Well, I should be writing my paper on One Hundred Years of Solitude, which I got a reprieve from last weekend when I got the Sunday-afternoon email that Monday's class was canceled. I immediately jumped away from the computer and told myself I'd work on the paper all week; that promise manifested into about twelve minutes of surface-level thought about comparisons between the Universal Baseball Association and OYoS.

I don't know why even a two-page paper gives me such agiada, especially considering that I am in a creative writing program. It's deadlines that do it, completely undermining all will and ability to pump out a crappy little paper that my teacher barely cares about.

Also on my to-do list: start the cinnamon ice cream for tonight's dessert: apple crisp and ice cream. Yum. Usually I leave the ice cream to Eric to make when we have friends for dinner, but he's actually busy doing his homework, so I guess I'll handle this one. It will let me procrastinate and get points from my husband. Awesome.

I keep hearing/reading from writers that they have these disturbing schedules. The playwright who came to talk to our class on Saturday gets up at 4:30 every morning; Mary Oliver gets up and goes hiking and then writes all before she has to get ready to go to work.

Yesterday I set my alarm for 5:30, but as usual I didn't have the willpower to obey it. This morning Eric was getting up early to go in to work, so I did actually get up at 5:15; amazing to me but probably to no one else.

It was productive, I guess. I collected a bunch of rough drafts with potential to revise for submission, and I wrote another 1.5 pages of my short story, also extremely rough. But even though that might not be much progress, the best part is my feeling of accomplishment. Even if I didn't accomplish anything. I still got out of my comfy bed at quarter after five. I probably only got one line that I'll actually use, though.

And it really is peaceful and beautiful that early. The sun is just now climbing over the rowhomes across the street, but the sky has been steadily lightening for the past hour.

The crappy part: now I have to go get ready for work, then work all day.

the wedding went well, but I have to say: anxiety dreams are there for a reason.

I just sit down and look at this big white box with a thin-line of black squaring it off, and then I realize, wtf I've got nothing of interest to write anyway.

I have to write an article about communication & training in the corporate world and I could just about give a fuck about it. Fuck. This semester is totally destroying me, what with planning a wedding and working full time and doing community service as well. I'm exhausted and my brain doesn't care anymore. Anyone want to write me an article?

I'm going to play Sims for awhile.

tired. so tired.......

sometimes, don't you wish you were a mutant, like an x-man? also, in the movie, why doesn't wolverine have that awesome yellow suit?

I should be writing my story for class, but I'm uncompelled. I mean, I'm compelled by the story, but it's so hard to make yourself sit down to write.

hello...hello...is this thing on...?

it's been some big number of days since I've updated. I think I'm done with journaling in general. I never write in my (totally awesome) paper journal anymore, and I barely read anyone else's journals. The rush of year-end recapping and new-year projecting was underwhelming, not because I think I'm the coolest and everyone else a booger-eating jerk, but because I've been too busy doing stuff. Last year and this year seem, gasp, like one and the same - time. I still go to work, I'm still stacked with tasks there. I still have writing to do. My family was all over the place like a bug ingestation (that's right) for the holidays; a tree even popped up in my living room to completely bewilder my poor cat. Horrible but true story: I was cooking with my mom in the kitchen (duh), and I opened the silverware drawer and saw a roach in the spoon-part of the tray. I quickly got what I needed and closed the drawer with a bang in the hopes that the critter would skitter away. A moment later my mom was like, "oh, I need a fork" or something and reached for the drawer. It took all I had not to yelp, "I'll get that!" and push her out of the way but instead I acted nonchalant but totally stared at the drawer as it slowly opened....and she reached her hand in...and nothing was there. Phew. Close one. My mom would have canceled Christmas eve dinner, seriously, if some roach had jumped on her hand while she was reaching for a utensil. We would have gone to the pizza place on the corner. Where they probably have more roaches than anyone else in the world. Plus rats.

