november 21st, 2005
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7:41pm

oh, i forgot to tell you that i found out what "funeral spread" is. i can't believe i had never heard the term until yesterday since i ate it all the time when i was little.
funeral spread (but also seen at quite a few weddings) is a ham and pickles really diced up very fine with a bit of mayo and then stuck on the top of bread. usually the bread is round. i don't knwo where they always got round bread. but also at weddings EVERYONE had round rye bread with cheeze whiz on it and then a slices olive with pimento in the very center. that was my favourite!
but i hadn't heard of the ham and pickle one being called "funeral spread" before.
that cracks me up :)

also, what is my favourite kind of hotdish? tator tot hotdish!
i think it would be tatortots, hamburger, velveeta (sometimes a can of green beans) and then the shoestring potato chips crumbled on top. then you bake it. so totally bad for you.
hotdish can basically be any leftovers you have stuck together and baked.
i'm not really sure how hotdish is different from casserole.
i think casseroles are baked covered and hotdishes are baked uncovered, but i could be wrong.

also, i do not know what egg coffee tastes like because when i was little i did not drink coffee.
but i want to learn how to make it.
supposedly putting an egg in with the coffee takes out the bitterness of the coffee or something.

if i ever get a real kitchen i think i will learn how to make lefse. i've heard it's difficult to make.

http://www.ruralroutebookstore.com/churchlife.htm

http://www.tiegens.com/lena.htm

right now i am cooking a 12 pound goose. i have zero clue what i am doing.
it's not even fully unthawed. i'm just going to bake it for a million hours until it's done.
i've never had goose before so i guess this is another experiment for me.

so i guess i will be eating goose and cake for the next week.
i should probably put 1/2 of it all in the freezer.

today has been a really blah day.
i just couldn't get motivated to do much.
just a little burnt out from all the socialness yesterday.

jason is coming over in a sec and then we are going to watch some more dr. who.

11:15am

i have so much to do today.
but i just sort of feel out of sorts a bit.
not in a big way, just kind fo a vague underlying sort of way.
still trying to take in all of yesterday but at the same time i really sick of thinking about it at all.
i can see now why i put my dad on such a pedestal, because #1 it's natural to put one's parents on a pedestal, but when you have a dad like my dad who looked exactly like jesus, and has hordes of adoring fans who also think he looks and acts and IS jesus (in many respects) and this is drilled into your head on a weekly basis or more (every sunday at least) for all of your childhood and most of your life....
well, it's easy to see why it's hard for me to see my dad as a flawed person who is anything less than christ like.
and so, coming back from all that...communal energy/MASS THOUGHTFORM...and remembering how it was to be in the midst of that all of the time.
i can understand why i feel the way i do about my dad and i shouldn't beat myself up about it.
it's hard to undo it. and then mix that in with his massively social kind gregarious loving exterior but still his other side which makes you never able to really get close to him....it just is confusing.
i am so glad that my dad has had such a positive effect on people's lives and that they adore him so much.
he deserves it in more ways than one.
but it is still hard for me to listen to person after person after person after person going on and on and on about what a loving giving person he is and how he haa always been there for them and consoled them and baptised them and married them and counseled them and confirmed them...but he hasn't really been there for me a ton.
it's like a weird mixed message that screws with my head.
and in the end, i feel like one of his legions of adoring fans who wants his love and approval so much but never can really ever fully have it. he's always right within reach, but not really.
but i just have to have compassion for myself for feeling these hurt feelings because i think it's only natural i should feel this way. he is my dad after all, and the energy i was around and the mixed messages are confusing, especially as a child.
i think it's a tiny bit of what children of celebrities must go through a bit.
your dad is not really your dad...he is kind of everyone's dad.
and everyone seems to get a piece of him except me.
and everyone loves you not because you are YOU, but because HE is your DAD.
and the pieces i get of him are kind of basking in his afterglow and being worshipped as a kind of subgoddess below him.
it's all very very weird.

