New Moon Hazel

Capitals and Italics

2007-11-18T16:07:00.000-05:00

In my last post, I used the word dreadful in the following context: “…absolutely nothing dreadful is happening and I’m tired of complaining about nothing…”

You can imagine, then, what simply had to happen:

I’m involved in a Situation at work. The Situation is not my fault. I neither conjured nor provoked the Situation. Yet, I’m at the center of it. It’s about me. I’m the one who has to find a way out of it.

Basically, I’m being offered a new job in a different department of my company. Current Department Honcho emphatically DOESN’T WANT ME TO TAKE IT. Possible New Department Honcho is PRACTICALLY BEGGING.

Wait, you’re thinking. Didn’t you, like, just take a new job in a different department of the company you’d been working for? Why yes, yes I did. That’s why I’m hesitant. Essentially, Current Department JUST trained me, so I’ve JUST become useful to them. To flee now would be, in my opinion, a crappy thing to do to people I like.

Indeed, there’s a but.

BUT, the new job is a level up. A promotion, some people would call it, although that sounds like something I should be happy about and I can’t be. This “promotion” also comes with more money. Not a life-overhauling amount more, but more is more. I think most sane people would say I should take it.

In fact, most people, quite sane and less so, have already said that. Without my having spread the news to anyone, EVERYONE in my office seems to know about this. They’ve all stopped by my cubicle to register their opinions. I’ve asked for opinions from outsiders, too – my parents think I should take it, my friends think I should take it. There’s wisdom in majority opinion, yes? So, I should take it.

Obviously, there’s a but.

BUT, if I took this job, I’d be making…a move. A “move” in the more negative sense of the word, like, a calculated shift that changes a whole bunch of people’s plans. My belief in life is that we can’t all go around thinking we don’t have responsibilities toward each other. And the fact, THE FACT, is that I’D be making life harder for people who don’t deserve to have more shit shoveled onto them. (Have I mentioned that conditions in Current Department are less than pleasant lately?) No question, I’d feel badly about that.

Of course, there’s a but.

BUT, I know that this is work. Work, not life. Work, not baseball. I can’t make decisions based on what’s good for the team. I could, but how can I then expect that if given an opportunity to elevate themselves, EACH member of said team would make the choice that favors the group as I did? I can’t, duh. I’m somewhat foolish and sometimes stupid, but not very much/all the time either and I’D HAVE TO BE.

Yeah, well, there’s a but.

BUT, the story’s a little sad either way it ends. I dream of neither path. If we’re talking about What Tracy Wants, then we’re having a different discussion entirely. To take the new job would be to sign up for a longer period of time than perhaps I mean to spend at this place. To spend a longer period of time would be to progress further into middle-life, i.e. the years that go best when supported by reliable income and sensible decision making. To do this would be to admit that I’m actually DOING THIS.

And we’ve arrived at dreadful. I’m full with dread of Monday, as I haven’t been in years. The Situation is waiting.

Missing October

2007-11-11T12:43:00.000-05:00

I’ve gone and ruined what could have been a smashing anniversary. Well, okay, it wouldn’t have been smashing. This blog is smashless, mostly. But it has been going for a year now, or rather, it had been going for a year as of October 1st, which it is now one month, one week, and four days past.

The reasons I missed October are: I no longer have internet at home (and writing at work is an irresponsible proposition, given that it can take me up to three hours to craft a post about my own shoes); nothing dreadful is happening and I’m tired of complaining about nothing (if one is going to complain, one should have cause – unless one is four years old (I need to grow up)); and I’ve been out most nights, drinking riotously, left with neither the time nor the wherewithal to craft posts on any subject, including my own shoes.

Also, I've been focused on various well-intentioned Octobery pursuits like cleaning my house, cooking, doing yoga, attending conventions. Excuses. Pick one and apply to the week of your choice.

I met with two friends from my old writing workshop yesterday, and they are the reasons I'm shirking everything on this blue-skied Sunday to bring you the first post of my second year. One friend is nearly finished with her novel and is working on finding an agent. The other has involved herself in National Novel-Writing Month, the point of which is to lay down 50,000 words in thirty days. Neither friend is going to be on shelves by Christmas, but both are making such admirable progress in writing such great stories that I feel inclined to listen to them. They're telling me to write.

It's simple, the theory of progress in writing. It's like losing weight. All you do is, you just do it: a little bit every day, behave the way you know you should, plan to let yourself slip up tomorrow as long as you get back on track the day after that. Simple, but not easy. Or else I'd be a size four with three published novels by now, and clearly.... No, no. Can't go there.

I have a respectable amount of work to begin with - about 8,000 words of what started out as a short story, which my writing friends inform me has too long an arc and really needs to be turned into a novel. This I'm taking as neither an insult nor a compliment, but certainly as bad news. What, I'm not done yet? So, I've plucked this particular piece from my pool of unfinished short/shortish stories to work on exclusively. I mean, to the exclusion of others from the pool, not to the exclusion of The Bachelor and (occasional) nights of riotous drinking. It's not October anymore, but I'm still me.

Angst, Part Eighty-Six

2007-09-28T20:34:00.000-04:00

They're blowing bubbles off the Washington Monument tonight. It's pretty. I would post a picture, but I haven't got one. I didn't bring a camera. Because I like to keep things in my head.

