January 12: I’m not feeling very nice today. In fact, I’m feeling really bitter and cynical to the bone. Maybe because I have a cold and am really quite the big baby when I don’t feel good. And right now, in particular, being a big baby for a stupid head colds feels selfish and really wrong. I have friends going through real health issues and real crises and less hope than they deserve. I have a country dealing with real health issues and real violence and looking for some real healing. And all I want to do is curl up and watch back episodes of Oprah and pretend none of that exists. The only real niceness I can report today was not curling up and watching Oprah. I kept my commitments (well, most. I rescheduled my day in Joe’s class to Friday), whined less than usual (which is still a lot) and … well, that was it.

January 11: Went and picked up the gigantic suitcase of rocks for Joe’s classroom. Had I realized that a gigantic suitcase full of rocks might weigh more than me, I might have planned better. (Why I didn’t realize rock samples would be heavy is fodder for another post. Maybe I need a My Year of Not Thinking Things Through blog too). But at least his class will get to look at and touch real rocks and minerals while they are learning geology.

January 10: Took a breath, shut my mouth, listened, then asked a question. Like so many other things that are going to be listed here, this is something I should be doing as a matter of course. But I don’t. Not always. Trying.

January 9: I’m in San Francisco for the Kraft Fight Hunger Bowl Game between Boston College and University of Nevada, Reno. Jason, my brother, my niece and I all went together, which was a blast because that’s just a fun group. My brother, Jason and I are all UNR alum; my niece is a student. We were decked out in our school colors, on the bus, in a city turned silver and blue by the onslaught of so many Nevadans, when my niece, Laura, realized she forgot her camera. She has started scrap booking and hasn’t been here, the city where her father and I were born, since she has been old enough to remember such things. I have a great portable camera, so I took the pictures all night. No grand act of charity or anything, just an evening viewing the world through a lens, trying to capture the moments a college student would want to remember. Her first bowl game. Her first time in the city. Enjoying father/daughter time. Running into friends. A streaker. A football player in desperate need of a bigger shirt. A winning score. A field filled with ecstatic fans. As usual, I found doing this small bit of niceness for my niece meant a whole lot of fun for me. I got to be a college girl again and just soak in that hopeful innocence. Really, a treat.

January 8: Prayed. I prayed for the victims and the criminals, for the slain, the injured, and those who left carnage in their wake. I prayed for the innocent and the guilty. I prayed for those who speak and those who remain silent. I prayed for the future of my country.