love nest

My balcony has turned into an aviary Rodeo Drive. Finches and chickadees and songbirds are scuffling and mating and rolling all over the place in the snow outside my sliding glass doors. It's like extreme Discovery channel, live.

They're really quite acrobatic, if ferocious and unromantic.

Part of me wants to lean out the window and yell, "Hey! What gives? I'm writing a paper in here!" Another part of me finds it enormously funny. Another part of me witnesses the sudden, sweeping, falling-in-mid-air feats and finds it beautiful.

William Had a Headache Day

Today, January 30, marks the eve of William Had a Heachache Day, an illustrious holiday held in honor of the Western world's very own William Wordsworth.

Why honor him, you ask? Because you can.

The story is as follows:

Romantic Literature, Grove City College, 2003. A group of very bored students and one bored professor (don't deny it, Dr. Potter) finally escape the clutches of Wordsworth's many and endless poems of self-scrutiny and take a peek into the journal of his sister and nearly lifelong caretaker Dorothy -- only to discover that the journal is filled with endless maternal reactions of scrutizing William. (Not to mention phrases which William quite blatantly stole to put into his poems.) The students struggle with feelings of pity for Dorothy, whose life revolved around her brother to the extent that she recorded how grateful she was that she followed his advice to wear wool socks on chilly day, and scorn for William, who must have looked like an addled idiot mooning around lying under the trees , gathering sticks and feeling ill while those around him struggled to make a decent living.

With no apparent means of connecting to this bizarrely codependent sibling pair, the students continue reading exerpts from the Grasmere Journal of 1802 and make a sudden, startling discovery: On January 31st, Dorothy recorded, "Wm had slept very ill -- he was tired and had a bad headache."

A legacy is born.

Three students from that class -- Marianne, John, and myself -- began a quest to sympathize with William. We decided to celebrate William Had a Headache Day as the entirety of this pursuit. Here's how the celebration is conducted: On the night of Januray 30th we go out drinking, so that on the day of the 31st we too can say that we slept very ill, are tired and have a bad headache.

We want to see this holiday on the calendar, some glorious day in the future. In the meantime, we are spreading it to whomever we can. So grab a beer and celebrate tonight, if it fits within your moral compass. (Don't worry, Mom, I'm moderate as ever.) Let's indulge one of the few opportunities that exist to understand what it's like in the mind of William Wordsworth.

Ole!

the winter of my discontent

Hahaha, thanks everyone for your support in dealing with Wretched Tim. Characteristically I have heard nothing from him since his unwelcome appearance at work, but when I do...

Perhaps Feminist Sarah will put in a few words. She's relaxed a lot since the end of the patriarchal domination of thought at Grove City, but this incident has her pissed off and rallying. Although what I think she'll say is more along the lines of, "Go to your house tonight? No thanks. We seem to have different expectations. You're busy and want what's convenient. I'm busy and expect sacrifices in return for the ones I make. Clearly this isn't going anywhere. In the future, if you're interested in a girl, call her once in awhile, even when you're not home. You might hold onto her longer. Good luck with work and there's no need to call me again. Bye."

After which I will mail him back the scarf he lent me. But I think I'll keep the Chinese fans. Those were a gift. You know, way back near Thanksgiving.

So today is witnessing the finalization of all the stuff I have to put together for my Notre Dame application. Leave it to me to leave it all to the last minute. Well, it always gets done.

I've been mulling over the phrase "the winter of my discontent." (Bonus points if you can name the author and work.) A song on the Muzak Ann Taylor soundtrack for the month of January had that line in it, and I appreciated the artist's literary taste. What a brilliant phrase. And entirely applicable right now, as I search for a replacement to my Gymboree job that will pay me by the year and give me enough to save a lot of it. Also the winter of being outside the academic world where I feel most secure and at-home. (But, please God, not for long.)

future wax!

It appears that my immune system is defeating my malady all on its own. All on its own, that is, with the help of Tylenol, Zicam, Vicks, Robitussin, and vitamin C. I highly recommend all of these products. Even if they turn out to be merely psychosomatic.

Graduate application almost done. A few more touches. Whew.

