Au revoir

I love "au revoir". It is the French word for goodbye, but it really means "until we meet again".

I have moved my blogging efforts over to something I love and which I have been dreaming of doing for a long time (which I mentioned on this blog previously).

My new fashion blog is www.chezheidi.com and I look forward to continuing to record my life's happenings through my sartorial choices and helping people style themselves and make better fashion choices for themselves, their wallets, and the world.

Merci, et au revoir <3

A day that will live in infamy...

When I took my Praxis exam a few weeks ago there was one of many questions that was striking and confusing in its wording but now I will use that wording for this post, because it was memorable (infamous?).

On December 19th, 6 days after I took my Praxis test, I was supposed to leave the country to go back to France (where I'm from) to visit family and friends and show my husband around (his first time to Europe). We were stressed out and excited at the same time. So much time and money and planning was going into this, and we juggled it all despite having barely survived our busiest semester to date.

Everything was looking fine and dandy until a day or two before the day we were supposed to leave, there was a forecast for some snow which evolved over a few hours to a storm watch for freezing rain and snow. My family, husband, and I thought it would be wiser to drive up to a city closer to the airport the night before the storm was supposed to set in, that way we could minimize risk for any delays or accidents...

At 1:50 AM on December 19th, 2013 my husband and I were calmly and carefully making our way up the highway to the airport. When we left our town it was raining and 41 degrees Fahrenheit, we thought we were traveling safely. By the time we arrived a little past the halfway point in our journey it was still raining, but we were about to find out that the temperature had dropped drastically at this new location. We were driving up a slight incline (a bridge/overpass of the highway), when out of nowhere (through very low visibility) we see a black car, parked horizontally across three lanes of the highway, about 200 yards ahead of us. We were far enough away to react in a timely manner and think we could maneuver and slow down to avoid it. Once my husband tried to do just that, he said "Oh crap" and I froze. We slid on what we now understood was the slush created by freezing rain, and hit the black car full speed laterally on the passenger side of our car. We were both screaming and I shut my eyes before impact. Apparently we flipped our car over the black one and landed on the roof of ours. It took my brain a while to process this information as I opened my eyes and noticed I was hanging upside down staring at my car's totally shattered windshield laying on the road. Shaking and responding to my husband's calls of "Heidi, are you ok?" as I undid my seat belt and crawled out of my shattered window, I understood that although I was seemingly unharmed, I probably shouldn't have been. I looked at the car as I stepped out, and everything just spun around me. There were weird smells, hissing and ticking noises and the insulation from the car doors floated around me as I was pelted by more freezing rain. I grabbed my husband and buried my face in his chest as we both began answering the rushed questions of a witness who had just pulled over and called 911. The witness was kind of hysterical, thinking she would be walking onto a scene of mangled bodies; seeing us come out unscathed was both a shock and a relief. Our luggage we'd packed for the flight was strewn about haphazardly, miscellaneous items from the car had been ejected and were in different states of destruction strewn about the highway with bits of our car.

Police came within what seemed were seconds, the big mystery of the night at this point in time was the location of the driver of the other car (the one that was still chilling pretty much where we had hit it). Witnesses speculated the other driver might have abandoned the vehicle and taken off. Once the police arrived, it was revealed the driver had been sitting in another car on the side of the highway reportedly attempting to call a tow service...she only came out to defend herself and once the police had arrived. Not to check to see if we were alright. I tried to be understanding and I was very even-tempered at the scene but later I couldn't help thinking that it takes a special kind of...person (cough-idiot)...to just leave their car like that in the middle of the highway with no signals flares or attempts at moving it to the very close shoulder. Paramedics asked if they needed to take us to the hospital but with no real injuries my husband and I both declined treatment. The rest of the night was kind of a blur, we filled out reports and picked up what could be salvaged of our belongings (my iPhone with no case on it was miraculously unharmed), the troopers took us and our stuff to their station where we awaited family members to come get us. Our car was towed away and the chunks of stuff were swept off the road.

(still can't believe I walked away from this unscathed)

We were told the official police report put no one at fault.

The rest of the story is not quite so positive. The trip to France and back was an atrocious nightmare, our insurance company has been even worse...but through it all I am still grateful for all the good things I do have and all the love and support I have felt from friends and family. I can't express how blessed my husband and I are to have such wonderful people in our lives when we need it the most. It took me three different rounds to write out the story, I got too emotional the first few times. However, I think it's important for me to document this moment of my life.

in the works...

