looking for a little sunshine...

although it's mostly glass, the outside wall has had precious little natural light to let in these last days. it's downright dark in here, which has made painting impossible. grr. i gave it a shot and there are bare spots and crazy-crookedness in too many places. foiled by nature.the lack of sun is wearying, since i'm trying to gear up to hopefulness. the interview tomorrow looks promising. just the thing, it would seem. i was referred by someone who likes me very much, and i think i really want this. yet the disappointments, the bait-and-switches and the dickheads still loom so large.

gosh, i really have had a lot of interviews. i've been over-qualified, or the job is a step backwards and they wanted me for marquee value, as little more than a baby-sitter. why work someplace i would never eat in a million years? where they offer nothing i have interest in pursuing? where i already know i hate the customers? where everybody knows it's a hell-hole to work? where my personal life will get devoured by 5 or 6 nights of closes? could i live on what they offer? it really has been stoopid. months ago, i made up my mind to not talk myself into something i knew i'd regret. i had enough reservations about the last place and they were well-founded. in 30 months those foul demons have turned and burned 12 managers. ridiculous. yet i'm stuck in a place of knowing far more places i won't work, than places i might.

as for tomorrow... he's creating a new position. will it be perfect? hahaha, uh, no. however of all else, this truly looks like what i wanted to do *next*. we shall see if it really is.

i am at the end of my rope for poverty. i am tired of deciding whether or not to spend money on the "t" or to stay home again for god's sake. it's impossible for me to consider getting a car at this time, so that other avenue of employ remains closed. last fall, i really thought i'd be all squared away by now and up to snuff financially. instead the hole gets deeper monthly. ack.

ok, research and numbers to wow the entrepreneur bright and early. they're predicting sun for tomorrow. let's hope so, eh?

the bible told me so

two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their toil. for if they fall, one will lift up the other; but woe to one who is alone and falls and does not have another to help. again, if two lie together, they keep warm; but how can one keep warm alone?

~~ecclesiastes



we left the restaurant and it was raining quite heavily. he opened up his giant umbrella, pulled me close and we walked home, entwined. he drifts off embracing me. during those gray early moments of not-yet-morning he reaches for me and though asleep, takes me in. that tender contact is so comforting in its genuineness.

it's so easy to accept it in that context. yet i have so much trouble with it elsewhere. and still i feel alone. i don't *feel* like a couple. or part of one. or part of this one.

ack.

hits and misses

i am the editor's first masochist. he has played at the ol' slap and tickle and a little faux bondage, but i am a whole new world of hurt. he is constantly amazed at how aroused it makes him. a selfish and joyful relief for me, because i have had others merely go through the motions and that quickly turned hollow on both ends of the belt. at first i feared being still too entwined in the emotional connections of the past. certain positions and endeavors i attached solely to the g.c. and i simply could not / would not go there, but the editor has grown more confident and i am unbundling. it remains impossible to articulate the savagery to which i'd grown not only accustomed, but attached. how can i explain the affirmation i feel from it? i confessed being beaten so thoroughly, on more than one occasion, that i could not stand. it was scary to tell him, and disconcerting watching him trying to process it. yet each time, he does go further. each time i assure him he could have gone further still.

when he finishes hitting me, he needs to hold me. or is it to be held? it is a strange segue for me and i still don't like it. i don't like the pause, i don't like the downshift. it pulls me too quickly out of my headspace of objectification -- a place i've missed and where he's only recently begun sending me. the tenderness is important to him though, so again, i need to stop being so self-centered and appreciate that. can i overcome the supremely effective conditioning of all those years though? do i want to? is it unfair to him if i don't? either the doing or the wanting? he doesn't know, so i can work it out on my own, i suppose.

if i could respond to it as an act of dominance, perhaps it could be more easily done. however he has been very forthright in not wanting to engage in a d/s dynamic. maybe this is more the root of my trouble here. the conditioning from the g.c. was all relevant to his absolute dominance. him. him. him. his. i remain very uncomfortable and very unsure of any bit of *me*. perhaps even a bit moreso since the editor threw the "l" word on the table.

