oh, the beauty

Dude, my new purse is big enough to hold Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.

but i still have eggs!

I've been getting hot flashes all week, and just as I was about to rummage for a copy of my birth certificate, to verify that in fact I'm about twenty or thirty years too young for them, I remembered that they occasionally happen when I'm stressed. I remember my sophomore year in college I would have to change my clothes completely just to get rid of some of the body heat saturating them. They practically steamed. (Surely a use of apostrophe, you say. No, really.)

Grad school questions, job questions, relationship questions (not bad ones in this department, mind you, but still questions), minimal days off, no time to clean my mess of a room, what's to stress about?

At least there's always Harry Potter. I'm rereading Order of the Phoenix and adoring it all over again. I'll be sad when the series ends, because Hogwarts is like another home in my mind. I go there when I need to check out of my everyday life for awhile.

Haha, I narrowly avoided an argument with my manager Deborah over Harry Potter; she is of the opinion that the books are evil. We share the same faith but have radically different views of certain things. Actually I didn't try hard to avoid the argument; she's welcome to her opinion but I wish the Christian community would try to keep itself well-informed before it goes about blasting books it has never read. And that it would also stop believing spam e-mails without first researching their accuracy. Because J. K. Rowling's official website, contrary to spam-popular opinion, does not have links to Wiccan websites; nor is magic even the focal point of the series. (Does that shock you? Read the books, then.)

I could go on and on about this, but then I'd be late for my least favorite job. And we can't have that.

yo ho ho and a bottle of rum

Did any of you ever watch The Pagemaster obsessively? My sister and I did. Really cute movie. We loved the little misshapen book Horror. He said the above line, "YO HO HO and a bottle of RUMMMM."

That one was for you, chicarita.

So it looks like M, G and I will be trekking OUT of the wastelands of northern Indiana for a date with destiny....or the lucky random culmination of William Had a Headache Day 2005. We're heading to see the Chieftains in the Midwest's greatest attribute, the city of Chicago.

Just got the confirmation e-mail from one of the dancers tonight...woo-hoo!

Things at work have been ridiculous this week, which reaffirms to me the silliness of corporate America. A new woman has taken charge of the Ann Taylor corporation and we're seeing a few picky little changes here and there that are naturally more irritating than helpful, although hopefully it will work out well for the company as a whole. Our little store in Mishawaka ought to be the model for Ann Taylor nationwide; we have a tremendous leadership team and a great group of associates. I'm not a company girl, but I'm a loyal girl to the women who work hard to maintain an environment of integrity, fun, and fabulous service to our clientele. These are the women who took me in and gave me a family, and my respect for them is pretty much boundless. (This isn't to say that I don't get irritated with them from time to time...or that I'm not similarly irritating!)

That's been one of the surprises in the working world. It's not my strongest suit, but I'm paying the bills and I've built unexpectedly strong relationships with my managers and coworkers. God couldn't have planted me in a better place. These women keep an eye on me, love to see me grow, take joy in my successes, encourage me in my weak spots, and have fun with me. (Mom, I'm sure you thank God for them every day, and you should; I sure do. If you can't be immediately nearby, Lisa and Deborah are the next best thing.)

So it's a Friday night, I'm plenty tired, but I don't have to work eleven hours tomorrow as I had expected, so hooray and huzzah, I'm turning in early and getting some much-needed sleep.

Night all.

* * *

Horror: (creepily) Fifffteeeeen men on a dead man's stomach --

Fantasy: Chest, chest, it's chest!

Horror: --Chest, chest. [Evil chuckle.] YO HO HO and a bottle of RUMMMM.

fewmets

(It's from a book.)

Am an abominably whiny bundle of misery tonight. Thank you, hormones.

Although I really think I'm going to blame it on the bad hair. I've been growing it out/cutting it myself for the past six months and it's gone beyond my ability to control. Bad hair depresses me. It doesn't just ruin my day, it ruins all the days I have to deal with it, starting from the first moment I get up.

And this spell of horrid hair blahness ends Monday. Thank God.

if i only had the noive [nerve]

Still no word from grad school. This would not be a stressful thing if students in other departments had not told me how quickly the turnaround time in their department was for hearing back. Or perhaps if the mail in Indiana came on anything like a regular schedule. I become neurotic and obsessed and check the mail three times a day, when I know that we're lucky to get the mail every other day.

