think about long distance rates instead of

Ohh the relief, that great exhalation as I flew over Los Angeles which, until this morning, I had only recently seen on episodes of The Hills. I was groggier than anything as I came off the plane, leaving the season 3 of The Office which Emma gave me for Christmas on my seat! Which truly sucks. Because what's going to keep me occupied on the flight back now? Nancy met me, Mum met Peter, she handed off Dad's car to him and while he drove down to long beach to pick up his boys from their jet blue flight, Nancy, Mum and I drove to starbucks where Mum and I sang along to the James Taylor song playing over their sound system that seems to leave this troubled world behind, then we drove to 3rd street where we attempted to find a farmers market, no dice, we decided on Whole Foods, we came home and cooked a little, I got the rollerblading bug but realizing I no longer had blades that fit I went to Big 5 Sporting Goods and dropped 100 bucks on some baby blue, very snazzy rollerblades.
I went out, down Entrada, going under PCH and coming up on the other side on the beach path that I took all the way down to where Venice blvd meets the beach. These blades were heavier than my old ones, and strained both knees a good deal, but it was so satisfying to feel that salt air tear at my throat and the burn in my quads while Paul Simon sang in my ears. I love blading on that path because I feel like I am taking advantage of my life, living to my capacity, under the sun, against the sky, through the wind, I am fast.

Tonight Peter brought over his visiting friends, Mum made killer fried chicken, and I made tapioca that Mum put too much orange flavoring in, so I'm a little bitter, and now I'm sitting upstairs in my room listening to the wind move through these trees, wondering how it's possible that I really live in a little room in Medford. The way I feel sitting in bed there, and the way I feel here are two entirely different skins, although I haven't really the vocabulary to explain why. Something about feeling less critical of myself, and trusting my head more. Or maybe it's just my sense of ownership and comfort here. I was trying to describe this to Mum earlier- in Boston it feels as though my life exists within these series of little rooms: my bedroom, Kate's house, Andy's office, the church, Upstairs, the rehearsal spaces, and outside of those rooms, or rather when I'm traveling between those rooms, I'm neither inhaling or exhaling, I'm this static isolated thing merely made to travel (yes, I realize this makes no sense, I'm talking about how it feels not how things necessarily are. And in LA, my life is open, both literally in that I spend more time outside, and in that it continues when I'm traveling, that I have a momentum here. I recognize that all these feelings, and this perspective itself, are just expressions of my relief in having this homesickness quelled, and that I wouldn't necessarily be flawlessly happy, and not depressed, and perfectly stable here as opposed to Boston. I know this isn't my ultimate cure. What I do know is that it feels marvelous to be home, and I'd like to hold on to that.

I'll go to the 9:30 women's meeting with Mum tomorrow, then to the bank and other errands, then to yoga *smile*. Mum's just called up to me; the tapioca's cooled.


***
***

Every time I'm home I rummage through my books and old journals, school notebooks and random spirals I've kept from years of education and spontaneous poetry, in search of notes I've left myself. Since I was little I've been leaving scraps of paper for me to find sometime late, informing myself of what I was doing on this day, or reminding me of what my favorite song was on the date the note was written, or some little thing reminding me that I love me. I found one tonight when thumbing through my copy of Faith On trial. It reads "To this place, I leave this girl so swollen by the noise in her head. From this place I take Mollie B- volume down."

Working my way back to square one, my slate is clear.

glories stream from heaven afar

I've made it up to Teds, helped play Santa by eating the cookies Eli left out and then wrapping some gifts. I may or may not have managed to wrap the scissors inside the wrapping.

The service tonight was beautiful, homey, and yet very very far...or maybe I was far from it. Or it was far from what I was used to. Same scripture But Mary kept all these things, and pondered it in her heart, same carols (and some new ones), but it wasn't really mine. It was the first Christmas mass I've been to yet without family, and honestly what I missed most (and what made me cry when they turned off the lights and we all stood and sang Silent Night with candles) was not having Kate's and Mum's harmonies, or my Dad fighting back tears beside me, or Peter looking bored, or Eric pretending he was more of a Bass than he is. It was very strange to be paid for the event. I got 100 bucks for going to service and singing some incredible music. I guess, as they say, "Christmas came early." Or in this case right on time. Anyhow I'm glad to be up here with Ted and Cheryl, and Eli who apparently has a cough that I will no doubt catch during the brief time I'm up here. My eyes are heavy, and I want to play with my brother a little before we all zonk out. I'm glad to have spent Christmas like this, or to be spending it this way tomorrow (I forget, it's only the eve, isn't it) Happy Christmas!


love biscuits,
fish, 5, lily

Show me how you do that trick, the one that

My house is damn cold, but my litle space heater from cvs is plugging away very diligently and it's slowly (very, very slowly) but surely breathing some warmth into this room. I think I'd like to name it. Suggestions?

I'd intended to go to a yoga class this morning (interesting Mollie, you're putting things off again) at 7:15 but I decided to sleep through it, go to the church rehearsal, and now I'm back with enough time to wash my uniform pants and haul myself back to Cambridge for a tea and dinner shift. Last night I worked dinner, and found myself amazed at the number of customers who go out of their way to be downright mean, and embarrass you in front of their friends. It's mostly tone, not their words-- Maggie had asked me to do a wine opening at her tables, and apparently she was a little behind because as I approached the table the guy said "we've been waiting for this for a half hour" (I'm more ready to believe Maggie, who said ten minutes, which, I agree, is too long to wait for wine.) I said "Sir I apologize, who is tasting?" to which he replied "don't bother apologizing, just pour." "Who's tasting sir?" "Who do you think?!" I cant convey his tone, but it was so sharp it scared me. I get really frightened when I'm spoken to like this, it brings tears to my eyes and I found myself working very very hard to retain my composure. I hate when people are angry with me (I know Mum, I should learn to handle my side of the street and the rest is theirs) but I have a really hard time when I feel the other person is going out of their way to be hurtful. Another gentlemen last night (I have yet to have a lady speak to me like this) pulled me aside (and granted, this was my table), and said loudly enough for his table of 5 to hear "What kind of waitress doesn't bring bread? I asked your busser for bread but he doesn't seem to understand english so I'm now expecting bread and butter from you. Don't bring the pesto." Ugly, ugly tone that again I cannot begin to convey here. Our bussers are Portuguese, and yes, are in charge of bringing bread to the table. Definitely, I should have taken note that this table was lacking in the bread department, and remedied that. My bad. But this guy, man, this guy... so for some reason I had a little nerve and I said "Sir the way you're talking to me seems intentionally mean, and it's hurting my feelings. Please stop trying to embarrass me. I'll bring your bread over." Thats what I said. And it felt badass, and cutting in it's direct simplicity. And he sat back, and the wives at the table looked surprised, and they left me an awesome 23% tip. So. Yeah.

Then I dropped Nate, David and Sarah off at their respective houses (it was kind of cute to carpool everyone home) because I feel that owning a car means i have a responsibility to putt out some good karma for all the times I've been driven home.

Anyway, this morning I went to the church to rehearse for the christmas eve mass which I'm really excited about - Bryce has chosen some insanely beautiful stuff, very traditional in text but less so in their style in that the harmonies from these various pieces sound Irish, old old Medieval English, and in one case modal. Respectively. I'm actually still struggling with them, but at the beginning of the rehearsal Bryce said "okay I have a few things to take care of, Mollie would you teach these first three and I'll be back?" So I did, and I plunked away at the piano and I wasn't awesome with the part-teaching but once everyone knew their notes, I was able to effectively explain what I wanted and make it happen with my hands. I just love that I have a safe place to learn all these things. Everyone knows I'm just beginning, but respects and trusts my aural image that I'm working towards. So they're not impatient with me, and often ask for things that they could use to better understand me, like "Mollie, could you give a clearer 4 there and show us that cutoff more clearly" "but Mollie when you do that the altos need clarification because they're subdividing." It's a group effort that I get to lead, and I love what I'm learning, even if these pieces are kicking my ass. Especially the Vaughn Williams Magnificat.

I've got to get in the shower because I honestly smell awful and wouldn't you much rather be waited on for Tea by a waitress who doesn't smell like armpit? I thought so. I'm classy.

a few Thanksgiving pictures... I love my family

the smoke and who's still standing when it clears

Well! It's been a busier day than I thought it'd be- I'm just home from the children's choir where I had a truly unfulfilling session due to the ratio of time spent sitting in traffic to time spent teaching was pretty disappointing. On the way home I called my friend Lindsay (from Upstairs) with whom I had dinner/movie plans, only to learn that she was canceling because she was, in her own words, "destroyed cuz [she's] been drinking since 5." So no movie. Which sucks. I was really excited to go hang out with a friend who I've been getting to know lately - I usually drive her home from work and sometimes she calls with random anecdotes of her nights she thinks I'd enjoy, and she's a piano performance major at the Longey school of music so she actually understands what I'm babbling about much of the time. What I both like and am utterly confused by is that she actually calls to ask me for advice! ME! Which means there's someone in the world who has less of a clue than I do and thinks I have some facking answers! Answers which, when we chat, come out of my mouth like water, like I'm some sort of mountain-dwelling Yogi who knows what she's talking about and you know what? More often than not, what I have to say is pretty wise. Stop laughing. Anyhow, I was feelin' kinda let-down about her ditching me (especially for that shitty reason) so on my way home from the BCC I called Allen to cheer me up and we talked about eating disorders vs. disordered eating and why Mitt Romney should be drawn and quartered. Chatting with him actually turned my head around out of my own little self pitying mini circus. *smile* So I'm home and that's not such a bad thing, because I'm feeling lazy and I have some left over chinese food and Season 3 of The Office, so that kinda brings the awesome.


