I know myself better because of people that I have found a connection with, and I get a little disoriented when that connection loses power.  I feel like a little strand of me is fraying at the ends.  Some people like to shut down, or turn inside, when things start piling up, but I crave interaction as a way to unfold and find myself again.  I am also that girl who can go to lunch and a movie all alone and thoroughly enjoy it, because my relationships aren't a necessity, but rather a luscious decoration.  And so I collect and am better for it.
Karen Mello Burton 13 comments

day 293: a vision

I was back in Boston with my cousin who was dying of cancer when I got a call from my husband saying that my bishop wanted to talk to me.  My mind was all over the place.  The swollen belly of Leigh.  The warm New England September.  And the kind Polynesian face of my friend back home.

Ever since my husband had called I couldn't get her out of my mind.  In the midst of learning about pain meds, cancered breasts and bones, and how to take care of my cousin's cats, Edris's face kept popping into my head.  Again.  Then again.

After I got home I was asked by my bishop to serve as the Relief Society president (leader of the women's auxiliary) in my ward (congregation).  I knew I was supposed to work with Edris.  I didn't know anything else, but I knew that.  And it was a great run.  I felt tapped in to her spiritual take on things.  I still do.  We did tons of crying together.  We still do. 

Somehow I have known her longer than I have known her.  She is my loving, smart, trusted friend, and she has been an answer to prayer more than once.  Like the time during a meeting when a woman said, for the third or fourth time, something that was completely against our beliefs.  I thought, Please let someone else make the correction here so I don't have to swing the heavy hammer.  Then there she was. 

Yeah, I love that brown face. 
Karen Mello Burton 22 comments

day 284: blogging, casually


I spent the weekend at the Casual Blogger Conference, where I learned lots of wonderful things and spent time with women that I have become connected to through our writing.  We spoke of finding our voices, increasing readership, storytelling, and even ways to make money blogging.  What a great thing to have my own little publishing company, where I can write things that matter to me.  I love having a place to be creative and to express myself.
JThis is Momza and me.  I am a new fan.  Also, here are Tauna from Garden of Egan, and Debbie, from Crash Test Dummies.  Crash is a little lady with a big heart.  I have enjoyed getting to know her so much.  All three of the above pictures were taken by her.

 
Me on the drive home to Springville, after a terrific weekend at the conference.  Below, I snapped a photo of my feet while I was waiting for Mindy Gledhill to start singing.  I really like her voice a lot.  Very smooth.
 
On the drive home tonight I caught an actual glimpse of purple mountains' majesty.  It was breathtaking.


 
Charrette and Heather of the EO as we were finishing up lunch.  

A little Sarah McLachlan on the way home.  I was very reflective in my mind as I drove home and thought about the experience of being at the conference.
I was so glad to finally meet Heather King, of Heatherofthe EO.  She is sweet and genuine and kind and thoughtful, and many other good things.  It was a real blessing to spend 90 minutes with her.
Karen Mello Burton 15 comments

day 247: over pizza and cheesecake

No pictures, sorry, but lots of them in my mind as I reflect on this nice evening.  I met up with 5 women for dinner at Pizzeria 712 in a neighboring city, and we talked about writing and blogging, and family.  Women I had never met before, but I knew.  Especially two of them, whose writing I have been reading for awhile now. 

Afterward off to a gathering where we were joined by about 30 others for an evening of getting acquainted, making connections, and typing into my iPhone the names of blogs that would, by evening's end, be added to my google reader.  I saw a handful of friends that I knew in print, and I was shocked at how quickly we were talking about important things and remembering what we already knew about each other.

On my drive home I thought to myself how, almost accidentally, this blogging world has become a vital part of my creative self.  My self that has things to say and things to search for.  And how happy I am to have a place for that.
Karen Mello Burton 14 comments

day 238: red hair and an eclipse

I had a memory today of walking to school with my friend Leigh.  She was three years older than me, but always treated me very kindly.  I would wear shorts under my plaid skirt, like most girls did then,  and we would walk up the tree-lined street to school.  My metal, purple, Osmonds lunch box swinging by my side.  


After school once we watched a solar eclipse while we stood in my front yard.  She had red hair and we would run back and forth across the street to each other's houses.  We splashed in the pool beside my house.  We danced in the carport to 45s we played on an old beige record player.  

These are some of my first memories of some independence around the age of 8 or so.  A good life.
Karen Mello Burton 14 comments

Musical Monday: Landslide

To Stephen, as he starts the rebuilding process.  

Time makes you bolder.

 Kazzy's voice has been silenced by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act(see the details here). Sorry you can't listen to her sing directly. But send her a message and she'll try to work something out.