I might as well interrupt myself to note: If you're thinking this is justanotherangstypost, you are, of course, correct. I have one setting. It's starting to freak me out. So, okay then, two settings: angsty and panicked. I think they're slightly different.

"I saw you roaming about the Baltimore Book Festival. Your pants mismatched your shoes and you appeared to be talking to yourself." That's nobody's quote. That is the thing I was saying to myself, aloud and in a British accent, while roaming. Rehearsal of imagined comments from other (imagined) people to me : a default pastime of mine. Disturbing? Don't answer.

Believe me, if I thought I could be anything other than borderline schizophrenic, I would go ahead and be it. I would stop batting at gnats that don't exist, speaking to myself in the voices of characters I haven't bothered to export to the page where they belong. And for the love of God or whatever, I would stop telling about such things on a blog, as casually as if they were TV ads killing the time between. But I know what happens when I do things, really, in the world outside my head. Nothing. Nothing happens.

See, I haven't found the cure for invisibility. I'm stumped. Tonight they're blowing bubbles off the Washington Monument. I watch people watching them, snapping their pictures, those see-through bubbles that don't come so near as six feet above the heads of tall people before disappearing. I - for all my solidity - might not have been seen at all.

Red Circles

2007-09-14T22:57:00.000-04:00

I'm walking down my city street in the rain, at night, with a fridge pack of Diet Coke tucked under one arm. In the other: three plastic bags with fields of bullseyes on their fronts. Steps behind me, someone yells.

"Tar-GET!" Emphasis on the get. Tar-GET. Should I be afraid? What does he mean? Tar...get out of here? Tar...get your ass back to the suburbs? I turn around to look - it's just a tipsy hipster. Nothing to worry about there.

I was already feeling the guilt before he said anything. What self-respecting snooty twenty-something urban-dwelling liberal shops three bags worth at Target on a Friday night? This is Mount Vernon, Charm City, for crap's sake. I think the deal is, I'm supposed to be out smoking in a narrow area, looking dour and European.

But I was at a box store. A big one. In Pikesville. I drove there, polluting all the way. And you know what? I got a pretty two-toned bamboo cutting board for just $10.99.

City living is what I've always wanted - I feel even snootier now that I do things like power-walk to Federal Hill, hustle up the steps, admire the sunset, and hit the bar on the way home - but I do have some adjusting to do. Like, I don't understand how to live without Target. What if I have simultaneous need of a 6-outlet power strip, a strapless bra, and toothpaste? Where do I go? For all their blobbiness, suburban communities are, at least, easy. There's always a vast parking lot, and it's actually ajacent to the destination.

I'm realizing that I'll miss that, the ease of it all. I hate to admit it, because, really, who wants easy? It's a word that means nothing much had to happen. I avoid it on principle. But it is habit-forming; you do one easy thing, and, well, it's just so easy to do more. I'll probably continue to travel out to one Target or another, every once in a while - I'm not rich, so it's not like I can do all my shopping downtown at funky independent stores. Next time, though, I may walk with those little red circles facing in. Hipsters don't have time for practical explanations. And for whatever reason, I care.

Spring

2007-09-04T21:40:00.000-04:00

"A place for everything - "

" - and everything in it's place. I know." My mom and I are standing in my bedroom, assessing the situation, discussing the new leaf I'm turning over. It's going to be a tidy leaf. And not just tidy, but clean. I figure I might as well turn it all the way, this leaf.

"Your room is the dustbin of the western world," she'd said with great amusement, a few days earlier, in my cleared-out bedroom at the old apartment. True. I hadn't dusted once in four years and the bunnies were raging out of control. If it had been anyone's mess but mine, I'd have been disgusted. I'd always been one of those people for whom messes were personal extensions, like Pigpen from Peanuts. They were where I was. Without threat of outsiders coming around to crinkle their noses and swat at the air, cleaning and tidying just never occurred to me as possible uses of my time.

Four years of that, and I find myself an amateur trash collector. It snuck up on me.

But I won't let that happen again - I have a new rule. It was inspired by the pulse of glee I felt each time I schlepped a heavy trash bag to the dumpster. (Whee! My house is losing weight!) The rule is: one thing in, one thing out.

"Oh, yeah, good luck," my mom says when I lay down my rule. "Just don't be like your father, and throw things out before you notice what they are."

"No, I'm not talking about an all-out dumping spree," I say. "It'll be more of a thoughtful exchange. Like, I buy a new book, I give away an old shirt."

"God, you'll be naked in weeks."

I explain about balance - how this is a new buzzword in my life, how I'm going to use the Scale of Stuff to determine the Quotient of Need minus the Weight of Want, or some loopy babble like that. The point is that I will have to move again someday. When that happens, I don't want to uncover archaeological detritus suggesting that, of all the personalities warring for my head, Pigpen is winning.

"Well, this place certainly has a lot of potential," says Mom. "I hope you do keep it neat." She pauses, considering the walls. "You know, I think this shade of green came out better than we expected."

"Yeah, me too," I say. "It's light, but not pale."

"And bright, but not neon."

"Kind of a spring-y green."

"That was the idea."