In other self-obsessed news...I actually meditated today. I say that with a bit of a scoff because it sounds pretentious, and in reality it wasn't hours and hours of zen but rather ten minutes of me sitting on a pillow by my window and trying to let my eyes shut and my spine lengthen while I listened to my neighbor shovel snow. My one success in my effort was that I didn't once open my eyes to check the clock to see if my ten minutes were up. I'm embarrassed to admit how proud I am of that. I made it ten minutes without boring myself.

One of the really neat things that's arisen today is an offer from Bryce (music director at North Prospect Church where they freekin' pay me to sing) has offered me the chance to not only sing the Vaughn Williams 'Magnificat' at their Christmas Eve service, but also to conduct the choir and mini baroque orchestra in the other pieces he's chosen, among them a William Billings piece, and what appear to be rather complicated versions of less traditional carols! I cannot believe he think me capable of handling the choir AND baroque ensemble, but I'm really excited about the offer and I'm gonna do it. Which means that I've opted out of park city about which I already felt conflicted because I couldn't ski and it was a quick flurry of a trip etc. etc. and Bryce's offer came my way. So on this pre-Christmas weekend I'll have a couple of rehearsals and work at Upstairs. Oh, and there will be some yoga thrown in there as well. Then on the 24th I'll sing the Christmas Eve Mass, and that same night drive up to Ted and Cheryl and Eli's place to stay over and spend Christmas day with them, during which I'll eat all their food and drive home to make my flight to LA on the 26th. This whole spending the days around Christmas independently isn't something I'm sold on every minute of the day, and I know it sounds kind of lonely, but I think it will ultimately be a good thing- getting to buckle down on some new music, making some money at the restaurant, and making a yoga class every day. It demands that I take care of myself in a way that I feel I'm just gathering the tools to do, and it's only for a few days. Yoga and conducting and singing and Eli and Upstairs folk. It sounds a nice to me.

Chinese food awaits...unless somebody's eaten it. In which case it's crepe time.

Name it, read it, tune it, print it, scan it, send it, fax - rename it,

I've received, today, a couple of really comforting emails (and a blog comment), all of them about loneliness, about how heavy it is, how there is hope and relief from it, and I guess mostly about how it's on everyone's backs. I guess what stood out to me most was not so much what was said, but the people who said them - these are people who aren't in Boston- people I don't see every day or even talk to with any regularity, but it's a weird thing, that loneliness, or maybe it was just me whining about it so much, but other human beings get it. And oh how quickly I forget that. How quick I am to assume that the guy who delivers my crepes from the place down the street isn't plagued with a damn thing, or that the woman who sent back her salmon has never felt hopeless in her entire life (fascinating that my references for the world are all food-based). I just liked hearing from other parts of the US that a) no one who is feeling lonely is actually alone and b) it passes. That was the theme, I guess. That everything passes- the peace and calm too. And I hate that. I have only few of those steady perfect moments that I would cling to with all my strength if I could, of these feelings of peace and resident happiness that I believed couldn't be wrestled away from me. At brunch at Lowes with Michael, Lucy, Peter and Mom after the Sunday meeting, where not only was there a 'make your own omelette' station but an entire dessert bar with waffles and cream puffs...fine...laugh at me...but my point is that I had everything I could have needed at the age of twelve at my fingertips at at that moment: an intact nuclear family, and an open buffet. Really, I remember that as a moment of unadulterated happiness. Another was a day at The Wedge after I'd been sufficiently pummeled by the waves and dragged out of the surf by Clint and Lucy where I fell asleep face-down on my hot towel with sand in my hair and Clint's warm body beside me. That, I'd keep. Or the first Sunday I sang at the North Prospect Church as a soloist- for pay- discovering the "our endless story hymn", and learning the music with the other choir members and hearing my clear voice resonate and being unable to believe that someone was paying me to do this. Rehearsing the Lauridson "O Magnum" for the first time. Struggling through e.e. cummings. Every Friday morning before school when Mum made blintzes. Playing Barbie with Lucy. Driving into Marlborough belting "Walking In Memphis" on the 10 fwy and believing I was profound. Rollerblading on the beach path while listening to techno thinking I was truly badass. Driving out to go Paintballing with Justin Parco and Kevin, also feeling truly badass. The left-footed goal against Marymount into the upper left corner (that one really was badass). Staying the night at Eva and Charlie's knowing I was going to be allowed to have donuts for breakfast. Singing on the street corner in Spain. Concocting very poisonous magic potions from Mum's spice rack when I was 6. Dressing Peter (willingly!) in drag for a play he and Lucy and I wrote and performed about an elf that falls into a well that leads to the human world that Mum and Michael watched and hooted at and loved. Their wedding and my perfect blue dress. Carrying Abigail piggy-back all over the parking lot while we ate peanuts and waited for a table. Realizing I'd actually stopped when I was full. "Accidentally" slamming Cami Marcus to the ground in a game of soccer at Mirman. Waking up early Saturday morning's at Dad's house to an english muffin with butter and peanut butter that he'd left for me, and likely a poem, and taking it to my red velvet chair where I could watch the beach wake up and see who was walking their dogs that morning. Finding out I'd gotten into Tufts. Falling asleep to "O Brother Where Art Thou". Sorry, these things are flooding to me and I'm writing them all down because the act of recalling them and typing them in detail is reminding me, as Dad is always hammering home to me, that I. Have. Good. Stuff. These are moments I would have chosen to keep. I guess I have.
Sierra Tucson was really the longest moment of all- afternoons spent running laps around the dry track or evenings by the fire. Those moments stretched into 45 days where I was untouchable by anything other than centered self-certainty and happiness. I'd hang onto that, too. So in knowing that those things pass (and thankfully return as they do when I'm writing, or when I'm fortunate enough to discover another one), I can find comfort in that, and in believing that the loneliness will not hang like this thick blanket all of my life. Maybe just this day, or just the rest of this month. Maybe for years it will be here, but it cannot cannot stay all the time. It, too, will pass. It will be interspersed with pockets where I will be okay- better than okay, and they'll be made of cream puffs and family and waves and my own internal kiva. And I guess that's faith, believing all that. Believing it'll be better.
My Gawd this is self-indulgent sometimes.


Ok, quick recap of my day thus far, this morning I had an egg and cheddar cheese sammich on cibatta from Au Bon Pain, went to Kelly's, and then to Andy's where I conducted the two excerpts of recitative from Messiah for him, with an awful lot more mistakes in them then I'd had last night. He sent me home with an even more terrifying ten pages of Magic Flute recitative that requires so much subdividing and careful counting that I don't know that I can tackle it without a lot of hand-holding. And then I blogged for like a bajillion hours about myself and loneliness and good memories and actually felt better.

I'm going to meet Kate for a Yoga class, and then likely to her house for Christmas Cookies and, with luck, Marx Brothers. By the way, last night she didn't call and ask me over, so I called her and invited myself over and I rehearsed my music and then she Eric and I watched The Matrix. Sometimes what this fish needs is to take initiative.

dance to the static on the AM radio

Mush. This weather has been mush and slip and splat. Freezing pelting rain and sleet and eventually softer rain that erodes the snow piled on the sidewalks and slicks everything in ice. Today, I wore too-big jeans and clogs, and now my jeans are soggy up to my knees and my socks are snowy. I went to the Sackler Museum with Dad, Kate and Eric to see an exhibit about painted figures of deities where I felt truly uncultured because I was having a difficult time feeling inspired to focus on any pieces or read any of their little blurbs. I don't know, it was a pretty disconnected day, though it improved when Kate Eric and I went to tea at Upstairs where we laughed hysterically and drew unfavorable attention from tea-goers who's snobbery far exceeded ours. There was a string trio there playing Schubert and Bach and during every waltz they played, we bounced in our banquette to the long-short-short 3 count of it, and looked very very silly.

Last night Dad and I attended the Christmas Revels, an event that happens for a few weeks in December where a group of singers, dancers, poets, actors etc gather to celebrate Christmas tradition and music and dances etc from a single culture. This Christmas was music and poetry in the Slavic tradition. I've gotta say, other than Dona Nobis Pacem it was mostly inaccessable - there's only so much half-tone yodeling one can handle in a two and a half hour show. HOWEVER, they did present a reduction of this beautiful story I remember Mum reading us when we were little, called The Month Brothers. (Mum, here's a link, see if this looks familiar: http://www.harpercollins.com/books/9780688015107/The_MonthBrothers/index.aspx)

I love rediscovering stories of children's books I'd read when I was little because the illustrations come back so vividly and I guess I find comfort in it. I keep a mental list of children's books I intend to collect for my own children's library, among them are King Bidgood's In the Bathtub (and he won't get out), Heckety Peg, and The Six Swans. Just...in case you were wondering.
I wonder.

I've felt pretty even-keeled all day, that is until I came home and encountered that familiar "now what" feeling. I'm waiting to hear back from Kate whether or not I'm going to be invited over to do work (I must must must go over this recitative for Andy before tomorrow) and I'm feeling like my attitude towards the night is kind of going to be made or broken depending on that invitation. I hate teetering. I came home to a really encouraging email from a friend (that was especially timely) that simply reminded me how these feelings, all of them, even the bliss, passes. And it was validating to be reminded that when they shift quickly, and a person bounces from that bliss to despair within a matter of hours, OF COURSE we'll feel exhausted and overrun. And hopefully, at some point, even again.

I don't know. I just wish the lonely would go away. No matter where I'm at on that emotional spectrum, loneliness is always clinging. I'm like a benched whale. That's right. That's what I said.

So I guess I'll hop on that recitative and not wait for Kate's invite, and if it happens peachy, and if not, poop on her.