I made a resolution for 2006, which I'm not sharing with anyone for fear that I will fail. I did a bunch of stuff last year. 2005 seems like it was a pretty difficult year world-wide; struggles abounded. All told the year put me in the positive, though for me new year's eve was glum and new year's day quiet and even glummer. It's one of those days where you just look at yourself, and your life, and there's nothing anyone else can do about it. But - and I hate to tempt fates here - I'm happy. I'm working at an ok job, I'm in school, I'm writing. I'm gonna get married this year, to a boy I have loved since 1995. Still, in 2005 my brother went to war, and that's no joke. It's not like 1984 anymore, where Eurasia is always warring with Oceania in some far-off, never-seen land; he went there, he is connected to me, he could have died. Many people already have.

i'm going now to finish cooking some shrimps and rice for dinner.

I never update anymore. Life is so tiring that it scares me. Walking to work, working all day, and elbowing my way onto the bus in the evening takes all of my energy, so when I get home it's the best I can do to cook dinner for us, turn on the TV, and then read for a little while before bed. I'm getting old, of course, and it's not always like this: Thursdays are especially nice, with the French Me happy hour at a nearby bar. My friend Beth rode the bus home with me, like you used to when you were in elementary school and your mom would write a note for the bus driver and principal so they knew you were accounted for and not being abducted by your friend's family. Ridiculous paranoia, and yet, I made sure Beth had her permission slip.

My cat sees or hears a ghost in the hallway. She always freaks out around this time and squawks and arches her back at nothing; if I open the door, sometimes I hear a rustling approaching from below even if no one is there. Poor esp kitty.

I'm going to Mexico early style on Saturday morning, my sister and parents will be there to greet me and it's going to be four days of south of the border fun. I'll take pictures. I'm sure youll all want to see.

Beer's kicking in, time to watch taped Veronica Mars and pass out.

LJ Interests meme results

1. being forgetful:
   when I realize that I've forgotten something, it makes this fluttery scared feeling in my stomach and I have to almost physically take control of myself.
2. cooking:
   Today I'm going to make eggplant parmesan for today and ropa vieja for the football game tomorrow! with yellow rice!
3. fiction:
   isn't everyone in love with this?
4. giving:
   I'd like to move my career in the direction of philanthropy, but I feel like the world of non-profit organizations is anything but organized. It seems like people have the best of intentions to go into non-profits, but somehow the beauracracy there has warped everything. I'm starting my own way, learning from the outside in.
5. kirosawa:
   awesome.
6. monty python:
   I've been watching Monty Python on my digital cable lately, and sadly I think I found this show funnier when I was in high school. It just doesn't make me laugh as much anymore.
7. piero della francesca:
   Used to be my favorite painter; his fresco cycle of the Legend of the True Cross rivals the Sistine Chapel, but doesn't conquer. After Piero it was Jacopo Tintoretto, who totally cheated his way into winning a competition to decorate La Scuola di San Rocco in Venice. The School turned out to be a masterpiece, Tintoretto was way ahead of his time even though he left Venice like one time in his whole life. Now I don't know if I have a favorite painter. I'm more into contemporary art now - sculpture, installation art.
8. sewing:
   I need to do more of this, though happily I'm knitting again and getting to the end of a five-year project. I need to start back on Missy's quilt, if I'm going to be done by her wedding.
9. the rainbow connection:
   Why are there so many songs about rainbows?
10. words:
    

Enter your LJ user name, and 10 interests will be selected from your interest list.

Last night saw the remarkable start to my creative poetry workshop. For the past few weeks I've been a little worried about the trip home from my new school, which is out in the dark, quiet suburbs. I have to walk down a very sparsely populated, residential street with only a few streetlamps to get to the train station. I've been building scenarios in my head where some murderer/mugger/rapist is running down the street towards me and there are only darkened houses on either side of me and no one to hear me yelling. This street is seriously something out of the Berenstein Bears Haunted Treehouse book, with big twisting elms and spiders skittering all over the place. The lights and busy-ness of the city has seemed so much safer and I've been psyching myself out a little bit.

Well. First, I took the train out to school and the twenty-minute trip took an hour and ten minutes. SEPTA sucks. A disabled train chugged along ever so slowly ahead of us, delaying us and making me late for class. One good thing: a security van from the college seems to make rounds to the train station and the driver picked me up and delivered me to Lawrence, so I was only 1/2 hour late to class. Another thing: it was the first class, and no one really cared. So class got over early, and I and another girl who had been on my train stayed to talk to the teacher, and we walked back to the station together. It's nice to have someone else in class who will be commuting with me, and walking down the creepy street with me. She's a quiet New England girl; she likes the fucking Patriots.

