I'm Ambivalent About Blog Awards

Is it just me, or has this year gone by twice as fast as normal? I have no idea how it's the middle of July. It feels like May at the most. I worry that sort of feeling means I'm not a kid anymore. I actually have quite a bit of anecdotal evidence that I'm not a kid anymore. For instance, I'm not sure when it happened, but all of a sudden I like Fleetwood Mac. And the other day at work, I had to hold something away from me to read it.

I think there was supposed to be a point to that, but I don't remember what it was. Sorry.

This post has a point, though, and here it is: I'm ambivalent about blog awards.

I used to covet them, because I didn't have one. So I made my own. He lives in my sidebar. His name is Captain Cluck and he's yours for the taking (assuming you are interested in having a picture of a zoo chicken in your blog's sidebar).

Then someone gave me a blog award, and I was happy. I felt ... oh, validated, I suppose, and appreciated. I posted about it and felt good about things because finally I had an actual blog award, and that was that.

Then someone else gave me a blog award, and I felt like kind of a jerk. Because I don't think anyone wants to read a blog all about how amazing someone thinks she is. But on the other hand, it's nice of people to give them out, and I don't want to be ungrateful. I don't want someone to say, "Hey, Jill, here's a blog award!" and have my response be, "Oh, hey, that's nice, but everyone already knows how big my ego is - I have SO MANY other blog awards, I'm not even going to bother with this one."

So I would like to say both I'm sorry, and thank you, for my newest blog awards. They are courtesy of mom/birth mom/surrogate mom blogger Tanya, who writes here: (click).





(If I were cleverer/less restless I would put the pictures next to each other instead of one above the other, but it was one of Those Days at work, so one above the other it is.)

As you can see, I am apparently both versatile and lovely, neither of which are words I think I have ever used to describe myself or my blog, but at least Tanya thinks so. See, I'm not being braggy or obnoxious. I'm giving someone else's opinion of me, or rather my blog, and it happens to be a good one. So that's less obnoxious, right?

Right?

Thanks, Tanya :)

I think I'm supposed to nominate other people but I never do. Is that obnoxious? Should I nominate people? I just don't want anyone to feel left out; that's my problem. If I nominate other blogs it's like saying I think those blogs are better than the other blogs I read, and I have a hard time choosing favorites. (I have a hard time choosing things in general. I have only two kinds of cereal in the house for this very reason.)

I may nominate someone later on, but as I said, this was one of Those Days at work. I think there is a disruption in the space-time continuum at my library. I swear I worked at least 15 hours today.

I digress. The other thing I'm supposed to do is mention seven things about myself. Because, you know, I don't talk about myself enough as it is. Let's do four and call it even.

1) My personal motto is a Jewish proverb: Man plans, God laughs.

Story of my life.

2) I once had a fleck of oregano lodged in my right tonsil. Have I mentioned that before? It seems like I may have but I don't remember.

3) I once concluded a story about a nativity made of white chocolate by saying, "I ate the baby Jesus last." (I have decided that if I ever write my memoirs, that phrase will be the title.)

4) This isn't about me specifically but rather librarians in general (not that I am a librarian; that honorific requires an advanced degree). When people find out I work in a library, they always have some story, and then they say, kind of jokingly, "I bet you guys talk about customers all the time," and they end with a nervous laugh, clearly hoping to be disabused of that notion.

So I'm sorry to say that yes, we do talk about you. We talk about you a LOT. We talk about the stupid questions you ask, and the excuses you give for lost books, and the ridiculous things you say to us. Some of us even write these things down and are planning both a blog and a book about them.

We spend hours talking about you. So be nice, turn your books in, pay your fines, and don't ask how we're doing alphabetical order these days.

A Few Things ...

And by a few, I mean ... oh, let's say, three followed by seven, and here they are.

1) My deep dark secret is no more! Ladies and gentlemen, I have a library card.