and as i stood in the church's kitchen after it was all said and done and the women were putting all the food in containers (and why is it always still the women who do this? never the men? EVER.)
i realized that this would be the last time i would be in a familiar church's kitchen as a "special person".
whatever church my dad was minister at i also felt the sense of entitlement that goes along with being a minister's daughter. i can go into his office and look through his things, i can go behind the altar and check stuff out,
i can go into the kitchen and talk to all the women in there and i know i am always welcome and that they will delight in my presence, i can play the organ or piano when no one is around. i just feel like churches are my second home, really. and i guess, they are. i often went to many weddings, funerals, baptisms of people i did not know simply because i was at my dad's work and i would come with so my parents wouldn't have to get a babysitter.
so church's have always been my second home to play in and explore and do whatever i like in them and it's just been a fact and no one ever questions it. it's just the way it is. churches are my second home. (and i realize they are for a lot of people who go to church every sundaybut it's different when you are the minister's kid, it just is) just like no one would question a president's child for playing under the desk in the whitehouse.
for the child it's just another desk. and you know it's a special desk and that you are somehow priviledged, but you don't know any other way because it's just always been that way and that is how people treat you always and that is just the reality of it.

so it was weird, at the end of the evening as i looked at the women in the kitchen and said "i guess i am not a minister's daughter anymore?"
and trying to take in that last ounce of feeling like someone special in a church....not realizing until then that up until that moment i had always taken that part for granted and now i had to let it go....even in the way i had nonchalantly walked into the kitchen as if it were partly my kitchen and knowing full well that the women in there would be delighted to see me. i know that sounds incredibly arrogant and narcissistic, but it's just the reality of the situation. there is no denying it. it's just the way it is and there's no sense in denying the phenomena. i'm not trying to brag, i'm just trying to see the situation for what it really is.

and the women said "oh no, you will always be a minister's daughter! and they went on to say that doctor's who retire still get called doctor, etc. once a doctor always a doctor. or once a general always a general"

and they are right. but in many respects i now have another thing i must let go of and redefine myself in this area, too. i didn't realize how much of my identity was wrapped up in this. i think i wrapped myself in it because 1. that's the fact of it, i am a minister's daughter...and all that goes along with that 2. it probably played a more important role in my life than it would , maybe be for other minister's children because "i took what i could get" FROM my dad since he wasn't all there for me. and if i couldn't have my dad, per se, then i could have my dad's "after effects" for lack of a better term.
or maybe all minister's children feel this way. i don't know.

and it's effect was amplified since we always lived in very small towns (like population only a few hundred or so). and so it was not like i lived in a town where there were a bunch of ministers and the church i went to was just another church in a big city. the church i went to was THEE church and my dad was always THEE minister. and everyone knew who i was (everyone knows who everyone is in a small town). so when you are a kid, this is just your UNIVERSE. you don't know anything else yet.

i'm sure it's this way for the children of any profession. like children who have dad's who are policemen or firemen or politicians or presidents of companies and so forth. you can't help but get some of your identity wrapped up in their identity. they are, after all, your parents and i 1/2 come from him, physically...emotionally...

so it was just weird to realize this to the extent that i realized it yesterday.
and then to realize it's over and that i have to let go of that and redefine myself just as my dad now has to let go and redefine himself.

and it will be nice to finally be able to spend a xmas with my dad because i never really got to BE WITH my dad on xmas because he had so many services and was so busy and stressed out.
and i don't know how many people realize this.

and i found myself getting kind of irked at people towards the end and feeling competitive towards them for my dad's future attention. as they all would come up to me and say "we love your dad , you are so lucky he is your dad, at least he will stay in our town and we will still have him"
and towards the end of the evening i started thinking and feeling, well, NO! you've had him all my life, now it's MY time to have him. so lay off because now *I* get my dad for the 1st time ever. so screw off.
and i didn't say this but i felt it towards the end a bit.

