Fickle

as my horoscope for 2007 said would be the case, this year so far has been all about self discovery. being back in school while also working full time has taught me a lot about how i handle stress and how i prioritize, reminding me that school is about the learning, not about the grades. through WW and some serious diet/exercise evaluation, i have started to examine when and why i eat, helping me to start changing my emotional eating habits. for the last few weeks i have been analyzing why i tend to give myself such strict deadlines for life accomplishments, and how i can stop doing this (as it does nothing but make me frustrated, sad or- surprisingly- much less productive). i have also recently discovered that instead of feeling the baby urges that all of my friends said i would the minute that the wedding dress hit moth balls, i am instead feeling the housing urge, and desperately want to own my own home in the next few years; i want a garden and a porch and the ability to control my own heat and paint my damn walls whatever color i want to.

but here, on a much less serious note, i will explore another of my newly discovered traits: i am extremely fickle. not with the important things, like love or friendship or moral/political beliefs, but with the little things, like maintaining a blog, exercising regularly, and hobbies. i am a big stop-and-start-er, always very very into the activity-du-jour. i never thought of myself as fickle before, but it's true. and not such a bad thing really, as long as it never affects the aforementioned "important things", and as long as i can learn to stop beating myself up for my lack of follow through.

so here are some of my latest interests, pursuits and goals. no doubt i will forget or cease most (if not all) of them by the end of the summer, but i'm totally digging them now, nonetheless:

Blueprint Magazine- they have the coolest blog, called bluelines, that gives all sorts of hip crafty things to do with your apartment and office and clothes. i have always wanted to be crafty, and sometimes i have even eked out small amounts of creative project work. but in my new mode of self-discovery, and self-acceptance, i am currently content to read about other people's hip craftiness and make imaginary mental notes about how i too should become a connoisseur of obscure citrus fruits.

Sewing- based on the blueprint obsession (and on the fact that i HATE the newest fashion trends of leggings, blousy maternity-looking tops and waist-less sack dresses), i've been thinking that i should learn to sew my own cute little tops and fifties style sundresses. sure, i've had this same thought for years, but this could just be the summer i make it happen.

Exercising- ah, my old nemesis, working out! this summer i have no excuse not to break my cycle of letting my exercise regime fall all to hell at the beginning of june- my gym is right across the street from my office, i have one hour lunch breaks just aching to be spent on the elliptical machine, and I HAVE AN ELLIPTICAL MACHINE IN MY FRIGGIN' BEDROOM!!! no excuse, even for those days when i say that walking is exercise enough- i can walk as bonus exercise, after i've gotten my big butt some real action for at least 30 minutes.

Writing (blog and otherwise)- i have been meaning to start writing about my mom and dad for about as long as they've been dead. every week or so i'll get the urge to start this project, and then let myself get distracted and forget it. it's got to stop...or, er, to start. it's time i paid the piper (or the paper, as it were...) and started writing all of these memories of mine down. at the very least it will be good therapy (back to the whole self-discovery theme) and at the very most i will write a brilliant and touching account of an unconventional american family that i will then adapt into a brilliant hollywood screenplay in which i will be played by kate winslet and for which i will be nominated for a best adapted screenplay oscar, earning me a seat at the oscars right next to george clooney (who may play my dad).

Gardening (esp. tomatoes and green beans and herbs)- this year i must plan my little back yard plot and get things in the ground before the middle of june. i want fresh vegetables, and i don't want to have to pay for them! subsequently, this will also help with both my exercising goal, my healthier eating goal, and my spending more time digging in the dirt on a sunny day goal (which i didn't bother to write down).

Cooking (with said tomatoes and green beans and herbs)- i want to start having more people over to dinner. maybe it's the winter blah's or being so busy with school and work that i feel like J is the only person i've seen since january started, but i want to reestablish my social butterfly self this summer and have lots of little dinner parties. this will also serve to remind me that i do actually have friends in this city other than J, a fact which i frequently tend to forget.

Learning Spanish, brushing up my French, and sharpening my computer skills (possibly learning some basics of web design)- all of these things will help my chances when i start looking for a librarian job in the not so distant future. plus, they're things i've always wanted to learn.

and now, in my fickle way, i've lost interest in listing things, so i'm going to stop.