[As soon as I can find the cable that connects my camera to my computer, I'll put a picture of it here. "It" being of course my library card, not the cable that connects my camera to my computer.]

One of my co-workers, with whom I am Facebook friends, found my blog, read my post about my secret shame, and offered to help me out. So last Saturday, when no one was looking, she re-activated my account and gave me a new card. It was all very stealthy, and I expected to be caught several times. I am just not cut out for espionage.

Thanks, Alexia! I'm glad you're back :)

I cannot even say what a relief it is to have that little matter taken care of. I no longer live in fear of being found out, and I won't have to endure the humiliation I would certainly have faced if I'd been found out.

2) I recently had to submit a detailed outline of my FSA presentation to the people who are in charge of that sort of thing. In the process of researching some of the things I wanted to discuss, I ended up sobbing about my dad's death for about twenty minutes. Am I wrong in thinking it bodes poorly for me that I'm supposed to be talking about grief and I seem to be struggling with it myself?

But it's not the same kind of grief, really. Death and placement weren't the same kind of pain at all. It's not that one was worse than the other, because I think they both rank pretty high on the rottenness scale, but the pain was definitely different. So maybe my presentation won't be so bad, after all. I mean, I do feel at least moderately qualified to talk about making placement grief useful. I don't feel remotely qualified to talk about grieving the death of a parent. I'm still trying to get the hang of it.

Onward now to happy thoughts, like the fact that for some reason,

3) People seem to like me. I'm always sort of surprised when people like me. But Mary likes me well enough to give me a blog award! Mary blogs at Genuinely Jarman and is an adoptive mama. I think the title of her blog fits her because she is a very genuine person. I love her thoughts on birth mothers; you can read them *here.* Mary gave me this:



Wasn't that nice of her? Thank you, Mary! It looks so pretty in my sidebar by Captain Cluck and friends.

There are rules with this but as usual I'm weaseling out of some of them. Well, I say some, but I mean most. I'm already blathering today so I'm going to do the bit where I tell seven things about myself, and here they are in no particular order:

1) I've had four surgeries in the past eight years. All four made my life a million times better, particularly the fourth one, which brought Roo into the world!

2) My biggest fear is fish. I think they are the nastiest, creepiest things in the world, and I have no sense of humor about them.

Let's change the subject.

3) My driving record is immaculate - not so much as a warning from a police officer. (This is a happy consequence of being a good driver.)

4) I have an Arizona cosmetology license, and I used to work at a children's hair salon.

5) I grew an inch taller between my 19th and 20th birthdays. I hadn't grown before that in nine years.

6) I started my first blog in 1997, before it was even called blogging. You think the internet is full of whiny emo crap now, you should have seen it in the days of Geocities and Tripod.

7) I don't know what I'm going to do if I have another baby girl someday, because I gave Roo the only girl name I really like.

Anyway. That's probably a lot more information than you ever wanted about me, but there it is. Thanks again to Mary for the blog award!

I'm supposed to give this award to at least five other people, but I can never choose, so as usual, if you're reading this and you've always wanted a blog award, it's yours for the taking, because you are all awesome.

And It's Not Even My Birthday

Let's face it, there's no way to mention you got a blog award without sounding like a horrible braggart. I can't bear a braggart. I had a rather humorous post written up about getting a blog award, and I referenced Captain Cluck and everything. But in the end, I couldn't bring myself to post it, because it felt a little too self-congratulatory. (This post does as well, but que sera, sera.)

But we talked about gratitude in church today, and I thought, if I just let this go without acknowledging it, I'm being ungrateful. Which I don't mean to be. Because I am super, super grateful to get a blog award. And this one came when I was feeling emotionally fragile and needed a little validation.

And here's my validation!



One of my new fave birth mama blogs is called Carrying a Cat By the Tail, and the blogger, who goes by A Life Being Lived, thought I needed a little pink to balance out Captain Cluck and the Daisy on my sidebar. Wasn't that nice of her?