and one woman even kind of admonished me for "not continuing the olson tradition"...and at 1st i thought she meant that i had not become a minister in his path (and i would disagree with that, kind fo feel i am a minister, in a way..well, actually i AM an ordained minister of ULC.org :)
and then i realized that she meant i had not had children yet.
and i thought what NERVE!
for one thing, i could be infertile, or i could have had 5 miscarriages by now...
and just...the assuming nature of that it was my duty to make sure some of my dad continued on because my dad is so cool...just AUGH. you know?

and then maybe that same person or a different person told jason to "keep me in line" (with a smile as if this is a funny joke..but not really). and i'm like HELLO? i do NOT need a boyfriend to "keep me in line".
but these people are coming from another generation, i understand that. but still. just augh!

and then at the end, my dad, absolutely understandably, just shut off and could take no more and i could see how exhausted he was and he just went home. i totally understand it. of course he was beyond exhausted.
he had had 2 services that day since 8am, and then the ceremony and everyone from his entire past coming to him and really it would be overwhelming for anyone and then the actual realization that this is the END of this part of his life. i mean, it's intense.
but i was filled with this sense of longing for my dad as he just gave me a hug goodbye and went home.

i wanted some time with him alone. i wanted to be THAT kind of special.
i didn't want to be just another person he hugged and said goodbye to. and i know i am NOT.
but at the same time i felt that i was. and i really hate how insecure i am about that.
and i feel like such a dork for feeling this way.
i don't like to feel "needy". i do feel "needy".
i don't want to feel like just another needy member of the congregation longing for my dad's special attention.
another adoring fan.

of course, logically, i know i am more than that. but it still was a feeling inside of me that irked me it was there.
and is still there. and maybe it will always be there and it's just something i will always have to "put up" with.

i don't know.
but it was difficult to not get sucked into the whole "energy" of that because it was just so MUCH.
but it was interesting to realize that on another level and see that in me in a new way.
and i know i have made progress just in the fact that i can SEE it now and actually decipher it and inspect it, whereas before i did not even know what was "happening to me" and why i felt the way i did about my dad.

so it was good to see that.
and i will work hard to let go of it, yet still cherish it.
and redefine myself, as i am always doing, but doing especially now.

and this whole turning 40 business. and it's interesting that 40 is a special number that comes up so much, especially in the bible. and i want to know more of WHY 40 is such a special number.
but it really is.

40 is a really pivotal number.

and i'm happy to report that each day that brings me closer to 'being 40" is a day i am closer to being EXCITED about it rather than dreading it and fearing it.

there is something to the saying "life begins at 40"

but then i realize i also felt this exact same way when i turned 30, and i though "the 30's will finally be the years where i know who i am and do not take any bullshit from anyone. and i will be this really strong woman"
and i was that, in many ways.
but in many ways the 30's sucked even more than the 20's.
and were even more intense and confusing.
each decade just brings the intensity and confusion to a new level.

so...i guess i'll see.
i wonder where i will be and what i will be doing and feeling when i am at the age my dad is at now?
i wonder if i will even be alive!

or if some catostrophic event will happen at 2012, the end of the mayan calendar?

the next 6 years are going to be very interesting, for sure.

oh and 4 more things to say about disapointments in how i think my dad feels about me...

1. i asked him if he would will to me his robes and stuff.
and he seemed really against that idea and said "they're holy!"
and i said "i know!" (but at the same time realizing this goes against a lot of his preaching against materialism)
and i feel pretty bad that my dad does not think i am worthy, or something, of having his robes. that i am not "holy" enough to have them in my possession.
and he said maybe he would sell them or something, and i'm like "i will buy them!"
but my dad just seemed dead set against me ever having his robes, and that really hurt my feelings.

2. my dad seemed even neverous about me having the cake.
he was all "what are you really going to do with that cake??"
and i said "i'm going to EAT it dad! what do you THINK i would do with it?"
as if i am going to put on some sort of cake sex show with a cake with a photo of my dad on it.
i mean my GOD, how fucked up would that make me?
it makes me sad to think i would defile his image in that way.
or whatever he was thinking.

