Ah, ambition. Where would we be without it? Sitting in a dark cave somewhere, eating unseasoned food, wearing fur, that’s where. So yay for that weird thing that compels us to aim for more, try something new, endeavor for something better. How lucky we are to dream, to aspire, to hope.
Yet for all the ambitious ideals that I set out upon for myself, I have to confess that, more often that not, I come up short. It’s OK. I’m not lamenting my underachievement in life or anything—in fact, I would still define myself most days as the opposite, an overachiever in some aspects. But I sometimes seem to set wildly ambitious goals that don’t seem wild to me at all at the time of their inception in my silly little brain, but yet they still just don’t come to fruition. So then I am left feeling a little—oh, deflated. Does this happen to you? Do you think things like, “Why, I’ll just do X, Y, and Z, and all will be perfect!” and then find yourself muddling through just to get to X? Much less even have time to consider Y and Z?
So it was for Valentine’s Day this year.
First off, I was going to continue my tradition of making Valentine’s cards to send to my nearest and dearest. I started this little tradition back in Japan when it was hard to find an inexpensive and English greeting card anywhere in my town and it has continued since-- until this year when I had a plan involving about 800 tiny cut-out letters and some store-bought blank note cards and enough glue to be against the law in some states. What in my silly little brain seemed like such an adorable idea turned into a nightmare of epic (and sticky) proportions as I tried re-creating a quote about love with tiny letters. So then the idea morphed into just saying “Love Ya” in cut out letters—but the finished product just looked so very 5th grade that I was forced to consider crimping my hair and donning a retainer to deliver them. So then the project morphed about six more times until the Monday mail date deadline loomed ominously and I ended up just handwriting the quote in cards and off they went. Sigh.
For the office, originally there were going to be homemade sugar cookies, frosted with royal icing instead of butter cream, and red velvet cupcakes with cream cheese frosting and hand-dyed pink sugar crystal hearts atop their frosty white peaks… All to be inserted into decorative treat bags and distributed with hand-made cards. Seriously, this seemed perfectly doable a mere week ago. Because I am, apparently, delusional.
I spent the majority of Tuesday and Wednesday night this week (after going to the gym thankyouverymuch) baking cookies for the festive holiday that is now upon us. Amie and I set out with the goal of making the dough ourselves as we did for the Christmas baking extravaganza, but since I had amassed a strangely large amount of the Betty Crocker sugar cookie mix packets, we decided to use those up instead. A few tweaks to the standard baking instructions and we had a nice amount of roll-out dough from which we made the tiniest of hearts to giant hearts to scalloped-edge hearts to regular hearts. Hearts galore.
After about four batches of hearts, and still as many to frost with three different shades of pink icing, there just wasn’t enough time or energy to make the red velvet cakes that we had been dreaming about for weeks. The tricky thing with cupcakes is that they’re really only good for a day or so, especially if the frosting involves cream cheese. So the alternative to make these on Sunday, when the day was wide open and fancy free, was not really an option for a Thursday holiday. This cookie fest was also my first attempt (since elementary school) at royal icing. Sometime in the late 1980’s I converted to butter cream and just never looked back. But we wanted a smooth, shiny look to these heart cookies, so there you go: royal icing experiment #1.
Dismayed about the red velvet cupcakes that never came to be, I began to consider my options for the handmade cards for the office (to accompany the cookies now in the decorative bags, sans cupcakes.) However, at 10pm on Wednesday night I found myself without any red or pink construction paper and no will to start crafting things out of random paper like, oh, I dunno… post-its.
So work ended up getting hand-delivered bags of cookies sans handmade cards sans cupcakes. I did manage to purchase some old-school Nerds valentines for my own team of word nerds (the copywriting group) in addition to their cookies. Although the cookies received rave reviews and no one seemed to miss their hand-made card, I still feel like I did not execute the Valentine festivities as well as I had hoped. Someday I’ve got to find a way to get my ambitions in line with my abilities (or, ideally, vice versa) otherwise I fear I face many more years (and unfulfilled sugar rushes) of perpetual disappointment.
But, on a day in which we celebrate LOVE, I have to admit that I feel lots of it and conveyed oodles of it, and that’s all that really matters in the end. So although there were no cupcakes, there were mailbox contents and sweet treats to bring smiles and remind people that I care. And that is the part I really love. And it’s enough. (Until next year when I somehow find a way to involve sky writing… )
Yet for all the ambitious ideals that I set out upon for myself, I have to confess that, more often that not, I come up short. It’s OK. I’m not lamenting my underachievement in life or anything—in fact, I would still define myself most days as the opposite, an overachiever in some aspects. But I sometimes seem to set wildly ambitious goals that don’t seem wild to me at all at the time of their inception in my silly little brain, but yet they still just don’t come to fruition. So then I am left feeling a little—oh, deflated. Does this happen to you? Do you think things like, “Why, I’ll just do X, Y, and Z, and all will be perfect!” and then find yourself muddling through just to get to X? Much less even have time to consider Y and Z?
So it was for Valentine’s Day this year.