I feel good getting off the train, and I decided to take the bus home - there were people all around me, I have nothing more to worry about after getting past the scary street. I get off the bus and start walking home, and notice three teenage boys riding their bikes around. A few minutes after I turn the corner onto my street I see them ride across the street again. I'm walking on the dark side of the street, next to an old penitentiary that is now empty and across from a row of homes. Suddenly there's a tall black kid walking right towards me on the sidewalk, from where the kids had just passed. I'm all the way over on the right side of the sidewalk and he's right on top of me. It really freaks me out and as he passes, I feel infintely relieved. Then I hear a lady on the other side of the street calling out, and I turn to see that the guy has turned back and is coming towards me again, so I cross over the street to the woman and she tells me that the boys on the bikes stopped and were obviously waiting for me, or holding the bike for their friend to to do whatever and get back to them. She and her husband and son walked me home and I was seriously freaked out for the rest of the evening. Who would have thought that north Philly is more dangerous than the goddamn suburbs?

well, it's been two months. that's a long time, and though I've been reading other people's journals, I haven't felt like clicking on that little "Update" button - not that a lot hasn't been happening around here. So since I'm just getting back in the swing of this, I'll make a list:

1. I started my new job. I have terribly mixed feelings about this. I love working downtown, my fifteen minute commute which I walk half of; all the people at my (small) office are very nice, and I work with my friend Beth; I'm rarely on the phone, which is wonderful compared to my last job. But this past week I've been slacking a little bit, and it's way too early to start slacking. I discovered TWoP, and have been catching up on my new favorite show Veronica Mars. And one of the guys I work with came over and was peering at my screen and I didn't feel like clicking guiltily away, so he saw what I was reading; not that everyone else doesn't surf around on the internet, and no one expects me to work 100% of every day, but still - that's not what I want my boss to see me doing. Also, I accidentally transfered millions of dollars to the wrong bank account for a client. Seriously. Millions. On the other hand, same boss-man who saw me slacking also paid me a very nice compliment about my work a couple of weeks ago. So I just need to pull myself together and buckle down from now on, and everything will be fine. No more cute little Veronica Mars updates at work!

2. I registered for a graduate class: Creative Poetry Workshop! I am so fucking excited about this. The director of the (small) program requested a writing sample before I could register, since I'm not matriculated in any program yet. When I went out to an information session at the school, she pulled me aside and told me how excited she and the faculty were about the sample I sent in. Subsequently, I applied to their MFA program in creative writing and have secured all three letters of reference with little to know difficulty. Now, a couple of years ago, when I was really frustrated with how little my college degree had prepared me to do anything more than think about stuff, I told myself that my graduate degree was going to be something practical. So, is creative writing practical? Of course not. But it's also what I love to do. So what if I never actually get a job doing it.

3. I might have a chance to write some Philadelphia articles for a tourist guide.

4. I've been one cranky bitch to Eric lately; it all has to do with how messy the house is and it has made me feel just like my Mom. It's so disturbing when these indicators of your genetics rear up and remind you that you're not as different from those crazy people who raised you as you think you are, not that I don't love and respect my mother but she's insane. Again, it's something that I just have to move forward, away from, and try to keep under check from now on. I've talked to my sister about this and am relieved to hear that it's normal, she does it too; this doesn't make it any more acceptable that the things I always swore I'd never say or do are spewing out of my mouth uncontrollably.

5. It's my birthday next week; 29 years.

Everything is official, pretty much. At least, the things that possibly could be official are semi-official. Kind of.

I got the job, after a day of serious drama last Friday. First they turned me down for the job, because of a tiny criminal act on my part back in 1997, and they made me feel like I total ex-con freak. Then later that day they reversed that decision, largely because the head of the office where I'm going to work is close to the president of the whole company and she wants me to work there, and she gets what she wants. So on Tuesday I gave my just-less-than two-weeks notice at this butthole of a job. It seriously is a butt, a big old smelly one. They are taking 2/3 of my last paycheck because I owe them back from vacation time I took, but didn't deserve, along with tuition reimbursement from last February. I actually owe them another $1200 on top of that but, will they see that money? No. They'll get what I feel I owe them: 2/3 of my last paycheck.