"what's a crocus" and you said "it's a flower". I tried to remember, but I said "what's a flower?" you said "I still love you"

Very, very disjointed (and whiny) post ahead...

All day I've been wrestling with the snow, whether it's trying to park in it and having my wheels spin under me, or not dressing warmly enough for it, or dealing with the repercussions of the approaching storm. The Handel Chandos Anthem has been canceled for this Sunday because Bryce has decided turnout wouldn't be as good as he had hoped, and also he felt it was unfair to ask all the instrumentalists to come into town under such weather conditions. I guess I understand, but honestly I'm disappointed. And Dad flew all the way out here to see it. *sigh* So that sucks. Today sucks, actually. This morning I compiled and turned in my poetry portfolio for my final, and then went over to Kate's briefly where I rehearsed the Handel downstairs while she showered and puttered about upstairs, and then went into work. But throughout it all, there was that loneliness. Really, it was like a person following me, watching me go about my day and waiting for the right moment to pounce and cling like an over-sized backpack. It came in the middle of Dinner service, just as Dad sat down in my section and I gripped my phone in my apron and Sandeesh presented me with the two cappuccinos I'd begged him to make for me (I honestly cannot make foam to save my life). At that moment, It came and it sat so heavily on my shoulders that I felt like the wind had been knocked out of me.

I feel, lately, as though I don't have any place in the world. I'm struck sometimes by the kind of displacement and anxiety and uselessness that makes me curl and wince at every word that comes my way. I don't know how to receive questions that are asked of me, don't know how to handle simple tasks because my motor skills have left my hands. This is just sometimes, and less often since the medication, but man oh man, this coming home at night, this little heartbeat in medford, this very quiet snow-slick street... This, the way This feels is not tolerable. If I believed the rest of my life would feel like this, I would likely combust. As though I have any idea what that would look like. I'm trying to tolerate living my life when I'm alone. Plus I'm out of Golden Raisins which really doesn't make my trail-mix situation easy. I should call Emma. I wish this were easier.

By the way I have 10 months.

Tomorrow I've promised my body a 9am yoga class (I may opt for the 11 o'clock one becauese I'd love to sleep in, but that wouldn't work so well with Dad's schedule, because he's running in the morning), followed by breakfast with Dad and then I'll head back to the restaurant to work the tea shift. I would have been rehearsing 9-4 if the Handel hadn't been canceled. Man that's disappointing. Then Dinner with dad tomorrow night, he's requested "somewhere simple". It'll be just he and I, as Kate and Eric are in NY this weekend to support Emma while she tests for her black belt.

Sometimes when I think of people other than Mum and Dad reading this, like Joanna or Annie, or Grandpa Allan, I feel embarrassed for being so blunt. Or raw I guess is a better word. Or I suppose I don't so much mind the bluntness, but I realize that these are people I respect and love and admire, and when I talk about depression like this, I'm definitely not portraying myself as I'd like those people to see me. I think the great hope is that I say something that strikes a chord with someone else, and so the great reaction is not "oh Mollie you really need some help, girl", or "Pull it together please" or "ew", but rather "oh...I've felt that". Or maybe they're just send me up a quick prayer.

*big sigh*

I'm going to bed without brushing my teeth. There's my act of defiance for the day. I feel pathetic. Oh, heh, and lonely.

breathe unless you do this with me

Just home from work, it's after 1am, my feet are buzzing. Today that infamous book I'm reading said this to me-

look for god like a man who's head is on fire looks for water

I love it. No, I really love it.

I've got a million thoughts but I know I really need to put myself to bed instead of expounding upon them. Really, they're all very self-involved. So is having a blog I guess.

wish you were (incubus version)

It wasn't at all in my plans when I got up this morning but I took a yoga class tonight. Chorale was short because it was the end of the semester, and Andy collected music (from everyone but me...I felt special) and wished us well, and so I went to the outskirts of Cambridge and took a yoga class that left me in a heap. I don't really understand the chanting of 'Om' three times at the beginning and end of the practice (and I got dirty looks when I sang my 'Om' a major third higher than everyone else). I guess it's to center yourself in your body and with the "oneness"of the others in the room, but I always wish it was more musical than it is.
I noticed some old habits when I was in the yoga class though, the pinching my waist and feeling for my hip bones, running my fingers along my jaw line, all in an attempt to assess my body, my weight, how am I doing, how worthy am I? Those aren't the literal words in my head, but I know enough to identify the surrounding thoughts. My food has been strange lately. I've been utterly uninterested, rarely hungry, and when I am hungry it's a pretty powerful feeling to acknowledge that it's not the kind of uncontrollable hunger I would feel when I wanted to binge, rather it's a quiet gnawing that, rather than trigger my search for a meal, has given me permission to congratulate myself for resisting. Also, I've lost a little weight without thinking about it, and so now that I've noticed of course I'm thinking about it. So...that's not so hot. It would help if I actually found the time to go grocery shopping and find bargain produce or something, and didn't subsist entirely off of trail mix, yogurt, cereal and carrots. Really, Mollie. You should know better than this... little dangerous doncha think? So there's my fessing up in text. I'm committing to eating three meals tomorrow. Embarrassing to admit these sort of things. It's like saying Tomorrow, I pledge not to poop my pants, or Tomorrow I will tie BOTH of my shoes! This is a basic thing. Children have mastered this, and yet I'm still unable to feed myself in a reasonable way

So now I'm just out of the shower about to go over some of the Recitative that Andy assigned me for tomorrow. It's to short excerpts from the Messiah, but the thing about Recitative is that the conductor isn't in charge; the soloist is in charge. So it's a matter of anticipating beats and cuing the orchestra based on the pacing of the soloist. I'm horrible at it. Really truly confused. I wish I had a better handle on it before going to meet with Andy.

Other news, other news...oh...poem...last poetry class of the semester. Here's what I brought.

***


He’s Homeless

Hate mourning soon; lets kill soon.
Swell the served, reserved,
and rather coddle-brained winter again.

How did my evening’s madman become such a pansy?
It happened when his hands moved up, over his swollen stomach,
to touch the plush hanging skin round his neck,
creaky piped, clammy tongued.
Socks are his fur-lined mittens.

Would you believe this seedy loaf of a man--
My canker sore of a hobby.

We may both be thinking of crude, sharp innuendos—
The azure bowl in both our hands, our well-wishing plate
Crumb-scuddled, so empty?
Give in. Scrape up.
Sloppy papa and no-art daughter.
We might both erode, I guess.
Gypped and reserved and enshrouded, but which of us first?
Smelling of rag-wool, like an unwashed soup can, I cuddle in his collar.

***


The poems I've gathered this semester are like benchmarks of where my brain has been going. My professor's feedback was that it admitted a real loneliness from the speaker. I hadn't really intended that, but it's amazing how, when one writes, what's living in you seeps through.

Father says, "Your mother's right, she's really up on things"

I slept in late today after going to bed around 2 (I got home at 1:40). When I lay down after working Lunch, Tea, and a full Dinner service my whole body hums because it can't believe I've been asking it to go this continuously. It's all day, its without a single chance to sit down except for a fifteen minute family meal, and when I'm going, it's a constant fast-paced walk interspersed with a sprint up three flights of stairs to the upstairs kitchen to retrieve ice cream scoops from their pastry chef.

The Wellbutrin is...the Wellbutrin. It's not yet a week in but the four days are up and I've doubled the dosage and I'm not feeling much of anything different but hope. My friend Sam told me that in his experience, just the act of surrendering to the medication is enough to change your head a little bit, because it's a concrete action. I've experienced a little bit of that and certainly feel it when I'm on my way to work or going to run an errand, but it's mornings like today, waking up, eating breakfast, and then the great "now what?" feeling that's like a slug to the chest, when I feel completely incapable. That one loud question immediately makes me cry because it's followed by the instant realization that I haven't anything to do now. I should probably make a list of ongoing things, or projects I could tackle in those "now what" moments, like bed-making, room-cleaning, laundry...I wonder if neat freaks are just extraordinarily lonely people who put their time to good use.

I certainly could stand to do some laundry.

Heh...I just got a text from one of the Chefs at Upstairs that read "my arm hurts." I ran food to the wrong table last night because I mis-read the ticket (I honestly think I have dyslexic tendencies) and he punched me in the arm when he found out because he had to re-make the food. So I punched him back. Hard, apparently.

I'm reading a book that Cheryl gave to me at the vineyard over Thanksgiving, it's called Eat Pray Love by Elizabeth Gilbert, and on the surface it's about this woman's travels through Italy, India, and Indonesia, divorcing herself from husband and her successful career, and living alone in these countries. But ultimately it's about what she unearths about herself in each place, her sense of pleasure in Italy, devotion in India, and in Indonesia her own personal balance between worldly enjoyment and divine transcendence. Anyhow, the way she describes herself is resonating with me in the most startling ways. She talks about how when, in love, she throws herself so far in that there are no boundaries, will give you her heart, the sun and the the moon, her spirit, her money, her dog, her dog's money, etc. She talks about a depression that had her on the bathroom floor for two years, and her own struggle to come to terms with and define her higher power. Most significantly is her unspeakable loneliness. She describes how she came to handle this loneliness, and what she did when she was feeling that kind of darkness: she kept a journal in which she would begin to write to God, just her most basic feelings. "I need your help'. And then she waits, and after a little while a response comes in her own handwriting "I'm right here. What can I do for you?" She writes about this with embarrassment because she understands that it's a version of talking to herself and wouldn't be easily understood, but I loved how she wrote about it. She writes

I've been surprised to find that I can almost always access that voice, too, no matter how black my anguish may be. Even during the worst of suffering, that calm, compassionate, affectionate and infinitely wise voice (who is maybe me, or maybe not exactly me) is always available for conversation on paper at any time of day or night. I've decided to let myself off the hook from worrying that conversing with myself on paper means I'm a schizo. Maybe the voice I'm reaching for is God, or maybe it's my Guru speaking through me, or maybe it's the angle who was assigned to my case, or maybe it's my Highest Self, or maybe it is indeed just a construct of my subconscious, invented in order to protect me from my own torment.