First off, I was going to continue my tradition of making Valentine’s cards to send to my nearest and dearest. I started this little tradition back in Japan when it was hard to find an inexpensive and English greeting card anywhere in my town and it has continued since-- until this year when I had a plan involving about 800 tiny cut-out letters and some store-bought blank note cards and enough glue to be against the law in some states. What in my silly little brain seemed like such an adorable idea turned into a nightmare of epic (and sticky) proportions as I tried re-creating a quote about love with tiny letters. So then the idea morphed into just saying “Love Ya” in cut out letters—but the finished product just looked so very 5th grade that I was forced to consider crimping my hair and donning a retainer to deliver them. So then the project morphed about six more times until the Monday mail date deadline loomed ominously and I ended up just handwriting the quote in cards and off they went. Sigh.
For the office, originally there were going to be homemade sugar cookies, frosted with royal icing instead of butter cream, and red velvet cupcakes with cream cheese frosting and hand-dyed pink sugar crystal hearts atop their frosty white peaks… All to be inserted into decorative treat bags and distributed with hand-made cards. Seriously, this seemed perfectly doable a mere week ago. Because I am, apparently, delusional.
I spent the majority of Tuesday and Wednesday night this week (after going to the gym thankyouverymuch) baking cookies for the festive holiday that is now upon us. Amie and I set out with the goal of making the dough ourselves as we did for the Christmas baking extravaganza, but since I had amassed a strangely large amount of the Betty Crocker sugar cookie mix packets, we decided to use those up instead. A few tweaks to the standard baking instructions and we had a nice amount of roll-out dough from which we made the tiniest of hearts to giant hearts to scalloped-edge hearts to regular hearts. Hearts galore.
After about four batches of hearts, and still as many to frost with three different shades of pink icing, there just wasn’t enough time or energy to make the red velvet cakes that we had been dreaming about for weeks. The tricky thing with cupcakes is that they’re really only good for a day or so, especially if the frosting involves cream cheese. So the alternative to make these on Sunday, when the day was wide open and fancy free, was not really an option for a Thursday holiday. This cookie fest was also my first attempt (since elementary school) at royal icing. Sometime in the late 1980’s I converted to butter cream and just never looked back. But we wanted a smooth, shiny look to these heart cookies, so there you go: royal icing experiment #1.
Dismayed about the red velvet cupcakes that never came to be, I began to consider my options for the handmade cards for the office (to accompany the cookies now in the decorative bags, sans cupcakes.) However, at 10pm on Wednesday night I found myself without any red or pink construction paper and no will to start crafting things out of random paper like, oh, I dunno… post-its.
So work ended up getting hand-delivered bags of cookies sans handmade cards sans cupcakes. I did manage to purchase some old-school Nerds valentines for my own team of word nerds (the copywriting group) in addition to their cookies. Although the cookies received rave reviews and no one seemed to miss their hand-made card, I still feel like I did not execute the Valentine festivities as well as I had hoped. Someday I’ve got to find a way to get my ambitions in line with my abilities (or, ideally, vice versa) otherwise I fear I face many more years (and unfulfilled sugar rushes) of perpetual disappointment.
But, on a day in which we celebrate LOVE, I have to admit that I feel lots of it and conveyed oodles of it, and that’s all that really matters in the end. So although there were no cupcakes, there were mailbox contents and sweet treats to bring smiles and remind people that I care. And that is the part I really love. And it’s enough. (Until next year when I somehow find a way to involve sky writing… )
6 comments:
All those cliches fit here... "what they don't know won't hurt them", "it's the thought that counts", and "one tiny good deed is better any day than one giant good intention"... I'm sure those cookies were delicious, and it was more than anyone else did! Your ambitious desires/acts are far more than any thought my mind could ever dream up. :) Happy Valentine's Day!
Okay, if you are at X, Y or Z, I am definitely not past A, B or C. I loved my card, which arrived today I must say. I missed Cody's name be attached to it though.
I agree with Tara, where was Cody's name? I told J&K that it was also from Cody anyway since the Cody Christmas card is still hanging on our bulletin board (that is when Kate isn't carting it around). Thanks for the card and the quote. If my ambitions matched yours I think I'd be too overwhelmed to get out of bed in the morning. You're amazing!
Agree with Julie - your ambitions make the rest of ours look shameful! And just wait until there is a baby J...all ambitions go out the door with your free time! :)
I've got a mega problem with keeping my ambitions in line with my actual talent/time/energy/abilities. And sadly enough my X, Y and Z's are pretty lame.
Just so you know, getting a Valentine from a dear friend is royal icing on a cake (or cookie). You expect Valentine's from husband, child and maybe parent, but not from a friend! The fact that you got it in the mailbox is a step further then I usually make it.
And finally, I will end this comment by saying something I've said many times before. PLEASE write a book. It can be about anything. I love reading your writing. Love it. Happy Valentine's day!
Laurel can I say in hindsight (61 years if) that I did too much of the cupcake and cookie baking at the expense of what I see now as the important thing: "loving time"
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