So now I have to make it through four and a half more days of work. Next Thursday is my last day, then I'll have a three-day weekend, then I start my new job on the 18th. I am as excited as I could possibly be for a new job; I really do think this will be at least interesting work, if not exactly the career I would have chosen for myself.

This weekend we're going down to Annapolis again for yet another wedding. Another Johnny reunion will take place, just a little calmer this time; it won't be manic or TOO drunken, though there will be manic drunks in attendance. It will be nice to be able to spend some time with people instead of hurrying through a ten minute conversation so that you can catch up with the twenty-seven other people you haven't seen in five years and won't see for another five. Eric and I are staying with Meghan and Patrick, which Leslie thinks is a bad idea b/c she says Meg will get drunk and emotional about not yet being engaged. Then again, Leslie still hasn't forgiven Meghan for sleeping with her ex-boyfriend seen years ago, before any of us even knew that Leslie existed. Anyway. It will be a nice, relaxing weekend I think. Serious sushi dinner at Joss tomorrow night, at least. Yum. Too bad I'm totally broke. Suck.

I have all of my stuff packed up at my desk, it is going into the trunk of my car this evening and then will sit there until next week, when I have to turn my car in. Funny thing is, the desk doesnt look much different than when I was actually supposed to be doing work. Know why? Because I never do anything at this job, because it is a boring piece of crap.

On Monday we went to a friend's house to watch fireworks on their roof deck. This was a guy I had gone to the Junior Prom with back in like 1992. Now he's married and has a baby and friends with babies, so Eric and I were the only unmarried, babiless couple there. It was great. The house was really nice, and baout five blocks from where we live; E & I randomly ran in to Josh and Stacy last Friday at the Live 8 sound check, before the rainstorm soaked us.

Well it's now time for lunch.

My dreams have been mirroring and mocking my life, and while I'm glad that I'm remembering my dreams again, I could do without the unconscious self-mockery. This morning I dreamt that I got the job I've been working my ass off for, but only after I met with the president of the company tonight and tomorrow. Two more meetings I'd have to slip into my already-crazed schedule without any more guaruntee than before. In real life, these people have been running me ragged. They brought me in for three interviews with nine different people, out of an office of about twenty-five. They did an FBI background check, complete with fingerprints, that showed my stupid DUI charge from fucking 1997, and then sent me to the courthouse to get my records copied, notarized, faxed and then overnighted to them. And after taking up so much time, and making me feel like a criminal, I still don't know if I've got the job. It's insane. In another part of my dream, I was sent to jail for this criminality. Eric asked me to let him know how the uniforms were, since his company had made them.

There are two happy outcomes of my recent dreaming spurt: in one dream, I saw a friend of mine who I haven't seen in eight years, and who I've been thinking about off and on since returning to Pennsylvania. This young woman has effectively dropped off the face of the earth, for me at least, and it makes me sad. Last night I ran into her on the streets of my hometown, and we went for coffee together and caught up, and hugged. The other happy aspect is that my dreams seem to be taking care of any wedding anxiety I might have. While I'm not at all anxious in my day to day life about the impending marriage, my dreams have created fantastic scenarios with destroyed dresses, foodless receptions, or missing guests. My dream self has had to deal with all this worry, while I can go about my waking life stress-free. Thanks, subconscious!

I have this weird blotchy sunburn from where I haphazardly spread (or didn't spread) the sunblock while at the beach last Sunday. And Sunday wasn't even very sunny. Some sun did peek out when we left the beach for the pool, and I think my marathon hopping around/floating in the cool chlorinated water is where the most damage was done. Swimming pools have the ability to make me into a fool. I usually spend the time floating about inhaling and exhaling to see if I can keep my whole body just touching the surface. Or else, I'll bounce up and down for about an hour. Just hop up out of the water, then sink back down blowing out through the nose, then popping back up again. It's extremely meditative but also makes me look like a loon.

Last Friday I left work at noon. I had worked straight through every day at work that week with no lunch breaks so that I could leave early without having to use any time. I made it to the airport at 1:30 and had a delectable lunch of a yellow tail hand roll and fried crab wontons at the Asian Bistro at the airport. With a Sapporo to wash it all down. I left the restaraunt feeling great; it was the perfect start to my relaxing vacation. Little did I know what the future held.

