Gold star links
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Back story: I am the queen of affirmation. Any activity that involves charts and stickers is my idea of a good time. Thus I bring you “gold star links” – bits and baubles from around the internet that caught my attention this week.
Tranquility du Jour suggests setting fall intentions and asks some thought provoking questions.
The whole concept of gluten-free is still a bit of a mystery to me, but these noodles look amazing.
In the “aw” category for the week – Snippet & Ink posted photographs of Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward throughout their marriage. He’s handsome, she’s glamorous, and they are so clearly in love.
What a thoughtful (and beautiful) gift.
Oh Joy! shares my love of dahlias.
This wedding has some seriously lovely details. My favorite? Photographs of the couple backed with paper doilies. Adorable.
And the above image is my Tumblr pick of the week via the lovely Fallon Elizabeth.
xx/ellen louise
Lost generation
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If you haven’t, please allow me to summarize. If you are currently in your twenties there is a 55% chance that you are unemployed. The fact that you are currently unemployed is likely to impact your future earning potential. When the economy does recover, you should expect to compete with recent college graduates for entry level jobs. You will never be as successful as your parents. You are part of a lost generation.
Depressed yet?
By way of a rebuttal, I would like to offer the following.
1) I choose to think better of potential employers. There is a significant maturity gap between recent college grads and those of us who have been out a few years. Not to mention the fact that working at Starbucks or Anthropologie can give you great experience in customer service and (for many college grads) management. I would also like to point out that many of the people I know who haven’t been able to find full-time employment in their chosen field are volunteering or interning at organizations they are interested in working for. And I have to believe that will count for something. Eventually.
2) It’s time to redefine success. Many of our parents are in their 50s and 60s. And while I hesitate to suggest that life was any less complicated back then, I think there was a much clearer expectation of what you were supposed to be doing at our age. When you are in your twenties you were supposed to get a full time job and get married. Then you were supposed to buy a house and start a family. You were supposed to do all these things because it meant you were successful.
Begin again
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I love to start new blogs. I’ve been messing around on the internet for the past two years starting new blogs. Dieting blogs, cooking blogs, lifestyle blogs. For the record, I also have an affinity for new journals. I recently visited my parents and my mother handed me a box with at least 15 blank journals. Sigh. I can’t help it. I just love the idea of writing. The idea of having something to say every single day.
Realistically I know that isn’t the case. Enter Tumblr. Blogging for the faint-hearted. I’ve been curating a Tumblr page for pretty consistently for about six months now. Granted it takes about two seconds. And most of my posts are re-posts. But I digress.
My point with all of this is that if I ever want to write anything other than grants (although I do love writing grants) I better start soon. Because when I reread my old stuff I realize some of it is really good. But it is good because I was writing all the time. Because I went from a creative nonfiction class (ah, college) into full-time blogger mode. Since then I’ve been busy falling in love, getting a promotion, and generally living life as an adult professional. Someone who has abandoned their dreams (ah, melodrama).
So this is the first entry to say I’m back. I hope. And I promise not to morph into one of those bloggers that shares every single detail of their personal life and talks about babies a lot. Because really, who cares? My motto is, if you don’t have something sassy to say don’t say anything at all. Or post a picture of something pretty.
xx/ellen louise
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