3. everyone who met me thinks i am still doing music.
so this is, obviously, what my dad tells them i am doing with my life.
and i AM going to make new music this winter, but i haven't made any music in over 9 years or more...
so...it's obvious he is embarrassed at my accomplishments this almost last decade. i mean i knew that already that he is.
but it just kind of hit home for me even more every time a person would come up to me and ask me how my music is going wich was A LOT of people that my dad is embarrassed with my accomplishments.

4. and just as a side note and this is not a really big deal...but when he introduced me to the entire congregation during his retirement ceremony and made me stand up and wave to everyone...he said "and this is my daugher and she is 10!"

now i know that was just a joke and i should not take it as any big deal. and it's NOT a big deal.
but all these little things, when you are feeling insecure already, kind of add up.
i know he meant it actually as some sort of compliment that i look young for my age....but when you are a woman of 39 grappling with the fact that you are going to be 40 in a few months...and you are coming to terms with it and want to celebrate it and not fear it...
being introduced to an entire congregation as being 10 years old is not the most empowering feeling and makes me feel that i am not really being taken seriously.

maybe i am being overly sensitive, and i probably am.

but i just wanted to write all of this stuff down so i could examine it and see it in words.

now please don't get me wrong, the whole experience was 97% positive.
i am only talking about the 3% that was not to get it out of me.
so it sounds as if i had a terrible experience. and it was not terrible.
it was very fun and joyful and happy...
but that 3% that was not was kind of bubbling around in me making me feel uneasy and so i had t get it out and inspect it.

because it's mystifying when you have just come from a positive experience but are still left with this unidentifiable feeling of uneasiness and slight confusion/depression/anger/sadness/meloncholy.

i also fully realize that this is just MY view of things and may not be exactly the way my dad actually really thinks or feels about me.
still, these are the conclusions i have come up with and are my feelings about these conclusions. whether or not these conclusions are based in pure fact. i just don't know.
all i can go by, in a way, is how i feel. and this is how i feel.

it's just all a lot to think about. and another layer of myself and my past i am unravelling and inspecting and realizing how these things have effected me and made me who i am today, for better or worse.
and nearing 40 and see my dad retire and get older...it is a time so a lot of introspection and redefining and growing and evolving.

and i have been going through all my past history of my life lately and getting rid of the old to make room for the new. throwing away old letters and old photos and such.
i'm just really scrubbing everything clean at every level of myself and it's very difficult but it's also very exciting and interesting to me.

life is just so very complex and there are so many layers to everything.

anyway, my dad is such an intense person. and i AM very lucky to have him as my father.
i would not trade it in for anything. he is the only father for me and i love him with all my heart.
he is an incredible human being who has really touched a lot of people's lives.
and he never stops growing or evolving either.
and i am lucky to have him as an example in my life for the good things he is and also for his flaws.

+++

Horoscope for Aries (November 21 2005)

Somewhere in the back of your mind, a little voice is telling you to step into the limelight. It's time to show what you are made of, to challenge whoever gets in your way and to take what's rightfully yours. You will make progress today.

and

Your emotional sensors
This is a two-day period when personal and subjective considerations will override everything else, but it need not be difficult. First of all, you feel a great need to belong and to relate to your friends or loved ones. This need turns on your emotional sensors and makes you very sensitive to the feelings and moods of the people around you, because you want to fall in with their rhythms and become sympathetic with them. This is the unconscious sign of relating to a group. Thus you are emotionally right there whenever someone needs your sympathy, warmth and understanding. You are very concerned about yourself, which is fine, but don't distort this into a state of mind in which you cannot see anybody else's point of view. Objectivity, especially in dealing with others, may be difficult to come by now.

and

No matter that you had the whole weekend; today you want to extend your playtime. You are not ready to acknowledge that the party is over, for it feels as it's just beginning. But as strong as your desires may be, you have too many responsibilities to ignore. Put all your attention on what must be done so you have time left over for relaxation.