Eight hours later I was still sitting in the airport, at a new gate, waiting to board the plane. I had read almost every page of the 150-page Debut Fiction edition of the New Yorker. That is a lot of New Yorker reading, but without the magazine I would have had to lift my head and take in the dismal surroundings. For most of those hours I was at a gate filled with three airplanes' worth of passengers and faltering air conditioning. There was one Yoko Ono-ish attendant at the gate, trying to answer all of our questions, but only one gentleman lost his temper. I made friends with an older British couple who were going to see their daughter and grandchild in West Palm Beach, and a Pakistani man with whom I kept trading off my seat as we got up to check on our respective flights. Eventually I went to another gate and got a boarding pass for the next flight to WPB which I had double booked for in the beginning of the whole ordeal. We finally took off at about 10:30 when my original flight was scheduled to leave at 3:25. My brother and sister picked me up at the airport, and we went to my aunt and uncles, had a drink, and went to bed - but of course, I couldn't sleep after snoozing almost the whole way down.

Saturday afternoon I found the most beautiful, perfect wedding dress in the midst of the 57,895 dresses I tried on. The changing room was a slew of lace and silk organza. The only problem with the dress is that it costs 7 times the amount I want to spend on a dress, so it's out. It is sooooooooooooo pretty, though. It almost broke my poor little heart. But then I realized that I don't care all that much, and that I can hopefully find something just as good within my budget. That's what everyone tells me, anyway.

The next four days were spent lounging at the beach or the pool and getting that weird burn. It's on my ankles, but my calves are still white; my thighs are red as is just below my boobs, my chest is red but the back of my arms isn't. It's odd. But at least I'm not pasty white as I usually am at all times of the year and am a mortal embarrassment when I put on a bathing suit.

Yesterday I had a stupid job interview and tonight I'm going to NYC for the weekend. Cheers!

I've been doing lots of stuff lately. Lots of things that don't necessarily need to be itemized and detailed in online or paper journals; but who will believe me when I say I'm doing stuff? I won't even believe myself, a year from now, when I look back on how little I've been chronicling. Maybe it's because most of the stuff has been done by myself or with Eric, I've been little social. Every now and again I'll see friends and family, usually in overwhelming doses that leave me sated for anyone else's company for weeks and weeks. Like Croquet. It was like I was back at St. John's (uncannily, that's exactly where I was, only a couple thousand miles from my St. John's), at a party, and years hadn't passed, and we were drunk and happy all together. This has happened a couple of times over the past two years, mostly for people's weddings, and it's going to happen again in July and August. The nice thing about Croquet is that no one had to put on fancy suits and dresses and parade around and cater to their families; it was just us, for the most part. Then I went to NYC a couple weekends later and hung out for Zach and Erika's going away party, and that was nice too except with that hard-edge of NYC-hanging-out, represented that night by a wasted old British dude who was creepy and starey and following me around. I had to have a friend walk me to the subway. Croquet was so calm, the weather so beautiful, the obligations so non-existent. I grilled burgers for fifty people! I talked and swing-danced with Carl! I revived my old questioning and self-doubt, wondering if anyone really loved me and at the same time feeling so loved. Eric had fun too, and my brother was there, and the only downfall was that Eric wouldn't dance with me. We need to get that boy some dancing lessons before our wedding.

This weekend was low-key, relaxing, wonderful. Just what I needed before I start my marathon family reunion next weekend. On Friday we got into a silly spat over dinner at London and crankily went home. Yes, maybe that wasn't so relaxing but it was still funny. On Saturday we slept in and snuggled hard core. We were trying to find reasons to actually get out of bed and the most convincing one turned out to be food. After breakfast we each took a room - Eric the kitchen, it was my turn for the bathroom - and cleaned the shit out of it (me, literally.) Those rooms are so spotlessly clean now, it is glorious. Now all I have to do is dust the bedroom and living room and straighten up before my mom comes inspecting around on Saturday! Exciting. Then we walked down to the home brewing store and bought ingredients with which to brew a batch of beer! Aha! Eureka! I love beer. It is so crisp and delectable. Of course didn't start brewing until five, which meant the five gallons of water, malt and hops (called the wort, yes that is gross but that's what it's called) took forever to cool down so we could add yeast. Beer! It's like alcoholic, drinkable bread! And who doesn't love bread? Anyway, we had to take everything out of the fridge and leave the wort in there overnight so that it would cool enough to add yeast. Eric fell asleep in front of the Dave Chappelle show marathon and I played Civ III until it was time for bed; of course, the next morning the wort was too chilled so we had to wait again. So we did laundry and walked to the TLA to get a video. As we were getting ready to throw the yeast in, an old boyfriend from high school called me! HA. He is a nice boy, but I'm suspicious he was making a booty call of utmost desperation, since he was telling me he'd moved back to his parents house (he used to live with a girl) and I haven't talked to him in years. He said he was flipping through numbers. Ha, I say. I don't know if I should call him back, because he's a really nice guy who I wouldn't mind hanging out with but I'm engaged and if he's looking for a woman, well, you know. I'm not interested.