I will also be looking for a new job. I won't be quitting Ann Taylor, but this is the slow season and I can't be guaranteed enough hours. Plus I'm tired of being desperately poor. Poor or fair to middling I could deal with, but desperately poor is no longer satisfying. I'll be inquiring today of a position I heard about driving mentally handicapped individuals to doctor's appointments and so on. This job, according to the grapevine, starts at thirty grand. If that doesn't work, I'll be hitting up the classifieds. My BA should get me something.

And just when I thought my life was nice and slow and regular...

Wretched Tim stopped by work yesterday. I've never spelled out the whole story, so here it is in a nutshell: Wretched Tim is a Handsome Young Man I met at the Boring Church a couple of months ago. It seemed that interest was sparking: He invited me over to his newly bought house a few times, nothing remotely compromising happened, just fun times of hanging out. Yet he didn't call very often, he never picked me up to take me anywhere, and we never really went on a date. He travels a lot with his job, so I decided slow was best and determined not to be the pursuer, since that's gotten me in trouble before.

Just before Christmas he had a housewarming party at his home, which I was unable to attend due to a late night of work. At church the day of the party I offered to swing by afterward, but he said, "Well, most everyone will have gone home, so there's no point in you coming over." (He also rejected the cookies I had baked and brought to send along even though I couldn't be there. He rejected my cookies!) I was good and hurt for a day or two, but then I shrugged it off and went on with my life. He went home to California for Christmas and I hadn't heard from him since. Then, after five weeks of silence, he pops in at work.

Hell. Apparently in Wretched Tim World it's perfectly reasonable to leave a girl hanging for over a month while he goes home and travels for business and does whatever an ambitious busy person does, and then come back to South Bend and look her up and expect her to be thrilled. I greeted him coolly and politely. When he asked if I'd be at Club 23 with the grad students that night, I said that I wasn't sure; I was fighting some kind of bug and was afraid the smoke would upset my lungs, but it depended on what my roommate wanted to do. He said he was leaving on business for the week but we would catch up when he got back. I blandly said I'd be around and he left. Then I fumed for the rest of the day.

I'd rather he had decided I was not what he was looking for, as I thought he had, than think so little of me as to reserve me for whatever scraps of time he has left over in South Bend. I'm better than that.

the vicks queen

Erdrich should have written a novel with that title. But let's be honest, The Beet Queen is much cooler.

Anyway, I'm currently wearing Vicks VapoRub for the first time since I was about ten. I hated it as a child. Mom smeared it all over my chest anytime I had a cough or cold, swaddled me in cloths that inevitably rolled up over my face, and tucked me in. Now that I'm fighting something that apparently wants to become strep or bronchitis, I figured I'd invest in some Vicks as one of those adult I-don't-want-to-but-it's-good-for-me exercises.

It was just as cold and sticky and unpleasant as I remembered, but when I rolled under my flannel sheets (sky-blue with clouds all over them) I had a weird out-of-body memory of doing the same thing as a kid and feeling parented and safe. So now this chilly ritual that will in all likelihood make my skin break out is a measure of comfort. Now that Mom isn't here to spoil me when I'm sick, I have to spoil myself in whatever small ways I can.

I read an interesting article in Oprah's magazine the other day, by a woman whose name I can't remember. I think she's a psychologist. She addresses women and the culturally embedded idea of the scarcity of love -- that we have to find that one person who will intuit and meet all our needs. In essence, most women look for a man who is a blend of father and mother -- someone strong and authoritative and yet nurturing and caretaking. Which is a good thing gone wrong; we can't expect to be parented ever again. Any relationship we enter into must be one of equals...not that we can't have needs met (that's what friends and family are for...love in the plural), but that we can't be children again.

This made me first of all grateful to be a Christian. No human being will ever parent me again, but I will have all my needs perfectly known and met by God. But also this made me realize that I am not in fact going to be parented by a person any more. I have to do most things for myself and not whine about it. So here I am rubbing Vicks on myself.

And a note to all you folks out there...my roommate is one fantastic cook. Come visit and see what I mean!

eat me, bill collectors.

Verizon thinks I'm going to pay them more than I owe. Aren't they funny.

So this whole bill thing really blows when you have to scan every line of the statement like a critic in a poetry workshop. I mean, really. It's much more fun scanning Yeats. The statements are always trying to screw you. Yeats is just brilliant.

