My Little Muffins

Dear future Juliana,

A couple days ago you made your first batch of really delicious muffins. Perfect little pop-out-of-the-pan, pillow-top puffs of palpable pleasure. Okay, you may be flattering yourself a little bit, but in case you ever forget your recipe (all 10 ingredients of it), here it is.

Ingredients:
2 cups flour
1/2 cup white sugar
1/4 cup brown sugar
3 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 egg
1 cup milk
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 cup chocolate chips

You know what to do. Preheat the oven to 425*F. Mix the flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt in a large bowl; whisk the egg in a separate small bowl and then add milk, vegetable oil and vanilla. Make a well in the dry mix and pour the wet mix in all at once. Stir lightly and quickly until batter is moistened, but leave lumpy. Gently fold in chocolate chips. Generously grease a muffin pan or line one with muffin cups. Fill cups 3/4 of the way full with the batter. As soon as you place them in the oven, lower the temperature to 400* (the higher initial temperature allows them to dome). Set the timer for 20 minutes and then check on them (or really, check on them constantly); if the tops are not yet golden, leave for another 3-5 minutes. If they're golden? Take em out, let em rest a few minutes, and bring them as a gift to someone you love, because or else you'll eat them all yourself within the hour.

Remember, you have to find a healthier alternative to this recipe. Next time try substituting:
Half a banana for the egg
7/4 cup whole wheat flour for 2 cups white flour
Less sugar all around, and maybe honey instead
Applesauce for vegetable oil (but still add 2 tsp of the latter for texture)
Blueberries for chocolate chips


Get on it girl! And go for a run! And yes, you did steal that picture from Google, because you forgot to take a picture of your own muffins. Be a more diligent documenter, please.

The Words I Have To Write

Yesterday--or rather, this morning at 4:30 am--I was refused by a sorority.

I am not a "sorority girl". Neither do I have stick-straight blond hair and big boobs and a tiny nose. I am one of those girls who has always had two or three close girlfriends, and the rest of my friends were guys (it's 100% on the mark that I get along with them more easily).

This particular sorority is different, though. It's not national or Panhellenic. It's local, Santa Cruz-y, with a real emphasis on genuineness, made up of mostly highly intelligent brunettes. At least, this is the perfect image I got of them when I rushed them my freshman year.
Oh, yeah, I've rushed them before.
My first week every in college, before I was settled, before I knew anyone, I put on my eyeliner-heavy sorority face and only spoke when spoken to. I easily did not make it; they didn't know who I was, because I didn't put myself out there. I was a little wounded but I moved on.

The next rush, some of my friends got in, and so when this year's Fall Rush rolled around last week, they convinced me to rush AGAIN. I was skeptical, but I decided to do it. I went to three nights of events and felt I connected with all these girls. Then I get a call this morning where they mispronounce my name and tell me that "due to the high volume of rushes we cannot ask you to come back for interviews tomorrow". Okay.

And you know what? I felt the pang of rejection and tossed and turned for a few minutes, but I had prepared myself for this. I've grown since last year; my life will not end because of a sorority. I figured that if I got asked back, then they like me and I like them, and it'll be a good match. If not? Well, I was completely 100% myself and presented them with exactly who I am, so if they didn't like me, then it's just a sign that we weren't meant to be friends. I could've faked it, but who wants to fake it forever? Too much work.

In short, I am myself, and I am proud of who I am, and with this attitude I can only make the right choices with the right friends. No, the sorority was not the right choice for me, but am I sad? Let down? Angry? None of those things (just a little peeved they pronounced my name wrong). In fact, now I have freed up my time to a) focus on my schoolwork yadayadayada,
b) make muffins for my new neighbor,
c) join the sailing team,
d) write an article for the school's environmental magazine,
e) cook with the medieval and renaissance club,
f)have time to visit my boyfriend often,
g) make some herbal concoctions I've been dreaming about,
h) have time to work out,
i) write my first computer program,
j) try out new recipes,
k) visit my family,
l) make my own dress.