last night he said he could see us together for a very long time. it felt like a slap in the face rather than reassurance. i'm really not right in the head. no. i am right in the head. i'm just stupidly still in love with someone else.

carpe diem

the editor gets up early. really early. he's a rise and shine kinda guy, all chipper and mentally mobile. i might be vertical and making his bed, but it takes my motor a bit longer to get moving.

i'm thankful though cuz he's really helping to set my clock and my days are so much longer! by 9:30 this morning, i'd traveled home from harvard square. saw the pretty slant of the sun's first rays lighting the rowers on the charles. felt the brisk spring air as i walked home. banking and shopping. small talk with the cutest clerk about her daughter wanting a sweet 16 party. the store is deserted at that time of day. who knew?

bills paid, house clean and back to painting. all before lunch.

et voila

salle de bains est finis. a demain -- le monde!

ok, not really, but the foyer, lol. in all my moves and myriad living spaces, i've painted dozens of rooms. in the past, i've battled ancient wallpaper, often many layers of it; shallow plaster that collapsed upon touch; walls that had been punched in by previous tenants (even a hole from bobcat goldthwaite's head); walls left unpainted for decades which sucked up paint like a sponge; and foolishly braved the removal of lead paint and ancient shellac. each one a special circle of home improvement hell.

this place is my first with new walls. they're like buttah ! once the tedious prep was complete, the job was so quick. it's heartening for the rest of the loft.

super speedy re-do and some promising job leads mean this will be a good week. yippee.

p.s. i don't hate painting here!

better

just a week ago we were being snowed upon, frozen and besieged by record-breaking rain. today i'm digging out flip-flops. magnolias and cherry blossoms are blooming and the sox/yankees series ended in a most satisfying home-team sweep.

the warmth and sun are on my side now, so i've finally picked up the paint. it's the palest yellow and yet making such a happy difference. the g.c. indeed would be surprised by the subtle shade, lol.

the carpenters, plumbers and electricians really banged the hell out of all the walls, plus cut so many extra holes! no longer subject to the carelessness of others, i can lavish the care and attention to detail i'm finally ready to give. i confess i loathe the process and playing twister with benjamin moore. i used to like painting. my t-shirt wears the evidence of at least 6 apartments and 1 house. ah well. the improvement from just the first few strokes was so gratifying!

this will be a good week. :)

still...

i've heard it said
that the thrill of romance
can be like a heavenly dream

i go to bed with a prayer
that you'll make love to me
strange as it seems

someday we'll meet
and you'll dry all my tears
then whisper sweet
little things in my ear
hugging and a-kissing
oh, what I've been missing
lover man, oh, where can you be?

~~billie holiday

kindness and hope

"there’s only one rule that i know of, babies — god damn it, you’ve got to be kind.”

this was in my last post, and with the mayhem early this week at virginia tech much on my mind.

an optimist, but also a pragmatist, arthur schlesinger diagnosed the ills of the current bush administration as "delusions of omnipotence and omniscience," and something likely to lead to the death of the american idea unless treated with the "antidote" of history. children unfamiliar with the world eventually become easy prey for fascist politicos and religious quackmeisters. a warmly golden state of amnesia cannot support the hope of individual liberty or the practice of democratic self-government.

the department of education estimates there are 30 million illiterate americans.

the teaching of history in lower grades has been sharply reduced because new "no child left behind" tests focus on reading and math. no politically correct compromise seems attainable by all interested parties, parents, teachers, school boards, town councils, dept. of homeland security, ad nauseum. so rather than teach kids about context and the framework of time and place, let's just not teach history at all.

recently i watched "jesus camp", about a camp somewhere in the boonies founded and attended by evangelicals.