Sunday night was probably my favorite part of the whole weekend. We started watching "City of God," which is pretty phenomenal but also extremely violent, but had had enough of all the kids shooting each other after an hour and a half, and we decided to take a break and go for a walk. The walk turned into an 18-mile hike, of course, where we went through Fairmount and over the bridge to Lemon Hill, across Kelly Drive to the Azalea garden where we watched a group of Asian kids playing whole-hearted but unskilled ultimate frisbee; over to the Water Works next to the Art Museum, where we watched the sun go down; up the Art Museum hill and down the famous steps out front; then back home. We had dinner and I played Civ III (which I'm totally dominating) and watched "Clash of the Titans", one of the best movies of all time, before Eric called me in to bed time. Yum.

Thankfully work is slow today. I had a kind of ditsy new wholesaler girl sit with me this morning for a couple of phone calls; now she's being hit on by my goofy boss. He had to go into his office with her and close the door, of course; now just giggles and her voice raised in merriment filter out every once in awhile as they confer. I had a strange call earlier where a disgruntled man asked me, "If you had wanted to buy a loaf of bread, and you opened the bag and saw a couple of apples, you wouldn't be happy, would you??" and when I said, "....nooo," he hung up.

For the love of sanity, people, please: do not read "The Hamilton Case". I started this book a month ago, and the only reason it would take me this long to read a book is because it is terrible, but I have the unfortunate aspect of my personality that impels me to finish any book that I begin. Unless it is completely hopeless. This book is obtuse, overdescriptive, nonsensical, full of characters that have little to no bearing on the plot, and is about 150 pages too long. I fully realize that this criticism is lame and too facile, but have had it about most of the new novels I've read over the past two years. Don't these people have editors? Don't these editors have the power to cut out the bullshit that an author can't bring herself to cut? If these novels (among them "The Effects of Light," "Amateur Marriage," "The Companions," to name a few) already went through a serious editting process, they must have been one and a half million pages to begin with.

Anyway. I had a pretty good weekend. On Friday night Eric and I went to see the Dali show at the Philly Art Museum, which was really totally awesome even though I'm not all that jazzed upa bout Dali. There were seven hundred thousand paintings and about three times as many people milling about before them; but we decided to take it slow, so the crowd wasn't too annoying. Actually at points it was almost surreal, the amount of people drifting quietly before these incredible, shocking, hugely metaphorical paintings. It was very nice. Then we walked home and ate mac and cheese and veggie buffalo wings, which were surprisingly good to eat, and fell asleep in front of the tv like some old married couple. On Saturday we got up and walked over to the post office in the shady neighborhood that starts three blocks away from our house, then walked around the flea market that was on the block next to ours. Since Eric never lets me buy junk, I invited my friend Melissa to walk it with me for a second time without him, and I got a ring, a pin, and a pair of yoga pants and a shirt for less than $5. There was some cool stuff there but a lot of crap as well. I ran into a couple of other friends there and they came up to see our "new" apartment (new to them, that is) and then I cleaned and ironed after they left until E. came home from seeing his folks. Yesterday we rearranged the living room and it was so nice outside that we decided to go drink a couple of beers and eat a burger at London Grill. It was beautiful out and fun to watch all the fancily dressed Mother's Day families walking about after their brunches. Then we got naked and then we took a nap, so that I couldn't sleep last night and was up until 3 am watching shitty movies on TV.