I mean, like I said, I don't want to brag or anything, but I don't want to be ungrateful, either. And I love cupcakes.

Of course, now I'm supposed to spread the love to 5 other people. Sigh. I hate choosing favorites. Some asked me once on Formspring what my favorite adoption blogs were, and I answered, against my better judgment. I do love the blogs I mentioned, but all I can think of are the countless others I love that I should have mentioned as well. So for now, I'm going to be a weaselling weasel, and weasel out of further nominations. I wish I could give it to all of you the way I did with Captain Cluck, because y'all are awesome.

(Y'all know how awesome you are, right? If you don't, kindly click HERE and start believing. Captain Cluck would love to be CTRL+C-ed and CTRL+V-ed onto your snazzy little corner of the blogging world.)

Would the blogosphere explode if I broke the sacred rules of the Blog Award? Like, if I said, "Hey, readers, you are award-worthy, please take this award for yourselves - all of you!" would that be a bad thing? I mean, if anyone can just take one it probably defeats the purpose of them being awarded. Which is probably why I haven't seen Captain Cluck floating around too much - people like the idea of being chosen for something.

Well, too bad. For now, I choose to abstain from further awarding.

Thanks, ALBL! You and your lovely blog are awesome. As a token of my appreciation, please take a chicken.

I'd Like to Thank the Academy ...

So. Y'all remember Captain Cluck? Click on his name if you don't. Long story short, I'd grown weary of seeing blog awards and not having one of my own, so I MADE one of my own, featuring a chicken, because I think chickens are adorable.

I offered up Captain Cluck to anyone who had ever wanted a blog award because, like Mr Sunshine in the Jimmy Dean Breakfast commercials, I think you're all awesome. One of the awesome peeps who adopted (no pun intended) Captain Cluck was Mary. Mary is awesome.

(I know I use that word too much. I've been told. I don't care.)

Because Mary is so awesome (hi, Mary!) she took pity on little old chickens-and-Paint Shop Pro me, and gave me a real, legitimate blog award! Here it is. Isn't it pretty? I've always loved daisies.



This is probably the first and only time that "sunshine" has been used as any sort of descriptor for me. I'm more ... partly sunny, I guess, or I would be if I were weather, which I'm not. But I'll take it just the same. Captain Cluck was getting lonely on my sidebar, and I bet he likes daisies too.

Actually, I did accidentally spread a little sunshine in Galway, and during the rain at that. This guy was standing by the bench with the Wilde Brothers statues, playing the most beautiful song on his violin. I dropped two coins into his violin case. I thought they were one-Euro coins, but they were two-Euro coins. I discovered when I went to pay for my hamburger later that I'd dropped in four Euro instead of just two. Oh well. Sure made that guy's day!

I'm supposed to nominate 12 other people for this particular blog award, which seems like a bit much. I'm not at my best and brightest before noon, and I can't even think of 12 different people I know at the moment, much less 12 award-worthy blogs. I don't want to be insincere or hasty so I'm going to be a lazy weasel and do that later. In the meantime, Captain Chicken and the Sunshine Flower (that sounds like a band from the late 60s) will keep each other company in my sidebar.

Thanks again, Mary! You're awesome.

I'm Awesome!

So.

I have, on more than one occasion, noticed a number of blog awards floating around. I won't mention any awards or blogs by name, since I read about 100 blogs on a regular basis (I need to get out of the house more). But there are "Kreativ" blogger awards, and "Beautiful Blogger" awards and awards with flowers on them, and teacups, and kittens, and mermaids and quilts and all manner of cutesy little things.

I once envied them - the recipients of those blog awards. I had it in my head that a blog award was validation; it said that the awardee (is that a word?) was delightful and lovely and that people liked them. I aspired to earn a blog award. I wanted validation. I wanted people to like me - and I wanted PROOF that people liked me. I wanted a blog award.