Anyway, we'll see what a good chewing-out will do.

Grad school applications. Ugh.

receiving a miracle

Wow, folks. My back is much much better. Usually it only improves with chiropractic assistance (yes, I know most people say chiropractors are quacks, but whatever, a good one is worth his weight in gold). This time it's getting better without such help, and with the normally harmful necessity of being on my feet for nine hours a day. I attribute this phenomenon to God's provision through prayer, a friend with stronger pain medication than mine, and walking instead of sitting around. (Thanks all.)

Funnily, the manwalk -- learned during Wind and the Willows for my role as the boistrous Otter -- has come in quite handy as a way to stabilize my hips and lower back. Hannah Fischer, you have proven to be, along with many other good things, a medical blessing.

And thanks be, I'm not broke.

asking for a miracle

The visit home was marvellous, and as usual I enjoyed the drive back, except for one thing...

My lower back.

Recurring problems since tenth grade occasionally make my life something of an agony...like a six hour car trip with minimal stops. I did try to walk around and stretch it out at service plazas, but it was dark most of the way back and one of the drawbacks to being a woman traveling alone is the creepiness of interstate waystations. So the stops were minimal. Today my lower back is swollen and painful; the last time this happened I couldn't walk for a day, and now, without health insurance, I can't afford to go to the chiropractor for a hip and spine adjustment, or to the doctor for prescription pain medication.

The gist of this is not to whine but to state the problem so that those of you who wish to can pray. If I can't work I don't eat. However God sees fit to provide for me is (I think!) fine with me. Not that He operates based on my permission, but you get what I'm saying, I'm sure.

Thanks all!

joy and crossdressing

I GOT EDDIE IZZARD!!!!!

My uncle, who shares my love of this funny funny man, sent me three of Eddie's shows for Christmas, which I just received. I jumped up and down and screamed for a few minutes.

I now own Dress to Kill, Circle, and Unrepeatable.

Ha HA.

home again, home again, jiggety jig

Well, there are supposed to be ice storms and freezing rain all the way across Ohio to South Bend as I drive through it today. Should be oh-so-much-fun.

Getting things rolling on the grad school apps. Talk about panic-inspiring. It's so easy to think, I'll never get in.

But that kind of attitude won't win me anything! So...I'm bright, I'm motivated, I'm born for grad school...and cupped firmly in the hand of a sovereign and loving God. (That's the biggest comfort.)

of easy wind and downy flake

I love Erie in winter. People in South Bend talk about lake effect snow, but they're getting it second- or third-hand. Erie gets its lake effect snow right on, and it's about the loveliest snowfall I've ever seen anywhere. Plus, since everyone's driven in it for years, the driving makes so much more sense.

That's one of the best things about being back in Pennsylvania: the driving. I don't spend most of my time behind the wheel trying to tear out my hair. People don't brake through green lights and sit in the intersection. People use the passing lane to pass. People get over when you come up behind them. People gun it through yellow lights. It's great.

On another note, I treated myself to a new Virginia Woolf novel -- The Waves. I hate listing her as a favorite author because it seems pretentious, but I deeply love her novels. (Even if she is slightly out of vogue in the academic world. What do they know.) She writes so much truth in a beautiful way.

Errands to run today while the folks are at work. Oh yes, and the cats are so cute.

snowy pastures

Yay yay yay, I'm home, for the first time since mid-August.

My parents left the Christmas decorations up for me, since I missed Christmas, and they showered me with a ridiculous amount of gifts. I'll need a dolly to get everything up to my apartment. (They got me a TV. A flatscreen. Are they nuts?)

The drive over was great. I keep forgetting how much I love to drive on trips. Ironically this love was conditioned in college on weekend trips across Pennsylvania with my parents to visit my sister in the hospital. But I find that travelling is just as relaxing and interesting as the visit; it's time away from everything to be cocooned in a small space, look at a broader landscape, and be alone.

I love to be alone. Especially now that my job consists of being outgoing and smiley all day -- which I love -- but it's very very nice to closet myself in my room and burn candles (huzzah for being allowed to burn them again!) and read all my old favorite books.

I'm home.

riddle me this

Four months cannot wipe away the occasional place-warp of living in a new region.