Please check the sidebar for the mp3 player.  ---------------------->
Karen Mello Burton 21 comments

day 201: the golden statuette


This evening we will hold our 13th annual Oscars Party here at Chez Kaz.  We print off ballots and have prizes and eat lots of good food with our good friends.  It is fun to see what the celebs are wearing, guess in the categories we are totally clueless in, and hand out prizes at the end.  Oh yeah, I said prizes.  I don't want to give anything away, but I will just say that one lucky person is going home with Junior Minty breath!

So, in the spirit of the big event, and everything we love about movies, please leave a comment stating your favorite film and a brief reason why it is your fave.

I'll start.  All About Eve.  Bette Davis is absolutely killer in this movie as a soon-to-be washed-up actress.  It was perfect casting, and she is brilliant.  Emma and Meryl are my favorite actresses, but I still go with Eve for my fave movie.

Your turn...
Karen Mello Burton 4 comments

day 199: rosetta stone



I have a student in my class that struggles saying a complete sentence.  I am not talking about correct grammar.  I am talking about getting out enough words in a sentence so that it makes sense.

I books cats.


In car.

No matter what I have tried, giving verbal prompts, encouraging, praising when she gets close, it is not happening. Luckily, she is enthusiastic about school, enjoys her peers, and manages to communicate just fine with her little friends.

I feel that way with those closest to me.  Sometimes my sentences can be choppy and incomplete, but those people that love me are able to interpret my meaning.  Yesterday I was on the phone with my husband, concerned about my oldest feeling overwhelmed with school, tuition, etc.  A catch in the throat from me on the other end of the phone and my husband responded, No worries, baby.  I am on it.  Within half an hour the problem was solved and I was at ease.  Now, don't think I always get my way.  Please don't think that.  I do, however get understanding.  And it isn't just by my husband.  Sometimes it is my sister, sometimes my best friend. 

There is an invisible rosetta stone I hold up when I talk to people that love me.
Karen Mello Burton 5 comments

day 165: soup as salve

The morning after my friend called to tell me about her mother's accident, I woke up and said to my husband that I was going to make a double batch of dinner and take some over.

What should I make?  Hmmmm.

Make that Portuguese soup, he said.  Mainly because I would like some, he thought.

The nice thing about soup is that it slides down and fills in the cracks.  There is no heavy feeling, like after prime rib or a giant burger.  It is easier than that.  Soup feels good going down and then subtly you are full.  I like that.

And when someone brings soup that was made with sweet potatoes and kale and concern, you can taste each ingredient.  I hope they did.  I love my friends.
Karen Mello Burton 13 comments

day 150: vegetable curry and minnesota

There is absolutely no connection between the two things for me, although I am sure there are some yummy Indian restaurants in Minnesota.  I went to Bombay House last night with good friends, where we ate plain and garlic naan, mango and strawberry lassis, chicken coconut kurma, mushroom mattar, bollywood chicken, shrimp tikka masala, lamb saag, and vegetable curry (hot).  My heart, my stomach, and my sinuses were very grateful as I sat and ate and talked with friends.  Thanks to Ganesh and Shiva we were not tossed out on our ears for our rowdy behavior and incessant laughter.  It was great fun.  And after getting the text from my jealous husband saying, "LEFTOVERS OR DIVORCE", I made sure to bring home some for him, the savage beast.

A little time snuggled up on the couch with Geo, after he ate, of course, as we watched reruns of King of Queens and laughed until we hurt.  Then I started to drift off and have dreams of Minnesota (which I have only driven through on I-90, btw).  I saw big flat fields of waving, tall grasses.  I saw lakes and big puffy clouds.  And then, all of a sudden, I was visiting my blog friend Heather of the EO, as she walked me around her new house she just moved into.  We laughed as she showed me her yard and introduced me to her kids.  It was so real.  She is sweet and cute in the cyber world, but you should see her in real life (so should I, I guess)!

Then I woke this morning, with visions of rice piled high with hot veggie curry, and visions of rural Minnesota.  What a great mix, dontcha know. 
Karen Mello Burton 2 comments

day 134: the weather outside is frightful, but...

It is so fascinating, the way it gets just a little warmer after a snowstorm.  Almost like the air is tired and will stop blowing and freezing for a bit while it rests from sending down the white stuff. 

I hope my suffering friend can remember this while his storm is finishing up its latest outburst.  It will feel warmer soon.  The storm will miraculously offer some insulation once it stops coming down, and you will feel blanketed, ironically, by some of the remnants.  They will help you to determine who you are and what you believe. 

And G and I are standing by with snow shovels.
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