I was FINALLY under budget this week for groceries. This was even with a few luxury foods, like bacon. (Mmmmm, bacon.)
Of course, with how OVERbudget I was last week, I just might -- might -- even out. I really hate skimping when it comes to good food. And, unlike my childhood years, cooking with the good stuff is expensive. One of our splurges used to be Kraft mac'n'cheese; now homemade mac'n'cheese is the bigwig. Kraft? Three for a dollar.
I'm beginning to rejuvenate my interest in cooking after a month-or-so-long reluctance. Sunday night I experimented with making pita -- the oven wasn't quite hot enough to make them puff-pocketed, but they're still delicious, and go wonderfully with the hummus recipe that I'm always on a quest to perfect. This weekend's project is Welsh clay-pot loaves. I love the idea of bread baked in a flowerpot. The recipe in the book wants chives, parsley, and sage, but I think I'm going with rosemary instead. I've been hungering for a rosemary garlic bread.
Yesterday something interesting happened. I woke up with a bad case of the Mondays, felt inexplicably stressed, anxious, doubtful and depressed, and went to work with a dread of the day...but the foul cloud dissipated as I went about my working tasks.
It's been a long time since going to work made me feel better. And it wasn't like it was a breeze-along day; it was insane. But I enjoyed myself. And was thankful.
And even the snow has morphed from midwinter snows to early spring snows. The difference is palpable. Come on, sunshine!!
Tuesday, February 27, 2007
Saturday, February 24, 2007
living with a schizophrenic central heater
My house is old. It doesn't take much to figure that out. My tub is cast iron, claw foot, and enamelled (I LOVE it. My feet when I shower are never cold); the bathroom sink is also cast iron, and the enamel is wearing off in blue streaks near the drain. Valance windows are painted shut over the doors. There's a badly patched hole in my living room wall where a stove used to connect to the chimney. Half of my walls curve up into the ceiling, instead of having sharply delineated corners. It used to be a one-family home.
So it has a central heating system, which no one has converted for the individual apartments. And since the landlord does not live on the premises, the thermostat lives in...the basement. The raw, dirt-piled, half-bricked, bare, creepy uninsulated Michigan basement.
This is a stupid place for a thermostat. Because it's always cold in the basement. So when the thermostat is set to, say, sixty-four, the central heat attempts to heat the basement to sixty-four. The result? I'm tearing off my clothes in my upstairs insulated apartment and sweating like I've just run a marathon because the temperature hits eighty-five or more. And since the basement doesn't have any heat vents opening into it, it never hits sixty-four in the basement. So the fan keeps running, and running, and running. Forty-five minutes at a stretch.
And when I use the stove, or particularly the oven, I pretty much want to get it over with and die of heatstroke.
See, I grew up in a heat-conserving home. We kept the central temperature at sixty-eight in the day; fifty-six at night. So I'm used to sleeping under ten blankets and wriggling into my socks, slippers and robe under the covers before I actually get up because the cold makes the tip of my nose ache and I DON'T want to expose my whole body to instant hypothermia. Now I can sleep under a sheet. And me no likey.
So at the beginning of the winter I sealed off the register in my bedroom with some handy-dandy adhesive foil my landlord gave me. That keeps the bedroom at a fairly reasonable temperature. But the living room has two vents, and last night with the heat from the oven for baking pizzas and all the living room lights on, Meg and Jess and I were enjoying a pleasant summer vacation in the middle of the Sahara.
It continued through the night, so that when I got up this morning and opened my bedroom door I walked into a wall of heat and had to kick off my slippers. I love wearing slippers. So then I got mad and snapped the kitchen vent shut and plunked down cross-legged in the living room in front of the register blasting me with heat from the bowels of hell and sealed it with the foil.
I did all this before even drinking my coffee.
Now the house is beginning to feel deliciously chillier. My toes are cold and in an hour I might even need a sweatshirt.
Of course the inverse of this situation is that when the weather warms up and the basement is at sixty-four, the fan will never kick on. So spring and fall are very very cold indoor seasons at my house.
Ah, the charms. I love it though. There's something delightful in having to outwit and trick your own house at every turn. You have to argue with it. You have to win its respect. It's like a step beyond Man vs. Nature. It's Man vs. House. And, if you have the occasional control-freak tendencies, and you can't tell your neighbors when to turn off their TVs or when not to stomp down the stairs, or you can't find them to tell them to put your patio chair back on the porch, or you have to bite your tongue instead of knocking on their doors and chewing them out for taking up too much parking space in the driveway again, it's a great outlet for some frustration.
So it has a central heating system, which no one has converted for the individual apartments. And since the landlord does not live on the premises, the thermostat lives in...the basement. The raw, dirt-piled, half-bricked, bare, creepy uninsulated Michigan basement.
This is a stupid place for a thermostat. Because it's always cold in the basement. So when the thermostat is set to, say, sixty-four, the central heat attempts to heat the basement to sixty-four. The result? I'm tearing off my clothes in my upstairs insulated apartment and sweating like I've just run a marathon because the temperature hits eighty-five or more. And since the basement doesn't have any heat vents opening into it, it never hits sixty-four in the basement. So the fan keeps running, and running, and running. Forty-five minutes at a stretch.
And when I use the stove, or particularly the oven, I pretty much want to get it over with and die of heatstroke.
See, I grew up in a heat-conserving home. We kept the central temperature at sixty-eight in the day; fifty-six at night. So I'm used to sleeping under ten blankets and wriggling into my socks, slippers and robe under the covers before I actually get up because the cold makes the tip of my nose ache and I DON'T want to expose my whole body to instant hypothermia. Now I can sleep under a sheet. And me no likey.
So at the beginning of the winter I sealed off the register in my bedroom with some handy-dandy adhesive foil my landlord gave me. That keeps the bedroom at a fairly reasonable temperature. But the living room has two vents, and last night with the heat from the oven for baking pizzas and all the living room lights on, Meg and Jess and I were enjoying a pleasant summer vacation in the middle of the Sahara.
It continued through the night, so that when I got up this morning and opened my bedroom door I walked into a wall of heat and had to kick off my slippers. I love wearing slippers. So then I got mad and snapped the kitchen vent shut and plunked down cross-legged in the living room in front of the register blasting me with heat from the bowels of hell and sealed it with the foil.
I did all this before even drinking my coffee.
Now the house is beginning to feel deliciously chillier. My toes are cold and in an hour I might even need a sweatshirt.
Of course the inverse of this situation is that when the weather warms up and the basement is at sixty-four, the fan will never kick on. So spring and fall are very very cold indoor seasons at my house.
Ah, the charms. I love it though. There's something delightful in having to outwit and trick your own house at every turn. You have to argue with it. You have to win its respect. It's like a step beyond Man vs. Nature. It's Man vs. House. And, if you have the occasional control-freak tendencies, and you can't tell your neighbors when to turn off their TVs or when not to stomp down the stairs, or you can't find them to tell them to put your patio chair back on the porch, or you have to bite your tongue instead of knocking on their doors and chewing them out for taking up too much parking space in the driveway again, it's a great outlet for some frustration.
Wednesday, February 21, 2007
i will awaken the dawn
[Stretch, yawn, grunt] I did it.
It wasn't as hard as I'd thought it would be. Of course when you're trying to get to sleep early, you never can -- all sorts of weird noises were happening last night -- dogs barking, Simon knocking things around in the kitchen, the neighbors coming and going, water dripping from the crappy gutter onto the roof outside my window, something scrabbling in the wall next to my bed -- so I finally put in earplugs, and when the alarm went off I was having an unpleasant dream, so it was actually a relief to open my eyes, although I felt my body going unnnnnghh, you want me to do WHAT?