This blog has like zero followers so no one will be heartbroken that I'm changing things up. I may or may not just quit using this blog altogether to express my random thoughts, and I am most definitely creating another one with a more focused venture (probably my daily outfits and other such posts). I feel super weird about it, but honestly, I think I need the push to document my life more, and I have always really enjoyed fashion and expressing myself through the way I choose to look. Really I'm kind of an artistic /creative free spirit so the blog may have other projects and posts other than fashion related ones...we'll see.

There might be mass confusion about why I would choose to focus on fashion. I know there's a million or so (give or take) "modest" (LDS) fashion blogs out there, but I don't always feel like I see my personal style and budget reflected in those blogs. The only one that ever came close to doing so is now out of commission because the owner is a new mom (go girl). I'm also going to be a teacher soon and don't want to feel like I lost myself (or my style) in the fact that I had to dress to a certain standard for teaching. No Mrs. Frumpkins over here! The challenge aspect is that I'm still super poor and frugal so it's gonna take a lot of creativity to work with what I have.


Anyways, so I'm trying to learn HTML and CSS and will be unveiling the new blog as soon as I feel comfortable with how to create a more personalized display. Oh and my camera is still in the mail on its way here so there's another little hang up.

(Hopefully we can avoid this kind of shot in the future...yikes...really bad iPhone outfit selfies ftw)

I guess one day my kids (grandkids?) are going to get a kick out of reading/seeing my boring life online, but for now this is all really for my own personal growth because I basically suck at journaling and documenting mine and my husband's life. I wanted to change that by writing on this blog but that proved to be a mild failure...oh well! Let's give it another go, with a different idea in mind and maybe we can reach mild success (yay mediocrity).

Links to the new blog will be posted soon(ish)!

Life of a gypsy

Since my last post A LOT has gone down in my life. I don't really know what's considered "normal" or "day-to-day" anymore, and I feel like that's a dilemma many college students face...so much changes in a matter of weeks! So I'm basically a gypsy for the summer.

It's all good though, I'm pretty flexible...

So I finished up my winter semester, then I took my last math class this spring term, totally got an A (guys this never happens, can we just relish that thought and bask in the glory?)

My husband has been gone since the beginning of spring term. He left the first week of May and will be back the first week of August.The reason he is gone is because he got an internship in AZ and it sucks, big time. Well, not the internship itself but the fact that I didn't really get to see him all summer.  And the fact that he has the car, and I had to walk everywhere for the better part of two months in Provo. My friends have all been so kind since I've been lonely and car-less.
We're almost done with the three month separation period, and I've been in Hawaii with my family since the beginning of July so I guess that helps ease the pain a little.

I guess you could say my life is the gypsy life; I live alone or with different friends or members of my family in different parts of the world for limited or indefinite periods of time. I like to dance with goats, I hitch rides with different people, I can get away with spending little to no money and I never know what the next adventure holds. The only thing missing is the con artist side of the gypsy life...just kidding. Mostly.

 

boba, and why I love my job

So this semester I work mostly in the French Writing Lab at BYU.

Our mission? To catalog error types made by students in their papers (with an angry red pen), while explaining to them (vocally) how to fix them.

Sometimes my job is less than stimulating. However, there are times, when a true gem pops up in a paper, and I will cherish it forever and ever in my heart. The most recent one is as follows...

A student was wanting to write about boba drinks in French ( it's no easy task to describe boba in English). But basically boba is a smoothie drink with little tapioca beads at the bottom that are kind of slimy and chewy: some people love 'em, a lot of people hate 'em.

This student wanted to describe the tapioca beads as balls in French (which is perfectly fine). However, using Google translate (even for just one word) can be a fatal error. Google translate erred on the side of a dirty mind and gave the student a very graphic translation for male genitalia. Bless their hearts. I had "balls" (couilles in French if anyone is curious) scattered eloquently and innocently throughout the paper. This poor student had the good fortune of getting me to look over the paper instead of one of the older professors, and even though it was a little awkward, it was really the single most hilarious event of my semester. We laughed (and cried) every time we came across the word in the student's otherwise well-written paper. I did manage to get some pretty messed up images ingrained in my mind, and will probably be avoiding boba for a while.