The Last, at Last

2007-08-29T20:53:00.000-04:00

My final night at the old apartment is being marked by nothing. See, I called it "the old apartment". I've already moved. My bed hasn't, and some piles of crap haven't, but everything else is at the apartment - "the new apartment" - i.e. home. I'm here now, at "the old apartment" (non-home, ex-home), marking my final night with nothing.

No last episode of Friends.

No last frozen dinner on the couch.

No last ritual airing-out of the foyer, which always seemed to smell like dead animal.

Okay, the place itself isn't much of a loss. I don't know whether I'm trying to be unsentimental or if there really isn't anything to be sentimental about. I have lived here for four whole years, which makes it the second longest I've lived anywhere. But, they were four tumultuous years. I have lived here with three different people, all good friends. But, we barely saw each other, same address or not. I have lived here through a lot of life changes. But, not the kind of changes that stopped me eating frozen dinners on the couch most nights. (That's less pathetic than it sounds. I do like them.) Sometimes I wonder, when the good and bad balance like this, whether anything has happened at all. That kind of tree-falls-in-the-forest thinking can drive you mad.

Pragmatist answer to the question: IT DOESN'T MATTER. I like it.

So, it seems that unsentimental is the way to go. No last anything, no photographs, no kissing the ground. This is weird for me. I tend to flail, emotionally. I cry when things go changing. I think up words that mean how I feel and write them down, arrange them. That I did, I guess. Just one more: okay.

So, September

2007-08-15T19:34:00.000-04:00

I have an appointment tomorrow to pick up keys. My next apartment sits waiting, empty, lead-tested and roach-bombed. It's old. It has the kind of hardwood floors that happened before hardwood floors got to be so chic. I worry that it's haunted but am willing to make friends with spirits if I must. It's in the place where I wanted to be.

So, I'm moving tomorrow. Or rather, as of tomorrow I've officially and for all postal purposes arrived at a new address. I have until the end of the month to vacate the current apartment, thankfully; I haven't even begun dismantling shelves and furniture. Paintings and lamps and ceramic items are still on display, undisturbed as they've been for four years. I can't make myself do the packing. It's better, for me, to put things together than to take them apart.

In two weeks I'll have done it anyway, because that's what the deal is - and it's sweeter than most. I do appreciate the large window of time that good luck and nice people have opened for me in this move. But I hate chaos. It puts me completely off-game. Last moving day, I woke up shaking at 4am, dropped a box of books on my foot, crashed my parents’ van into a guard rail, and ended up on the floor of my bare apartment, rocking back and forth singing show tunes. I wish that was an exaggeration.

So, I'm aiming to get through it. To the part where there's paint on the walls and mugs in the cupboard. September. Books grouped by genre, alphebetized by author. September. Towels washed and rolled up, clothes hanging by color. September, September. It'll all be fine and fabulous then.

The Birthday/Comeback

2007-08-06T14:33:00.000-04:00

At 10:06 this morning, my exact birthminute, I was wearing sweaty gym clothes and slouching in an armchair with my computer on my lap, struggling to write what was meant to be a very entertaining email reply to a friend. It took me an hour and consisted of four sentences. Picture that. It's fairly representative of my first twenty-six years, which have been all about struggling to do easy things that aren't, and failing (though valiantly) to look and smell better than God seems to have intended.

But let me not give you the impression that I'm not a blazing success, because I am. I've been told that nobody does angst like I do.

Nobody! Hell. Yeah.

Anyway, it's a happy-hopeful candy-colored sort of day, the birthday, so I'll keep it positive and make only one new year's resolution: to finish the things I start.

That is, you'll be hearing more from me.

See Here

2007-07-09T21:07:00.000-04:00

If you're going to Kentucky, and if you're going to camp there, and if the camping is taking place on a vast expanse of former commune known as the Frog Farm, and if it's hot July, here's what you need to know: the tent should have windows.

Past that, you don't need to know nothin'. Not what time it is, not where you left your cell phone, not what's happening next. Please don't bring a portable anything, or watch the news, or - heaven help you - email. As you've figured out by now, (assuming you have the normal, manageable amount of ego) the modern world can withstand your dropping out. If it helps set you in the proper mood, tell yourself the harsher version: It doesn't matter. It's boring. And you are just so over it.

This, on the other hand -

- well, this is something new. New like knitting, skinny pants, and God himself. Everything old, again. Not that I would ever recommend such things purely on their popular appeal. You'll have to see for yourself, and that's why you need a tent with windows. That, and hot July.

Solstice

2007-06-21T21:10:00.000-04:00

There are six things I'm not doing because I'm doing this. Multitasking is a ridiculous invention - an impossibility, even. You have to choose. Tonight I choose the balcony. Maybe because it's summer now, the latest-coming night, prime balcony time. I enjoy these things.

But I'm not making progress. Oh, hell no. And that's too bad. I know of people who are making progress, as I am not. They're very impressive. They have medals and microphones and homes made entirely of recycled materials. They have astonishingly shiny hair. But I never see them on any balcony. I bet they don't even know that today is their longest-staying day, the best chance they'll have all year to see the light and step into it, too. Me, I never miss these things.

The Strawberry

2007-06-12T19:46:00.000-04:00

You like them all, but your favorites are strawberries. You eat them at the average rate of one pound a day, which translates to something like $28.49 a week, $34.99 if you go fancy, organic. That's insane, but you have your reasons: no food better represents happiness, red is your favorite color, you're trying to prevent cancer.

