Foto Friday: For Natalie

So today's Foto Friday honors an angel's birthday. Natalie would be 25 today. Two weeks ago, following a memorial ceremony honoring Natalie Lewis and Ginny Doyle and their contributions to the University of Richmond family, I was privileged to accompany those who knew her so much better to her favorite spot in Richmond.

I had been to Maymont Park before. but I had never seen it the way she saw it.  There was a whole part of the park I had not even known existed and it was immediately clear what made it so special to her.

This gazebo is where her fiance proposed, with the help of her sister and some of her best friends. Watching the proposal videos on facebook this past February was so wonderful.  The park looks completely different from that winter wonderland now.

Dear Natalie,

You are such a gift to everyone blessed enough to know you. Your genuine enthusiastic love for your friends and teammates and even for strangers was inspiring.  You took such care to welcome everyone and make them feel special and you took time to create and share so much more kindness in almost 25 years than most people can hope conjure up in 75. You used God's gifts and lived almost every day with joy, even on the hard days. The legacy you leave is a solid mark of hope and kindness in this word (made with glittery hand-made cards and home-made cookies).
I am blessed to know your spirit. You welcomed me to the swim team family with open arms and home-made posters. I wish we got to spend more time together, there's so much I could learn about friendship from you. There's so much I could learn about how to comfort those in whose hearts your loss left the greatest holes. Know that you are missed. You are loved, you are remembered, and oh so deeply missed.

Love,
Julia

Blue Christmas: Thank God for Kids

Because it's Christmas. Because there are 27 people whose murders shocked the world.  Because many were beautiful innocent children.  Because they are near to my heart right now and should not be forgotten. Because, the darkness threatened to overshadow the light, but the Light has and will always conquer the darkness.

Because in the midst of asking how this could happen, we can all thank God for the gift of children everywhere, and for the joy and laughter and smiles of those kids in Newtown, Connecticut shared on this earth before they were taken from it.

Oak Ridge Boys: Thank God for Kids

If it weren't for kids have you ever thought
There wouldn't be no Santa Claus
Or look what the stork just brought
Thank God for kids

And we'd all live in a quiet house
With out Big Bird or Mickey Mouse
And kool aid on the couch
Thank God for kids

Thank God for kids, there's magic for a while
A special kind of sunshine in a smile
Do you ever stop to think or wonder why
The nearest thing to heaven is a child

Daddy, how does this thing fly?
And a hundred other where's and whys
I really don't know but I try
Thank God for kids

And when I look down in those trusting eyes
That look to me, I realize
There's a love that I can't buy
Thank God for kids

Thank God for kids, there's magic for a while
A special kind of sunshine in a smile
Do you ever stop to think or wonder why
The nearest thing to heaven is a child

And when you get down on your knees tonight
Thank the Lord for His guiding light
And pray they turn out right
Thank God for kids

Thank God for kids.

Spring Break Recap Video *Insert Excited Face*

"But Bitz... Spring Break ended a month ago..."
Yeah, well some of us had stuff like law school to do and kept forgetting to upload the footage to the computer...
Anyway, I recorded a little recap video of the whole trip as soon as I got back, it just took awhile before I had the time to get it up on the interwebs.  There is actually a 1/2 hour of footage from the trip and I made a lil movie for each of the ladies but since I have yet to ask their permission for eternal glory on the interweb (and I haven't had THAT much time to make a highlight-reel or edit out faces) , I haven't included all my footage. That might occur later. So stay tuned:

check out my horribly awesome Aussie accent at 3:28-408, and then at the very end

Also, let's take a moment to think how this is only my fifth numbered vlog entry and I had already forgotten which number I was on when I uploaded it...

As I face the last two weeks of law school and finals, we can be sure I will either ignore this blog completely... or devote all the time and energy I should be spending on my studies here instead.  

Free Write Every Day: #6

Well, I remembered to write all my posts for my assignment... even if I forgot to post the last one here... oops.
Anyways, I am taking a week-long "fast" from social media for a week, so if you're looking for an update in the next 7 days, sorry but it might be awhile =) But really, let's be honest, my blogging is sporadic at best anyways.
Last free writing assignment, I actually attempted to get creative with style and form before letting my time-crunch, procrastinating, gotta get it over with ways kicked in:

Sunday February 26 11:00pm
I’m currently back in Richmond and unpacked from a fun and refreshing trip to see the family. I’m surprised that I have not used this writing time more creatively but have merely used it as a journal or reflecting space for myself.  I have never spent time trying to cultivate a writing to this extent before so I guess I fell back on a default of writing as a reflection, or subjective report of events.  I’m going to try something else for the rest of today (the last day’s) entry.
Words or short phrases relating to the weekend:
technological detox, glittering blackness, reunion of friends, paleontological diets, she spoke with the adroit word choice and the cattiness of a roommate and almost friend, laughing while feeling a deep uneasiness, further motivation to regularly exercise: swimsuit shopping in February, exhausted and sore yet feeling like I accomplished very little, with the camera as a shield protecting mt from unwanted conversation, I ventured into the throng of people.
Meta-ReflectionSince that was harder than I thought and the deadline is short approaching (as well as the knowledge I must awake in less than 7 hours, I will strive for a mixture of quantity, quality, and ease to finish this last entry of the week before searching for reflections to share or writing a new one. I guess I never had really paid attention to how much of my writing is never manifested due to the delete/backspace button.  I used to wonder what happened to the used and then discarded letters.  Since they are a digital projection onto a screen, there is never any proof over what once existed, unlike writing by hand or typewriter, where the tell-tale trace of white-out at least belies the effort a writer undertook to adjust what was written. this can be sort of a metaphor for life in the digital age.  Photos are taken, reviewed, and deleted within seconds.  No longer does the casual or amateur photographer have to wait an hour at the very least to evaluate the shots.  140 character manifestations of thoughts are instantly broadcast to the world (and can be just as quickly deleted) through twitter.  Does this mean less thought, intention or planning goes into what we produce? Is there really any sort of valid argument to counter this thought?

Free Write Every Day: Day #5

Saturday February 25 10:00am


Today my plan is to spend all day with my sisters and then various friends as we set up the party for "Rah", my middle sister.  Her birthday is tomorrow and that is the reason I traveled up to northern Virginia to see the family.  For the last three years I have been able to do this and I definitely enjoy the short-lived breath of fresh air I can get outside of Richmond and away from the law school.  Unfortunately, my obligations follow me up here, and do not cease to exist but at least I have plenty to motivate and distract me up here.  My other sister does get a little bit jealous and she has let me know how bummed she is that I am not able to make it up for her birthday.  Unfortunately hers is in late April during exam-study-crunch time and I can’t quite justify leaving everything to travel home at that stage in the game.

The odd thing about this particular trip is that my parents have just about finished the process of renovating the kitchen/family room and other parts of the main floor.  This means all of the furniture that normally adorns the foyer, living room, dining room, kitchen/family room space has been moved into storage.  Lamps, tables, couches, chairs, pots, pans, bowls, shelves, and plenty of boxes fill our garage, our neighbors garage, and the upstairs.  This includes my old bedroom, which as I am the daughter living furthest from home and least likely to visit during the renovation meant that it is full to the brim. I actually ended up staying in Rah’s room, which was perfectly fine as her bed is a double, where as mine is merely a twin.  


This made me think about the ways the places we sleep can become a reflection of who we are. We decorate them according to our tastes and convenience yet they themselves can shape our thoughts, moods and emotions. For example the room where I grew up has plenty of decorations, images, and leftover crumbs from the time spent there, while the hotel room I stayed at for two nights last summer had maybe a dirty towel and some trash to witness my presence after I left.  these rooms themselves can shape our thoughts, moods and emotions.  I sleep most of my nights these days at a room in a house in richmond, posters, hats, and Christmas lights adorn the walls, displaying parts of me, but even still, it is not “mine.” 

Free Write Every Day: Day #4

Friday February 24 11:00pm

So I traveled home today.  Like most times that I drive home in the middle of the day, it just seemed to highlight how I can be two totally different people at once.  It feels like the last 24 hours were really two completely separate days and when you think about it, it is actually sort of mind boggling how in todays world in less than 2 hours I can be 100 miles away.  This never ceases to amaze me when travelling by plane.  


For instance, this past fall I took a trip to Las Vegas to play in the national championship tournament for an adult kickball league (a story in itself how my sister roped me into this sport in the first place).  I was in Las Vegas for less than 48 hours and by the time I got back it, the journey and the time spent almost seemed as if they belonged to someone else.  As if they were not mine to own, that I couldn’t have travelled that far and returned in such a short time.

An even better example occured last summer when my grandfather turned 85.  My grandmother had planned a surprise party for his birthday.  Bizers and Robinsons made the trek to Huntsville Alabame from Texas, Florida, Kentucky, and Virginia.  Unfortunately the main party (and my grandfather’s birthday) fell on Saturday May 6, the day after finals. Even more unfortunate was the actual surprise was set to take place May 5, a day I needed to devote to my last final exam.

I found a ticket where I could leave Saturday mid-morning from Richmond for Huntsville, and then leave to go back to Richmond the following day in the early afternoon.  In order to afford the ticket I had to incur a layover in Charlotte, N.C. a city towards which I have a semi-reasonable wrath due to interactions and games with their Varsity women’s soccer team (grrr).