I love this idea.

When she's in Italy after a reprieve from her depression and loneliness, she encounters a night when they return full-force, and she's rendered almost hysterically helpless. She reaches for this voice again, and what she writes is that she is weak and full of fear. She writes that she's afraid she will never be without the Loneliness, that she doesn't want to take medication and is afraid she will always have to. She says she is terrified that she will never really pull her life together. You can understand why I'm riveted by this book. She writes all this in the journal, and what she finds herself writing back and all the certainties I have always wished another person would say to me when I was hurting

I'm here. I love you. I don't care if you need to stay up crying all night long, I will stay with you. If you need the medication again, go ahead and take it-- I will love you through that, as well. If you don't need the medication, I will love you, too. There's nothing you can do to lose my love. I will protect you until you die, and after your death, I will still protect you. I am stronger than Depression and I am braver than Loneliness and nothing will ever exhaust me.

I read that and cried quietly and wished that I had that kind of faith. I cry typing it now because of how gentle the words are, and how I wish those words would come to me from a person, a real person who could sit across from me and hold my head in their hands for awhile, or at least one I could be on the phone with. I guess that's why we believe in God, because no real person could commit to the kind of consistent reassurance and unconditional love that we crave. And so we construct something to satisfy that. And if it satisfies, it's just as real as if it were someone we knew and could take them out for burritos to say thank you. When I was young I remember Mum telling me about the writing she did to work towards defining her God, and how comforting it was to realize that she could make up the terms, and I remember being truly comforted by that. I can also remember loving the idea of doing that for myself, and actually trying to in a journal I kept, but giving up because I was afraid I was doing it wrong and was making up something beautiful in which I had no faith. That was the big thing, I was worried I wouldn't believe in what I wanted to believe. I distinctly remember telling myself that it was okay because Mom's God had me covered and I could borrow hers if I needed it.
Wow. That's making me cry.

I don't mean that we're fabricating a character here, but that whatever we need is what God will be to us. I believe in God. I know this because when I'm really, really hurting, I say what everyone says when they're hurting: 'O, My God, help me'. And I it. They're said with such intensity and such Need that the thought of them being sent out to the universe without a recipient is unacceptable. Really, I'm unable to accept that possibility. And so for now, I believe in God because I Need God.
Fuck. I really wish it was something more beautiful than that, that I believe in God because of Bach, or because of how I feel on a swing set, or because of how I can now eat when I'm hungry and stop when I'm full.

I guess I should take what I can get on this one, letting the belief be enough without berating myself for the lack of poetry in my reason.

little boy, little boy, won't you lay your body down

Up and out for a long day at work at the restaurant. For which I'm very, very grateful. It actually shouldn't be that long, I'm not scheduled to work dinner but I'd happily pick it up if asked, and even the lunch and tea shifts that I will be there for tend to extend into the dinner hours, especially if we get a gang of ladies with a baby or wedding shower. Anyhow, I've just "ironed" my shirt by hanging it in the bathroom while I shower, and now I'm gonna throw on some sweats and head into Cambridge.

If I don't pick up the dinner shift tonight, I'm hoping the plan will be to go to Kate's and bake cookies and watch Elf with Eric and maybe Emma.
Alright, I've gotta fly...

that's my daughter in the water

So, I'm not sleeping much; I hear this isn't unusual. I had an incredibly defeating morning yesterday when I woke up at 6:30 to make sure I was breakfasted and dressed warmly enough (and familiar enough with directions) to get out the door and on the road to my shrink's office. I don't like saying my psychiatrist because that feels clinical, and I suppose I'm not all that fond of 'shrink' either but I feel slightly less ashamed using that word so I'mma stick with it. I had clear directions, I was out the door, I had more than enough time, and I was lost in ten minutes. I'm damn familiar with driving in Boston until I venture beyond Medford into Arlington and then I'm toast, I might as well be driving blindfolded because it's unfamiliar, it's entirely unmarked, and I've never gone more than a block beyond mystic valley parkway. So needless to say I was lost and running late and I called Dr. Pearson and let her know. I felt embarrassed (this is an office I'd gotten to before by T) and irresponsible and foolish. But when I sat back in my seat while resting in traffic (because of course there'd be traffic AND I'd be lost), I recognized that I was no longer crazed after making the call. I was no longer that worked up over this. I had made the appointment because I've been feeling like shit and had agreed to consider medication and a little more monitoring, so of course I saw this appointment as a big symbolic surrender and of COURSE I couldn't get there, I was late, I was under-slept, I was dark and grim. What was odd was that I came to a place where I wasn't losing my mind. This might sound like something I should have found comfort in, but I didn't. I Was pissed off; somehow my brain was able to calmly handle what I knew I was understand to be a kind of personal apocalypse (here I was, needing help, willing to get it, and I couldn't physically get myself there...madness, right?), and yet once I made the phone call I had no emotional response to it other than "hm...I'm sure this'll work work itself out. And yet, when I was making the bed the morning before (that's right Mum, Dad, I gave making my bed a bold shot) and I couldn't get the pillowcases on, or the day before when Andy asked to push our meeting back an hour, making it so I'd have to reschedule, or each time I encounter the faintest hint of loneliness: I. Am. Shredded. Defeated. Sometimes crying and unable to stop, sometimes silent, and feeling the need to make myself as still as possible. It's strange, but at those times lying on the floor next to my bed and concentrating all my efforts into not moving a single molecule of my body is all I am capable of.

We ended up doing a phone session and I'm good to go. Kind of. My friend Sam once told me, when we were discussing medication "I'd rather be an unhappy Sam than a happy somebody else." It's hard to argue with a point like that. My inclination is that I, too, would rather be an unhappy version of myself than a happier version of some other incarnation of me. Or not me. Or that I'd rather feel the floor of every emotional canyon and the zenith of every peak that's thrown my way, all the while believing I'll be a richer human being because of it. I suppose that just isn't true anymore. I'd rather be a happy anybody else. Hm. Reading that sentence back made me feel really sad.

and stand in a long line of sinners like me

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sestina


Here's how the sestina turned out. It's missing the envoy at the end but I'm happier without it. Another stanza would be forced and awkward. I wrote most of it last night when I what I was feeling was impossible. Dark. I was imagining what it would be like if my whole life felt like that, if I continue to grow up into those kinds of feelings, wondering if my capacity for feeling lonely would only deepen and stretch with age. I wrote it wondering what my children would think if they saw me like that, so that's how the poem began. As I wrote the driver character became less and less me but the thoughts behind her remained. I woke up this morning to finish the piece hoping my feelings around it would have changed, that I would have time to u-turn it in one or two more stanzas but I couldn't. I wish me out of the woods.


We go home

The snow wouldn’t melt on the cold road
and collected, as though being cold was effortless.
Our mother cried, silently, with her mouth open,
We hushed in the back seat and took in no air.
It used to be a big deal, these episodes;
By now we knew better than to take her hand.

The steering wheel looked huge, unmanageable in my mother’s hand
as she guided us down the darkening road.
The drive home was just another gray episode
marking our day-in, day-out, otherwise numb and effortless.
This was something. Around our car was the loud rush of cold air
and I noticed our mother had her window open.

“Would you get my makeup bag open?”
My mother’s face was in her hands
and a fresh spray of perfume sat dead in the air.
She hadn’t taken her eyes off the whitening road.
I imagined her perfume freezing in the air, effortlessly,
and raining to the carpet in pearl-thump episodes.

Not a word during the makeup ritual of her episode,
Strange how, when applying lipstick, her mouth isn’t open.
the silent sobbing has stopped, she steers effortlessly.
Her fingernails look redder on the ends of her hands.
Her breath is the only warmth in the car, fogging the air
We all lean to accommodate the curve in the road.

you could always be your own girl

My Gawd I'm exhausted. It's been one of those weekends where nothing goes as planned (not that that's a bad thing) and when I look back on my calendar all I can think is - wow...I did none of those things. But it was just as productive. I ended up working three shifts at the restaurant on Saturday. Three. That's 9am-1am, roughly. Usually I work three shifts a week, but it was nice to just get there and stay there, knowing my car was safely parked, knowing I was in a place where the chaos was predictable, knowing I was going to make some serious money and I did. I had a bit of a meltdown in the middle of dinner service though, actually it was about Michael. I was walking upstairs to the soirée kitchen with Tony, our main Monday Club Bar chef, to get butter lettuces that they'd under-stocked, and he made some reference to his step-mother being very ill and out of the blue I crumpled on the stairs in this stupid, dramatic heap. Poor guy didn't really know what to make of me. I felt really embarrassed and was trying to get myself together but what was keeping me crying was a bleak and gruesome image of what it must have looked like when Michael was found in that hotel room. I'm assuming when booze wasn't the only thing that did him in so there must have been other crap around him, and alcohol poisoning does ugly things to your body before it eats you, that's to say, I'm guessing he puked. I wonder if he had his false teeth in when he passed out, what he was wearing, what he'd been spending the night doing. It's a thought I'm pretty haunted by, and poor Tony sat down next to me and just sat there with me, totally quiet, until I could banish the image and get up off the steps.
I know this is a weird transition, but I really can't think of how to end that last paragraph. Other than that the night went unusually smoothly. I worked the center of the MCB and did about three turnovers of my section, including one birthday - it made me so happy to see this family's face light up when I came out with their beautifully decorated plate and the candles and the sparklers and set it all in front of their father. I forget that this job makes me happy in simple ways. Also, everyone ordered really expensive bottles of wine, so that's always nice. It was great to walk out of there and get my ass home and crawl into bed with my the balls of my feet aching and my lower back in one single knot because those clogs have a little bit of a lift in them, and feeling my heartbeat in my toes. I felt useful and productive and as though I was making some small contribution.