25% of americans identify as evangelicals.
75% of american children who are home-schooled are members of evangelical families.

as the film progressed my fists grew more clenched, my eyes widened in horror and my stomach grew sick with sadness. 11-year-olds spontaneously proselytizing at a bowling alley; kindergartners writhing on the floor in fits of religious ecstasy, howling in tongues; 12-year-olds preaching against homosexuality; parents teaching their kids that evolution is blasphemous fallacy and global climate change is a liberal god-haters' propaganda.

most disturbing was the anti-abortion speaker. (a tie really with the homo-hater, but he didn't have visual aids.) much shouting about dead babies. the evil women who kill their babies, but they will burn in hell. children as young as 4 were at this meeting. it didn't take long for many children to be sobbing. when they were sufficiently frenzied, he opened up a little red box which contained tiny baby dolls, representing the progressive size of a fetus. children became hysterical. counselors and parents looked on in approval. how in the fucking world could they think this is appropriate material for children this young?

why are they teaching their kids fear and hate? what happened to the christian value of "love thy neighbor"? this not to go all pollyana. i do recall when the religious right started to twist their poisoned fingers in the political pie. their first full-frontal assault failed, so they quickly devised much more effective and insidious ways of achieving ends. bob evans university continues to churn out graduates and there are 150 of them in the current white house. many young people accepted for admin positions in iraq got the job simply because they believe in god. no wonder the damn lights are out all day over there.

does pat roberston want to make the world a better place? no. he wants what all other megalomaniacs want: power. preying on the small shuttered minds of the sheepishly faithful is one of the oldest snake-oil cons in the book.

bush cloaks his pathology in god and country. if this is his demonstration of christianity, i am an atheist. i question both his method and madness, so must be a traitor.

glimmer of hope?

our recently elected governor refused to play dirty pool with his opponent. she was an extremely weak candidate out of the gate and went immediately for muck. he didn't play. he stumped on optimism and change. change from within and goodness from the same place. reminiscent of smart hopeful men from the 60s. he won.

leaving aside hillary, (whom i really like but just has too much damned-if-ya-do-damned-if-ya-don't baggage) obama and edwards are not yet hate-mongering. we shall see what happens when the swift-boat crew et. al get up and gunning for a more clear target, but maybe americans really are ready for a change. the dishonesty, corruption and insanity of the bushies must be obvious to all but the most oblivious by now. they (mccain too, wtf?) insist on holding fast to a policy a huge majority at last decries. he is no longer representing the people. (was he ever?) only his cronies. you can have your god all over your house and car, but please keep him to yourself, and out of my face.

however sincere were last week's outcries against hate speech remains to be seen. that there was debate at all brings me hope for the future of civil discourse.

i live in a blue state with friends who share my views. maybe it is just spring fever and rose-colored glasses. maybe they're being mailed out to all the idjits who vote for "american idol" and "dancing with the stars". dunno. i know more people vote on those shows than actually do at their civil polls. however the margin of fear's victory over sense's last time was only a few points. it wouldn't take a mass movement off the couch. just a little one. really.

sun is out. at least for today.

hate

my own rickshaw crash of racism aside, this has been quite a week.

long ago, i gave up on the shallowness of tv news and the pundits who'd become shouting heads. "shut up -- you're stupid!" sounds like 6-year-olds on the playground, not highly paid media analysts. however without the tv, i sometimes miss when stories blow up.

when i was a very little girl, don imus was a d.j. in nyc, on am radio. he played top 40 hits and made fart jokes. i was 5 or 6. i had a transistor radio and danced around in my room. he was funny. i lost track of him.

eventually, i had an uncomfortable awareness of howard stern, rush limbaugh and the resurgent imus; hannity and colmes and bill o'reilly. just reading their words made my skin crawl.

at the same time, shows like "def comedy jam" started on cable. "damn, niggah" 20 times in a 2-minute skit ain't funny. well, not to me. rap opened up the vernacular of bitches, hos and niggahs; poppin' caps in pigs. i hated it.