Yesterday I ran into a grad student in literature who attends some university in Indianapolis (known by all residents of Indiana as "Indy"). It completely brightened me. A flash of sororal understanding enlarged the literature part of my brain and we chatted animatedly about Victorian novelists for about three minutes. The people next to her at the counter eyed us as though we were somewhat possessed. It felt like yelling about Yeats in the Gee in front of the football business majors.

I am currently being an unforgiveable coward and not returning the call of the funny young man with whom I went out for lunch on Valentine's Day. He called last night, but failed to leave a message, and I am fretting about whether or not to call him back. It's the second time he's called sans message in a week. The first time I didn't feel obligated to return it, as it was an early Thursday afternoon, and how did I know what he wanted? But last night's call, I think, deserves some reward, since he knows that Sunday night is usually the only evening that I'm reliably free.

Coward, coward, coward. (At least I haven't been whining nonstop about being single in oh, say, a month.) But still -- coward, coward, coward. The sad truth is that I'm terrified of men. I hate being vulnerable. And I'm not saying that like I say "I hate bologna" or "I hate being tired." I hate being vulnerable. It's much easier to condescend, bully, or in other ways establish myself as superior -- a defense mechanism perfected through nine or ten years of queening it over youth group guys, even when I was fond of them. But I couldn't do that with this guy. I don't want to. I also don't want him to think that I'm not interested. A ridiculous coward, but not disinterested.

Well, I've wasted most of the day not calling him knowing full well he works second shift so that I'm safe for the rest of Monday, but I'm posting this declaration so others can hold me accountable: I will call him tomorrow. Granted, I'll be at work, but I have an hour break.

At least this guy calls. That's an improvement on the last model.

a necessary space of solitude

That's what I have at my core.

I was talking with Hillori last night (someday I'll have to post on the amazing wonderfulness of having a best friend whom you've known since you were five, who grew up down the street from your house all of both your lives, and with whom you keep in touch and can reconnect no matter how long it's been) about this solitude. She has it too, although, unlike me, she hasn't used it as an excuse to avoid relationships. It's interesting, watching her struggle to balance the need for space with the need to love. I admire her courage.

One thing I've always known about myself is the need for space. For time alone and quiet. My room was always my haven at home, that place where I could go and shut the door and be by myself for hours.

One thing I've always wondered about is how that would play into future relationships, marriage, and kids. I will always need "a room of my own." Are husbands cool with that? I'm going to need a library/study where everyone in the family understands that if I go in and shut the door, I'm not to be disturbed unless something drastic has happened.

Selfish? No. Introspective and necessary to mental stability. It's not even that I spend all my alone time thinking and probing the depths of my consciousness. I've become surprisingly less inclined to examine myself in the past year; I usually get fed up with myself and say, "Enough Sarah, go do something." Normally what I do with the alone time is nothing. Maybe cook, maybe clean, do the little household tasks that need doing (sometimes), and not even talk to myself. (I'm the queen of out-loud self-conversation.) Just tap into that empty space somewhere inside me and let it stretch.

My mom has gotten up two hours before everyone else in the family in order to have her time of solitude.

Fortunately right now it's easy to have that space. Later, with changes in circumstance, it won't be so easy.

See, I'm much less afraid of winding up alone than I am of winding up never able to be alone. (You could even say I'm much less afraid of winding up alone than I am of love. Not silly romance love, but the kind of bonedeep love that opens you up to worlds of hurt and claims too much attention. Blah, blah, stop whining.) Of course someday it will be worth it, but right now I'm content. Usually.

And on a less introspective note (the urge will overwhelm sometimes, however I normally squelch it), I have a doctor's appointment today to find out why I've been feeling blah for a month.

Enough Sarah; go do something.

gonna be a bright...bright...cold rainy day

I knew today was going to be awesome when I reached into the mismatched silverware drawer this morning and pulled out my favorite coffee spoon.

I have faith in this coffee spoon. Back in November it usually heralded a call from Tim (hm, have I seen that spoon in two months?) or news about a managing position at Ann Taylor (nope, didn't get that job either). At the very least, it usually signaled a pleasant or exciting day.