Between the running, the toning, the sunless tan, and the strawberries, you'd been feeling very healthy of late. Your mind was on physicality and off, well, itself. You were ignoring the fact that you hadn't been writing, hadn't been reading, hadn't been keeping up with smart publications/current events/oil changes. I can't, I don't have time, I hafta go running. It slips away quickly. You start forgetting words, losing arguments, losing track. It's terrible, but hey, the endorphins are pumping (or whatever they say) so you're happy and even better - you're healthy.

But when you're sitting on the shoulder of the beltway with a smoking, dead vehicle, you're not healthy anymore. You're sick because you know you've just lost your strawberries. Your monthly berry bill is half the coming car payment. You have to get to work, but you don't have to be healthy. You don't have to feel good. You don't have to eat expensive fruit.

So you do some reading, some research. You remember words like interest and emissions, what they mean - no really, what they mean that you suddenly have to do. You skip a day of running and go to the store. You pick out a new car. You say goodbye to your old car. It was with you for nine years, mostly causing trouble, kind of like a spouse, in sickness and in health, nine crazywild years that changed you. The new car works quietly and well. It's not exciting; it's dependable and predictable. If it were a person , it would probably read the Washington Post. It's red, the color of a ripe strawberry, and you're paying for it yourself - first time you've ever done that. It feels healthy, just not like healthy used to feel.

I Get It

2007-05-28T15:39:00.000-04:00

People have had babies before. But not my people. This is my oldest cousin's first child, my godparents' first grandchild, my grandmother's first great-grandchild. He's the first new baby my extended family has welcomed in fifteen years. He's the first newborn I've held since my own sister was born. He's named for his father - my cousin - who was named for his father, who was named for his father, who was named for his father. End it already, I once thought. I've never been a great upholder of tradition; I prefer, as a matter of general philosophy, to modernize and move on and overthink - never to do things like give names and have babies just because It's What People Do.

But that was before he got here and I saw him. Now, 120 years of William Joseph is exactly exact and perfectly right. The one I grew up with is a role model and a teacher. He used to read books in corners and give me new vocabulary words to learn. I learned them. We're finally and irrevocably grown up.

Deadhead for a Day

2007-05-20T17:15:00.000-04:00

This was one of the busiest weeks of the last few months, so I almost skipped the concert last night. I nearly chose in favor of a night on the sofa and whatever was on TBS (probably Legally Blonde, it's always Legally Blonde) just to have some time to myself, finally. But at the last minute, I decided to go along with my friends to see the Dark Star Orchestra, a Grateful Dead tribute band that aims to recreate the Dead experience by playing exact setlists from bygone decades.

Now, I'm no Deadhead. I certainly have nothing against them - they tend to be nice people, with a very refreshing lack of fashion sense - but I can't claim to be an expert on the music or philosophies of the Grateful Dead. I like some of their songs, but only the upbeat, melodic stuff. Here's a bit of definite blasphemy: fourteen-minute lyric-free jam sessions bore me to tears.*

Even so, I was pretty excited to see this band, you know, for the experience. We arrived into bizarro 1968, everyone in tie-dye with cell phones. There were fans of all kinds - the stereotypical aging hippie, the stereotypical latter-day hippie, and even a fairly sizable group of corporate types in collared, buttoned shirts. (On a Saturday night? At this show? Yeah, I found that disturbing on a few levels.) We wormed our way into a spot right behind the sound guys, a straight shot to the stage, bonus points for the rail to lean against. For the first half of the show, I kept myself amused watching the happy bobbing heads in front of me. There was a guy next to us who would periodically thrust his arm into the air and wail toward the stage, "Jerry! Jerrrrrryyyyy!" Ah, people and their music. It's a beautiful thing.

By the time the band took a break, I was getting cranky. This had already been a long, long show by my standards (I have the attention span of a flea) and in fact it was long, long break, to be followed by, God help me, a long, long second half. I was tired. My feet hurt. My back ached. There were no chairs anywhere. I considered curling up in a corner; I figured this crowd would let me be. But on a trip to the bathroom, my friend ran into someone she knew, who insisted we all come upstairs to the balcony.

Downstairs, it turned out, had been only a light, refined taste of what the Dead experience was supposed to be. Upstairs was the grainy, whole-wheat version. True Deadheads danced around us, their arms and legs flailing indiscriminately, their eyes mostly closed. An old man with a lazy eye and a peg leg charged around the floor like a bull toward the red cape. A few people wandered over to chat, doubly impaired and unintelligable, but seeming to want to enthuse with us over the general excellence of the night, and of the music. One guy asked me how old I was. Twenty-five, I said. His response, one I'd never gotten before: "When Jerry died, you were eight."**

I usually don't (can't) dance unless I've had a couple drinks - which I didn't do - but the beauty of hippie style is that no one cares much for technique. Caught up in the feeling surrounding us, we had all joined in the Slow Flail by the end of the night. I don't know that this show will turn me into a real follower - I'll probably just continue to put "Uncle John's Band" on repeat when I need to relax - but I'm thrilled to say that I was there. I was there, man. It was like going back in time. Just like that, I bet.