all these words i was raised to believe as hateful were suddenly pouring out of boom boxes, call-in radio and late night tv. i'd hear kids on the streets and the t calling each other nigger. it made me flinch even though i knew they embraced the word. how messed up was it to hear white kids using it with each other? yeah, tupac might be in your walkman, but kid, you are not black.

this was not lenny bruce or richard pryor holding up a mirror to themselves as well as to us. this was lazy vulgarity, not insightful smarts. indolent shock, and it seemingly led to numbed indifference.

where then is the line of decency? where does shock end and hate begin?

every now and again, a shock-jock would get a slap on the wrist. i'm sure they laughed about it on-air the next day. as revolting as it seemed to me, these guys got paid to be offensive, so i always thought the fines or reprimands were absurd. oh! he said something insulting! um, that's his job. shouldn't he get a raise, not a fine?

as this hate speech seemed to expand, i just became confused. why was it ok? why was it accepted, expected and then thought funny for some fat-ass 60-year-old millionaire to drench the airwaves with words my parents never said out loud?

it seeped further. inflammatory whores like ann coulter and rosie o'donnell, dozens of local radio personalities, began routinely using this kind of language. oh, let's add "faggot" to the mix -- an especial favorite of cunter's.

then: "nappy headed ho's."

without the internet, it never would have been a story. everybody gnashed their teeth and pretended this was *outrageous*!! jackson, sharpton, the usual suspects. on npr, i heard a black female professor defending hate speech in hip-hop as contextual. i wanted to smack her.

imus admits he said something stoopid and apologized sincerely to the girls and the public numerous times. he's fired. i smell scapegoat.

a.j. liebling said, "freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one." imus was an employee. we all know he'll turn up elsewhere soon enough, anyway. so what's changed? what's different? the genie does not go back into the bottle. ever. people feel *the right* to talk this way. try taking it back.

i believe in free speech. can the dissemination of *hate speech* be stopped in the mainstream media? if it's only hate speech when whities say it, what happens then? you put a 10-second delay on live radio? you fire all those guys? you prohibit anne coulter from giving public speeches? none of that is right either.

the whole thing just makes me want to take a very hot bath.

in opposite land, the charges against all the duke lacrosse players were dismissed. talk about a ho. she falsely accused 3 men of raping her. she had the semen of at least 3 men in her, none of whom were the accused. why did she cry wolf? obscene karmic pay-back for all the black men falsely accused in the past? 15 sordid minutes of fame? she's a mother, ffs. what will she eventually tell her kids about this? why did the d.a. go all rabid, in a bizarro attempt to not seem racist or classist? a year later, she walks away, and these boys and their coach try to pick up the pieces.

the day of imus' slur was the anniversary of the killing of martin luther king jr.

today is the anniversary of jackie robinson's debut in the major leagues.

tomorrow is patriot's day. arguably one of the most provocative defenses of personal liberty and freedom from tyranny in history.

kurt vonnegut died this week. "there’s only one rule that i know of, babies — god damn it, you’ve got to be kind.” much like faludy, malamud and orwell (plus so many others), he despised man's most base impulses -- hatred, stupidity, cruelty and prejudice. ironic they all should be on such high peacock display when he passed.

the hateful hypocrisy of the christian right will be saved for another day. as will the astonishing corruption of the administration by its assumption of absolute power.

i have struggled with this post. it's too long. i'm too angry, and too confused. sufficient parallel to the situation, i suppose.

don ho also died this week. tiny bubbles? i don't think so.

cloak of invisibility

more rightly, the "caucasian cloak of invisibility".

yesterday morning, i went to chinatown for salmon. my supermarket's fish is woeful and the quality at the new nearby fish store is terrible too. ridiculous how difficult it is to buy decent fish at decent prices in one of the country's premier fishing regions. ack. irrelevant rant.

anyway...

this was not my usual store. in hindsight, i realize the customer base in the other is much more diverse. this one is down a side street and i was the only round eye in the place.