Kudos to you student, for brightening my day.

Pictured above: the infamous boba drinks, with the tapioca balls at the bottom. 

If anyone's in the Utah area and interested in having some bomb boba, check out Tokyo Sweets at the Provo Towne Center mall. They sell a variety of Asian treats and goodies, if you want to try something a little different I would definitely recommend it! (I'm not just saying that cuz I used to work there...it's actually good guys)

La terre

Usually spring and summer bring about nice nature smells (i.e. flowers, sap, cut grass, etc...)

In France there's a distinct scent in nature, and it actually varies a lot from one region to the next (in Provence it smells like lavender and rosemary...take me back please...). The mountain air in Grenoble just smells clean and fresh, and overall pleasant (sometimes it smells like violets and that's about as pleasant as it gets people).

In the Pacific Northwest of the United States there is also a distinct nature smell. Pines. Pine sap. Rain. Priuses (Prii?).Pines. Oh wait...
It never gets old to me because it always smells nice and everything stays green and lively. I wish I could say the same thing about the next and most recent place I have dwelt in.

Utah. So Utah is great for a lot of reasons, but lately I've been noticing some of the not-so-great things. Every time I wanna breathe deeply and smell what I think should be the pleasant smells of a spring awakening (no connection to the raunchy musical), there's this awful stench of mildew, must and DEATH that hits my olfactory senses with a bludgeoning force. I gag a little. I probably make a weird face too.
Go away nasty earth smell, no one likes you!!!

I've been pondering on why this is the case, and I've come to a few possible conclusions:

1. Having the earth be buried under snow for 4 months gives it a nasty smell
2. Having the earth be under a layer of mulch THEN have snow cover that gives it a nasty smell
3. The grounds crew at BYU replace the dirt too often and it never gets to settle into a nice smell (far fetched and least likely conclusion)
4. Utah earth just sucks and it stinks...
4.5 The spring plants haven't actually started growing yet, everything is still kinda dead and brown (pictured below)

5. Maybe there's something gross perpetually trapped in my nose and I'll never be able to smell anything pleasant in nature ever again (most depressing conclusion)

Anyways. For the few people who read this, you got the privilege to smell my life for a moment...lucky you!

Catharsis

I think it's pretty typical that sometimes you feel super grateful for what *seems* like no good reason at all...I think that it often happens right after (or during) really difficult times in your life.

If you don't want to read about my deep personal thoughts (it's really boring and frightening all at the same time) then you should probably stop right now.

For reals just don't.

I usually hesitate to write stuff like this on a public site, but hey, "future employers" will now know that I indeed have a soul and am not some dry, sarcastic android dropped from planet France.

I was actually looking at a long-time friend's new blog when I realized just how much I care about that friend. She was awesome when I met her, and she still is, even though so much has changed during the course of our friendship. I credit her with being one of the strongest supports for me during a time that just sucked for me (I don't think she even realizes). I received on that same day, a facebook message from one of my best friends in France, who has also been there for me more than she knows, and who I will always be close to despite the current ocean and land mass standing between us. Just now I also read a student's composition about dealing with death, and cherishing our loved ones while they are here on earth (she was a sweetheart and the composition was beautifully written despite French being her third language). Cue that awful (and wonderful) chokey/prickly/dry  feeling in my throat that I get when I am emotional and can't handle it but I have to keep it together cuz I'm such a professional...

I don't do enough to appreciate the people in my life. I don't think I'll ever be able to, even though I try. Because of me having to move around so much in my life, I think that friendships were always something that I saw as transitive and temporary. I realize I can't afford to think and act like that anymore, even though to a certain extent friendships do evolve and change with time and because of our own changing lives. I've realized that I need to start telling people how much they mean to me. Even those who seem like they don't have that much of an impact on my life. Even those who feel like all I do is whine to them (I do that a lot... it's a problem).

I think we all need those introspective times where we just think about how much our friends and family have been there for us. We need to realize we're weak, and we can't always make it on our own.

I am weak, I have weaknesses, and I need loved ones in my life to make it what it is: bearable. enjoyable. 

I have a hard time saying all that, but it's also pretty cathartic.