*I'm told that they wouldn't, if only I were high. If only!
**Faulty math - I was actually fourteen when Jerry Garcia died. It was 1995. I remember it. A whole bunch of those bear t-shirts showed up around school that year.

Living Here

2007-05-12T18:31:00.000-04:00

My bedroom door has become half-disconnected - by which I mean that the top hinge has come unhinged. Or rather, the hinge device itself has come off the wall, so the hinge still works, theoretically, except that it can't do its job as long as the hingy-plate-piece-thingy no longer fastens to anything. (See, this is why I can't be an architect.) Anyway, the door is useless. But that's not the most annoying thing in my life.

That would be this: My new black ballet flats, which are good quality and which I bought for just 50% of their intended price, are well beyond adorable. I've gotten at least one compliment on them at every single wearing. Unfortunately, they cause raging, angry blisters on my hours-long weekend walks around Mount Vernon, my favorite neighborhood in Baltimore. This means that I'm unable to pull off both cute shoes and a jaunty step. I have to choose, as Carrie Bradshaw never did.

I choose the neighborhood. My long walks are the light of my life and that's no exaggeration - think what you will. Mount Vernon is the closest to Europe I feel in Baltimore, and it isn't expensive to get to or bursting with good conversation I can't understand to overhear. This is the season when it's booked solid with markets, festivals, and events. I make the fifteen-minute commute every weekend, as early as 8am if I must. I'll miss none of it.

And that has surprised me very much, my love for Baltimore. Four years ago, I was hoping I wouldn't end up here. I wasn't shocked, though, when I did end up here; I never ever manage to get what I want. But as it turns out, I'm pretty good at wanting what I get. Lately, when I think about following some dream to New York City - or even the much-fantasized-about Europe - it exhausts me. I like it here, where if my shoes don't fit, there's a doorless room full of more comfortable options just up the road.

The Intruder

2007-04-29T17:58:00.000-04:00

There's a man in my neighborhood who used to like to break into my apartment. Actually, that's not fair: it was probably not a man, it was probably a woman. I knew this because none of the electronics were ever missing. My laptop, my roommate's laptop, the DVD players, the digital cameras - all remained after the break-ins. The only things that ever appeared to have been touched were the contents of my medicine cabinet - creams, lotions, pills, etc. - which I found congregating in the sink, on the floor, or even in the toilet when I came home. It always upset me, the floating facewash. I'm sure you understand.

It took me a while to figure out what was going on. Oh no, I'd think, rounding the corner that leads to my bathroom, as I caught sight of the doors of my medicine cabinet. Wide open at odd angles - I could tell they weren't how I left them. I'm a messy person, but I have an excellent memory. I know when I've closed a door and when I haven't. Slowly, suspiciously, as if the perp might be hiding in the shower, I'd walk into the bathroom and survey the scene. Yep. Always just as it had been the last time: everything out of the medicine cabinet, nothing left in. And then I started to notice that while everything may have been out, everything was there. SAY, WHAT KIND OF A BURGLAR ARE YOU? I'd shout into mid-air. No response. Sheesh. If I had bothered to break in to someone's apartment, I'd at least take a bottle of Ibuprofen, for the road.

Eventually, it occurred to me that a theftless intrusion was a whole different game. My stuff is worth stealing, like anyone's stuff. A couple of minutes on e-bay can teach you all you need to know about stuff: people like it. Even when it's crap. Especially, they like the crap they don't currently have. Therefore, if they have an opportunity to seize such crap, and no one is around to stop them, whether it's right or wrong, they may well take it. So, clearly, what I had here was not a physical case of stuff at all, or even crap.

My neighbor owns a hammer, which causes pounding, which causes shaking, which causes mess. My neighbor's hammering of her wall is an act that I believe to be independent of me. Perhaps she redecorates frequently. Likes to put up pictures. Is a carpenter. I've got no reason to think she's been hammering her wall in the middle of the day specifically to antagonize me; I am probably at work, I produce almost no noise with which to anger her, and, in fact, we've never met. Besides that, in case it matters - and I think it usually does - she has an angelic singing voice and is most likely a lovely person.

But the hammering, which isn't about me, is still an intrusion on my life. The wall shakes and the facewash falls right out of the cabinet. Every so often, I have to clean up my bathroom. I didn't say it was a bad thing - the bathroom has to be tidied up occasionally anyway, and otherwise I might never do it. My neighbor knows neither what she does to me, nor what she does for me. And this, dear readers, is something we must always remember.

Furthermore

2007-04-20T20:30:00.000-04:00

The lamentation will continue, at least for one more post, and then I swear I'll get happy, or funny, or something good will - well, whatever. I think I probably shouldn't write anything about what happened this week, but there are two reasons why I can't leave it alone and maybe they'll fade a bit if I share them:

1. I know exactly what I was doing at 7:15 and 9:45 on Monday morning, the times of the shootings. In the first instance, I was eating Fiber One with granola, skim milk, and strawberries, sitting cross-legged on my bed, watching the Today Show and thinking that I should probably have left the house by now if I wanted to get to work on time. In the second, I had just thrown away the bag of green tea that had been steeping in hot water for the last five minutes. I was annoyed because I hate green tea - I think it tastes like somebody poured water over a clump of rotting leaves, I only drink it because it's so ridiculously healthy - and now that it was ready, I had to force it down. Man, this sucks. That was what I was thinking.