But here I sit, it's nearly seven, I've been moving around for nearly two hours, and it's been marvelous. I had time to sit down and read my Bible and pray (I'm in Luke right now, one of my favorite Gospels, and I love Jesus' heart for women), put away last night's air-dried dishes, write a letter to my sister, make a grocery list, and savor my coffee.
Now I'm going to go play with picture frames. I have to drill holes in a couple of them.
It wasn't as hard as I'd thought it would be. Of course when you're trying to get to sleep early, you never can -- all sorts of weird noises were happening last night -- dogs barking, Simon knocking things around in the kitchen, the neighbors coming and going, water dripping from the crappy gutter onto the roof outside my window, something scrabbling in the wall next to my bed -- so I finally put in earplugs, and when the alarm went off I was having an unpleasant dream, so it was actually a relief to open my eyes, although I felt my body going unnnnnghh, you want me to do WHAT?
But here I sit, it's nearly seven, I've been moving around for nearly two hours, and it's been marvelous. I had time to sit down and read my Bible and pray (I'm in Luke right now, one of my favorite Gospels, and I love Jesus' heart for women), put away last night's air-dried dishes, write a letter to my sister, make a grocery list, and savor my coffee.
Now I'm going to go play with picture frames. I have to drill holes in a couple of them.
Tuesday, February 20, 2007
a season of discipline
My Lenten vows:
1.) Get up every weekday morning at five o'clock.
2.) Spend NO money on anything that does not directly relate to food, bills, or basic necessities. This means I won't be buying, renting, or going to see movies; buying books of any kind; purchasing home improvement gadgets, knick-knacks, or antiques; paying for new music. (That last one is going to hurt -- well, they're all going to hurt, but music is on deck for what I start buying next.) I'm trying to include eating out, although that directly relates to food; I want to exercise more hospitality in having people over to eat fabulous food in my homey apartment.
I'm going to attempt to observe the Lenten season in the no-meat-on-Friday deal as well, which will be an excellent opportunity to prepare some of the mouth-watering fish dishes I've been eyeing out in my various cookbooks but have been too cowardly to attempt.
So I went to the store today and bought a lot of picture frames (hey, people drink a lot on Fat Tuesday, right?) to settle down with. I want a Dali Wall in my bedroom. And that'll be it for awhile.
I guess if I really wanted to hurt myself, I'd start hanging out a lot at Borders and Barnes & Noble; but I'm not THAT ascetic (or that disciplined). I'll just avoid those places like the plague and pretend they never existed, and all of my cookbooks appeared ex nihilo in the kitchen.
1.) Get up every weekday morning at five o'clock.
2.) Spend NO money on anything that does not directly relate to food, bills, or basic necessities. This means I won't be buying, renting, or going to see movies; buying books of any kind; purchasing home improvement gadgets, knick-knacks, or antiques; paying for new music. (That last one is going to hurt -- well, they're all going to hurt, but music is on deck for what I start buying next.) I'm trying to include eating out, although that directly relates to food; I want to exercise more hospitality in having people over to eat fabulous food in my homey apartment.
I'm going to attempt to observe the Lenten season in the no-meat-on-Friday deal as well, which will be an excellent opportunity to prepare some of the mouth-watering fish dishes I've been eyeing out in my various cookbooks but have been too cowardly to attempt.
So I went to the store today and bought a lot of picture frames (hey, people drink a lot on Fat Tuesday, right?) to settle down with. I want a Dali Wall in my bedroom. And that'll be it for awhile.
I guess if I really wanted to hurt myself, I'd start hanging out a lot at Borders and Barnes & Noble; but I'm not THAT ascetic (or that disciplined). I'll just avoid those places like the plague and pretend they never existed, and all of my cookbooks appeared ex nihilo in the kitchen.
Monday, February 19, 2007
picture perfect...and young and restless
No, no, I'm not picture perfect.
But my apartment is. Or nearly so.
I spent all weekend working on the Picture Wall. I've exhausted my supply of attractive antique postcards and cute greeting cards, so on Saturday when out with Meg and Phillip I bought two itsy-bitsy calendars at a remarkable discount, one full of black-and-whites of New York from the 30s/40s, and one full of Van Goghs. I used the black-and-whites to finish the Picture Wall...well, almost finish; I need to hang about three more, but my drill battery died...and hung the Van Goghs in the hallway around a larger Van Gogh already there. It's not like anyone really looks at pictures in the hall -- there's no "step back and appreciate" space -- but you can see it at angles from the living room and entryway, and the effect is nice.
But what is this restlessness? I find it creeps into me every six months or so. There's this inexplicable desire for something new and different, something more, and it's not diminishing with time, this time around. Maybe it's the kid in me rebelling at the laid-out steadfastness of daily routine, when for the first twenty-two years of my life I had new classes every year...or, in college, every semester. And then for the two years after that there was a job change roughly every nine months. And now things are pretty straightforward. I have a nine-to-five. I'm here for awhile. Every week is basically the same.
So I go insane on the weekends with projects at home. I obsess about every little detail in my living space. I even worked up the energy to clean for the first time in forever -- the basics, scrubbing, sweeping, vacuuming, mopping -- but now that that's done I'll probably go all out and start washing the walls, which hasn't been done since I moved in almost two years ago. When I go home tonight I plan to rearrange the wall opposite the Picture Wall to get a little more feng shui out of it.
It's not that I want to go back to school. I don't. I enjoy the routine, I love my bosses, I'm more or less satisfied with my work. But there's something missing.
Of course there is, you might say. It's what you're always clamoring about. You're single.
Well, yes. There's always that. But that doesn't pang quite so badly lately, or else I'm just ignoring it. I had a great date on Friday night, so the awful loneliness eased for a few hours in fun and conversation. And meantime I'm regaining my center in myself.
But something else is missing. My best guess is that I'm bottling up my writing. It's always so easy for me to say, I'm going to do this; but when the "this" is as monumental as overcoming my own fears of rejection and vast inertia toward laziness to send things out for publication, I lag at following through. And I've been working out a lot of stuff, and fixating on my messy apartment, and that's been absorbing my attention.
The good thing is that my Lenten vow is to get up every weekday morning at five. (I know Lenten vows usually involve giving something up -- and I'm giving up later hours and later sleep, and necessarily some social time during the weekdays -- but what I really want to build is discipline, which also ties into the Lenten season and the preparation to observe the passion and the resurrection of Christ who was always disciplined in submission to the Father.) I used to get up absurdly early in high school, and I loved it -- something about sitting in a robe sipping coffee and journalling, reading the Bible, or writing while the earth blinks and begins to open its eyes is calming and invigorating simulataneously. So I'll begin to see some changes in my morning routine, and some time before the wear of the day during which to channel my energy into the craft; and maybe thereby an ease some of that restlessness.
I also need to cultivate a greater involvement in church. I'm hungering for some kind of ministry. I want to do something, not just think about it, or talk about it, or write about it. Fortunately I saw a few opportunities in the church bulletin, so I'm tackling that this week.
Meanwhile I'm making endless lists of things I want to accomplish at home, and trying to make myself file all the papers running loose about the office like a flock of madcap sheep. I hate filing. But it needs to be done, and so I have to do it.
But my apartment is. Or nearly so.