there didn't seem to be a line at the fish counter and just one guy was doing service. i stand behind a chinese woman. he nets, bludgeons, guts, scales and bags her fish in a trice.

another chinese woman basically cuts ahead of me and also wants a live tilapia. he busies himself with her fish while she scuttles off someplace for something of sudden and dire importance. now another woman starts ordering, and is trying to convince him to give over the just killed fish. all the conversation is in chinese and it sounds like arguing but who knows. previous woman returns, gets her fish and so now this 2nd interloper has cut ahead of me.

a man stands next to me. while the monger is killing yet another tilapia, his back is turned and this guy is trying to get his attention. i look at him. "i'm next." he says something in chinese. fish guy turns around and cutter #3 is yammering for service. again i say it, "i'm next." the fish guy starts to ignore me and serve the "line" cutter. very loudly i repeat it. finally the fish guy makes eye contact -- and suddenly discovers he can speak english.

i say, "salmon, please." in a mincing whisper, chinese guy next to me imitates me!! i bang his shoulder with my index finger. "do you have a problem with me?" he says something else, very softly, in chinese. i can only imagine. at last i got my fish. i was furious.

i shop in chinatown alot. many many times, old chinese ladies have cut in front of me to pay. they're never buying much, so it hardly seems worth the hassle of confronting them. in fact last week, a woman tried to pull this and the cashier (i think an owner -- i've been going there long time) waved her off and indicated i was first. i was impressed and kinda laughed, but i know the old woman was very angry, and carried on the whole time i was being rung up.

i always just took it as rudeness. it wasn't until yesterday i realized it is racism. in its purest form. i was dumbstruck. this has never happened to me in any bodega i've shopped in anyplace i've ever lived. customers and proprietors always seem equally polite and pleasant. my money is as green as juan's, right? they'd like me to spend money there again, right? maybe they mock the gringa when i leave. who knows. yet these chinese people took their disdain so pridefully that i was invisible.

36 hours later, i'm still amazed.

i'm a white woman, living in a mostly white country. a very rainy night, many years ago, i had a scary scrape outside of baton rouge with some local blacks waving bats at my car. for certain, they were not in need of a ninth to play. their actions were hardly passive, like those of the chinese, who literally did not see me.

all these years of not recognizing it *as* bigotry only underscores what a life of cultural privilege i've led.

as if...

i didn't know. lovely thank you note from the neighbors i know did NOT complain about me.

as the forks have fallen, i shall have a small early dinner party tomorrow. if only i could afford a mariachi band. the dinner is mexican themed, after all, lol. the desperado soundtrack will have to suffice, i guess. but played so very softly. ack.

the manager's reply took the tone that allowed me to know she too thinks these folks are cranks. funny, i rarely use the main entrance, but now recall the impression of seeing the husband in the office many times. by contrast, i've been in there twice. i'm sure he's got all sorts of issues that need addressing. perhaps a shrink rather than a building supervisor might be of greater and longer-lasting benefit.

if other people are such a bother, why live in a building surrounded by hundreds of them? those log cabin kits are very reasonably priced.

let's play...

passive-aggressive. i've been parented by it. i've been friended, boyfriended, co-worked and supervised by it. it sucks. even ignoring it, pretending the other person isn't doing what they're pretending not to do, is exhausting.

now and again, i've been filling in at an old job. memory conveniently blocks much we hate, so i'd forgotten the champion efforts a particular person puts into p-a. he is incapable of framing the simplest request in a direct way. "could you please get me this?" instead comes out as, "when you have a moment, could you please look to see if this is over there?" "yes, it's here." silence. "j., would you like me to give this to you?" "if it's not too much trouble." wtf? save us all some time please, would you? more discussion of his petty nefariousness isn't relevant here. so...