2. I have indirect but important connections to two of the students who died. I've taken to repeating their names out loud for no particular reason and with no particular idea of what I intend to accomplish. The speaking of the names is never a scheduled tribute or an emotional outburst. Simply, I will park the car and say a name. Open the refrigerator and say a name. I never met either of these students.

Now, as a very wise man once said, that's all I have to say about that.

No-Spring Year

2007-04-15T08:25:00.000-04:00

Where is our lightness and light? I can't come up with a current event that isn't bringing us down these days. All the politicians are angry - except one - and everyone wants to see a change in some direction, and although it's been promised, we don't yet have our spring.

Then a guy calls a group of us hos on the open air, and none of us will leave it alone as we should have done (the worst thing to do with bad behavior intended to get a "laugh" is to pay heaping amounts of attention to it), but we can't, obviously, because it was just that stupid, so we're playing catch with blame and bad words, tiring ourselves out to make change, but we still don't have our spring.

And then Kurt Vonnegut dies, a man who wrote highly unlikely stories that are playing out, in fact, right under our stuffed noses, a man who wrote books we could talk back to, or take issue with, or believe. I quoted him at dinner once, to an accusation that I did not support our troops. Our troops are being treated like toys a rich kid got for Christmas, I said, and people looked up, because that was interesting and it made sense. I don't know who will feed me my next good line. It's scary to have to come up with one myself, so in that way maybe I'm not even ready for my spring.

April Rant

2007-04-05T23:27:00.000-04:00

"Are you serious? You HAVEN'T DONE YOUR TAXES YET?" She's clearly horrified and probably surprised. I'm a responsible, punctual person - a dork. Everybody knows this. I like charts, graphs, and office supplies. I continue to be wildly impressed with the design of the paper clip. It's just the teeniest bit of metal twisted brilliantly!!! I'm also a mess.

Have I done my taxes? Ha! I don't even know where my taxes are. Where my W-2s are, that is. I hate that: W-2s. You'd think they'd have named them something that made a bit more sense, like "Yearly Totals" or "Wow, You Need a Better Job". I absolutely cannot stand things that don't make sense to me, and taxes make no sense to me. I don't mean the part where we have to pay them - that's fine, I get it, I even favor it. It's just the methodology and the terminology. Why do we have to "do" taxes at all? I refuse to believe there isn't some frightening piece of federal technology that could record all our earnings and expenses, that knows how many dependents we have, that can tell whether or not we've actually donated money to our church, etc., and could use that information to set factors and formulas to remove automatically from our paychecks the correct amount in the first place, thus leaving us happily ignorant of the whole process. Or maybe I'm just annoyed because tax forms bring up math in the springtime. April could be such a lovely month, otherwise.

Many of my peers insist that they enjoy tax time, since it means they get lots of money back. These are mostly the peers who have managed, through some kind of government-encouraged existential crisis, to claim "0" instead of "1" on their W-4s. This is another thing that makes no sense to me. It's like wearing size zero, it's completely ridiculous. Zero is zero. Nothing, not there. You may think your existence is debatable, but if you're pacing around on April 14th clutching W-forms and sweating profusely, then financially, it is not.

That'll be me, most likely. I am a responsible person, but much more so at the eleventh hour. And I've nothing much to look forward to, as I always declare myself, myself. I doubt I'll have to pay, but my refund will be small. Sandwich-sized. Good for an afternoon at the mall, where it'll *poof* into lattes and going-out tops that will turn out to be embarrassing, and no good will come of it and nothing will change. Speaking of horrified. Maybe the feds should just keep it.

Gastronomy à la Karl

2007-03-30T21:58:00.000-04:00

Fish soufflé
Quail flambé
Protein sachet

Today's entry in the food diary? Nope - it's tomorrow's. Because that's when I'll be starting the zany Karl Lagerfeld diet. Amid the many diet crazes to sweep the nation in recent years (and by "sweep" I mean misinform, traumatize, and finally, sabotage) this one was quite overlooked. I found out about it yesterday, over a lunch of deluxe pizza - one of the many food items Karl would deem unforgiveably indulgent in the way that is typical of Americans.

Our essential Americanness is probably the reason that the K-man's diet never attained Weight Watchers status in this country. We love: pie (both eating and baking, as a kind of heartland sport), spirited encouragement, positivity. We hate: hunger as punishment, harsh metaphors, words with suspect accent marks over the e. Karl gives us none of what we want in a diet plan and everything we don't. A 1,000-calorie limit? Snacks of homeopathic granule? Orders to be a "single soldier" marching toward victory? Dinners of rabbit? I mean, rabbit?! Dude, not unless it's chocolate and wrapped in pink cellophane.

But my favorite recommendation of Karl's is that we not try to lose weight for downer reasons like cardiac health or self-esteem. Rather, we must lose madly in the name of fashion. We must lose so that we become the fourth person in the world on whom skinny jeans are not an atrocity. This, he insists, is actually the best attitude toward weight loss: "nothing in your life depends upon it." You know, I think he's really got something here! Personally, I always have a difficult time succeeding at the things upon which my life does depend - that's why I'm starting this diet tomorrow!

Now, if only I could remember how to flambé a quail...

Read the Slate article, my main souce of information.