I spent all weekend working on the Picture Wall. I've exhausted my supply of attractive antique postcards and cute greeting cards, so on Saturday when out with Meg and Phillip I bought two itsy-bitsy calendars at a remarkable discount, one full of black-and-whites of New York from the 30s/40s, and one full of Van Goghs. I used the black-and-whites to finish the Picture Wall...well, almost finish; I need to hang about three more, but my drill battery died...and hung the Van Goghs in the hallway around a larger Van Gogh already there. It's not like anyone really looks at pictures in the hall -- there's no "step back and appreciate" space -- but you can see it at angles from the living room and entryway, and the effect is nice.
But what is this restlessness? I find it creeps into me every six months or so. There's this inexplicable desire for something new and different, something more, and it's not diminishing with time, this time around. Maybe it's the kid in me rebelling at the laid-out steadfastness of daily routine, when for the first twenty-two years of my life I had new classes every year...or, in college, every semester. And then for the two years after that there was a job change roughly every nine months. And now things are pretty straightforward. I have a nine-to-five. I'm here for awhile. Every week is basically the same.
So I go insane on the weekends with projects at home. I obsess about every little detail in my living space. I even worked up the energy to clean for the first time in forever -- the basics, scrubbing, sweeping, vacuuming, mopping -- but now that that's done I'll probably go all out and start washing the walls, which hasn't been done since I moved in almost two years ago. When I go home tonight I plan to rearrange the wall opposite the Picture Wall to get a little more feng shui out of it.
It's not that I want to go back to school. I don't. I enjoy the routine, I love my bosses, I'm more or less satisfied with my work. But there's something missing.
Of course there is, you might say. It's what you're always clamoring about. You're single.
Well, yes. There's always that. But that doesn't pang quite so badly lately, or else I'm just ignoring it. I had a great date on Friday night, so the awful loneliness eased for a few hours in fun and conversation. And meantime I'm regaining my center in myself.
But something else is missing. My best guess is that I'm bottling up my writing. It's always so easy for me to say, I'm going to do this; but when the "this" is as monumental as overcoming my own fears of rejection and vast inertia toward laziness to send things out for publication, I lag at following through. And I've been working out a lot of stuff, and fixating on my messy apartment, and that's been absorbing my attention.
The good thing is that my Lenten vow is to get up every weekday morning at five. (I know Lenten vows usually involve giving something up -- and I'm giving up later hours and later sleep, and necessarily some social time during the weekdays -- but what I really want to build is discipline, which also ties into the Lenten season and the preparation to observe the passion and the resurrection of Christ who was always disciplined in submission to the Father.) I used to get up absurdly early in high school, and I loved it -- something about sitting in a robe sipping coffee and journalling, reading the Bible, or writing while the earth blinks and begins to open its eyes is calming and invigorating simulataneously. So I'll begin to see some changes in my morning routine, and some time before the wear of the day during which to channel my energy into the craft; and maybe thereby an ease some of that restlessness.
I also need to cultivate a greater involvement in church. I'm hungering for some kind of ministry. I want to do something, not just think about it, or talk about it, or write about it. Fortunately I saw a few opportunities in the church bulletin, so I'm tackling that this week.
Meanwhile I'm making endless lists of things I want to accomplish at home, and trying to make myself file all the papers running loose about the office like a flock of madcap sheep. I hate filing. But it needs to be done, and so I have to do it.
Wednesday, February 14, 2007
i deserve flowers
So Valentine's Day started out wonderfully -- I had the morning off work because of the roads, so I spent it on home improvement in the kitchen. I purchased a pot rack the other week to hang over the stove (and got it half off because it was a display -- which still seems like an astronomical discount, but I wasn't about to complain; quite the opposite: I danced in the car all the way home), and as the darn thing is heavy it's currently sitting on the floor. But since it will be hung soon, this morning I took down the pots and pans that have been hanging on one wall, spackled all the holes (badly, but it was my first try, so what the hey), and washed and screwed in a couple more old crates to use for shelves. The two form a rough "L" shape on the wall, and are now sporting my extra cookbooks, an assortment of tea tins, my recipe box, teapot, loveliest mug, and new ceramic nesting bowls (red, of course). The effect is neat, and I'm so glad to get some extra storage space in my storage-space-challenged kitchen.
Plus using my drill is somehow relaxing, comforting -- like talking while working with an old friend.
The day is beautifully sunny, so I drove in to work with a light heart and light work load.
The only canker in the hedge was when the florist next door brought in an enormous flower arrangement for my boss's wife -- bursting with gorgeous roses of all different colors. Because I'm just as happy to spend the evening at home sipping a glass of White Zin, working in the end pieces of yarn in my knitted blanket, and talking on the phone with Leigh Ann while watching Bones (that's a pretty much perfect evening), but I really, really love roses.
I felt an unexpected wave of blueness surging toward me. And thought, Nope. I'm not going to let it get me. This holiday is ridiculous enough.
And put on my coat, walked next door, and ordered a half-dozen pink and yellow rose arrangement for myself.
They're going to look so pretty when I get home tonight. And (hopefully!) smell delicious.
Then I gave the twelve-year-old kid who lives on the other side of the office a dollar for shoveling snow so he could get his girlfriend of three years a flower. As I told him, "Dude, you've been dating longer than I have!"
But it was totally cute. He's one of those freckled, cowlicked, open-faced, polite, eager to help, do-work-for-money kinds of all-American kids. He looks like he should own some scruffy, rascally dog that follows him everywhere; but he's usually by himself, grinning and earning change to buy things for his mother, who just had a baby. He could easily get himself in trouble, I think, but he's simultaneously delightful.
Yay for flowers.
Plus using my drill is somehow relaxing, comforting -- like talking while working with an old friend.
The day is beautifully sunny, so I drove in to work with a light heart and light work load.
The only canker in the hedge was when the florist next door brought in an enormous flower arrangement for my boss's wife -- bursting with gorgeous roses of all different colors. Because I'm just as happy to spend the evening at home sipping a glass of White Zin, working in the end pieces of yarn in my knitted blanket, and talking on the phone with Leigh Ann while watching Bones (that's a pretty much perfect evening), but I really, really love roses.
I felt an unexpected wave of blueness surging toward me. And thought, Nope. I'm not going to let it get me. This holiday is ridiculous enough.
And put on my coat, walked next door, and ordered a half-dozen pink and yellow rose arrangement for myself.
They're going to look so pretty when I get home tonight. And (hopefully!) smell delicious.
Then I gave the twelve-year-old kid who lives on the other side of the office a dollar for shoveling snow so he could get his girlfriend of three years a flower. As I told him, "Dude, you've been dating longer than I have!"
But it was totally cute. He's one of those freckled, cowlicked, open-faced, polite, eager to help, do-work-for-money kinds of all-American kids. He looks like he should own some scruffy, rascally dog that follows him everywhere; but he's usually by himself, grinning and earning change to buy things for his mother, who just had a baby. He could easily get himself in trouble, I think, but he's simultaneously delightful.
Yay for flowers.
Tuesday, February 13, 2007
winter wist
You know what I miss about grade school? Snow days.
Once upon a time the promise of overnight snow showers was like the promise of Christmas: I went to bed with visions of snowmen and mugs of hot chocolate dancing in my head, hoping, just hoping, that when I awoke there would be seven feet of snow on the ground and I’d have to dig tunnels from my doorway just to play outside, and school would blow away on the frozen wind like a shattered icicle.
Of course, my dream of seven or twelve or fifteen feet of snow never came to pass; but still, a good foot or so would get you what you needed: that blessed, unexpected day off, when the school board decided that everyone should play hooky.