I wondered for a time if there was a website where people submitted their blogs for award consideration, like the movie folks do with the Academy Awards. I poked around, and as it turns out ... I couldn't actually figure out how on earth these awards were getting around, or how they started. And, eventually, I gave up.

But then a few days ago I started thinking again. I was doing a bit of reading and pondering on the topic of self-esteem and happiness, and I thought about how I like myself so much more now than I ever have before. I used to joke about it, but more and more I'm starting to think that I'm actually pretty awesome! (Don't laugh.)

And so I decided that if no one else was going to give me a blog award, I'd give one to myself - not just give it to myself, but make it myself. And it wouldn't just be any old teacup or patchwork award. I wanted something different and fun and quirky like me. Well, nothing says "quirky" like a chicken! I went through some of my winter zoo pictures and found a likely candidate, and opened it in Paint.NET. And so here it is, peeps: the Awesome Blog Award, featuring Captain Cluck.



I'm pretty awesome, and I have an awesome blog, and now I have a blog award to prove it! I bet that a lot of you (if not all of you) are pretty awesome, too. Wouldn't you like an awesome blog award, too? Sure you would. So Captain Cluck is here for the taking (although he probably needs re-sizing, something I'm too lazy for). Right-click, save, and knock yourself out.

You don't have to list any little-known secrets about yourself, and you don't have to nominate anyone. I'd get a kick out of it if you linked Captain Cluck back to my little blog, but I'll leave that to your discretion. You could also e-mail me with your blog URL so I'll know you're awesome, but that, too, is up to you. Self-confidence shouldn't come with strings attached! Captain Cluck thinks you're awesome. Don't you think you're awesome, too?

Snaps for The Happiest Sad!

Can I brag for a moment? (Of course I can!)

I was bored earlier - something that happens with astounding regularity these days. In any case, I was wasting some time with Google. I Googled myself and, even after adjusting my search to eliminate any results mentioning the Canadian singer/songwriter who shares my name, I didn't come up. I went through over 300 search results and didn't find myself. Which was sort of depressing.

But then I Googled this little blog here, and much to my surprise, I found The Happiest Sad listed on About.com. They've rated my blog as one of the top 10 birth mom blogs out there! The link is here: http://adoption.about.com/od/newsandreference/tp/birthparentblog.htm

I am so surprised and so flattered! This totally made my day. Maybe I'm not doing so bad after all!

Brother

I have said it before, and sometimes I wonder if repeating it takes away the impact of what I'm saying, but there are really no other words for it: I have the best big brother in the entire world.

I have two big brothers, so I should probably be less enthusiastic in asserting that Scott is my favorite. But it's true! He is more than just my big brother. He is my geek squad, my substitute dad, and my friend. Since my father died a year ago, Scott has had a lot to deal with. He has his own family to take care of - a wonderful wife, and three children 7 and under - and a full-time job, and a rather involved church calling. But he's never been too busy for me. He has changed flat tires, re-set sprinkler timers, set up a new cable box, resurrected my laptop computer, replaced electrical outlets, put together and taken apart furniture, fixed TV and internet problems, listened to story after dull story of mine, installed a Dog Silencer Pro, shared MP3s, baked bread sticks and pizza, answered phone calls and text messages at odd and sometimes inconvenient hours, fasted and prayed for me, and given me more priesthood blessings than I can count.

The last one on the list has been the most important; had the most impact. I miss getting father’s blessings from my dad. But the ones from Scott have saved me. There have been so many occasions this past year where I was fighting off panic attacks or crying so much I got dehydrated or feeling like I wanted to give up. And then Scott gives me a blessing and says the things that my Father in Heaven knows I most need to hear, and I know things are going to be okay.

I am more thankful for my brother than I can ever say. I am thankful for his love and patience. I am thankful that he lives worthy of the priesthood so he can give me and my mother blessings when we need them. I am so blessed to have him as a brother.