For instance... Explain to me a people who brake through green lights. Why, Indiana? Why? (It makes me want to lean out the window like Kat in Ten Things I Hate about You and yell "Remove head from sphincter, then drive!")

And why did I spend so much time learning to say "soda" when the first waitress who heard me ask what kinds of soda they had looked at me blankly until I amended it to pop? Seriously, where am I living? Even in Western PA people know what soda is, even if they opt not to use it as an active vocabulary term.

Well. All that aside, I am beginning to work on the necessary grad school application things...whew, the deadline is moving up! I hope I get in. I'm happy with my life as it is, but I really want back into academia.

And in two days, I'm taking a trip home.

Kicking the New Year in the Knees

I had the most delightfully dull New Year's Eve ever. A full month of working with next to zero days off has been catching up on me like a runaway Mac truck and New Year's Eve found me barely able to keep my eyes open driving home from work. So going out was not in the plan. But a friend of mine from work, a Seventh Day Adventist unable to go out because it was a Friday night, lives in my apartment community and I asked her if I could join her and her roommate (who shares my love of yerba mate!) for the evening.

So Juanita, Keena and I sat around in their living room drinking cherry juice and watching Esther. I can't remember a tamer evening than that, which possibly atones for my wild Christmas at the Sommervilles. The three of us were so tired we barely stayed awake to greet the New Year; then we mumbled our Happy New Years and our goodnights, and I drove around the corner to my apartment and lay in bed for three hours shaking with exhaustion and unable to sleep because of the caffeine in three rounds of mate.

We had talked a little bit about New Year's Resolutions, which I don't normally make because I don't feel like capitulating to the pathos of a twenty-something single girl's failed attempts at self-improvement. However, I feel inclined this year to make a few, and I want to develop greater discipline in all areas of life, and what better opportunity to make some things new than the start of an unseen year?

So here they are:

1. Read 1 chapter of the Bible four times a week.
2. Keep off lost weight.
3. Get up at 7:00 every day except days off.
4. Better money management. (I have a well-laid-out plan for this, but you don't care, so it's staying in my journal.)
5. Clean the bathroom once a week.

I think if I make any more I'll give up. So there they are, and they'll be difficult enough. For instance, I hate cleaning the bathroom. Hate. Did I mention that I hate cleaning the bathroom? And I hate getting out of bed. So we're talking major life changes right there. Oh yes, and I'm not going to date until I'm twenty-seven. That's still ten years younger than my dad wanted, so I'll be doing pretty well. The kind of guy I'm interested in -- established, moderately successful, mature, looking for a life partner -- is too old for me right now, so I'll wait till I'm a little older and getting more established myself and then we'll be on even footing. As it is, I'm really really young, and having a largely satisfying time flying solo.

I impulse-bought a plant yesterday. A big bristling loveable Dracaena, much larger than the one I bought and watched wither away due to mites three years ago. My lost plant's name was Robert Browning (*puts hand over heart*), and although I tried to name this one Samwise, when I woke up this morning I thought of him as Robbie. So Robbie it is. He's currently sitting next to the basil on the floor by the window.

Today is cleaning, laundry, and taking-down-the-tree day. Like Bridget Jones, whose first diary I am reading before bed most nights, I am disgruntled that Christmas is over just when I was getting settled into the Christmas mood. I missed out on much of the mellow glow and dark holiness that I associate with the advent of Christmas -- thanks to retail -- and now that I could maybe enjoy it it's over. Well. There's always next year. Or this year, as the case now is.

Does anyone find a parallel between Helen Fielding, author of Bridget Jones's Diary, and Henry Fielding, author of Tom Jones? Or maybe that's a well-known cleverism and I'm slow on the uptake. This is the sort of trivia that wakes me up at four in the morning.

it makes me sad

Two women in the past two days have shopped at Ann Taylor with black eyes. I remember my dad telling me stories from his days on street patrol about men getting mean on Christmas because they hated themselves for not being better fathers and husbands. It was sad but I didn't have to think about it. Confronted with the reality, I wanted to cry. Instead I clacked briskly around in heels helping them return unwanted clothing and getting things for their daughters to try on.

Maranatha, please. I hate the thought of this happening in the world. Even more than the suffering, it's the acceptance and endurance of suffering that sticks a knife in my gut.