And now? I know that the only way I’ll be able to get my own snow day is if there really are seven feet of snow on the ground. I listen to the overnight forecast with great hopes of blizzards, even now, but every morning a few more inches only means an extra twenty minutes of struggle to scrape off and dig out the car, and maneuver it precariously down my drifted driveway before I brave the badly plowed roads to work.
And I need more rest now than I did when I was seven. I’m not around to drive my parents crazy, and I would love the extra time to clean the house and sleep in and take a nap and bake bread and cook something yummy for dinner (I’ve been ravenously in the mood for my mom’s homemade mac and cheese) and watch a movie or two and sip some hot cocoa and burn a few candles and hang out with Simon and enjoy the fell beauty of winter from the warm cozy comfort of my own nest.
The weather is supposed to be baaaaaad tonight, and, ever the optimist, I’m hoping...
Because I’m all stocked up on food, and as long as the power is operative, I’m ready to snuggle in.
Once upon a time the promise of overnight snow showers was like the promise of Christmas: I went to bed with visions of snowmen and mugs of hot chocolate dancing in my head, hoping, just hoping, that when I awoke there would be seven feet of snow on the ground and I’d have to dig tunnels from my doorway just to play outside, and school would blow away on the frozen wind like a shattered icicle.
Of course, my dream of seven or twelve or fifteen feet of snow never came to pass; but still, a good foot or so would get you what you needed: that blessed, unexpected day off, when the school board decided that everyone should play hooky.
And now? I know that the only way I’ll be able to get my own snow day is if there really are seven feet of snow on the ground. I listen to the overnight forecast with great hopes of blizzards, even now, but every morning a few more inches only means an extra twenty minutes of struggle to scrape off and dig out the car, and maneuver it precariously down my drifted driveway before I brave the badly plowed roads to work.
And I need more rest now than I did when I was seven. I’m not around to drive my parents crazy, and I would love the extra time to clean the house and sleep in and take a nap and bake bread and cook something yummy for dinner (I’ve been ravenously in the mood for my mom’s homemade mac and cheese) and watch a movie or two and sip some hot cocoa and burn a few candles and hang out with Simon and enjoy the fell beauty of winter from the warm cozy comfort of my own nest.
The weather is supposed to be baaaaaad tonight, and, ever the optimist, I’m hoping...
Because I’m all stocked up on food, and as long as the power is operative, I’m ready to snuggle in.
Sunday, February 11, 2007
creating is hard
So, I was talking to a friend on the phone this weekend, and we were discussing creativity and art. I quoted (or paraphrased) from Dorothy L. Sayers' The Mind of the Maker, saying, "The first thing -- the very first thing -- we learn about God from the first verses of the Bible is that He's a creator. And, if we are made in His image, that means we're creators too."
On a bigger, broader scale, this means that I'm going to begin more ruthlessly honing my own gifts as a writer to submit articles, fiction, and poetry for publication; but today, I was content simply having gone to church, and came home determined to recreate my apartment, which in the wake of a month of dragging sluggishness has fallen to crap.
But since I actually hate cleaning, I narrowed my eyes at a few large white spaces on the wall that I'm slowly covering with small, cheaply framed photographs and old postcards (and I mean old. Some of them have hit a hundred) and decided to hang a few more.
The problem with cheap picture frames is that most of them, inexplicably, aren't made to hang from walls anymore, but to clutter up flat surfaces; so you have to drill or pick or poke or scrape nail and screw holes (screws for some because I kept running into studs) into the wood or cardboard, and hope you can get the balance right. (My dad spends hours hanging pictures, measuring and drawing lots of x's on the walls in pencil; I have a sort of whimsical approach born of sloth and impatience, and bang the nails in helter-skelter, and pull them out if they don't work the first time. I like trial and error.) I'm also creatively incorporating one corner into the overall effect, and fitting nails in such a way as to allow pictures to hang across the corner, facing out at an angle.
The look is neat, if I do say so myself, but the problem with such precarious hanging situations in the no-wall-holes/balanced-on-nails-in-the-corner frames is that every time you start to pound another nail in, about five pictures come crashing off the walls.
I managed it all right, with a lot of grumping and stubbornness, but it made me think that making a workable, attractive something out of a conglomeration of somethings is hard enough, let alone a unified, diverse, interdependent, beautiful, perfect something out of nothing. Talk about awesome.
And I'll bet Mars didn't keep hitting God in the forehead while He was working on the exact angle for Earth.
On a bigger, broader scale, this means that I'm going to begin more ruthlessly honing my own gifts as a writer to submit articles, fiction, and poetry for publication; but today, I was content simply having gone to church, and came home determined to recreate my apartment, which in the wake of a month of dragging sluggishness has fallen to crap.
But since I actually hate cleaning, I narrowed my eyes at a few large white spaces on the wall that I'm slowly covering with small, cheaply framed photographs and old postcards (and I mean old. Some of them have hit a hundred) and decided to hang a few more.
The problem with cheap picture frames is that most of them, inexplicably, aren't made to hang from walls anymore, but to clutter up flat surfaces; so you have to drill or pick or poke or scrape nail and screw holes (screws for some because I kept running into studs) into the wood or cardboard, and hope you can get the balance right. (My dad spends hours hanging pictures, measuring and drawing lots of x's on the walls in pencil; I have a sort of whimsical approach born of sloth and impatience, and bang the nails in helter-skelter, and pull them out if they don't work the first time. I like trial and error.) I'm also creatively incorporating one corner into the overall effect, and fitting nails in such a way as to allow pictures to hang across the corner, facing out at an angle.
The look is neat, if I do say so myself, but the problem with such precarious hanging situations in the no-wall-holes/balanced-on-nails-in-the-corner frames is that every time you start to pound another nail in, about five pictures come crashing off the walls.
I managed it all right, with a lot of grumping and stubbornness, but it made me think that making a workable, attractive something out of a conglomeration of somethings is hard enough, let alone a unified, diverse, interdependent, beautiful, perfect something out of nothing. Talk about awesome.
And I'll bet Mars didn't keep hitting God in the forehead while He was working on the exact angle for Earth.
Friday, February 09, 2007
Valentine's Day
So Valentine's Day is coming.
I've had violent reactions to the advent of this holiday before. It stops being all cute once you graduate high school -- sure, there are the occasional college sillies where you give your friends valentines and candy hearts, but usually in the face of people who are getting their significant others flowers and dinners out to nice restaurants.
I've done AlternaValentine's before, where a bunch of girls get dressed up and go out to eat somewhere fancy, since no one else is going to take them; and I've done the wearing black bit, and I've done the sitting at home eating too much chocolate and watching some romantic comedy and sniffling. Oo, and last year was viewing a performance of the Vagina Monologues, so I've done the feminist underground thing too.
But this year? I actually feel kind of warm and fuzzy about it. I have no prospects on the horizon, am recovering from the latest attack of bitterness, and will almost certainly be spending V-Day home alone reading Sunshine and sipping a glass of cheap champagne. (Or maybe I'll celebrate by going to see Blood and Chocolate, which I'm told is a wonderful guilty pleasure for the paranormally obsessed).
I think I exhausted my ability to feel jaded and bitter at Christmas, when I had to drive about a thousand miles in a four-day stint just to visit people I'm related to, and had no one in the car with me, and cried because Simon spent Christmas Day at a boarding facility. I broke down then, and haven't been feeling quite that low since.
In fact, some of the nice Valentine's memories have been playing through my head. Don't get excited; none of them have to do with any romantic relationships of my own. But my daddy always got my sister and me a boquet of carnations to put in vases on the table with Mom's roses, and my grandparents always send cards.