So that was the weekend. It was nice and relaxing, and I will need the next two to get totally rested for when my mom visits in the end of the month.

I guess I should write, though I have too much/not much at all to say.

We've been so busy lately. The weekend after we went to Pittsburgh, my friend Read came to visit for two weeks. He wasn't really visiting us, particularly, which is a good thing because we would have had no time or energy to entertain him. He was coming to do a class at an art school/studio in Philly, and being poor, it was either crash on our airbed or sleep in the car. I can't let someone do that! It's weird, though, because I hadn't seen Read since we graduated from college almost FIVE years ago (egads!) until we met again at JB's wedding in Chicago. The funny thing is, I once had the hugest crush on him! Ha! Now Read is cooool, way cooler than when we were in school, and it's really hard to understand what I saw in that incarnation of him. Anyway. He was around for a couple of weeks, in the middle of which we went down to Annapolis for the annual game of croquet between St. John's (my old school) and the Naval Academy (a bunch of driveling ninnies.) (Just kidding about the ninnies.) The game was canceled but there were hoods from years past, we rented two houses next door to each other and got drunk, had barbecues in the rain, and danced. It was really fun, but it also brought back to me the strange insecurity I always used to feel all through school. Whenever I see my friends one-on-one, which is actually pretty often considering we all live in different parts of the country, I have the best time with them and feel lots of love and security in our friendship. But when we're all together, I'm always wondering if this person likes that person better than me, or whatever, and for days afterwards I'm all confused and sad again. Boo. But it was really fun anyway, my brother came and he hooked up with my friend Jim's sister, who is like five years older than him and some high-powered Washington D.C. lawyer lady. It was really cute, but she's a total rebound girl because my brother's girlfriend broke up with him the day after he got back from Iraq.

So this past weekend was the first weekend we haven't been travelling or had house guests for like, twenty seven months, so we filled it with chores. Which I will tell you tomorrow, since my boss just let me go early! ta

What are you supposed to do when the person you're closest to does something so out of character that you're completely thrown? For a loop? Acts so unkindly that it really hurts? Are you supposed to try and understand that the person is probably sad, feels badly about it, wants to change what they did? Or should you stand up to them and say "no, you f'd up."

Totally unrelated:
Last weekend we went out to Chicago for my friend Jacob's wedding. It was really fun, as that city always seems to be, and I saw people I haven't seen in five-six years. There was also questioning between Eric and I whether or not the bride would jilt him, but she didn't and they looked really happy. The first time I met her, she told me that she didn't understand why Americans were in such a hurry to get married (she was already engaged to Jacob at this time), since in Italy, where she's from, girls would rather just live with someone first. First of all, that's bullshit. Italian women are among the most voracious husband-hunters on the planet. Second of all, are Americans, in general, in a hurry to wed? I don't think so.

I love the school I went to, a very small liberal arts college in Santa Fe, because the students and alumni form a very tight-knit group. Even if we don't see each other for years, we are very quickly comfortable when we do meet again. There was a lot of drinking, staying up late, and shit-talking like the old days. There were tears shed, old pictures, little speeches of love to one another. Promises to stay in touch, that will go only sporadically kept. But I love and respect these people, and I know that, even if they aren't calling me all the time, they're thinking about me and the next time we'll see each other.

There were also lots of Italians there, and I got to practice a little bit of Italian. Which was fun. I can listen and understand, it's just conjuring up the words that is really difficult.

Next weekend I'm driving out to Pittsburgh to see my very depressed little brother. He just got back from Iraq last week and his girlfriend already broke up with him. I feel so bad for him. And now Eric has decided (non-negotiably) not to go, in protest to the fact that Jared has never come to visit us. I understand his point. But this is probably the worst time POSSIBLE to make this stand. I'm so confused and sad by what I see as totaly unkindness. Perhaps I should just get over it. Plus he said his decision was "non-negotiable." What is that crap? Isn't this a relationship? Handing down set-in-stone decrees seems anathema to the communication you need for the health of that relationship.

Also, I have to drive out by myself, which is annoying. But at the same time, it's a weekend without the old ball and chain!