11

today my alarm clock didn't go off- even though i am sure that i set it before i went to bed- and i overslept by about 20 minutes. when i did wake up and notice the time, i sprang out of bed and ran to the shower, jumping in even before the water had heated up all the way, "damn!"ing and "fuck!"ing the whole time. how could i have overslept when i knew that i needed to catch the train today so that J could study for his psychology class? as i was standing under the luke warm water, J poked his head in and said that he could drive me to work and just take his psych quizzes later in the day; after a few feeble protests, i thanked him (grateful for such a calm and patient husband) and calmed down a bit, realizing that i had just gained back the lost twenty minutes. i relaxed into my morning shower, enjoying the now warmer water and the extra "me" time.

standing there under the shower, my mind began to wander, and then, out of nowhere, i remembered what day it is. at first it was just a thought, just passing through my head, one i've had before, for such a long time now, that i didn't really focus on it. but for some reason it stopped there, and hung there, and for the first time in a long time i really realized that it has been 11 years. and it hit me, like it hasn't hit me in a long time, and my spine felt heavy and my mind felt fuzzy and suddenly i felt sick, and tired, and sad, and standing there under the water was the only place in the world that i wanted to be.

i got out of the shower and went about my business: dried my hair, brushed my teeth, put lotion on my face. and it was still there, like a film or a weight, but i had to get ready for work, i was still running late, and i went to get dressed, waking J up and asking him how he slept. as i thought of what i would wear today, i remembered the silver earrings that were hers, the one's i thought i had lost after christmas but then found again in february, on the day of her birthday in fact, and that J had said she returned to me as a present. i went to the kitchen to fix breakfast and find something to take for lunch. i wasn't hungry, but i made myself fix a bowl of oatmeal, because not eating now, today, seemed so silly and melodramatic, and i'd surely be hungry by lunch time. there was nothing to take for lunch, so i decided to grab something from the cafeteria at work. i ripped open the packet of oatmeal and poured in the milk and set the microwave for 2 minutes and 40 seconds.

i went back to the bedroom and woke J up again- 'we have to leave in ten minutes'- and got dressed quickly. i put on the earrings and my silver locket with her picture (though i never open it to look anymore), and looked in the mirror and noticed that it was too much silver, too close together, but i had to wear them both today, so oh well. i put on my socks- would she have liked the black socks with the butterflies?- and my boots and grabbed my school work from beside the computer in the office, so that i could work on it today at work.

i looked for a twenty dollar bill that i'd had yesterday, going through all of my pants pockets and jacket pockets and even the pockets of my purse that i hadn't been carrying, and i got annoyed that i couldn't find it, mad that i'd possibly lost it- how could i be so careless, so wasteful? as i went back to check the jeans pockets again, i called to J that we needed to get going, then checked again in the pockets for the bill i knew by now i must have lost. J assured me that he hadn't seen it, and that i hadn't spent it yesterday, but that it was 'sure to turn up'; how stupid, i thought, to say that something that was surely lost would just 'turn up'.

i grabbed the bowl of oatmeal as we were walking out the door. walking onto the porch i noticed that it was raining, and i rushed ahead of J down the stairs, not wanting to wait for him.

in the car i noticed the rain again, and thought to myself that it was appropriate. then i thought how on my wedding day rain had been hailed as a blessing, so why should it seem so different now? i looked at the raindrops on the window and felt silly and self-indulgent. i didn't say anything to J. what could he do? he always gets uncomfortable when i bring it up- he doesn't understand, can't relate, it frustrates him that he can't fix it-so why make both of us feel bad. i turned my face away from him and cried, just a little, and suddenly wanted to call in sick to work and curl up on the couch all day and cry and cry and scream, but that would be even more silly, and useless, so i kept my face turned and didn't say a word.

i still want to go home. she would think i was being melodramatic. it's been 11 years- i want to tell everyone and no one- 11 years. i wish that i knew more people who would understand why this day matters, really understand and relate. i wish that i thought about her more often, that i remembered her more. i wish it was just a monday, a rainy monday in march and not this ridiculous, self-indulgent, self-inflicted anniversary that makes me want to throw up and curl up and hide, that makes my mind feel heavy and blurred and useless. that makes me feel like a child, a lost little child, an orphan.

but i'm not a child. and i don't have time to hide. and today is just a rainy monday in march, and i have work to do.