Half the fun, of course, is predicting what is going to happen and then being completely wrong. And then there's the speculation that it's probably a good day because I'm looking for it to be.

Anyway, I pulled out my favorite coffee spoon. So little fun things happened...I broke a fixture at Ann Taylor but Lisa wasn't mad (she was impressed though; that fixture is supposed to be indestructible), Gloria Jean's brewed my favorite coffee on their three-week-ish rotation (oh yeah, Black Gold, baby), and even though I had a terrible selling day, I left in a good mood.

The best part was coming home and finding, not a letter from Notre Dame regarding my application to the graduate school (there was the wrong prediction), but a letter from my good friend since the summer of my fifteenth year. I thumped down the stairs to the mailbox bracing four pounds of butter, a purse, a tote, and two bags of Tostitos against various bony points of my anatomy, managed to work my key into the box, opened it, and started tipping the mail out between the boxes of butter and my bosom. And saw a flash of that familiar handwriting.

I had forgotten the thrill of seeing one of his letters in my mailbox. It's been almost two years since the last one, and this one arrived just after Valentine's Day, a three-page letter and a card. From my friend, well-known and trusted.

Aww, warm fuzzies.

Time to get a drink.

what valentine's day can do for me

If you appreciate or are interested in feminist rampages, read my below post from earlier in the day. If you have been warned away from it, don't read the below post (this particular one is safe, so you can keep reading). But be aware: If you find Emily Dickenson in the title of a blog, it probably means I'm angry.

Now. All things being said, I think that I have come a long way since college as far as hating the male gender is concerned. I hate society's allowing men to be the worst, most perverse, most disrepectful, laziest pigs they can think of being (think of your stereotypical college guy...stereotypes, as I saw last Thursday at Legends, come from somewhere), but most guys I can deal with and am even learning to like (with ease!), because they tend to be much better than their stereotype. This corresponds with getting out of Grove City and with a renewed respect for my father. Interesting. Much as we may hate it, sisters in combat, our fathers' influence in our lives is profound, as is a mother's influence on her sons. And so on.

Anyway. My Valentine's Day turns out to be, on the surface, much like one would expect on a Valentine's Day: A care package from my mother and a date. Naturally under the surface the reality is nothing like the appearance. The care package from Mom didn't arrive till late in the afternoon, almost five, but it throws a spot of color backward on the whole day. A deep pink color, to be exact; she knitted me a darling, super-cool eyelash scarf that I can't wait to wear with my jacket to work tomorrow.

The date was a lunch date. The guy my Gymboree coworker has been trying to set me up with since December called me last night, and we ended up on the phone for three hours, which struck me as rather odd. I mean, I can chatter with the best of them, but this gent did most of the talking. When Marianne came home from a birthday gathering for one of her colleagues, I started throwing markers into the living room and she obliged by yelling for me to get off the phone. So I arranged to meet the guy for lunch the next day (today) and only realized after I hung up that I had unintentionally weasled a date out of a complete stranger on Valentine's Day.

Cool.

So it was a good time. A rather bland, good time. I don't really see him as the churchgoing type, which is a strike against him, and I get rabbity and scared when it comes to unimagined feats like kissing, which is probably a strike against me although for my own part I don't regret it. But he was a gentleman and opened the car door for me and picked up the tab (although I took care of most of the tip because our waiter was AWESOME), and we talked for awhile, swapping high school and college stories, and he took me back home. Then I spent the rest of Valentine's Day grocery shopping, purchasing port, and cooking.

So I got a date and a meal out of Valentine's Day, which is a point for me against Cupid. I realized, in my beloved ten-year-old beat up old Earl of a van, gathering all my Wal-Mart bags together to lug them upstairs, that I'm generally happy with being single. I haven't even been depressed today. (Oh sure, because you had a date, you say. No, really. I haven't even been depressed today.) I bought Queen Latifah's new album, remakes of blues and soul classics, which are amazing because she is amazing, and revelled in my singleness.

Basically the deal is this: Because I am awkward when it comes to the physical aspect of a guy-girl dating relationship, it's going to take one amazing, (possibly) experienced but (at least) patient guy to deal with it. Probably someone I've known for awhile before we start dating. That's the way I've always wanted to do it anyhow. And since it's going to take time, and since I have time, I'm fine with it. I have good friends and a great family and a fun roommate who makes sure I don't turn into a boring old lady before my time. I'm in no real hurry.