But probably the best Valentine's Day happened my sophomore year in college. My roommate at the time and her boyfriend and I hung out together in our teeny dank cave of a dorm room (yay MEP) once in awhile, and at the beginning of the academic year, Erika and James and I were discussing gardening. I didn't have much to contribute to the discussion, really, except for my lovely Midas Touch rosebush which I received as a graduation gift from a high school friend who worked at a greenhouse, and which puts forth enormous yellow roses three times a summer, with a fragrance that haunts with its sweetness. The conversation went on explore roses and other shrubs and flowers, and that was that.
But come Valentine's Day, I got a phone call from the front desk saying there was a boquet for me. Puzzled, I went up to retrieve it...and it was a half-dozen beautifully arranged yellow roses. The card was signed by James.
I ran back to the dorm room and showed Erika, who had her nose buried in her dozen reds from him, and I could barely speak, I was so touched and close to tears. She smiled and said, "He was actually really angry that he couldn't find any Midas Touch roses; these yellows were the best he could do."
So that was my most thoughtful Valentine's Day experience -- when a guy I wasn't even dating remembered my favorite flowers and expressed an act of kindness to a single friend of his.
Sure, I'm sure I'll feel a little blue come Wednesday, but that memory will help tide me over. It's good to remember the agape love, which assuages the absence of eros.
I've had violent reactions to the advent of this holiday before. It stops being all cute once you graduate high school -- sure, there are the occasional college sillies where you give your friends valentines and candy hearts, but usually in the face of people who are getting their significant others flowers and dinners out to nice restaurants.
I've done AlternaValentine's before, where a bunch of girls get dressed up and go out to eat somewhere fancy, since no one else is going to take them; and I've done the wearing black bit, and I've done the sitting at home eating too much chocolate and watching some romantic comedy and sniffling. Oo, and last year was viewing a performance of the Vagina Monologues, so I've done the feminist underground thing too.
But this year? I actually feel kind of warm and fuzzy about it. I have no prospects on the horizon, am recovering from the latest attack of bitterness, and will almost certainly be spending V-Day home alone reading Sunshine and sipping a glass of cheap champagne. (Or maybe I'll celebrate by going to see Blood and Chocolate, which I'm told is a wonderful guilty pleasure for the paranormally obsessed).
I think I exhausted my ability to feel jaded and bitter at Christmas, when I had to drive about a thousand miles in a four-day stint just to visit people I'm related to, and had no one in the car with me, and cried because Simon spent Christmas Day at a boarding facility. I broke down then, and haven't been feeling quite that low since.
In fact, some of the nice Valentine's memories have been playing through my head. Don't get excited; none of them have to do with any romantic relationships of my own. But my daddy always got my sister and me a boquet of carnations to put in vases on the table with Mom's roses, and my grandparents always send cards.
But probably the best Valentine's Day happened my sophomore year in college. My roommate at the time and her boyfriend and I hung out together in our teeny dank cave of a dorm room (yay MEP) once in awhile, and at the beginning of the academic year, Erika and James and I were discussing gardening. I didn't have much to contribute to the discussion, really, except for my lovely Midas Touch rosebush which I received as a graduation gift from a high school friend who worked at a greenhouse, and which puts forth enormous yellow roses three times a summer, with a fragrance that haunts with its sweetness. The conversation went on explore roses and other shrubs and flowers, and that was that.
But come Valentine's Day, I got a phone call from the front desk saying there was a boquet for me. Puzzled, I went up to retrieve it...and it was a half-dozen beautifully arranged yellow roses. The card was signed by James.
I ran back to the dorm room and showed Erika, who had her nose buried in her dozen reds from him, and I could barely speak, I was so touched and close to tears. She smiled and said, "He was actually really angry that he couldn't find any Midas Touch roses; these yellows were the best he could do."
So that was my most thoughtful Valentine's Day experience -- when a guy I wasn't even dating remembered my favorite flowers and expressed an act of kindness to a single friend of his.
Sure, I'm sure I'll feel a little blue come Wednesday, but that memory will help tide me over. It's good to remember the agape love, which assuages the absence of eros.
Wednesday, February 07, 2007
winter games
Evidently a favorite winter pasttime in the Midwest is driving around in your municipal vehicle or pickup truck with your plow up.
It's like a Best in Show Exhibition of Cleanest Plow Blades on Most Blocked Roads.
It's like a Best in Show Exhibition of Cleanest Plow Blades on Most Blocked Roads.
Sunday, February 04, 2007
why today was great
1. I got enough sleep, and woke to a warm kitty curled up next to my hip.
2. I purchased a hundred-dollar pot rack (to hang all my pots and skillets above the stove) at half off because it was a display.
3. I talked to Meg and Phillip.
4. I bought Much Ado about Nothing (Kenneth Branagh) and Romeo + Juliet (Baz Luhrmann) as a two-pack for ten dollars.
5. I got out of the house to (half)watch the SuperBowl with some awesome girls.
6. It wasn't yesterday.
7. It is no degrees and snowing.
2. I purchased a hundred-dollar pot rack (to hang all my pots and skillets above the stove) at half off because it was a display.
3. I talked to Meg and Phillip.
4. I bought Much Ado about Nothing (Kenneth Branagh) and Romeo + Juliet (Baz Luhrmann) as a two-pack for ten dollars.
5. I got out of the house to (half)watch the SuperBowl with some awesome girls.
6. It wasn't yesterday.
7. It is no degrees and snowing.
Friday, February 02, 2007
Sufjan is the glue
Leigh Ann and I discovered late this past summer that we both share an enthrallment with the music of Sufjan Stevens. We tend to go through similar spiritual depressions and doubts, and through the past few months have been listening almost exclusively to, and talking to each other about, this music.
Because this man speaks our language. His album from last July, The Avalanche, was my first exposure. From there I've gone on to buy everything he's done solo – an endless supply of songs upon which to fixate and meditate, and in which to find healing.
His songs tear me apart. The lyrics and instrumental arrangements and vocal ensembles dive past my consciousness and hit me right in that semiotic area of unspeakability. I can't describe exactly what it does to me to listen to him – it calls up a joy so intense it's pain.
One of the sources of his power is his use of repetition. Some of his songs repeat a single cycle of lyrical and musical phrases for three minutes or more, and, far from irritating, it strips away the automaton, the careless listener that evolves from too much casual listening, and forces a sharp confrontation with the music. Repetition does something to the human mind and soul. Some of the Psalms repeat one phrase over and over; hymns have choruses. Repetition is one of the backbones of human understanding.
To use a pop culture reference, the climactic moment of Good Will Hunting underscores the force of repetition to dismantle psychological walls. The first time Will hears, "It's not your fault," he responds with an automatic, "Yeah, I know." The second time, he repeats, "Yeah, I know," but gets agitated saying it. As he continues to hear, "It's not your fault," he gets progressively more upset – because the repetition of that powerful truth pierces through all of the shields he's used since childhood to cope with his abuse and anguish, and brings him face to face with a reality so intense he almost can't bear it, and it calls out the grief and brings him to peace.
That's what Sufjan's music does for me. I've buried a lot of spiritual hurts and damages, have watched them scab and scar over, and have gone on with my life; I came to an intellectual understanding of the forgiveness and love of God; but it was never really healing. The repetition in Sufjan's songs holds me firmly by the chin and directs my face toward God – a God whose love is so persistent and all-consuming as to be terrifying, and whose tenderness brings me back to the simplicity of my identity as His child. And it breaks me down. And holds me together.