Unfortunately, due to some ridiculous layovers and delays, I got to the party and it was great to see the whole family.  I was definitely bummed to miss a bart of the whole cleebration but I was even more bummed when the airline cancelled my initial flight, which then meant I had a longer layover.  I once did the math and I think I ended up travleing for $18+/hours for a 16 hour trip.  however, I am so glad I got to see my grandpa’s happiness to be surrounded by so many people that love him.

Free Write Every Day: Day #3 (really #7, Out of Order)

So on Thursday, February 23 I used my "free day of writing."  It was unplanned but I had a lot of work due by Friday morning and the next thing I knew, midnight had passed and seeing how I do not possess a time machine, I did not have a free-write that day.

I will use this space as a brief reflection on the time spent writing (which is weird because there are three more entries for you to read... even though I'm finished):

I guess for me, writing holds that place in my life that physical fitness or exercise holds for other people.  I think about it, I think about how I will be better for it, I think that I will not regret doing it, but inevitably most of the time I only ever think about what I want to write.  Since I am in the gym a lot (teaching yoga, teaching a core-training class, refereeing IMs or doing a personal workout) I hear a lot of "exercise talk."  You know, the little phrases people are always telling themselves to motivate them to get to the gym or to actually push themselves.  Stuff like: "you never regret a workout, you only regret not working out", or "everyday you're either getting better or worse" (I guess I actually see more of these on pinterest and have even pinned a few myself "There's no easy way to get in shape"

Can I please apply this motivation to writing/schoolwork in general?!?

I know there are times I enjoy writing, I know I have been proud of my schoolwork in the past, I know I have busted my butt to finish assignments and enjoyed it, I just don't know where that is now.  Sometimes I feel like there's so much on my plate, I let things slide because I just cannot imagine how to get everything done so I give up on one thing, but that's not how I should be approaching learning.  I have no idea how I will make it through Bar Prep this summer (that's a different post entirely unto itself)...

20+ years of formal education and I know what I should be doing, I just don't know how to get myself to do it...

Free Write Every Day: Day #2

Wednesday February 22 11:00pm

So today ended up being much busier than I initially planned but I am using my “free day” this weekend when I visit my sister for her birthday, so I gotta write something today.  It was just a rough start, I was a couple minutes late to teach yoga this morning, the first time it happened this semester, but I had to make sure I had my yoga gear (outfit and mat), classwork, shorts to wear for pilates, my work uniform and a business casual outfit for the GRIPLA (Greater Richmond Intellectual Property Law Association) event (where I tried my best to inform attorneys about the Global symposium, and found out my co-editor was sick and therefore not going about 2 hours before the event) and of course after a nonstop day (the only respite was lunch with an old friend after ash Wednesday service, and another brief meet-up at night with another friend) I realized I forgot something rather important.  

After teaching two exercise classes I went to shower and change in the locker room.  Emerging clean but slightly rushed from the shower I went to put on my nice clothing.  Unfortunately, I realized at that moment that I had not packed a regular bra.  I spent the rest of the day in my still-slightly-sweaty exercise top with the built-in sports bra under my dress.  I did my best to forget about it while surrounded by some of the best-connected trademark lawyers in the Richmond area.  Luckily my accessory was a large and sparkly purple scarf I used to strategically cover the spot where the v-neck dress showed the neckline of the exercise top.  

On a completely different note, the Symposium for Global has me pretty stressed out, I will be very glad to wake up March 16, when all of it is behind me.  I have started to seriously space out while riding this, I think that I will take it as a cue to go to bed and make up for lost sleep from last night.  Tomorrow will be busy as well and I have plenty of work left to so before making the drive up to northern Virginia.

Free Write Everyday: Day #1

For one of my more alternative classes in law school, I had to write 300-500 words a day, I figured since I shared them with my professor, I might as well share them with you all.  Also, this allowsme to post something since I have not written anything here for awhile.

First entry:

"Tuesday February 21 11:00pm
Where does my resistance to put pen to paper (or in this case, letter to keyboard) come from? I have always seemed to have trouble filling a word limit.  I had a tendency in high school to check the word count with each passing sentence to constantly update myself on exectly how many words I had left to write.  I do not know why this is because I have no trouble filling up any available silence with spoken communication, and I actually like the intention behind the words I chose to put down to paper.  I guess I like that I can sound more put together or intelligent on a  written document without the “likes” “ahs” and “ums” that occur, often against my best effort while speaking.
I struggle to write thank-you notes, I rarely wrote the observation portions of the labs in science class, and in my eighth grade “weekly journal” for English class I spent the lunch break before the last class of each quarter frantically putting pencil to notebook to write all nine entries I had not yet written.  In all of these cases, I thought about what I wanted to write a lot... a lot! I wanted each “thank-you” to be sincere and heartfelt, I wanted to pick the right adjective to describe the experiment and I think I wanted my journal entries to be a good quality.  What is so surprising is with amount of time I spent reflecting on the possibilities of what I could write, I never left myself enough time to actually write what I wanted.
I put extra pressure on myself when writing because I am a harsh critic of my work.  If I say something it can fade away into memory (where we so easily edit things to see them the way we want to) but when I write I know I will be looking at it later and judging what I wrote.
I also think my aversion to writing comes from a compelling desire to be active and to truly write, I have to disengage from whatever activity I am doing and stop, sit and write.  My monkey-mind and my restless body have a hard time staying still to focus and write, especially when it comes to the preparation it can take to write something well.  In this way, I allow my other activities or work take over my attention and I become so easily distracted from actually writing."