Although sometimes it would be nice to have an inkling of what I'm to expect. In the meantime, I have work and books and (hopefully, oh please Father) school to concentrate on. And friends to make.

My life had stood--a loaded Gun--

It's February and the greatest weakness of my humanity has hit the markets, rendering me helpless...

Cadbury Creme Eggs.

I love them. I adore them. Whenever I see them, I buy them. Half the reason I worked in the Gee my senior year was to eat Cadbury Creme Eggs for free. It's not so financially expedient any longer, but that doesn't matter. In the least. I have half a dozen mini-Creme Eggs in my pantry (because I couldn't find the big ones) and now that I did find the big ones, I have those in my pantry too.

It's like sucking eggggssesssss, only (since I've never actually done that but can imagine its grossness) much better. Gollum might have turned out better if his grandmother had taught him to suck the insides out of Cadbury eggs.

So. Okay. The past two weeks have been ridiculous, and I've been working a lot (not complaining, I'm expensive and I need the hours), so I haven't had time to write everything down on a blog. Get ready...

For G and M: I think we should go to the Chicago show. We can take the train there, see the show, eat dinner, stalk the band, and take the train home. No sweat. (Unless you have other plans, but if the decision is up to me, that's it. Chicago is a way cool city and I haven't been there in forever.) There, that's the tie-in to the funness of William Had a Headache Day and its ensuing insanity. I'm so excited.

Now. (Drrrrrrrrrum roll.) The amatear comedy show at Legends. My friends, if you follow my roommate and our friend's blogs, you have already seen two facets of this story. I would like to add a third.

Thursday, February 10, a day like any other. I was excited to attend a stand-up comedy show at Notre Dame's Legends (which wasn't as scary as it looks from the outside), got off work a few minutes early, and showed up in time to grab a table for myself, M, and G. A philosophy student whom we all know and trust usually runs these shows, and we were hoping he would make an appearance, as we had never heard his routines and he is, in person at least, quite funny.

Unfortunately the show consisted entirely of the most misogynist bullshit I have ever had the misfortune to hear. It started out all right, a few anti-woman cracks, the usual locker room sort, but I thought, maybe that's the exception, hopefully it gets better. No. The only good comedian in the act was a freshman girl who refrained from making gender jokes at all. The rest were pissant athletes whose only knowledge of "woman" is what her vagina can do for his penis. We were repeatedly told by these paragons of male respectability to "stop whining about your problems and go starve yourselves or whatever it is you do," to "be considerate and stay awake for sex after a date or we'll slip GHB in your drink," and to remember that "you're not popular, you're just whores." They kept up a constant flow of anal and oral sex jokes, as well as a litany of masturbation references that I would attribute to sixth grade snickering at the lunch table. One young man bragged about the thrill of flatulating in a woman's face. Altogether it was a thorough and leisurely tour of the junkyard of human morals and creativity.

We walked out. Booing (according to M I sound like a moose), shouting "oh my GOD," and talking loudly during the acts weren't enough. We stood in the foyer and fumed. I was furious -- with society at large for permitting people to grow up with these neolithic attitudes, with Peter (whom I've credited with impeccable taste) for heading up the event, with the Bam-Bam jackasses whose basic, socially supported drive is to club women over the heads and drag them off to a cave for a quick fuck (sorry, Mom), with the stupid, deluded college girls who laughed their heads off right along with the guys in the audience not even realizing they should be standing up for something better.

It was tragic. Infuriating. But we managed to get our own back a little bit. As the show ended and the audience poured out and the "comedians" joined them in the foyer to be fawned over by the abovementioned college girls, I yanked my hand from my coat pocket and two pantiliners fell out. I had shoved them there a few days previously as I ran out the door late for work, and had forgotten them. I picked them up slowly, hoping someone would notice both the pantiliners and my lack of embarrassment, and G took one and stuck it on her forehead where it looked like a misplaced eye mask. M left in disgust for the bathroom and G and I stood looking at the last pantiliner and pondering what to do with it. We turned. A beam of light from heaven fell shining on the broad shoulders of the tallest, most misogynistic asshole of them all. Genius struck.

