Monday, November 30, 2009

Also,

Interests of the day:

Coriander seeds.

The way the end of everyone's nose dips when they say "m."

Today:

Subway for lunch.

Driving in the rain, being cold.

Waking up at 6:30 am.

Shoe shopping via the Cole Haan 40% off sale--the salespeople in the store were so nice/cool! As in, so nice/cool that I for real want to be friends with them, and wish it wouldn't have been socially super weird, awkward, and generally unacceptable to look them up on facebook or something.

Driving 70 miles around town.

Wearing some of the supercute new clothes purchased yesterday with Lucy at Target (and being complimented on them at the shoe store).

Starting my new job! Zomg! Not that I get paid till I finish training (I think?) but whatever.

And the real kicker,

Two and a half years dating David Vinson: awesome boyfriend extraordinaire.

Just a refresher:




Goodness. What a day.

Thursday, November 26, 2009

Roast bird and stuff.

Thanksgiving is pretty awesome, btw. And I love having a big family--we had about 22 in attendance, despite the fact that we were missing roughly 17 people (cousins and their progeny celebrating the holiday with the in-laws, mainly).  And tomorrow, assuming I've got enough energy, I'll probably be driving down to Winston-Salem to visit David's dad's family for a day. Lots of driving, but hopefully good times.

enter food coma, exeunt marie.

Wednesday, November 25, 2009

Note To Self

By the way, Bama was rough. Not because the people I visited/saw/hung out with weren't awesome, but because I NEED to do something about this depression crap. I keep and keep and keep ignoring it and looking the other way and hoping it'll disappear, like maybe this time, after ten years of episode-breath-episode-breath-breath-episode-breath-episode-episode... it'll be different. What was the definition of insanity again? I keep telling myself that since I can function it's not that bad, or that, since I was "alright" today, maybe I'll be better tomorrow, despite the fact that last night (and, oh yeah, this afternoon) I could hardly bear the thought of having to live for decades more before I can have peace. Logically I know and I can sort of vaguely remember that life isn't all bad, that maybe it's even mostly good and that I've loved people and enjoyed things and had fun and been genuinely glad and thankful for moments, for life, for being alive and having the opportunity to live and experience and create and love. Lately though, most of the time, I'm reactionary and angry and empty, and I look forward to nothing, and I want nothing except to be left alone, though being left alone makes me miserable. There are moments, stretches of minutes even! When I'm fine, when I forget, when I'm talking or listening or watching or even laughing, and enjoying myself--but when I'm no longer distracted, the fog descends again.  Sometimes I try to (and tonight I tried to), and sometimes I can shoulder it and lift it away, like Atlas, but the moment my concentration slips it descends again. And then, inexplicably, there will be days of light, or at least forgetfulness. Or light. I just wish they would stay. I need some counseling and some medication. I need some hope.

Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Language

We talk about people having "baggage" as though it's a situation that only happens on occasion--as though we aren't all basically luggage racks, rolling around and picking up bags until our wheels wear out.

That moment.

That time I was drowning six years ago was so typical of me. It was exactly like now. I never called for help. I tried to pick up other people's shit while I was in the water. I tried to swim in the floodwaters and then got confused when I didn't make it anywhere. I gave up and let the water throw me around and still didn't call for help, even mentally, until the last second when I thought something along the lines of "God, just so you know, I'm going to need some oxygen right about now, or I'll die." And then I suddenly knew which way was "up," and kicked as hard as I could, and barely broke the surface in time. All that is textbook me, except for the part where I asked for and accepted help. It's funny how many different kinds of drowning there are.

Friday, November 20, 2009

New Moon* tonight, and

Going to Alabama with David tomorrow afternoon! We had been planning to drive, of course, but then his mother called yesterday morning and said she'd found cheap-ish plane tickets and wanted to fly us down there. I guess I shouldn't have been so surprised to hear that from such a generous woman. I tried to talk her out of it, but she bought them, and we're flying out at 4pm. I'm hoping it'll go well. I mean, David's mom and grandparents are awesome, I think they're great, but he and I have both been a little down lately, and that's always hard for me to handle. So we'll see. We're flying back up on Tuesday and heading toward our own respective family Thanksgiving celebrations.



*New Moon: I am pretty excited and slightly ashamed. Kelly, Maggie, Chloe, Taylor, and Kelly's and my two mentees, China and Christina, are going to the 11 pm showing tonight. Let's not even get into how stupid it was for me to invite a 15 year old who lives about 35 minutes from me and God knows how far from the theater to a movie that won't end until at least 1 am. I just wasn't thinking. But hopefully it'll go well and I won't get into a car accident on my way home at 3 am or whatever.

Other movies I want to see that are out now or will be shortly: Precious; Pirate Radio, Men Who Stare At Goats. I feel like there were others, but I have no idea what they were. David is determined to get me to see Big Trouble In Little China. I cannot wait until Voyage of the Dawn Treader comes out, but that won't be for a while. (Oh, woe to me.)

Wednesday, November 18, 2009

Starlings

 If you haven't payed attention to flocks of starlings in flight, you have been missing out. I'm not sure there's anything I'd rather watch. When you tally up starlings and leaves fluttering down onto the water and rain blowing through street lights in the wind, and schools of fish and snow sinking from the clouds to the earth, and fields of poppies standing by the roadside, and banks of fog rolling in and whisping past, and families of ducks and geese dabbling, waddling, calling and flying, and trees bending and shaking in a storm, and sunlight trickling and filtering through it all, and water misting and flying and falling and rushing through the air and through our bodies and above and beneath and through and across the earth, and sparks and woodsmoke flying up into the night, and herds of goats wandering down the valley in the distance, and phosphorescence lighting up waves and beaches, and the stars and moon shining from behind strips of cloud, and fireflies dancing above a black lake and lighting up trees like Christmas in the dead of an august night, and bats swirling up into the twilight, I don't even know what you get. Heaven. I know nature and life can be hard and cruel, but it's difficult for me not to believe in grace and goodness in a world filled with so much reckless beauty.