Let's Play Yoga (Videos)!

So for almost exactly one year, I have spent 60 to 75 minutes twice a week (leaving time for a couple weeks vacation) teaching yoga.  It has been a lot of fun and has really challenged myself in unexpected ways.  I am less anxious about trying to find the right word when speaking (this comes from calling my foot my elbow, or mixing up some other cues).  I get to share good music with the world, I get to meet interesting people and teach them something, I get time to calmly lead people away from their own problems for awhile to focus on their breath, their body, how to connect the mental with the physical and I really enjoy it.

Before I left on break one person suggested creating some workouts so that people could continue to have guided practice while I was gone.  So far I've posted three yoga videos and have really enjoyed seeing all the other stuff people have put one there.  I even discovered yogadownload.com from a friend, which is a great resource for a variety of yoga workouts..

Here's the first video I posted:

My first Yoga Demonstration Video (SuperThanks to Sarah for helping me out!)

I've filmed three more to post and can't wait to see that people are benefiting from them.  They are a mixture of workouts and a series I've titled "Perfecting Your Yoga Practice" where I show people some of the physical and mental cues for getting into proper poses.  You can check out a playlist of my Yoga videos here!

Let me know if you've any suggestions of particular poses for which you want clarification or muscle groups you'd like to work with a Vinyasa flow! 

MLK Day, Excerpt from Letter from a Birmingham Jail

‎"Time itself is neutral; it can be used either destructively or constructively... Human progress never rolls in on wheels of inevitability; it comes through the tireless efforts of men [and women =)]willing to be co workers with God, and without this hard work, time itself becomes an ally of the forces of social stagnation." Martin Luther King Jr., Letter from a Birmingham Jail

New Year, New Endeavor

This winter break I keep telling myself the goal is to finish the final paper for which my wonderful professor granted me an extension, prepare for my last semester of law school,  and most importantly get a job. Instead (and oh-so-obviously), my mind is filled with all the wonderful other things I could be doing with my life.

The conclusion I keep returning to is that as a person-on-the-go, I am constantly filling my schedule with things to do but not taking the time to properly reflect and meditate about them.  The problem with sitting and meditating is that I am an extrovert! While I enjoy time alone to reflect, I re-charge my batteries through interaction with other people.  This means all the withdrawal, alone, focus, study time involved in finals period wreaks havoc with my inner balance.  I become emo-Julia with pensive philosophical thoughts that lead to sadness and inertia (and a lot of web-browsing).

This particular finals led me to a Quarter-Life crisis, (for anyone who was unaware, 24 is almost 25, a shocking conclusion I reached just days ago) where I tried to examine what made me happy in life and how I ended up in law school of all places.

I also had random, not-productive-to-actually-share-because-I'm-sure-other-people-have-expressed-it-much-better meditations on how we as humans shape our own lives through Production vs. Consumption as well as the roles Reflection and Dialogue can play in our lives.

So in order to have a creative outlet, produce something for the world and have time to reflect I have created a YouTube channel that will work like a vlog, which I will connect it to this blog.  The overall goal would be to use it as a platform for connection and dialogue with other people but more than likely it will just be some sort of public outlet for my creativity until law school makes me too busy to keep up with it.

It will be about things that interest me, and I understand the whole idea is somewhat selfish/narcissistic, but really it will be a way for me to explore who I want to be and what valuable connections exist in my life to allow me to impact the world more efficiently.  This means I will examine my relationship with myself, my relationship with my peers, my connection to the activities that interest me (yoga, soccer, performing), my relationship with random people on the internet, my relationship with my environment, and my relationship with my lord and savior Jesus Christ.

Basically, there are multiple goals: reflection, and dialogue, expression, connections, sharing, creative outlet, and my favorite: productive procrastination.

Here is the first entry/welcome video:

you can go to the channel and check out what else I have up but just know the first two things I uploaded were college art projects and also happened back when YouTube videos had to be supercompressed and you can't see everything... who am I kidding, they're just weird!