Armed with one pantiliner each, G and I worked our way through the crowd and bumped against the athlete whose toilet-and-whore jokes were earning him plenty of kisses, and plastered the pantiliners to his long swimmer's back. On our way back to the door, we peeked over our shoulders and beheld them shining in white glory on his black jacket. M joined us and we made a fast exit, howling like monkeys; through the glass we saw someone peeling them off and handing them to him, and his corresponding look of astonishment.

I hope it ruined his night. I hope I have pantiliners handy more often. It could be a signature, like Zorro's famous "Z." We need a new superhero: Mad Maxi. Sexists beware.

Seriously. That lineup was the perfect picture of everything that's wrong with society today. Or human nature in general. How do women let these attitudes endure in their presence? Why can men get away with it?

This has nothing to do with the majority of guys that I know. The majority of guys that I know are nice. But where do these other morons come from? And why do they have the loudest voice in society?

Snarl.

eeeeep!

IT WORKED.

Marianne and Gretchen, constant eggers-on whose latest favorite evil twin pasttime seems to be seeing what mischief they can coax me into, convinced me (bullied me?) to e-mail Canadian Irish stepdancer hotboy's brother (whose was the only e-mail address we could find in our new regime of internet-stalking) to say hello and see about getting tickets for one of their upcoming shows.

Goodness, Canadians are nice. (Well, these Canadians are, anyway.) The brother e-mailed me back in less than twenty-four hours with a warm greeting and instructions to e-mail him closer to the show of our choice so he can secure tickets for us. He also set me up with the yahoo forum for their other band.

Mwah ha ha. No really -- it's so cool.

And so the saga continues...

what are you eating?

Small apartment, evening. In the kitchen Sarah spreads generic peanut butter on a piece of French bread. Everybody Loves Raymond fills the background. Footsteps sound on the stairs and the lock in the apartment door clicks.

Sarah: [calling around the corner] Hi!

Marianne: [bursting around the corner after having been gone all day with an intense frown on her face] Are you eating enough meat?

Sarah: Uhh...

Marianne: When was the last time you had meat? You're not getting enough protein and I think you're tired all the time because you might be anemic.

Marianne shrugs out of her coat and dumps her bookbag on the floor and comes around the counter and begins pulling recipe books off the refrigerator. Sarah thoughtfully licks the peanut butter knife.

Sarah: Now that you mention it...

Marianne: Because I have all these recipes from home with meat and they're really super easy, here, look, there's Spicy Rice Skillet and Saturday Night Chicken, and there's Chicken Stir Fry which is really good, and that big bag of shrimp -- do you like shrimp? -- in the freezer only costs nine bucks and I've been eating it for like a month and a half, it lasts a long time.

Sarah: [thoughtfully and guiltily eating the iron-free peanut butter bread] I think maybe you're right. Okay. I'll make a meat dish this week and buy some chicken breasts soon.

Marianne: [shutting the recipe book] Good. Sorry. It was bothering me all the way home.


I think at some point after that we actually exchanged hello, how was your day greetings. I love my roommate. I don't know how not eating meat escapes my attention, but it does sometimes. See, I'm born to be an absent minded professor. Just not an anemic one.

let me guess, your zip code is...

My coworkers think I have mono. It seems that, after weeks of feeling vaguely blah and appearing to conquer a throat thing, I must now capitulate and search the phone book for clinics that don't charge much for the uninsured, and haul my tired butt to the doctor.

At least if it's mono, I won't have to buy expensive medicine. It'll go away on its own.

Eleven more hours of sleep last night and I feel slightly better but still weary. Whee. I've been living on caffeine and determination since Christmas and my resources are finally exhausted. (Not the coffee resource, though; I couldn't live without coffee. Mmm, coffee. I think I'll get another cup.)

You know you've found a good mug when it's so microwave safe that the handle doesn't burn your hand when you take it out. I succumbed to my incurable mug fetish a few weeks ago and bought a new one at Gloria Jean's. It depicts a hazy field-and-mountain scape in blues and greens and purples. My favorite colors.

Anyway, since nothing really exciting has happened in the past twelve hours (except hearing from Hillori -- yay!!), the point of this blog is going to be a few societal observations I've made since moving to Indiana. Particularly since working in retail.