It snowed last night. It was so cold that it didn't even melt in the streets and came down in teddy bear-sized flakes. It's so gray and foggy out I cant see the hills only two miles away. I'm trying to write this sestina for my poetry class in an hour, so I'm gonna get on that, and probably post it if it's not utter drivel. Here's my first stanza...I'm guessing I'll have to re-think a few of these end words:

The snow wouldn’t melt on the cold road
and collected, as though being cold was effortless.
Our mother cried, silently, with her mouth open,
We hushed in the back seat and took in no air.
It used to be a big deal, these episodes;
By now we knew better than to take her hand.

a muted click, and a closing of the eyes

I watched my audition tape last night. It consists of two run-throughs of the Alleluia with a few of my comments and attempts to fix things. Frankly, even aside from the fact that all I can think when I watch the video is "I look fat", it's a shitty tape, and a really horrible example of what I can do. Or maybe that's exactly what I can do and I'm totally kidding myself. My expressions are dead-pan, I couldn't look less interested in the piece or less connected to the choir. From this side of things it looks like I cue nothing, I interpret nothing, I emote nothing. And it's the strangest thing because what's going on in my head is this cacophony of analysis and quick request and expression, but why the fuck it's not showing up on my face is beyond me. It honestly looks like I'd rather be anywhere else. I look bored. I'm really embarrassed to send this in and totally discouraged. I really hope these recommendations are encouraging enough that I'm invited for a live audition, because this audition tape isn't gonna help me much.

I've got my apps together at this point; I'm waiting on recommendations from John McDonald and Bryce (advisor, and the church conductor who hired me, respectively), and then I can get these things in the mail, at which point it's just a matter of plugging my ears and wincing. I wish I had more hope about this.

I made myself an egg and cheese bagel this morning and watched Sesame Street where Sugarland joined Elmo and sang about the joy of singing. Duh. Then the Count counted Russian sheep (you knew they were Russian because they had on those barrel-shaped ushanka hats that the Russian kicking dancers in The Nutcracker wear). I'd like to see the Nutcracker actually. I've been thinking of taking myself some Saturday night because I remember going to see it with Dad and Michelle and her daughter Eva and loving how Christmassy and celebratory I felt. Like I was really taking advantage of the season. I feel like I'm going to miss that this year, what with spending so much of the pre-season solo in Medford, and no skiing. At least there will be caroling, right? I mean, Peter won't go but Dad and Kate and I will I'm sure. Damn I wish I could ski this year. I've even fantasized about doing it just a little bit, just some light cruisers on Payday, but I know I couldn't stop there, or at least wouldn't be able to keep my speed down and the next thing I know I'd be an ego-driven comet downhill and all it takes is one little wrong edge and it's an utter yard sale. Ugh. Poor knee.

Bryce just dropped off his recommendations. And gave me a copy. Wow. I've got a little bit of hope now. Here's to clinging to that.

I found THE most excellent Christmas present


...hoping they have it in fuji size

Hokis

This is the poem I brought into my poetry workshop today. I'd written it a good while ago and re-worked it substantially so the idea is similar but re-directed.

I'm totally bragging when I say Prof. Digges responded to the class by saying "folks, were in the presence of a great poem. No corrections." It was a good day.

****

Here is the truth: you were anticipated.

There were times when, in the grey constancy of our
struggled aversions,
I’d wondered about you.
if you’d thrill over a truly fantastic marinade-
romanticize me as a mother-
could be talked into a second helping-
would tolerate incessant harmonies-
wouldn’t mind reading to me-
would speak with open urgency of going home-
if your t-shirts would fit me-
if you’d let me have a bite. Or five.
these were the thousands foundlings at the freshest genesis.

It was Spring, and the “better things” promise was alive,
the weight of blossom bowing it’s gentle head like a lily of the valley.
I wore my inadequacies emblazoned upon my chest-
Yours were in skywriting boldly across the orange evening that fell upon the West --
a zero lightning line, that horizon, and even then,
fearless.

These love things, these unspeakable love…things…
“And there was evening, and there was morning—the
sixth day.
Thus the heavens and the earth in all their vast
array.” (Genesis 1:31)

you stayed at my mouth.
found shelter there, find sanctuary
and under the roof of that chapel there breathed
breath so warm--
alive--
to evaporate the shadows that shrouded my tongue,
and there with joined flesh to taste
(the gothic arches at the corners of our mouths and)
sweet so soft, that not all the hungry residue
at our cheeks could extinguish the flame called up inside of these,
the walls of our new cathedral.
I’ve learned that I love my body
when it is with your body.
Facedown in our bed months later
we enlaced our fingers and closed our eyes:
we were children fumbling through a prayer built on breath,
exhaling our desired perception of our sweet selves.

That’s some courage, you know
to pray with someone watching you,
to ask for things for yourself and for them when their ears are open to every failure,
when your own mouth can form the words to God before him.


Months from now,
buried in your sweater I will not find your scent
strong enough to keep you there:
over my shoulders, between my legs.
Atop my pillows.
Out on the back porch smoking stoically into the unscripted sky.

In those sheets I will ignore your parallel hollow in the feather bed,
rolling across it into kind of birth, a new advent.

In days I will be your body:
the churlish curve of your ears and the softest skin on your brow,
each of your teeth and all of the space between your vertebrae.
I will reinvent my skin for you.
Our Season, re-sharpened, re-gilded, safely re-sheathed,
and will not sleep till then.

“Let there be an expanse between the waters to separate water from water. So God made the expanse and separated the water under the expanse from the water above it. And it was so. God called the expanse ‘sky'. And there was evening, and there was morning.”
(Genesis 1:6-8)

What magicians;
we have blown the sky off the very world.




***


This evening I recorded my audition tape for my applications with the Chorale. It wasn't great, but it wasn't as bad as it could've been, and with luck I'll get back both a VHS to send in with my apps, and a dvd to post here. Right now I'm listening through Handel's Chandos Anthem for the Church (Dec 16th). I love having music to learn, especially holding the hard copy in front of me and marking it up, what scale degree to listen for, where I'll get my note from, how to phrase the measures, how to count it...makes me feel like a really strong musician to look back at my scores after a performance.

There are Christmas lights and a little Christmas tree up in my room that Emma brought back from her house. I think this is my first Christmas tree of my own. Lights too, I guess, because the chili peppers I had up in my room in high school just don't count. The tree and these lights kind of walk the line between making me feel warm and celebratory, and lonely in that pathetic "Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas" sort of way. Right now they're feeling warm, so I'm gonna run with that.

I keep forgetting I have Thanksgiving leftovers in the fridge...harumph...yay yams!

one generation to another

A grand, grand Thanksgiving. I'm sitting at my computer right now listening to Handel's Chandos Anthem #7, the Alto Solo "My Song Shall Be Alway" (no 's'). Brian and Gwen are downstairs decorating the little Christmas tree they've gotten for the house, and adorning the living room with garlands and light. It's pretty damn beautiful. It's the first time it's felt nice to be home.

I've got a crown up in that kingdom, ain'-a that good news

Man that was beautiful! Not perfect beautiful, but music beautiful! I just got finished conducting the Randall Thompson 'Alleluia' AND Trevor Weston's 'Deliver Me O Lord' that Andy threw at me literally a half hour before the performance. The concert is still going on upstairs, that's how recent this all is, my heart's still pounding a little. I could hear myself breathing loudly as I went through the piece; it's amazing because where when I was singing before, nerves would greatly effect my sound due to breath and the consistency of my voice and all that, but with conducting if I lock up my wrists that's a good thing- there's no confusing where the beat is, in my wrist or in my fingertips. My nerves make me rigid, shoulders back, demonstrating the singing posture that'll get the best sound out of my guys. They didn't pay great attention to crescendos and diminuendos as I would have liked, but there were no big big big mistakes. No big mistakes either. I finished to great applause, and whistling too, because not only was the house full, but the chamber singers with whom I sang last year, the ones I conducted on the rooftop in Cordoba, were in the back of the house waiting to perform next and they whooped and hollered and I honestly felt popular for the first time since...god...Marlborough I guess, when I played Jacques. While the audience was still clapping Andy grabbed my arm and whispered "I think they have something for you", and one of the sopranos came out with a bouquet of flowers for me. I tried to keep from crying and bowed my head and thought about Dad and Michael and Mr. Bruneau, and about standing by the bookshelves upstairs at Dad's house when I was little holding one of those batons and being frustrated that I didn't know how to conduct other than keep time. In some ways I still don't. In most ways, in fact. Once I left the hall John McDonald, my advisor (and a composer whom I greatly greatly respect) took my hand and told me he thought I'd found my calling. I don't know that it's true, but it's damn nice to hear from someone I admire so much.

I've been an unbelievable emotional wreck today. I think that makes experiences like this one better; something to foil it against, something to stretch my very humanity to it's capacity. I couldn't be inspired and moved to tears by that heroic arrival in measure 52 if I weren't also capable of feeling pockets of deep loneliness. I eat like that, I breathe like that, I run like that. I love like that, and I think I'm a better human being for it.


Oh, and I had 9 months on the 13th. *beams*

Whos gonna steal the show, you know, baby it's the Guitar Man

Michael gave me a card when I was 12 that I kept on my bulletin board for a long time. It was one of those hallmark "just because" cards and he gave it to me during a period in which I'd been struggling with the transitions between the Ocean Park house and Alisal. When he and Mum divorced I cut off the front cover and kept the message he'd scrawled inside of it

"I know it's hard to move back and forth
I can see the pain in your eyes,
but do not fear, I am always here,
your friend till one of us dies."