Living in Yellow

2007-03-27T20:08:00.000-04:00

I was dreaming in black last night. Swirly, inky black, like the color of a movie with no plot, just terror. I awoke already upset and turned on the morning news - never a calming distraction, especially not in Baltimore. It wasn't going to be a good day, but then it was a good day:

Summer in March. A three-course lunch and laughter the whole way through. Early pardon from work following the three-course lunch, a retirement celebration. The scenic route and rolled-down windows - and the confidence that it was too early in the season for bugs to fly in. My third run of the week, in spite of sore muscles. A thunderstorm I ran right under and all the way through, soaked completely, before a quick dance in the rain.

So, you can save it. It can be saved.

More Whining

2007-03-24T14:18:00.000-04:00

I'm pissed off. The bottom third of my computer screen has become a blacked-out mess of pulsating horizontal lines that make it impossible to get anything done without feeling epileptic. Tech support has been unhelpful, probably because I registered my complaint only minutes ago, after having put up with this problem for nearly two weeks. That's why I'm pissed off - I'm annoyed with myself. I can put up with anything. I won an award for it once. You could plop me down in the middle of the desert and instead of using the sun to navigate toward civilization, I'd lie down to get a tan and wait for the rain that never comes. That ain't good.

Neither is anything else I've done (not done) lately. Like I said in the last post, it's been all TV and weeping for the last few weeks, with infrequent breaks to go to Panera and work on the story I'm writing. Apparently, I can only write this story while dining on French Onion soup. This is not an acceptable quirk; in fact, I suspect it's not a quirk at all, but an excuse - I can't go to Panera every day. I can go maybe once a week. Once-a-week writing does not add up to great success anytime in the next five years or so. Which is perfect for me, because then I don't have to finish something I actually feel good about and think has potential.

Do I need psychotherapy, or what?

Anyway, I'm in unloading mode and I guess that's what this blog is for. I never took the time to define it, did I? Some people say right up front that their blog is a diary, some people insist it's a showcase of their serious writing, some people have an obvious agenda. Those people are probably also the ones with personal mission statements and five-year plans. (And readers.) I don't have any of that. Surprise.

March

2007-03-21T21:22:00.000-04:00

Two weeks. Was I on vacation? Working overtime? Reading Michener? Protesting the war? Hiking through Tibet? No.

I was watching televison.

A while ago, I wrote about having become obsessed (re-obsessed, actually) with the first season of Felicity, the show that followed a group of nervous, drama-prone New York college students for four years. Since then, I've watched the other three seasons on DVD, which, at twenty-some episodes a season, required serious dedication. I finished the series two days ago - it was a five-tissue finale - and am now officially in mourning.

But it's time to come back to my life. I hope I can find it.

Two Fifty-One, and Nothing

2007-03-07T19:33:00.000-05:00

I was going to win Mega Millions. I knew. The day was filled with bizarre happenings, little blips that meant something unusual was about to transpire. I woke up with my contact lenses still in my eyes, having completely forgotten to take them out. I started to take a shower, but we had no hot water. Randomly, the pictures fell off the bathroom walls. When I opened my wallet to pay for lunch, the only money I had was a two-dollar bill. Later, after an ATM visit, the lady at Royal Farms gave me too much change. Concerned for my financial karma, I tried to correct her, but she brushed me away. So, clearly, I was going to win Mega Millions. Just had to.

I'd been gearing up all weekend, making plans, rehearsing lines. I simply couldn't believe it when I looked at the ticket! Is this really happening? Pinch me! I joined forces with a group of women at the gym. We signed our names to an official document and surrendered ten dollars each. We pooled two hundred and fifty tickets bought from a variety of locations. The amount split twenty-five ways, even after taxes, would put each of us into the rank of people who can buy groceries without anxiety and mental math. Groceries, or, you know, yachts. Wooohooo! We would all go to Aruba together to celebrate our luck.

Of course, I also bought myself a ticket. A single, secret ticket. A potential fortune to be shared only with those of my choosing. I imagined paying off all my debts and loans, and buying an entire block of houses in the city to rehab at my job-free leisure. I decided I'd turn the place into a community for artists, musicians, and writers. Then I'd establish a charitable foundation and direct it myself, traveling around the world to deliver inspiring speeches. Finally, I'd get a dog.

I stayed up until 11:22 to watch the drawing live from Times Square. It happened so fast, number after number - dreams were flattened and shattered in seconds. I could hear the neighborhood sighing along with me. Who didn't have a Mega Millions ticket last night? Or, two-hundred and fifty-one of them? Who didn't believe in some small way that it was going to happen? 11:23 was a sad, and sadly unexpected, minute. There was nothing I had to do, or could do. So I got up off the couch, took my contacts out, and went to bed.

Ego

2007-03-06T22:02:00.000-05:00

I zig-zagged around the parking lot, in search of the elusive Saturday space. Crowds were worse than usual – it was a sunny day, a happy weather day, a get-me-outta-the-house day. In the best of circumstances, I wouldn’t have ended up at a large chain store off Reisterstown Road, but for reasons too depressing to divulge without having had a single potent beverage today, my action-adventure options were none. So I circled the parking lot.