an e-mail from the building manager. a neighbor complained i'm too noisy during "quiet hours". especially my tv. if my boyfriend can fall asleep, how loud can jon stewart truly be? (and this guy isn't deaf in one ear, either!!) i was so steamed, i waited 36 hours to respond. i was especially angry that this person never approached me, but instead jumped the chain. i can only think it's the busy-body next door who complained last winter that my coughing was bothering her. instead of being concerned that i had the equivalent of bird flu, and was coughing up blood, she icily suggested i might go buy some cough drops. cunt.when finally calmer, i crafted a very polite reply, and was sure to include the coughing incident, assuming it all stemmed from her. intention, conscientiousness, etc. flip-side, my tolerance, ambient noise, expectations, etc.

then in a fit, i realized to kill her with kindness. i baked my world-famous lemon-poppyseed poundcake and best brownies. wrapped them nicely in a bag and included a personal yet utterly neutral note. "decided to bake and share. enjoy and happy spring. your neighbor."

to be safe i gave a bag to each side. but i know it was her. makes me want to play ac/dc all day. on 11.

surprise

we were out to lunch in a friendly place, relaxing with cranberry mimosas and recapping her recent vacation. i talked a little about my class, and off-handedly mentioned my anxiety about the german portion. "what about the g.c.? is he ever coming to visit you? do you still talk to him?" all these months she hadn't asked. she knows i'm seeing the editor and must have been curious all this time. although we've been friends for years, she's got that characteristic celtic reserve so does not tread too deeply into the personal waters of others. i reciprocate, and leave aside unanswered questions of my own. it works.

instantly my brain performed a classic feat of its horrible magic. a deluge of memories, images, sadness, longing, possible replies all flooded my mind in a flash. it just gushed out: "he's not in germany. he never was. he's married, with kids; his wife found out and forced him to give me up. he did." it was like i'd just told her i kill litters of puppies for kicks.i'd felt terrible for deceiving her, but it just seemed simpler to tell the same story all around. in case he came back. i explained that was why i'd plunged into the canyon of debt so quickly too. he'd been helping, etc. with the door now open, she probed a bit and i was honest. we wrapped up agreeing last year was the worst of my life, lol.

i do believe she was more shocked by the revelation because i'd been so long, and so happy, in an affair, rather than hurt by my subterfuge.

we ordered another round and talked about dice-k. safer ground for sure.

mini rant

i know, i know. if you don't like the weather in new england, just wait a minute. i pulled my nose up out of my book and big mean blobs of snow were clashing around in the grey sky. it's april! and it's supposed to slop around til tomorrow. grrrrrr.

but there's boffing in the offing, so i'll bundle up and suck it up. wine and hits await. that'll help. the snow is still very wrong.

mein kopf explodiert

a torrent of information. last week felt like alot, but with its measly 60 appellations and only 2 or 3 soil types, bordeaux was a cake-walk compared to burgundy, with 600+ of the former and so very many of the latter. again we ran 45 minutes over. do the brits speak so quickly they actually finish these classes in 2 hours? i don't believe it. it's just fact after fact after fact. no joking around, no digressions, no opining on producers or history. athough fun little (albeit required) detour into napolean successfully carving up burgundy but bordeaux telling him to fuck off.

truly i couldn't get outside fast enough. my brain was bursting!raced to meet the editor, who was true to character with much chipper chit-chat. i begged exploding head. he relaxed and was happy to let me spill out some facts since he has a fondness for all things francaise. phew. the time out and the tempranillo helped me calm down.

so far most of this is stored in a disorganized fashion in my memory nooks and crannies, so it's good to be sorting it. france is strong for me, but once we get to regions i don't really know -- oh la la. i'm dreading germany and i know the exam places significant emphasis on it. ach bruder!

it's making me happy though. it's the most challenged my brain has been for a long time.

bony fingers

a friend recently spent several days in intensive care, having had his 2nd heart attack in 5 years. he is 42.

