life begins again

For some inexplicable reason, I have lately felt this craving to listen to the music of my high school years. Not the music I actually listened to when I was in high school; most of that was the sort of Christian crap that was allowed in my household (with a few grudging exceptions for Steve Miller). No, the music I've been craving is the stuff I listened to voraciously on the radio in other people's cars -- Nine Days, Oasis, Savage Garden, Matchbox 20, The GooGoo Dolls, Chumbawumba, Barenaked Ladies, Train.

There's something about that 90s music. The power chords, the drums, the wacky incorporation of strings and horns and unexpected classical instruments (all synthesized, of course), the love of falsetto, the scratchy grunge voices. I love it. It brings back memories of plaid flannel and huge black sneakers. A time when it was strangely good to be young and cynical.

And I like the noise. I generally prefer the quiet, generally have no background music or television or an electronic whitewall of any kind in my environment, and when I listen to music, it tends to be quiet and melancholy. But periodically, something in my muscles wants to move. Since I hate what passes for mainstream music these days, I tend to look backward. And play it loud.

But none of that has to do with the subject of this post. The subject of this post celebrates the return of Bones this coming Monday. I haven't allowed myself to think about that show since it took its forever-long hiatus since last fall. It hurt too much -- I can't believe I'm this attached to a show, but every week Bones kind of gets me back on my feet and helps me deal with my life a little better. The relationship of joshing, support and affection between Brennan and Booth -- I guess I soak it in like I can live it vicariously. Seeing that kind of love -- the real kind, not the usual television trash -- gives me hope. All those characters have become extremely real to me. It's just good story.

So pondering the show's return to my living room this coming week gives me an internal feeling like spring (which is taking its good. old. TIME here. Mr. Cold Front? Seriously, dude. Head for the poles. You're needed there, anyway, to combat the alarming shrinkage of the ice caps. You have a JOB to do! You can make a difference -- maybe even save the world! Go save it! Stop wasting your time heckling me -- one little person. Doesn't look good on your resume. Get some ambition already).

In the meantime, there's always Simon. Who apparently can read my body language. Since the completion of my bed-spread-size knit blanket, I've had little to do with my hands while relaxing at night and have taken to the various games of solitaire I learned to pass the lazy early evenings camping as a kid. (Not hours and hours of solitaire, and I really ought to be reading something good, but I've been tired.) This requires setting up the cards on the ottoman where Simon is accustomed to sitting.

This new development confuses him. We've been having issues with him jumping up on the ottoman to see what I'm doing, and although he's surprisingly adept at not scattering the cards everywhere, he's still in the way. So I've been gently nudging him off.

Yesterday I was in the middle of a round when I saw him with my peripheral vision go into run-and-jump mode; so I held up one hand, without even looking at him, while I surveyed the cards. And he stopped. And hunkered down in the middle of the floor. And waited.

I felt badly for taking up his ottoman space, so I finished my game and collected the cards and said, "Okay, kitty, you can come up now!" while I sat back in my chair. He came running right over, jumped up, and assaulted my ears with skull-splitting purrs.

Yeah, yeah, I talk about my cat too much. It's nice to have a creature understand me that well, even if the highlight of his day is when I wake up to feed him funny-smelling pellets in the mornings.