In the way-back right side, farthest from the door, I thought I saw a space. Two spaces? An SUV was blocking my view, but it looked like I might be in luck. Just before I swung my ’98 Saturn into it, I saw the Aston Martin convertible of “Meteorite Silver”, parked diagonally across the two spaces. For those of you not familiar with this car (as I was not, until I looked it up on Wikipedia), it’s a six-figure purchase. It’s a house. It’s a college education. A fancy one. So, I was rather relieved not to have smashed it.

And then I got annoyed. Because, really, how unimpressive is that? How do you become such a person – who is not James Bond – who spends the money that could have gone towards many dozens of life-enriching experiences to obtain a bulletesque vehicle instead, who cruises out to a big-box discount store on a road notorious for bent fenders, who thinks it’s his right to take up two spaces on a busy Saturday while the real people are out buying their toilet paper? Show-offs. I’m may sometimes be jealous of their posessions, but never their incredible capacity for delusion. How much lovelier is life when you understand that you are not your stuff?

Idol Wednesday

2007-02-28T22:26:00.000-05:00

Welcome to Day Two of my American Idol fanaticism. Hello, I love pop culture.

Seacrest opens by wondering if the girls can match the guys’ throw-down last night. It was more of a toss-down, so I’m betting they’ll manage.

Gina’s “Alone”, and never really cared until she met us. She brings her big rock voice, but sounds screamy at times. R says she got it together. P says, man, excellent job. S says the vocals felt forced and, hey, isn’t she supposed to be edgier? In an embarrassing moment that probably shouldn’t be happening, Seacrest admonishes her boyfriend to propose. I don’t even think she told him to say that! I say: the girl’s got spirit.

Alaina is not ready to make nice. She hits a few bad notes and doesn’t quite pull off the bold, angry thing like a true Chick, but maybe that’s better for her – I fear a lot of voters are going to HATE the fact that she’s singing this song. R says it was not good. P says it was a hard song to sing. S says he’ll put it into plain English: this performance was like R taking part in a 100-meter sprint. P says she looks beautiful, which in P-speak means she sucks. I say: I’m ready to let her go.

LaKisha sings “Midnight Train to Georgia." She’s flawless; I’ve got nothin’. R says she’s got some vibe. P says she loves it, and her. S says she’s a phenomenally good singer, but she should act like more of a star. (Um, don’t go advising normal people to become insufferable divas right before they make it big. 'Kay? Thanks.) Then he criticizes her outfit, which is uncalled for. I say: major contender.

Melinda, who is by far the most likable candidate, personality-wise, ever to appear on this show, sings “Funny Valentine”. At first, I think she’s headed for disaster (AI history: slow and old can be baaad), but she does the best version I’ve EVER heard. R says we’ve got a competition going. P is astounded. S says it was incredible and that she’s a breath of fresh air. I say: perfect.

Antonella sings a Celine song, which nobody should ever attempt. (Say what you want about Celine – that woman can sing.) She hits, like, three notes, total. R says she’s drop-dead gorgeous…but pitchy. P says less than 1 % of the population can sing like Celine. S says it was worse than last week. Antonella fights back, comparing herself to Jennifer Hudson, whom S also dissed back in the day. I say: just go home.

Jordin, who is by far the most impressive human being, everything-wise, ever to appear on this show, sings a song from Mulan. She’s incredibly articulate, insanely talented, and, oh, seventeen. She’s confident and gorgeous and charismatic. I may be slightly in love with her. R says it wasn’t her best, but is so, so impressed with where she is at this point in her life. P tells her she’s a brilliant talent. S stresses her massive potential. I say: top three.

Stephanie sings “Dangerously in Love” just like Beyonce. Which is great, except that it makes her – just like Beyonce. R says she has proven she deserves to be up here, but needs to find her own sound. P says fantastic, brilliant, more adjectives, and everyone will be in love with her. S agrees with P. Let’s say it again. He AGREES that it was terrific. I say: another one to watch.

Leslie is feelin’ good. She’s got that smoky, deep, soulful thing going on. I’m a BIG fan of the voice, but she’s too jazzy-cool for the voters, probably. I’m thinking basement club, gritty city. R likes that she’s returned to her trademark style, but it was just aiight. P says she’s in her element. S says a bunch of whack shit that we’ll skip over, because P jumps in to compare her to a “different” flavor of ice cream. The judges spiritedly discuss what flavor of ice cream Leslie is, while she kind of rides the wave. I say: keep this one around.

Haley’s got the stuff that we want, the stuff that we need. Girl has WAY more fun than she did last week and is entertaining to watch. Still, I sense reviews will not go well, because you just can’t sing “The Queen of the Night” and get away with it. R says everyone has had a good time, but the song was not great for him. P says leaps and bounds better than last week. S says she gave it a go, but advises that contestants not take on Whitney songs unless they have Whitney voices. I say: yeah, forgettable.

Sabrina sings “He Fills Me Up”, another Whitney song. She’s powerful, and actually does have the voice for it, but – meh. Except for her hair, which is itself incredibly charismatic, she just doesn’t command attention. R says nice overall. P says she’s a big contender. S says she almost confused power with shouting, but predicts she’ll be back next week. I say: works for me, I guess.

And we’re done. I’ll spare you commentary on the eliminations tomorrow, as I’ll be watching Grey’s Anatomy and, you know, reading some tremendously important literary masterpiece during the commercial breaks. Because I’m cultured, oh yes I am.