There is a certain community in the nearby area where the wealthy make their dwelling. Now, in Indiana it's not all that tough to afford a really nice house, since the cost of living here is dirt low. Which is why I can hold down an apartment on the income from two lousy part-time jobs. That aside, these people are the "silver spoon" people, northern Indiana's idle rich who leave perfectly good used furniture on the curb because they don't know what else to do with it. (I plan to benefit from this as soon as the weather turns nicer.)

These folks live in large new houses in fakey estate subdivisions with names like "Fox Grove" and "Fern Hollow." And they have their social status tatooed on their personalities. They're either incredibly, beautifully nice or incredibly, inexcusably rude. So anytime I'm dealing with someone in Ann Taylor who talks to me and wants to know about my life and liberally deals out sunshine in smiles and conversation, she's from G------. Conversely, if she won't acknowledge my hellos, gives me curt orders to find her clothes, ignores my polite and friendly questions intended to put her at ease and help her find what she's looking for, and treats me like I'm the worst cliche of servant, she's from G------.

The great thing is, the Ann Taylor cash register system requires us to ask each client's zip code before we ring her up. So when I finalize a sale with one of these people and ask, "May I have your zip code, please?" my internal voice is going "Wait for it...wait for it..." until I hear the magic five digits and think, Bingo.

One of these days I'm going to smile sweetly at the sour unhappy idle rich whose husband could pay my bills without noticing and say, "I thought so."

It's all well and good to have a nice social station, but there's no need to treat other human beings like they're less than that. The rude ones' bitterness proves that money isn't happiness. And the nice women are so full of joy that you can't help but think they realize that.

unnnnnnnnnnnggghhhhh

So ridiculously tired. I slept for eleven hours last night (thanks, Tolkien, every time I type "eleven" I try to type "elven" first) and today I still felt like I'd been hit by a truck. (Maybe the squirrel's aura followed me home and is punishing me.)

Valentine's Day is coming. It's coming like Santa's big red ass down an unsuspecting kid's chimney. There are TV commercials (my punishment for watching TV) about love, dating, flowers, chocolate...

Blech.

I forget about it successfully every few hours and then it leers at me again.

Monday, huh. One week. Well, it'll be over soon enough. I'm generally pretty content about being single, but February is an admittedly tough month for the single world. You start thinking about how nice it would be to have someone to snuggle with on the couch, someone to kiss your neck, someone to roll up against at night.

Now of course there are other things that come with all that...farting, toilet seats being left up, dirty underwear that isn't mine on the bathroom floor.

Someday, it'll be worth it.

shoot me, please

I ran over a squirrel on my way home from church.

I saw it crossing the busy state route a few hundred yards ahead of me and thought, great, I'm going to have to watch a squirrel get creamed. But it crossed in front of me and the car in the left lane, so I figured I at least was safe; it was going to duck under the guardrail on the median and die over there.

But no. Just under the guardrail it got scared and ran back the way it came. Right under my wheel. There was nothing I could do to stop it; braking wouldn't have averted the disaster in time and I ran over it yelling "No--no--no" and as soon as I felt the crunch I burst into tears. I looked in my rearview mirror -- never look in the rearview mirror -- and saw it crawling around in the middle of the road and thought I was going to throw up. I didn't even kill it. And the highway was too busy for me to pull over, back up, and finish the job out of mercy.

I sobbed like a child the rest of the way home.

I hate hurting things. I was the girl in grade school who carried dead birds home to bury them. I have always understood roadkill, and I have always grasped the concept of the necessity of death in the world as it is, but I have never been reconciled to being an instrument of that necessity. I never hit anything before I moved to Indiana. Now I've killed two animals -- one huge mother of a raccoon and this poor, stupid little squirrel.

I want my mom.

the madness!

If you haven't talked to me in a long time, today is the day I heard from you. A new e-mail makes three people I heard from today with whom I haven't spoken in forever.

What is this, the month of nostalgia? I've been missing some people like crazy and beginning to get back in touch with them, too.

well, toto...

And to complete the craziness, a woman at work has been trying to hook me up with a guy she knows who apparently lives in my apartment community but whom I have never met. Tonight she asked me for my phone number so she could give it to him.