I don't really know what to say about it, I'll probably have to wait a few days before I've got anything I can put words to. Rough day.




The Guitar Man - Bread

Who draws the crowd and plays so loud,
Baby its the guitar man.
Whos gonna steal the show, you know
Baby its the guitar man,

He can make you love, he can make you cry
He will bring you down, then hell get you high
Somethin keeps him goin, miles and miles a day
To find another place to play.

Night after night who treats you right,
Baby its the guitar man
Whos on the radio, you go listen
To the guitar man

Then he comes to town, and you see his face,
And you think you might like to take his place
Somethin keeps him driftin miles and miles away
Searchin for the songs to play.

Then you listen to the music and you like to sing along,
You want to get the meaning out of each and evry song
Then you find yourself a message and some words to call your own
And take them home.

He can make you love, he can get you high
He will bring you down, then hell make you cry
Somethin keeps him movin, but no one seems to know
What it is that makes him go.

Then the lights begin to flicker and the sound is getting dim
The voice begins to falter and the crowds are getting thin
But he never seems to notice hes just got to find
Another place to play,
Anyway got to play, anyway got to play.

square one, my slate is clear

Aaaaanxious anxious anxious. The concert is today and I feel vastly unprepared. I began a post yesterday that I never finished for lack of energy and a little bit of discouragement. Yesterday was the dress rehearsals, which invariably go badly so I shouldn't be particularly torn up about that, but we were supposed to use this dress rehearsal to make my audition tape to send in with my applications. It was a nightmare: they couldn't get through the piece fully, mistake after mistake after mistake, and not unnoticeable ones either. This is a piece they've had from memory since October, and I finally had them use their music which, amazingly, didn't help at all! It's not like I just didn't get a decent take, I didn't get a single full take. Andy's since told me we'll have a chance to tape again at the concert tonight but I'm feeling pretty discouraged and not very hopeful. That, followed by a BCC rehearsal at Villa Victoria in which Zoey, a usually disruptive girl, was unusually so, and I asked her to leave for the rest of class and she burst into tears. Just rough to watch. Ugh.

I feel uninspired by anything but this increasingly cold weather. Rain all over the brilliantly colored leaves everywhere. It's all peaking towards Thanksgiving, and I'll be so grateful for its coming. I feel so at sea and I'm sure I'll continue to afterwards, but at least for that week I'll be solid.
I need to figure out my Christmas vacation plans...I sing the Handel Motets at the church on Dec 16th and I don't have to be back until January 16th for classes but I need to see about the BCC and the restaurant for the days between. It'd be nice if I could do some traveling...have an actual vacation.

Alright, time for a little breakfast and some music review before the potential train wreck that is tonight. Disaster or not, I still wish I was gonna have some family there. Damn, what do I need to get out of this mood? A gym visit perhaps? Bench-press a buick?

Rejected Cartoons

I'm probably the only person in the entire world who finds these funny, but I stumbled across them online recently and I remember laughing till I peed when I saw them in 11th grade. Enjoy, if you can, and please don't think any less of me.

Now darkness has a hunger that's insatiable, and lightness has a call that's hard to hear

I've had the most unproductive morning I've had in a long long time. I woke up really late, late enough that Saved By the Bell wasn't on and TBS had moved on to King of the Hill, so I watched that, followed by A Mother's Fight for Justice (on the Life channel, not Lifetime) which I watched despite mum's cringing over the phone. I love seeing her on TV and recognizing jewelery she's wearing that she's work for years, or expressions in her delivery, or the way she touches the actors playing her children like she does us, and here I'm thinking of that hand to the back of the neck or ears. It's nice to remember what being around those things regularly was like.
Last night Emma had given me the remainder of a giant bag full of plump golden raisins so I supplemented breakfast (still trailmix) with those, and then sat on the couch for forever. Really, I can get sucked into TV like it's my job, and it's the most unproductive thing imaginable. Right now I just came upstairs, and it's already 2:30 here. I've got to be at the restaurant by 4. The tube ate my day.

It's felt like a rough series of days, weeks I guess. At least they've been entirely music-oriented, whether it's the Children's Choir or the Church solo gig or the Tufts conducting. I'm glad to have musically busy. I wish I saw more of Kate (although that's really a matter of my insane schedule), I wish all of this with Emma were easier, I wish I had someone to call up and go out to dinner with when I was coming home late after the children's choir rehearsals, I wish I were around Mum and Dad more often (they're very good for going out to dinner with, especially Mum who insists on having the waiter bring over the food BEFORE she's ordered it so she can see what it looks like *snicker* ...muffins...), I wish I had people to spend time with here to whom I didn't feel like I was trying to prove myself. Maybe that's why I'm so willing to have a day wasted in front of the TV. Nothing to prove to the Saved By the Bell cast.

Alright, I've got to snag my laundry out of the dryer and shower before work. No one likes being served by the waitress who has armpits of doom.

and the world, your balloon, peeping-tom for the motherstation

I slept like a brick last night. I went to bed around 2 or so and slept till 11, which was wonderful given that I haven't been able to sleep past 8 with the whirlwind that last week was. Sunday night was the Boston Children's Choir Fall Family Kick-off Concert, or at least that's what the program said. It was nine million children in black slacks and their bcc button-downs, with three teaching fellows to wrangle them all, and I've gotta say we did a mighty find job! We were expected to keep all of the singers upstairs above the auditorium in classrooms that served as holding tanks, but the rough bit was keeping them quiet.

The kids that I rehearse with and teach (those from the central location on Shawmut ave and not those that are in the extension neighborhood choirs) are very obedient and sweet and usually, when I hold up two fingers and sing "Do" they quickly quiet down and mimic me.
It was a strange experience with the other kids, however. I'm kind of embarrassed to say this maybe but I had a really hard time with the young black girls; girls as young as 6 gave me an unbelievable amount of attitude! They weren't being directly rude to me, but it was more a matter of seeing them be rude (and in some cases cruel) and impatient with their peers. Crappy language across the board, constant yelling, one girl had a problem with kicking people, they pushed the people in line in front of them, and one girl kept yelling "Oh you don't know!" every time she was asked to quiet down no matter who was asking her. All of the boys were totally rambunctious, black, white, sparkley, they were all bouncing off the walls, but the girls behavior was blatantly divided by race. The white girls kept to themselves, playing with each other's hair, singing, one group played some game on paper to which they'd just made up the rules. Many girls, black and white, played hand-clapping games ("down down baby, down down the roller coaster, sweet sweet baby, I'll never letchya go, shimmy shimmy coco pop, shimmy shimmy rye...") that I remember playing when I was in 2nd and 3rd grade, but they played only with friends of their race, and I couldn't hear the white girls from down the hall. I feel like kind of an asshole talking about these racial divisions like this but I honestly had a really difficult time with these young black girls, and I'm not writing about this with any spin, it's just what I saw. I found myself losing patience with them quickly, I heard myself reprimanding a little black girl who had gotten up to go to the bathroom without permission with words that were much harsher than I would have used if she had been white. I also felt myself responding to the attitude I got from them defensively, it actually hurt my feelings, I felt frustrated and as though I wanted to exercise my authority. We were told by the Artistic Director Anthony (who is also incidentally black) that we were allowed to pull from the concert any kids who were grossly misbehaving and they wouldn't perform, which I didn't do but my GOD I really wanted to. And what's unfortunate is that if I'd pulled the kids that deserved it, the treble choir (made up of the younger singers) would have been about 90% white! I may be overreacting in my guilt about this, but it was a little rough backstage last night. The concert itself went off well, but the teaching fellows were exhausted.

One nice thing: I was warming up and conducting the Premier Choir before they went on, and one of their pieces was "Ain'-a That Good News"...which I sang in Chamber Choir at Marlborough. Just grinning as I ran it with them...what a great way to come full circle.

As I've been writing all this I've also been switching back to work on my grad essay which is coming along nicely. I'm desperate for feedback though; it needs eyes on it other than mine. Sometimes with the right music playing I end up writing things that would be far more appropriate for self-indulgent poetry than a Statement of Objectives essay for grad school.

In other news, we've apparently run out of oil in our house (Gwen has a call into Larry, our landlord) so in the meantime there's no hot water, no heat, no, um, nothing. So I'm a shivering fish walkin' around in sweats with her big ol' comforter around her shoulders.

Alllllso...I think I'mma make a Thanksgiving mix cd, y'know, for cookin' to. I can't wait to take those long cold walks down Boldwater after dinner! Oh, and the pie. Cannot wait for the pie. I've been talking to Chef Tony at upstairs about various recipes for vegetarian stuffings as opposed to the escarole mushroom that Kate claimed Mum was tired of, and Tony has recommended potatoes as another base, although I'm worried that'd be too starchy for Nancy. Also, potatoes? Really? Kinda dull. Lame, Tony. I think we're gonna hafta keep looking. I'm also really looking forward to the Thanksgiving 5k that Oak Bluffs organizes. I always have these wildly romantic fantasies about my entire family at the finish line when Peter and Cheryl and I cross, actually it's more like Cheryl and Peter.....................and Mollie cross the finish line. There's one family that always t-shirts made up that says "Merriman Family Thanksgiving 5K Team!" and they all cheer and encourage each other and sometimes I'm a little bitter that most of my family is at home sleeping. Although, Mum and Allan always come and eat pancakes where it's warm while Cheryl and Peter and I are racing, and by the time we all finish they're outside to cheer us on. AND by the time that I finish, Mum, Allan, Cheryl and Peter are there, so that makes me feel pretty fuzzy and loved. Still...can't wait. *smile*

deal gently

Off to church to sing and I should be there in 4 minutes so I must be extremely brief here. Eric's going to be our guest bass this morning, so I'm kinda excited about that. My phone is doing this fantastically fun thing where it can hold out battery till the cows come home provided I don't actually make any calls with it, and the moment I do (or receive any) it's beeping low battery again, so my phone is not currently the best way to reach me, just fyi. Okay, running out the door, will post tonight.