Monday, November 16, 2009

I have a job!

Let me say that one more time:

I have a job! In sales, which basically makes me feel like I'm selling my soul to the devil, but you know, no big deal...

Sunday, November 15, 2009

Well.

From Momma Bear's (Chris's mom's) status message tonight:

Well it looks like Chris's suicide may indeed have been an accident. You can definitely tell he slipped and fell, there is no denying that. I do not believe the Chris we all knew and loved would think or believe he did it on purpose. Unfortunately when you play dangerous games (like Russian Roulette) you sometimes lose. Chris thought Lacey [his ex-girlfriend, probably the main person responsible for the state he was in in the first place] was on her way over. But because he had been drinking he was not thinking.

Saturday, November 14, 2009

I want these so badly. It's a problem.




And when I say "so badly," what I mean is that when I think about the fact that they'll probably all be sold out everywhere by the time I have money, I seriously consider crying. Particularly since these will almost certainly be all gone, too:


I wear 10W, in case anyone was wondering.

And they're called Aster Mary Janes (black leather and winter blue suede, respectively), by Softspots.

Friday, November 13, 2009

Liddell* River / God is in the rain**

The stream sweeps joyfully past
after the storm, barely contained
in its banks. It rushes by,
full and lithe,
leaping to leap
and running to run,
fat and swift and happy.

I can hear it singing:
"God made me for a purpose,
but He also made me fast.
When I run,
I feel his pleasure."


*Eric Liddell

**From V For Vendetta, the movie. (Possibly the graphic novel as well, but I have no idea.)

Recycling

(As in, double-posting, from opendiary.com. Don't hate.)

It's been raining almost ceaselessly for three days and doesn't really show signs of stopping soon, and I have remembered that temperature inversions are the work of the devil. So there's that.

Living with my parents is still happening and still not awesome, and not having a job makes that still less awesome. I spend a lot of time looking forward to visits with David, who, when I am with him lately, almost inevitably makes me smile.

I was poking around on Sheenagh Pugh's website and trying to reconcile myself to the fact that she actually hates the poem "Sometimes," which I've got posted on my front page on Opendiary, when I saw her reference another poet: Jenny Joseph. (Ok first of all, what a name.) It seems that I'm in the business of liking one-hit-wonder poems, because I think this one is great. It's called "Warning." It pretty much encompasses* my dreams of pensionerhood.

When I am an old woman I shall wear purple
With a red hat which doesn't go, and doesn't suit me.
And I shall spend my pension on brandy and summer gloves
And satin sandals, and say we've no money for butter.
I shall sit down on the pavement when I'm tired
And gobble up samples in shops and press alarm bells
And run my stick along the public railings
And make up for the sobriety of my youth.
I shall go out in my slippers in the rain
And pick flowers in other people's gardens
And learn to spit.


You can wear terrible shirts and grow more fat
And eat three pounds of sausages at a go
Or only bread and pickle for a week
And hoard pens and pencils and beermats and things in boxes.


But now we must have clothes that keep us dry
And pay our rent and not swear in the street
And set a good example for the children.
We must have friends to dinner and read the papers.


But maybe I ought to practice a little now?
So people who know me are not too shocked and surprised
When suddenly I am old, and start to wear purple.




*This is not true, because my vision also involves things like cats, and watching PBS all the time, and yelling loudly about "young whippersnappers" and cracking people on the head with my cane. And reminiscing about how when I was a girl, everything was so much better/people knew how to do stuff/I had it way worse than all you goodfornothings/we knew the value of a dollar/we ate misery for breakfast and liked it.

Thursday, November 12, 2009

Jobs and weather

I had a job interview this morning, and was asked back for a second interview this coming Monday! So that's promising. And exciting. I was also emailed to set up a phone interview for an ethnographer position on Tuesday. Also a plus.

After I came home I went out again to see my friend Anna. It had been a while, and we ended up hanging out all day, which was pretty great. I took the scenic route home through the rain, really a heavy mist at this point, which has continued uninterrupted for two days now. I have this near obsession with the motion of groups--flocks of birds, groups of people, clouds, schools of fish, raindrops. I love to watch things move. I stared up into the yellowed streetlights the whole way home, watching the rain drift through. It was beautiful.

I love, too, rainy nights in winter where the rain slicks onto the ground like a mirror, reflecting everything back in sharp contrast and bright colors. The brightness against the dark almost never fails to make me think of Christmas, regardless of the actual season.

Friday, November 6, 2009

Things I Am Sick Of

Joblessness (that's a shocker right there, I know)
Broke-ness (related to the above, obviously)
Recurring angst
boyfriend related
job or money related
whatthefuckamIdoingwithmylife related
living-with-my-parents related
Living 3000 miles away from my best best best friend



While we're on the topic, I meant to post this a little while ago:

Things upon which I would like to spend money:
plane tickets
gas
books
cds
gifts for friends
shoes/clothes/etc
did I say plane tickets?
TEFL certification

Things upon which I need to spend money:
student loans
gas
TEFL certification (already signed up)
new contacts
probably, an ankle x-ray
household bills (I really should be helping)

Things upon which I am currently able to spend money:
gas, sometimes.

fml.




On another note, I love this Penny Arcade quote from today's comic:
"Hail, Grey Warden. Your master once made a promise to me. Will you abide by that promise?"
"Word. I'm always abiding by shit."

Tuesday, November 3, 2009