I have been very sick for the past three or four days. I don’t remember exactly how long, because I’ve been coughing and sleeping for that time. Eric has taken very good care of me, driving me out to the doctor in a snowstorm (while not feeling well himself), making me lunch, organizing my medicine schedule, turning on the shower (and making sure the heat is on in the bathroom!) He did make me go out with him on Sunday night, while I was starting to feel crappy, and he made me help him empty the dishwasher. Humpf. Dr. Tedesco diagnosed bronchitis and prescribed steroids (for my throat that was so inflamed I couldn’t swallow) and antibiotics. I’m feeling a hundred times better but I’m still all woozy and not used to being out of bed in the bright, bright sunlight. It’s sort of like taking a weak hit of acid before coming to work; my fingers don’t type right, everything is wavery and doesn’t matter very much. And my brain feels like it’s melting out of my nose.

They were talking about terrorist websites on the radio today after announcing that Kofi Annan said that a nuclear attack by terrorists is very possible. A couple of years ago I would never have believed that report, but now it is so sadly real.


The day I moved to Bologna

1. I had to awkwardly ask my landlady’s girlfriend to give me a lift to the train station, since my bag was huge and I had no idea about taxis, and it was raining. I awkwardly hugged her when she dropped me off (people don’t hug in Italy, they kiss on the cheek) and invited her and Giuse to visit me there. Why would they?
a. My memories of her and Giuse include one night I came home after they had had a dinner party, and the kitchen was dark in candlelight and Barbara (I can’t believe I remember her name!) was sitting on Giuse’s lap, even though before they had tried to hide everything from G.’s senile mother. It must have been such a difficult relationship.
b. When I first arrived in Arezzo, a random guy I met outside of the hostel where I had stayed drove my jet-lagged ass over to Giuse’s apt. They both thought I was totally crazy.

2. It was still drizzling when I got to Bologna, and I had to wait until my landpeople got home before I could go to the apartment. I was shackled by this huge bag (why didn’t I just store it in one of the lockers?) and so I squatted on it outside the station, by a payphone, watching the mostly north African travelers come and go in taxis and buses. Instead of calling the people I just waited until the agreed-upon time and took a cab; when I arrived, they exclaimed – why hadn’t I just called? They’d been home for hours!

3. Reading “The Leaning Tower,” by Katherine Anne Porter, has brought back to me all the awkward, self-questioning, uncertainty, dignity-sucking ugliness that becomes a part of the ex-pat resident in a new land with confusing culture, stays with them, and translates into anger and discrimination towards the country’s residents.

things whose lameness annoys me
* people who keep insisting that they hate tv and never watch it (oooh, do you want a medal?)
* people who claim enlightenment only to distinguish themselves as better than other people


That's it. Only two today.
I think the livejournal has cursed me not to ever write in a rl journal ever again. I have two: the leather wrap-around beauty that Jenn let me buy in Italy, and the blue felt-covered one that my brother gave me for Christmas two years ago and has suffered some water damage, crinkling all the pages and the drawing he put in it. The leather one is too big to carry around with me, and the blue one is annoying because my brother gave it to me and I let it get damaged. I did imagine yesterday the simplicity of carrying my red satchel with just a journal in it, either one, and some pens. I mean, right now I have three manila folders (random ideas, school writing, and school - other people's stuff), a large blue Penn State notebook, my creative writing textbook (which I rarely read and find minimally helpful), at least two revolving library books (today, three: Collapse by Jared Diamond, Strange But True [set in Radnor, about a mile from here!], by John Searles [and poorly crafted, if I may say so], and Skin, a book of poems by April Lindner), my day planner and some pens and random scraps of paper (receipts, most likely.) Phew. All this is packed in a small red sack made of rather thin, but surprisingly strong, red material. Think of emptying my bag, and placing one simple journal in it (and MAYBE one book, maybe) and skipping off to work or to the coffee shop to write.

work-unrelated pictures I have tacked up to my cubicle walls:
* Sophe in a crazy vampire-faced twist, curled from tail to head.
* st. johns' calender, on march: two kids wokring on dna at a lab blackboard
* pic of esl and the fishpond (also on st. john's campus) covered in snow
* idea for my painting, sketched with pen and highlighter: sun in space with photons flying off

Last night my teacher used my story as an example for the whole class, in a good way. This makes me happy.

Tonight: call my sister, Meg and Leslie/ do laundry