I bought you a crate of papaya

FILES RECOVERED! *big grin*

Apple store told me they couldn't do it at all, Scott did it in ten minutes! Amazing how very static I felt without access to it all.

I'm puttering around Ted's office, playing with my computer and everyone else's, downloading music, rearranging my grad app essays, nuzzling my old files, and happily basking in the glow of my new computer with all of my old work. Mum sent Legos to Ted's office for Eli and they've just arrived, so I have a feeling the afternoon will be filled with space ship building and castle construction. I remember them spilled out all over Peter's carpet and us in the middle, each of us trying to build ships that were far cooler than the others, and while mine were always very practical and ended up looking more like houses than anything else, Peter's would be wild and imaginative and actually look like space ships! He always knew how to use the special pieces, the ones with angles and extra nubs that are best used as wings? See, to me those were always rooftops, and it NEVER occurred to me to use them as he did; he was always so much better at that crap, and I have no doubt that Ted will be as well. No hard feelings: :)

After work I think we'll go pick up Eli from school and then Ted has Bagua, we'll do dinner, and then I'll get on the road back to Boston. I'm working at the restaurant tomorrow morning at 8am, there's a wedding I think, so I'll likely crash pretty quickly. Hurray for data recovery!

the circus has fallen down on it's knees

I'm in bed in New Hampshire, on my back typing, Eli is sleeping in the next room, and Ted and Cheryl down the hall. It was a strange drive up here, shorter than I'd expected, but I wasn't jazzed about spending all that time in the car alone with my music which usually would thrill me. I drove the two and a half hours up here to a CD that consisted of Barenaked Ladies, Tonic, and some sporadic country, and didn't even feel like singing much. The fact that I was nibbling trailmix most of the way had something to do with this, I'm sure. I mean, of course I DID sing, but it was more because I remind myself that I wanted to exercise the muscles, and less because I couldn't stop myself. I'm feeling quiet lately.

I drove imagining I was driving across the country, not stopping in Hanover but continuing on West. I was going 70 most of the way, which was apparently relatively slow on that highway, and cars were moving around me, getting places, going home. I want to know what it's like to be in somebody else's traffic jam, to be caught up in their morning commute knowing you're driving straight on through it into some other time zone. Previously when I've thought of this it seemed freeing, encouraging. Tonight the idea felt simply lonely (I hate this theme). People, a community in traffic, and me floating through.

I had this conversation a few days ago about remembering specific events, not even events really, but moments that may have felt insignificant but by acknowledging their insignificance they stuck with us. I remember sitting on the school bus on the way to Marlborough in the 8th grade, Counting Crows 'Long December' on my CD player, and leaning my forehead against the window pane so it's vibrations tickled my ears. I can remember deciding to remember that moment. I have a whole scrapbook of those moments. What I'm usually unable to decide in those moments is how I'll feel looking back on them. I didn't know on the plane to London round I that I'd remember that moment with feelings of encouragement and hope, as though encouraging my younger self. Or after Mom's wedding to Michael we had to take Lucy to the hospital for an ear infection, and I remember sitting in the limousine en route to the ER, sitting across from Michael who had his shirt unbuttoned most of the way and Lucy on his lap, and thinking to myself that I felt suddenly uncomfortable, that I wasn't as gun-ho about having him around as I had been before the ceremony. And looking back at that, I feel a little proud for having identified my anxiety and hesitation. I bring this idea up because as I lay here in bed in Ted's guest room, I'm feeling inexplicably disconnected and at sea. Those are all just elaborate synonyms for 'lonely'. I swear I should have that word tattooed on my sternum or something. I feel like it's been the only word in my vocabulary for the past two years. What I'm able to recognize tonight is that this event of being in bed and blogging is one I'll remember. I'll remember the quilt, the Counting Crows "Raining in Baltimore" that's playing on iTunes, the feeling of my warm keyboard under my fingertips. I will look back on how I'm feeling right now and be grateful that I'm not right there anymore. That's not about Ted's guest room, and it's not about not being in my own bed or anything like that- I'm really glad to be here and I can't wait to see Eli tomorrow morning and have breakfast with them all (I love other people's breakfast cereals). No, this feeling is just about the loneliness. As always. I guess anticipating that I'll look back at this moment with relief that I'm no longer living with those feelings is indicative of a kind of hope. Maybe that's convoluted and confusing. I just mean that I believe that someday I won't feel like this. And will be grateful that I can remember being under a quilt one night, one year, when that's all I could feel.

Tomorrow morning I'll go into work with Ted and he and his boys will try to breathe some life into my old G4 so I can snag the remaining files off it. Wish them luck, and me warmer toes.

and the band played Waltzing Matilda as the ship pulled away from the key

Biiiiig sigh

I've just sent off an email to Leslie Geffen, the director of my Elementary School (Mirman), asking her, in a round-about way, for a job. Or if she knows of one. Or if she knows of anyone else who knows of anyone willing to pay someone else for doing something (anything) vaguely related to music. These applications (and yes, there are only two) are seemingly increasingly out of my control, but I took some steps towards them tonight. I confirmed that Andy was writing me a recommendation, I asked my advisor John McDonald for a rec as well, I organized what I need to do (other than re-write my mass analysis) in order to send them both in... small steps, but steps none the less. I'm going to continue as though I were expecting to get these missing files recovered, and as though I'll have a full application to send in. Dad and I talked earlier tonight and I admitted exactly how hesitant I was to apply, not just because I'm missing the necessary files to do so, but also because I feel extremely inexperienced. I don't know that this is the program for me. I know that I love the conducting, that when I'm up there I feel indestructible, joyful and proud, but it doesn't hit me the same way the singing does. With my voice I feel far more capable, but I can't speak to whether or not that's just a matter of experience and cultivating the proper techniques or not. I'm going to finish these applications, get them sent off, and I'm not gonna talk about them with anybody. Okay Dad? (I love you).

In other news, my new Mac is up and running, she hasn't been named yet, and she's currently playing Makem and Clancy - Waltzing Matilda (which you can probably tell by the title post. By the way, I should clarify that my titles to each post are lyrics of whatever piece I'm listening to as I write, nothin' fancy). All my pictures are also on my old computer, but I was lucky enough to dig through my email and find this one:



So that's my desktop of this new computer. That's my house, my kitchen, my bananas. I love that counter top. It's the place mum made me a gingerbread girl, literally, where Mum made Wheatena with peanuts for us when I was little, and I love that Annie always has some fruit in a bowl for us. And flowers. *smile* Big hug, Annie. I can't wait be go home for Christmas. I could happily spend the whole vacation sitting on the bench in the hallway that faces the living room, watching us all go about the day. Hm. I dislike the thought of going home because it means I'll inevitably have to come back to this third floor room in Medford that feels so completely detached from the rest of the world, even the house below it. Like I'm in some treeless treehouse, orbiting the rest of the planet.

Osanna, Osanna

Alright. It's 9:00 and I'm sitting on the futon with my feet up on the coffee table watching Ghost Hunters with Gwen (she's shrieking, I'm making fun of her when she does). This whole week has just been inundated with technological failures, and electronics out to thwart me. The hard drive from my old computer has been deemed "unredeemable" by the Genius Bar at the Cambridge Apple store, but Ted seems to think that this is because they use only Mac hardware to salvage the data on the hardware, so I'm gonna drive up to Hanover to let his geeks take a crack at it. I was SO FACKING FORTUNATE enough to be able to recover nearly all of the music from my library. Strange that I'm more comforted by the things I have amassed, the library I have collected, than by the poems and papers I've created. It's gonna take a day or so to process all this...


**Legends of the Fall is on HBO....back in a bit**

night swimming

Well, because I didn't make an appointment it looks like it'll be at least a 2 hour wait here at the Mac store. I'm missing today's poetry class because I'm waiting around the Genius bar in the hopes that they have time to fit me in on stand-buy. How could I have made an appointment? How could I anticipate that my little G4 would poop out in the middle of editing my grad school essay last night? The poor thing wouldn't even shut down properly, so I fell asleep to it hiccuping and clicking away trying desperately to re-boot itself. I was finally able to shut it down but now it won't boot up past the apple with the little twirling fan. I'm surprisingly calm despite the fact that I have nothing backed up. I'd survive the loss of all the poetry and papers, my entire educational history, but I don't know what I'd do if I lost all that music. That's a strange attachment, I guess. It's not like I created those mp3s in the same way that I wrote all those essays or researched all those papers or scrambled to create all that poetry, and yet it'd feel like a much greater loss. As though my accomplishment lay in the actual amassing of all collection. *big sigh* This sucks.

and I believe in the kingdom come and

It's been a whirlwind of a weekend. Frankly I'm a little too tired to even conceive of an interesting way to detail it all, but it began with a beautifully spicy Dia de Los Muertos concert with the BCC on Friday night (it was hardly a concert, really more of an organized seance). Saturday I worked a busy Lunch and tea shift at the restaurant, which Moyoko (a fellow server) and I spiced up with a running game of Truth or Dare which soon escalated to Dare or Dare. On one such dare, in the style of the movie Super Troopers, I had to use the word "meow" five times while greeting a table and taking drink orders. I then turned the Dare over to Moyoko with the word "nugget". She was slightly less successful. My next dare for her was to drink a concoction of my making. I combined raw egg with ice cream, tobasco, olive oil, shrimp paste, chive aeoli, lemon curd and some duck pate, which I'm damn impressed to say she drank. And then I took over her section because she felt really ill and had to sit down for awhile. Honestly though I was extremely impressed. So impressed in fact, that the game had to end right there because I was afraid I wouldn't be able to down any potion she made for me. Today I worked an equally busy brunch shift which began with me showing up to the restaurant an hour early, thanks to the daylight savings time kicking in, and me without Mum to leave a post-it on my door to turn my clocks back. What do grown-ups do to remind themselves that these events are approaching? Isn't it our duty to remind each other? Does everybody else get a call from their Mothers reminding them the night before? How does this work in the big girl world?