It's been a strangely depressing and uplifting winter -- full of violent turns for the good and the bad: spiritual reawakenings, physical illness, amazing resurrections in familial relationships, money troubles; moments of joy, contentment, restlessness, despair. And through it all I keep turning to God, and to Illinois, Greetings from Michigan, Seven Swans, The Avalanche, and Songs for Christmas. (There are two others -- A Sun Came and Enjoy Your Rabbit -- which I have yet to listen to, although I have them; I'm half-afraid to. When I put in one of his albums to hear the first time, I have to put it in first as background, to get accustomed to it, before I'm able to sit down and concentrate on it, because otherwise the power would bowl me over.)
His art taps into the wellspring. And it's terrifically fun to live near the states after which he named two of his albums -- to drive past Ypsilanti, Michigan, to plan trips to the Sleeping Bear dunes, to turn the car toward Chicago. There's a weird visceral connectivity with place.
And, on a more frivolous note, I love hearing the Midwestern dialect in his pronunciation of the short "a" sound. "aa."
*Credit to Leigh Ann for the title of the post.
Because this man speaks our language. His album from last July, The Avalanche, was my first exposure. From there I've gone on to buy everything he's done solo – an endless supply of songs upon which to fixate and meditate, and in which to find healing.
His songs tear me apart. The lyrics and instrumental arrangements and vocal ensembles dive past my consciousness and hit me right in that semiotic area of unspeakability. I can't describe exactly what it does to me to listen to him – it calls up a joy so intense it's pain.
One of the sources of his power is his use of repetition. Some of his songs repeat a single cycle of lyrical and musical phrases for three minutes or more, and, far from irritating, it strips away the automaton, the careless listener that evolves from too much casual listening, and forces a sharp confrontation with the music. Repetition does something to the human mind and soul. Some of the Psalms repeat one phrase over and over; hymns have choruses. Repetition is one of the backbones of human understanding.
To use a pop culture reference, the climactic moment of Good Will Hunting underscores the force of repetition to dismantle psychological walls. The first time Will hears, "It's not your fault," he responds with an automatic, "Yeah, I know." The second time, he repeats, "Yeah, I know," but gets agitated saying it. As he continues to hear, "It's not your fault," he gets progressively more upset – because the repetition of that powerful truth pierces through all of the shields he's used since childhood to cope with his abuse and anguish, and brings him face to face with a reality so intense he almost can't bear it, and it calls out the grief and brings him to peace.
That's what Sufjan's music does for me. I've buried a lot of spiritual hurts and damages, have watched them scab and scar over, and have gone on with my life; I came to an intellectual understanding of the forgiveness and love of God; but it was never really healing. The repetition in Sufjan's songs holds me firmly by the chin and directs my face toward God – a God whose love is so persistent and all-consuming as to be terrifying, and whose tenderness brings me back to the simplicity of my identity as His child. And it breaks me down. And holds me together.
It's been a strangely depressing and uplifting winter -- full of violent turns for the good and the bad: spiritual reawakenings, physical illness, amazing resurrections in familial relationships, money troubles; moments of joy, contentment, restlessness, despair. And through it all I keep turning to God, and to Illinois, Greetings from Michigan, Seven Swans, The Avalanche, and Songs for Christmas. (There are two others -- A Sun Came and Enjoy Your Rabbit -- which I have yet to listen to, although I have them; I'm half-afraid to. When I put in one of his albums to hear the first time, I have to put it in first as background, to get accustomed to it, before I'm able to sit down and concentrate on it, because otherwise the power would bowl me over.)
His art taps into the wellspring. And it's terrifically fun to live near the states after which he named two of his albums -- to drive past Ypsilanti, Michigan, to plan trips to the Sleeping Bear dunes, to turn the car toward Chicago. There's a weird visceral connectivity with place.
And, on a more frivolous note, I love hearing the Midwestern dialect in his pronunciation of the short "a" sound. "aa."
*Credit to Leigh Ann for the title of the post.
Wednesday, January 31, 2007
Happy Wm Had a Headache Day, everyone!
So I've been caught in a swirl of lethargy and forgot about this grand holiday almost completely; hence the no blogvertisements.
BUT this year WHHD went international! Yes, a dedicated group of people headed up by the incomparable Laura and Glen held their celebrations in the great nation of Canada. It can only go up from here!
If you forgot to celebrate last night with plenty of toasts and poetry, there's still time! Have a mimosa for breakfast; have a beer at lunch; have a glass of wine with dinner. Or, since those things probably won't give you a headache now, konk yourself on the noggin with an Acme hammer.
Here's to Wm's longwinded verse! Here's to all the poets who followed and proved themselves better! Here's to Murphy's Irish Red and WHHD celebrations in a South Bend blizzard, where the plows only come out once it's stopped snowing!
BUT this year WHHD went international! Yes, a dedicated group of people headed up by the incomparable Laura and Glen held their celebrations in the great nation of Canada. It can only go up from here!
If you forgot to celebrate last night with plenty of toasts and poetry, there's still time! Have a mimosa for breakfast; have a beer at lunch; have a glass of wine with dinner. Or, since those things probably won't give you a headache now, konk yourself on the noggin with an Acme hammer.
Here's to Wm's longwinded verse! Here's to all the poets who followed and proved themselves better! Here's to Murphy's Irish Red and WHHD celebrations in a South Bend blizzard, where the plows only come out once it's stopped snowing!
Monday, January 29, 2007
i don't care what your political affiliations are, this is funny
Saw it with MP on a trek to Grape Road. We laughed for ten minutes.
Thursday, January 25, 2007
Reparation
Given time, desires breathe
their final colored lights and flick
to flakes of gray: white unfruitions
scattered on cement.
Hopes’ betrayals peel
from the pale cores of old loves
that, blown, roll into the cracks
of memory to endure
beyond significance.
So the comfort in yearning
is the anticipation of yearning’s
end, when longings no longer
hurt the lungs, but rest
in a film of wet ash
under the breath.
their final colored lights and flick
to flakes of gray: white unfruitions
scattered on cement.
Hopes’ betrayals peel
from the pale cores of old loves
that, blown, roll into the cracks
of memory to endure
beyond significance.
So the comfort in yearning
is the anticipation of yearning’s
end, when longings no longer
hurt the lungs, but rest
in a film of wet ash
under the breath.
Tuesday, January 23, 2007
Inferences at Bedtime
Faucet water from the iron sink
scalds and freezes lather
from the stripped skin of my face.
A rhythmic cry, a half-sung growl
sound a cacophony of wrath or foreplay
down among the cinder blocks.
In the dark I balance on the toilet
and breathe the clean chemical smell
of snow through the rusted screen.
A cat shadows through the yard.
On the other side of the bathroom wall,
the neighbors’ voices sharpen.
Monday, January 22, 2007
(slightly) broader horizons
So, I joined eHarmony today. There's this really logical, well-thought-out-process as to why. Basically I don't meet anyone new, because my work circle is very small, and the things I enjoy doing most don't involve leaving my apartment; so, in the absence of matchmaking friends and neighbors, if I'm to expand my skyline even a little, I should probably look to the online community, where other people are looking for the same thing I am.
Does this mean I'm writing off and ruling out the guys I already know? Absolutely not. Should one of them ask me out, I would almost certainly accept. (I have this policy, you know. A very liberal one. If a guy isn't unwashed or creepy, and if I don't definitely dislike him -- evidenced by my hesitancy to speak to him -- I say yes to at least a first date. Some that have asked, I've liked a lot; some I've barely known; and "you never know until you try.")