2 months ago, another friend, age 45, had a massive heart attack and had to miss 8 weeks of work.

another friend has a tenaciously persistent tumor on his spine and is undergoing debilitating radiation.

a former co-worker who was pronounced cancer-free last summer, is back under chemo for breast cancer. she is 40.

a colleague was in a car accident last week and broke his neck.

a friend is at a funeral today for his favorite aunt who died of uterine cancer. in one month she went from feeling fine to being a dried apple doll who couldn't swallow water.

the editor has a relative who at 90 recently underwent a mastectomy. she was sufficiently healthy for the surgery. but what is recovery like for a woman so incredibly old? what then is quality of life? and how many more years does she truly get?

rhetorical questions, really, i won't know til i get up there. it just seems i'm young to have so many sick friends and conversely that seniors now have a skewed perception on their entitlement to *robust* health. the medical interventions required to keep them alive can be staggering. how much did that operation cost for that old lady? really? my friend with the tumor has gotten bills approaching $200,000 and he is in his early 50s. sure, insurance is paying for them both. (digression alert: in the meantime, i can't get insurance to pay for my birth control pills because *not* being pregnant isn't a condition.)

my friends, including those with such recent close-calls, all claim a willingness to take the spiked applesauce rather than prolong the inevitable. i still cannot wrap my head around being 90 and getting myself carved up so badly. only to worry about breaking a hip while on meds and dying a month later anyway.

my genetic hand of cards is sound. although not outrageously long-lived, most of my relatives' deaths were either lifestyle (smoking) or their body was simply done after a lifetime of hard work. ya know 80+ is old. i don't feel those bony fingers or cold breath on my neck quite yet. it just seems like maybe this actually is the age where bodies start to falter. not just feeling creaky when getting out of bed, but more insidious and organic breakdowns. technology can prolong things, but to what end? it's the gerontological equivalent of the tremendous interventions to keep profoundly premature babies alive. sure it can be done, but for staggering sums and those babies are never quite right.

it is not my place to play god, nor to judge the personal health decisions of others. however, i do think sometimes less deus ex machina and more rational willingness to accept mortality might give us all more peace. and leave some money in the pool to fix the beyond fucked-up health care system. if something did happen to me now? it would be the end. i'd get the equivalent treatment of an indigent, with a quick trip to potters' field, or go bankrupt and lose everything anyway.

i'm very careful crossing the street. best i can do. :)

creature of habit

one benefit of my unemployment is lots of time to cook for friends and the editor. the albatross was too far out of everybody's orbit, so i rarely entertained, and working nights, i never could do much spontaneously. now, a simple "wanna come over tonight for dinner?" gets an enthusiastic "yes!"

pantry space here is very small, just 3 little half-moon shelves, so i no longer buy funky dry goods on a whim. when i cleaned out my last kitchen preparing to move i found some truly curious jars, bags and boxes. not here. the other day when i bought vermouth for fish, i placed it next to the other chefly boozes (sherry, marsala, brandy, etc.) and i realized how long i'd held a very unconscious habit of never keeping cooking alcohol in the house. it came out of living with an alcoholic. he'd drink anything. he didn't have to enjoy the taste, it just had to have a proof percentage on the label. so i couldn't keep anything around, cuz it would get gulped. (don't remind me of the 1988 krug i'd gotten as a gift that he chugged one christmas eve while i was working. we didn't speak for days.)

anyway.

it should have been a no-brainer the last time i locked the door on him all those years ago, but it happened only a few months ago.

we all have our routines of cleaning the house, of bathing, of dressing. automatic motions that require no thought. i always put on my socks then my pants. the g.c. always did the reverse. which never made sense to me, because he'd have to roll up his pants. but hey, they were his socks, his feet and his pants. didn't affect me one bit.

the same handful of restaurants and bars get my business; same websites daily; same breakfast; when cooking for myself, spin the same small rotation of dishes.

at the editor's the other night, i got back into bed and he said, "do you realize you always ask me if you may go to the bathroom?" boink. no, i did not.

i can only wonder what other patterns he sees that i don't.