I didn't even realize I can now do all that until I wrote it down just now. Wow. No, I am not exaggerating as to how much time being in a sorority (especially pledging one) takes up.

Well this certainly turned out for the better.

Update: upon seeing their new pledge class, many of whom I know, and doing some reflecting on what the sisters shared with us, my roommate and I realized that this sorority does not accept strong personalities. Rather, they take the shy, sweet, malleable girls and mold them into what they wish. They appear to turn out nicely by the time they're done, and hey, to each their own, but I'll keep my unwavering independence and outspoken quirkiness, thank you very much. Not feeling bad about this anymore. In fact, feeling a)relieved and b)more sure of who I am than ever. Now to do some homework.

Real Life Magic; Sleep

I get carried away by fantasy and impossibilities. Fantastical other-worlds, three limitless wishes, mermaids, trees with hearts and voices; all these things are ever-present in my mind, laughing, fluttering stewards of my imagination.

But what really makes my heart skip a beat? The incredible truths of reality: the ones that make you redefine what magic means to you, the ones that make you shelve your fantasies for a moment.

While our imaginations have the ability to stretch infinitely with very little effort, perceptible stretches of reality are only ever small; thus their rare presence, no matter how un-magical they are compared to the dryads dancing in the forests of my mind, is astounding.

They are those moments when something you worked hard for pays off, and you realize your own strength;
when mother earth reveals herself to you in a way that only you can perceive;
when the complexity of our biological composition and the way it makes us feel (sex, runner's highs, even incredible sadness) causes you to realize you are your own largely undiscovered world, with surprises, pleasures and pains around every corner.

One of the real things that fascinates me the most, and constantly connects me with this ever-present, all-natural magic, is sleep. A few hours ago I woke from a wonderful night's rest, feeling almost guilty as to how well I slept because my boyfriend wasn't there (I usually sleep best when he's with me). I know why I slept so well: it's simply because I had a long, busy day yesterday. I woke up at 6:30 am and was going going going until 9:30 pm, when I finally got back to my apartment. I did some homework, ate some noodles, watched a cooking show, read about herb gardening, and by the time I got in bed, I must have been fast asleep within five minutes.

How amazing is it that you can be unconscious, immobile, maybe enjoying a nice dream (more on this in a moment), and your body is preparing itself for the next day of your life all on its own? Sleep makes you happy, healthy, and here; by that I mean that when you are well rested, you are 100% present, ready to meet your day and the people and places in it with confidence and clarity.

I probably appreciate sleep more than most because I suffer from sleep apnea. The maturation of my body over the last year has actually (miraculously to me, though the doctors predicted it) caused me to grow out of the worst of it, but every once in a while I have a terrible night's sleep that takes me back to my hazy high school days. I actually dropped out of high school for a while when I was 16 because I slept so rarely it made it impossible for me to go to class.

Sleep has the power to restore us, to rejuvenate us, to wipe clean the slates of our minds, to encircle us in unconscious comfort, to render us vulnerable yet indifferent, to keep us alive.

And then there are dreams. Worlds fabricated by your own mind where you can do anything you wish, anything, without disturbing any real people (or being subject to their opinions). You can completely immerse yourself in one, touch, feel, move--albeit in a strange way, and often I can't move in dreams--see, and sometimes even smell and taste. How awesome is that?

In short, sleep is magic; real magic. To prove that I am not the only one who believes this, here are quotes by some pretty rad (understatement) people who seem to agree with me as to the power of sleep and dreams.

“Each night, when I go to sleep, I die. And the next morning, when I wake up, I am reborn.”
― Mahatma Gandhi

“I love sleep. My life has the tendency to fall apart when I'm awake, you know?”
― Ernest Hemingway

“You know you're in love when you can't fall asleep because reality is finally better than your dreams.”
― Dr. Seuss