But since, for whatever reason, I haven't been asked out in a long time (and for once I'm not throwing rocks -- you won't find me asking anyone out, although I have the justification of a role that traditionally allows me the right to expect pursuit), I'm opting for a slight expansion of my available selection. I'm not stacking all my eggs in the eHarmony basket; but at least with that service, I know that the men I meet there are looking for a relationship themselves, which makes it potentially a little easier to start one, and you can skip the stage of excruciating existential questioning -- Do I like him? Does he like me? Just because he talks to me, does that mean he's interested? Should I play coy? Should I make the first move? Should I just kill the crush and get it over with? Do I wait for him? How long? Will it ruin the friendship? Blah blah blah -- and move right on to Do we date or not?
So we'll see. No guarantees, no grandiose hopes or plans. Just a new way to meet people I otherwise wouldn't. And hopefully a few funny tales along the way.
Does this mean I'm writing off and ruling out the guys I already know? Absolutely not. Should one of them ask me out, I would almost certainly accept. (I have this policy, you know. A very liberal one. If a guy isn't unwashed or creepy, and if I don't definitely dislike him -- evidenced by my hesitancy to speak to him -- I say yes to at least a first date. Some that have asked, I've liked a lot; some I've barely known; and "you never know until you try.")
But since, for whatever reason, I haven't been asked out in a long time (and for once I'm not throwing rocks -- you won't find me asking anyone out, although I have the justification of a role that traditionally allows me the right to expect pursuit), I'm opting for a slight expansion of my available selection. I'm not stacking all my eggs in the eHarmony basket; but at least with that service, I know that the men I meet there are looking for a relationship themselves, which makes it potentially a little easier to start one, and you can skip the stage of excruciating existential questioning -- Do I like him? Does he like me? Just because he talks to me, does that mean he's interested? Should I play coy? Should I make the first move? Should I just kill the crush and get it over with? Do I wait for him? How long? Will it ruin the friendship? Blah blah blah -- and move right on to Do we date or not?
So we'll see. No guarantees, no grandiose hopes or plans. Just a new way to meet people I otherwise wouldn't. And hopefully a few funny tales along the way.
Saturday, January 20, 2007
Ice
I
Oh my heart has
returned to Sister Winter
~Sufjan Stevens
It was fourteen degrees on Wednesday morning. The air was so crisp and dry you could have cracked it with a hammer. I wanted to dance down the crunchy-snow-covered sidewalk on my way to the car, but having awakened disoriented and dizzy (I really can't get away with not sleeping anymore; I'm too far past seventeen), I took it easy on my inner ear and settled for a deep, contented sigh...that set me coughing.
Southern Michigan had an ice storm last weekend, and the drive to work, over the back roads and highways, had me staring arrested out the window so often that it was a good thing those roads are sparsely traveled. The trees glittered like glassworks. All the snow had melted on the ground, so the contrast between the brown-and-yellow stubbled fields and the ice-coated trees limning their edges and covering the low hills almost hurt -- like a good haiku.
Everyone but my parents and sister eyes me like he would a crazy woman for saying I love winter, but it's not a masochistic obsession. I dislike cold toes, wet socks, wind-snatched breath, and icy roads as much as the next person; but what I get from winter more than compensates for the inconveniences and the dangers.
I like that everything hibernates. I like the austerity, the beauty of starkness, the stillness that comes from the snow. It's a time that mandates rest. And it's one of the only times in the turn of the seasons when you can step out anywhere and be truly alone. No one's around, and when you're standing in the middle of a field, or a stand of trees, you're far more alone than you would be in any other season, because nothing around you is growing or dying; everything sleeps. The only active life you might see are a few birds, and their presence underscores the emptiness. It's just you.
So you can walk down the sidewalk, or through a field, or along the river, and soak in the quiet, absorb the stillness of everything around you -- the trees, the snow, the ice, the river. You can be by yourself, and in that solitude you can be yourself.
II
Oh my friends I
apologize
To everything there is a season. The Christmas season this time around was a hard one. Illness, loneliness, a yawning sense of purposelessness all robbed me of the childlike joy that usually takes over me like a sizzle of static. I did a lot of traveling, and I came back tired. The lack of wintery weather hurt me. I didn't feel that sense of magic, and when January wore on without a hint of snow -- with weather so warm you didn't even need a coat most days -- it bogged down my spirits. It wasn't seasonal. It wasn't right.
So I have been glad for the snow and ice. I may need to get up earlier in the morning to allow for time to put on boots and scrape the crystallized precipitation off my car and let the engine warm up so it doesn't stall out, but something about walking into that shock of cold brings me alive.
I love people. I love to be around them; but cyclically I need to be alone (there's a season for that, too), and winter is exactly that call to solitude that I've been missing. It's a time also to process a lot of the things I've refused to deal with from the past year. While life was busy and the landscape was lush I put everything away, like sweaters into a bin, and now that everything is silent I can dig them out and hold them up and look them over.
When spring comes, I'll be glad of that too, but this is the time for things to be still, and I like the stillness to have a blanket of snow. It's cold, and sharp, and beautiful.
And when the trees are stripped of their leaves, you can see them for what they are -- all of them throwing their branches up to the sky. If you pick out one, just one, while you're driving (or riding with someone in the car; that's probably safer) and watch it as you go past, it seems to spin, with its arms thrown up, like a dancer. In praise.
Oh my heart has
returned to Sister Winter
~Sufjan Stevens
It was fourteen degrees on Wednesday morning. The air was so crisp and dry you could have cracked it with a hammer. I wanted to dance down the crunchy-snow-covered sidewalk on my way to the car, but having awakened disoriented and dizzy (I really can't get away with not sleeping anymore; I'm too far past seventeen), I took it easy on my inner ear and settled for a deep, contented sigh...that set me coughing.
Southern Michigan had an ice storm last weekend, and the drive to work, over the back roads and highways, had me staring arrested out the window so often that it was a good thing those roads are sparsely traveled. The trees glittered like glassworks. All the snow had melted on the ground, so the contrast between the brown-and-yellow stubbled fields and the ice-coated trees limning their edges and covering the low hills almost hurt -- like a good haiku.
Everyone but my parents and sister eyes me like he would a crazy woman for saying I love winter, but it's not a masochistic obsession. I dislike cold toes, wet socks, wind-snatched breath, and icy roads as much as the next person; but what I get from winter more than compensates for the inconveniences and the dangers.
I like that everything hibernates. I like the austerity, the beauty of starkness, the stillness that comes from the snow. It's a time that mandates rest. And it's one of the only times in the turn of the seasons when you can step out anywhere and be truly alone. No one's around, and when you're standing in the middle of a field, or a stand of trees, you're far more alone than you would be in any other season, because nothing around you is growing or dying; everything sleeps. The only active life you might see are a few birds, and their presence underscores the emptiness. It's just you.
So you can walk down the sidewalk, or through a field, or along the river, and soak in the quiet, absorb the stillness of everything around you -- the trees, the snow, the ice, the river. You can be by yourself, and in that solitude you can be yourself.
II
Oh my friends I
apologize
To everything there is a season. The Christmas season this time around was a hard one. Illness, loneliness, a yawning sense of purposelessness all robbed me of the childlike joy that usually takes over me like a sizzle of static. I did a lot of traveling, and I came back tired. The lack of wintery weather hurt me. I didn't feel that sense of magic, and when January wore on without a hint of snow -- with weather so warm you didn't even need a coat most days -- it bogged down my spirits. It wasn't seasonal. It wasn't right.
So I have been glad for the snow and ice. I may need to get up earlier in the morning to allow for time to put on boots and scrape the crystallized precipitation off my car and let the engine warm up so it doesn't stall out, but something about walking into that shock of cold brings me alive.