I've made a check-list of 5 things to accomplish tonight and I've managed half of two of them: the first part of a poem for this class tomorrow, and a sloppy review of the Randal Thompson Alleluia for the rehearsal tomorrow (Tufts Chorale). I'll also be leading warm-ups with the Chorale which I shouldn't be so worried about, but I'm actually more anxious about doing that than I was about conducting them. Because I'll have to sing in front of them.

The poetry assignment was to write a poem with my name in it. She didn't specify in what way, whether we're supposed to address ourselves in the voice of apostrophe or use a kind of 3rd grade acrostic format or what, but I've found the process really challenging, and so far I'm pathetically disappointed in what I've been able to create. When she described the assignment I was so moved at the idea of sitting down and writing this, as though to make room in a poem for my own name was a way of honoring myself, but I haven't yet been able to do the assignment justice. I've got some images along the lines of constructing the beginning middle and anticipated end of my life under the metaphor of a basic triad chord (tonic, mediant, dominant), tonic being childhood, dominant old age, and all that, but it's sounding trite and silly and I'd rather scrap the whole thing and go to bed. After all I have been up since 7. Or is it 8?

Again, I'm sitting with this pervasive loneliness. It's relentless and loud. And strange, in that I go through my day and come into contact with a number of people at work and then on a good day, some people that I actually care about (namely Kate, Eric, Emma, Gwen) and yet after each of these interactions I go home feeling somehow more lonely and detached. I don't know if it's about going home to the empty house, or the constant realization that I have very few people here with whom I'm at all close and connected, or just feeling awash and unauthentic in the this city that I feel like I don't belong in. Maybe it's in feeling that I can't completely be myself around any of them, that with everyone I spend any time with, especially Kate and to some degree Emma, I'm clambering for their respect, for even keel in the relationship, to be seen as an equal who is worthy of their time, is just as smart, just as good, just as responsible as they are. It's exhausting to be around people I don't know because I'm dying to be liked, and exhausting to be around those those I do know because I'm working hard to make sure they keep liking me. Sometimes I don't feel known at all. I guess that's a theme for tonight. Not being known, and not paying close enough attention to those around me enough to know them, and therefore forming a belief system around what I think I've learned. I don't know, I'm just realizing that the loneliness feels especially profound after company. Recognizing that I may not have good company again for awhile, and often that feeling is so overwhelming that breathing isn't voluntary in that moment. It's terrifying, but I think it's more my problem than anyone else's. That's not a self-pitying thing, I'm just trying to acknowledge what's my part and what's not, and I do have a part to play in this loneliness. In a way I guess I've chosen it. Like I did during London round II, or any time I've isolated. Like I think I'm getting something out of it, or will. I also find comfort in knowing that I'm just, this way. I have a great capacity for loneliness, I have a great need for connection, but none of that bullshit pass the time stuff. You know what I'm talking about. e.e. cummings did.

Crappy post, I know, but I'm completely unenthusiastic and unmotivated right now, and am compelled to get through my days only by reminding myself of the following things:

1. Boston won't be forever
2. Loneliness will evolve and will feel different in ten minutes
3. Thanksgiving is less than 3 weeks away

pleni sunt coeli et terra gloria eius

And now that I've been out in the world a little I can report that it's another of those strange gray Boston days that looks colder than it actually is and the realization that it's not all that chill and your scarf is superfluous is somehow depressing. I'm back from Kelly's and I'm exhausted by this loneliness. I'm so grateful for nights like last night because I get to check my luggage at the door and just do my job and worry about my aching feet and not spilling martinis in their goddamn impossible glasses. Seriously, try carrying three of them, just three on a tray to a table 30 feet away and tell me if you don't splosh some over the rims.
Maybe this is part of why I feel so at sea in Boston; I feel like I've made it so I have no safe havens, no places to exhale, no places to sit and be me but with company. I spend my days running around to appointments and jobs and when I'm there I'm always watching the clock until I can duck out and race home but to what? I spend my evenings in my room downloading music, working on my applications, and lately watching the Lord of the Rings trilogy in it's entirety (that includes special features and then again with director's commentary). I'm not even all that interested in LOTR and sure, I can see it for what it is - my relief to have somewhere to escape that's pure fantasy and has no connection to my life and how I'm feeling (though sometimes teaching at the BCC is remarkably similar to fighting an army of ax-wielding dwarves). I kept thinking if I packed my days with responsibilities and places to be and people who were expecting me there I'd feel fuller. I thought volunteering for MEDA and the restaurant and the BCC and the poetry class and working with Andy and the Chorale and all of these things in my day planner would make me feel less lonely, and while they're wonderful distractions, they only highlight the contrasts between when I'm busy and when I'm not, when I'm racing and being of service and when I'm still and suddenly hurting. I feel in extremes, I know that, I feel everything bigger and grander and deeper than...well, most I guess, or than I'm supposed to. I don't know. But sometimes it feels like to much, and I miss either being able to numb out somehow, or halve my trouble by sharing it with someone I love. It's kind of a bleak day right now, and I know this will all pass and I'll go to the BCC in an hour and feel valuable and useful and not so dark, but I wanted to write about this because I feel like this most days and try to avoid thinking about it by writing about other things. I'm grateful for the many things in my life that allow me a break from thinking about these feelings, I just wish I had some things in my world that would allow me a break from feeling them. Like a fellow benchwarmer sitting out the game, or a really excellent fantasy novel. I need a choir.

I've been thinkin' about my doorbell, when ya gonna ring it? When ya gonna ring it?

Well last night was a whole bowl of crazy. I was the closer at the restaurant, and the thing about upstairs patrons is that as snobby and as well-versed as they are in fine wines and delicate food, they're very gung-ho when it comes to Halloweening and rocking out. I'm not sure what I went as. I had this pleated skirt and black and white stripey socks and boots and painted-on scars like Salley from nightmare before Christmas and my hair in pigtails and dramatic eyes completely lacking in subtlety that I blame on Marci. It was fun. It was Halloween. The place was packed with people, everyone dancing (and drinking) and patrons and staff were dressed up as well which was nice because it meant the night lacked that intense formality that makes working there so exhausting sometimes: there was a dj, there was candy everywhere (and it totally wasn't a big deal), there was a pretty great pre fixe that finished with a devils food cake cupcake covered in so much buttercream that it was actually the size of my head (and that wasn't a big deal either). Nothing can be a big deal when your bartender is a giant telletubby and your waitstaff consists of a hippy, a zebra, a paper boy, a pirate lady, a matadore, and me, the chicest dead girl you've ever seen. Hopefully someone will send me some pictures of everyone.
My favorite part of the night happened before we'd even opened the doors yet, whem Maggie grabbed me by the hand and said "okay I need you to do my Zebra makeup". I followed her upstairs, we went to the handicapped bathroom, she got out all her white and black face paint, and slowly by slowly, I made her a Zebra. It's an odd thing when you're painting someone's face or doming somebody else's makeup or plucking someone's eyebrows...first of all when those activities go on it becomes a girl sanctuary with no boys allowed and gossip and chatting and whatnot, and I'm not particularly good at any of that. It's kind of a role I've learned to play when needed, but it doesn't come naturally. Also, there's always the awkwardness about physically being so close to someone- you're right in their face, focusing on the details and imperfections of their skin, and I've never fully figured out the rules here: do you pay attention closely to what you're doing or do you make small talk and how do both parties ignore the fact that the other can see every blemish or patch of dry skin on on your face and most importantly what if you do a bad job of what they've asked you to do?! That's damning, right?
I guess it just made me happy because it felt like one of those moments when you're proud to embody the stereotype. My friend had asked me to do her makeup and I did and we giggled through it. That's it. Only it didn't end up being the stereotype that I'm no good at because she was funny and had no expectations of me doing a good job of zebra-ing her and glamor wasn't really the focus here she wasn't awkward at all, in fact it was cool because I didn't feel self conscious about myself and self-deprecating about my makeup talents (which by the way I think I did a damn good job on). I don't know. In reading it back it doesn't seem like a huge deal, and I guess it wasn't, I just liked that she trusted I would do a good job on her face paint, that she would be comfortable with me in the girl sanctuary, and that she thought nothing of grabbing my wrist and saying "lets go". I guess it means she thought of me as a normal person, like a normal girl with friends who was comfortable anywhere, and that felt kinda cool. I aspire to that :)

Anyhow, after the night of waitressing and clean-up and preparation for service tomorrow, by the time I got home my feet were blistered and my makeup was smeared and oogey so I put myself right into the bathtub where I promptly fell asleep for a bit and I woke up with goosebumps and put myself to bed.
It's about half past ten now and I've just woken up, my pillow covered in the face makeup I haven't attacked yet, and I'm starving. So breakfast it is, hopefully accompanied by an episode of Sex and the City if it's on.

That was my Halloween. That means it's November first. Rabbit Rabbit. That means my grad applications are due in a month. Dinosaur Dinosaur.