Considering the kind of week I've had, I handed it over without hesitation. Why not.

On a random note (I'm just starting my thousandth viewing of Lilo and Stitch), the THX Digitally Mastered sound that starts off so many movies is one of my favorite sounds in the world. I turn it up just to shiver.

a rather blustery week

Jane, Jane,
Tall as a crane,
The morning light creaks down again;

~Edith Sitwell

What a weird week. Not only was I ignorantly and tipsily talking with a celebrity on Sunday (whom my friends are trying to get me to e-mail), not only do I have a little more money than I supposed, not only did I complete and turn in my Notre Dame application, but today I heard from an old friend with whom I haven't had contact in a couple of years.

I've known this boy since I was fifteen, the summer before my sophomore year, when we met on a vacation my family was taking to Myrtle Beach, when my cousin, not wanting to be the only boy on the trip, brought a friend who used to live down the street from him but had since moved out of state. This friend was the closest thing to a summer fling I ever had, which mellowed into the longest pen pal friendship I ever maintained. We wrote letters back and forth for four or five years, happy and fun, and then lapsed into the silence that such writing friendships usually assume with busy-ness and adulthood and a shift in pace of life.

Today he IM'd me, having obtained my screen name from my cousin, and it was great to chat. We've both changed from the time we were teenagers, but there's nothing like reconnecting with someone you've trusted for a long time.

And on another note, with the sun shining and the snow melting, the love-crazy animals are crawling out from under every bush. Today Discovery a la Sarah notices a squirrel tottering on a branch frantically flicking its tail, then moving on to another branch to continue the tail flicking. Spreading pheremones, perhaps?

Seems to me that Valentine's Day comes at a hormonally strategic time of year.

whoa there, chief

So it turns out the Canadian Irish dancer is a famous dance accompaniast to The Chieftains. Who knew?

shadows, obscure holiday tales, and a deadline

Today I find great comfort in the laws of physics. Despite my firm belief in God's mystical transcendence of the created universe, I take joy in the order and structure that generally characterizes it. The woods outside my window, for example. They are sparse and bare, the forest floor covered with a skin of snow, and the sunshine sends stripes of tree shadows at regular and defined angles to the ground.

This is what I love about bare winter days: The stillness, the stark beauty, and the structure. It's easier to notice the governing of nature's laws when most of nature is hibernating or dead.

Although evidence of life is scattered quite liberally over the snow. My balcony is covered with tufts of feathers from the other day's mating performances.

So, William Had a Headache Day was a bizarre and hilarious success. Gretchen has joined our troupe of crusaders who will dedicatedly celebrate this holiday for years to come. We held the momentous event at the Fiddler's Hearth, a wonderful Irish pub in downtown South Bend, where I discovered a new beer: Belhaven Scottish Ale, a rich caramel beverage with slight carbonation and a thick and bitter aftertaste. Mmm. (It is not, as I learned, a beer to be drunk quickly.)

Marianne and Gretchen have better tales of this on their blogs, but I will say that the strangeness escalated with the evening. The usually vivacious and chatty philosophy department duo who joined us were a little melancholy, although recitations of Wordsworth's more sexual poems cheered them with the awfulness of the poetry. A particularly undesirable acquaintance committed the unforgivable social faux-pas of asking Marianne to dinner in front of said philosophy duo who did not rush to her aid, while Gretchen and I, who would have, were busy chatting up a cute Canadian Irish dancer whom Gretchen accosted and dragged to our table because I refused to garner the nerve to speak to him myself, despite the fact that he had apparently been checking me out all night, and so were unaware of Marianne's plight. So there we were, a crazy tableau in a noisy Irish bar with live jigs in the background, gathering in honor of William Wordsworth and absolutely falling to pieces in the end. All in all, and particularly because of its Twilight Zone flavors, I think the holiday was a success.

On another note: I turned in my application to the Notre Dame Graduate School, a full twenty-three hours and fifty-six minutes before the deadline. For most of you that is probably a narrow squeak; for me that is a world record in timeliness and being prepared. Now begins the waiting, but at least I can sit it out without feeling guilty for avoiding working on it.

Today is domestic day; I have laundry and cleaning to do before work tonight. And now for more coffee.