I love people. I love to be around them; but cyclically I need to be alone (there's a season for that, too), and winter is exactly that call to solitude that I've been missing. It's a time also to process a lot of the things I've refused to deal with from the past year. While life was busy and the landscape was lush I put everything away, like sweaters into a bin, and now that everything is silent I can dig them out and hold them up and look them over.
When spring comes, I'll be glad of that too, but this is the time for things to be still, and I like the stillness to have a blanket of snow. It's cold, and sharp, and beautiful.
And when the trees are stripped of their leaves, you can see them for what they are -- all of them throwing their branches up to the sky. If you pick out one, just one, while you're driving (or riding with someone in the car; that's probably safer) and watch it as you go past, it seems to spin, with its arms thrown up, like a dancer. In praise.
Thursday, January 18, 2007
out of control
You know those weeks when you are just really not with it? And how it takes at least two weeks to clean up after them once you start to get back on track? I'm having the aftermath of one of those.
I spend a great deal of my time in a state of comparitive sanity, but every once in awhile everything breaks down and my life skills disintegrate and I find myself completely forgetting simple and important things at work, while my apartment goes to crap and my sleep goes out the window.
So this week I'm playing hard-ball catch-up at work, feeling stressed and stupid and frantic -- how could I have forgotten to record that hearing date? -- but still determinedly optimistic. I'll just work my petutie off all day, and by the end of the week I'll be back on track.
The other fly in my ointment is that the headaches, which have taken a tremendous backseat since the last hospital trip, are resurfacing. Stress, I'm sure. Blargh.
I spend a great deal of my time in a state of comparitive sanity, but every once in awhile everything breaks down and my life skills disintegrate and I find myself completely forgetting simple and important things at work, while my apartment goes to crap and my sleep goes out the window.
So this week I'm playing hard-ball catch-up at work, feeling stressed and stupid and frantic -- how could I have forgotten to record that hearing date? -- but still determinedly optimistic. I'll just work my petutie off all day, and by the end of the week I'll be back on track.
The other fly in my ointment is that the headaches, which have taken a tremendous backseat since the last hospital trip, are resurfacing. Stress, I'm sure. Blargh.
Wednesday, January 17, 2007
of horses and pieces, or pieces of horses, or horses in pieces, or...no, never mind
Living in the Midwest brings to the mind of a Western Pennsylvanian the odd quirks in her own regional dialect.
Particularly to a girl hailing from Erie -- the land of oxroast, pepperoni balls, and uninflected questions that come out sounding like irritable statements -- the Midwestern speech patterns are nasaly and off-puttingly pleasant. (Don't be offended! It's an all-American dialect here, and I love it.) "College" sounds like "callege," for example. And everyone's speech pattern is so friendly. They actually ASK questions here. And they'll say hello to almost anyone. I'm accustomed to greeting only people I like, and glancing or grunting at strangers and acquaintances.
So some differences already exist; but the idioms are what really intrigue me. I've noticed certain things, certain terms and phrases, that didn't travel from Western Pennsylvania to northern Indiana. "Gum bands" never made it. "Red up the room" died before Ohio. "Run the sweeper" gets you skeptical glances from people imagining brooms hooked up to motors, while "my hair needs cut" or "my room needs cleaned" or "my brakes need fixed" makes English majors from other regions cough.
But these, while a little odd, seldom break down communiation completely. Hearing one of them might require a little more concentration or forbearance on the part of the non-PA-er, but the point goes across the gap and interprets itself well.
The kicker, the one that knocks the neurons all askew and drops an anvil on conversational understanding, appears to be one of the primary phrases of my childhood: "it's a horse apiece."
I've said it indifferently once or twice, once to a friend who was born and raised in Michigan, and once to a friend who's more or less from the East Coast, and both times I received a flat, "What's that mean?"
"You don't know?" I was incredulous (and probably looked insane).
"No. I've never heard that before."
"Oh." I had to pause, and came up with, "Well. It means two things are the same."
A synonymous phrase is "half a dozen of one, six of the other," which to the Western PA mind takes WAY too long to say. So when a friend calls to ask if you'd rather go out for pizza or Chinese, if you don't care either way, you grunt, "horse apiece." Or if someone asks you for advice on which of two courses of action to take, and both options are grim, what do you say? "Horse apiece."
Where does it come from? I have no idea. A quick google search identified some old gambling game called "horse," the rules of which I didn't understand; or trying to select the best of two bad ways to get to one place on horseback, both of which will ruin the horse before you get there. Apparently the phrase was first found in a DARE dictionary in 1980, but related phrases go back to as far as 1846; and none of these references identified a region of origin.
Which leaves me curious: Has anyone else ever heard, or used this phrase? Where? Is it limited to Western PA, or are there pockets of use elsewhere in the U.S.?
In a land where English is one of the most common languages, it's sometimes startling to be brought up short only four hundred or so miles away when someone asks you to translate a childhood phrase you just used.
Another reason why I love my native state. Even if people say our grammar needs fixed.
Particularly to a girl hailing from Erie -- the land of oxroast, pepperoni balls, and uninflected questions that come out sounding like irritable statements -- the Midwestern speech patterns are nasaly and off-puttingly pleasant. (Don't be offended! It's an all-American dialect here, and I love it.) "College" sounds like "callege," for example. And everyone's speech pattern is so friendly. They actually ASK questions here. And they'll say hello to almost anyone. I'm accustomed to greeting only people I like, and glancing or grunting at strangers and acquaintances.
So some differences already exist; but the idioms are what really intrigue me. I've noticed certain things, certain terms and phrases, that didn't travel from Western Pennsylvania to northern Indiana. "Gum bands" never made it. "Red up the room" died before Ohio. "Run the sweeper" gets you skeptical glances from people imagining brooms hooked up to motors, while "my hair needs cut" or "my room needs cleaned" or "my brakes need fixed" makes English majors from other regions cough.
But these, while a little odd, seldom break down communiation completely. Hearing one of them might require a little more concentration or forbearance on the part of the non-PA-er, but the point goes across the gap and interprets itself well.
The kicker, the one that knocks the neurons all askew and drops an anvil on conversational understanding, appears to be one of the primary phrases of my childhood: "it's a horse apiece."
I've said it indifferently once or twice, once to a friend who was born and raised in Michigan, and once to a friend who's more or less from the East Coast, and both times I received a flat, "What's that mean?"
"You don't know?" I was incredulous (and probably looked insane).
"No. I've never heard that before."
"Oh." I had to pause, and came up with, "Well. It means two things are the same."
A synonymous phrase is "half a dozen of one, six of the other," which to the Western PA mind takes WAY too long to say. So when a friend calls to ask if you'd rather go out for pizza or Chinese, if you don't care either way, you grunt, "horse apiece." Or if someone asks you for advice on which of two courses of action to take, and both options are grim, what do you say? "Horse apiece."
Where does it come from? I have no idea. A quick google search identified some old gambling game called "horse," the rules of which I didn't understand; or trying to select the best of two bad ways to get to one place on horseback, both of which will ruin the horse before you get there. Apparently the phrase was first found in a DARE dictionary in 1980, but related phrases go back to as far as 1846; and none of these references identified a region of origin.
Which leaves me curious: Has anyone else ever heard, or used this phrase? Where? Is it limited to Western PA, or are there pockets of use elsewhere in the U.S.?
In a land where English is one of the most common languages, it's sometimes startling to be brought up short only four hundred or so miles away when someone asks you to translate a childhood phrase you just used.
Another reason why I love my native state. Even if people say our grammar needs fixed.
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