on the menu: a small serving of self-pity.

Maybe it's the rain, the perpetual, unending Winter, or maybe it's just the truth - the absence of anything fair at all in love and war.  I can't look at his pictures because suddenly it isn't ok to remember him in any dimension.  His face smiling, laughing, caught off guard unseals the vault that keeps him distant.  Remembering feels too sweet, too rich to continue tasting.  

The photos remind me that he's real, that this is all really happening, that I can't touch him or talk to him when I need it, on my time.  They remind me that there were and will be times much better than this, but that this isn't one of them.  This time is for making debts.  

I'm not sure why for five weeks this was easy and that now it isn't, not this week anyway.  I don't want to be strong today.  I want him to be here, to justify the photos that hold our place, for him to be strong enough for the both of us so that I can take a 10 minute break.  I would like for him to walk up behind me, wrap one arm around my waist, pull the hair away from my neck with the other hand and kiss my skin, or at least to be able to imagine it without the bottomless ache.  

It takes a village to decorate my house

I was wondering what you think of this chair...

in this fabric [with bright red piping]...

I'll tell all about the teaching experience tomorrow.  Right now, though, it's off to bed with The Dutchess. It's been a loooooong day.

What was I thinking?

Tomorrow morning I have to teach two English 1020 classes before noon.  Tomorrow morning may be a two-cup coffee day.  Come to think of it, tomorrow morning may be ripe for a number of out of character activities, such as: vomiting in my new purse, actually forgetting my name, crying in front of two classes of college freshman/sophomores, getting drunk before 9am, actually forgetting coherent language, totally forgetting the way that "Young Goodman Brown," "Boys and Girls," "The Lost World," "Araby," and Erdrich's character, Lipsha all share the commonality of innocence lost to experience.  

I'm just a teensy bit nervous about this endeavor.  I keep imagining myself walking into the classroom and through some supernatural occurrence, they all know that I am horrifically under-qualified even to be supervising them for a period of 55 minutes.  It's a little like the dream where you're naked in pubic.  While I will surely remember to dress myself, what if they know I have no business being their temporary authority on American Literature?  This is only my second semester and I wasn't an English major.  I am the epitome of "fish out of water."  My second dreaded scenario is that they all have I.Q.'s infinitely higher than mine so that when they ask me questions, I have no. idea. how. to. answer.

Back to the lesson plan.

bring on the beer

I just finished batch number one of Irish Beer Brownies. They'll be starring in the St. Patrick's Day care package that's coming up shortly.

Something about the recipe intimidated me at first, I think it was the bitterness of beer against the chocolate heaven of brownie batter. Whatever it was, I felt compelled to give the recipe a test drive before shipping them overseas only to hear how bad they tasted later.

The only trouble I had was with the cook time. Twenty minutes turned my mix into hot soup. Something closer to sixty minutes fluffed these babies into a very spongy-delicious consistency. You can taste the bitterness, but in a mature-palette kind of way, like dark chocolate or coffee.

Irish Beer Brownies

4 eggs
3/4 C. superfine sugar
8 oz. bittersweet chocolate, chopped
4 oz. white chocolate, chopped
6 T. unsalted butter
3/4 C. all-purpose flour
3/4 C. cocoa
1 1/4 C. (Irish Beer) stout
Confectioners' sugar for dusting

Preheat the oven to 375° F. Butter an 8-inch-square pan. In an electric mixer, combine the eggs and sugar. Beat until light and fluffy. In a medium saucepan over medium heat, melt the bittersweet chocolate, white chocolate and butter, stirring until smooth. Remove from heat and beat into the egg mixture. Sift the flour and cocoa together and beat into the chocolate mixture. Whisk in the beer. Pour into the pan and bake for 20 to 25 minutes, or until a skewer inserted in the center comes out almost clean. Remove from the oven and let cool on a wire rack.

To serve, dust the cake with confectioners' sugar and cut into squares. Serves 8 to 10.

(recipe from cookie-recipes.net)

Poem for the Telephone

Because I can’t imagine much more than
a continent’s worth of copper,

strand to strand, pole to pole,
supporting crows in the moment

before their brains spasm with
not thought but imperative

to flight, because I don’t know
why I see when I walk

knotted shoes hung
like dead things from

those suspensions of imagined
copper, because everything

beyond the toaster oven
glows with a magic

in my cloddish head,
I imagine our four a.m.

talk pulsing dark
to dark and back again,

and I am in love
with you, yes,

but also the world in which
love is translated

and carried and kept,
even meted out

in minutes, in cents per each
sweep of the clock

hand, I am
in love with this

world and this word
and the ones after it,

the ones said
in the night

when we are so close
no one could

say who spoke first
and who answered

if we slept,
if we spoke at all.

- Paul Guest

underneath the covers

Sometimes I truly feel like I'll never find my place in the Army lifestyle.  If I were paid per avoided confrontation I could drop all of this business of higher education.  I am not a conservative republican.  I am not a conservative...anything.  I am not religious in the Christian sense or in any other conventional sense.  I just don't fit those molds and I really, really, really hate it when someone advertises their belief/moral/value system by talking shit about "the others."  

When I think of the "democratic mindset," I think "tolerance."  I think of humanity and equality and advocating for people who deserve better.  It's difficult for me to respect a person who tells me that they know the difference between political supporters and have all their life, hence their staunch alignment with [fill in the blank]-ism.  What that speaks to me is close-minded-ism, in flashing neon language.  

While my blood pressure rises and my ability to sit at the table, composed, begins to lessen, I smile so as not to upset the dynamic of a situation.  I don't have a problem with the little foundational stone of free thought or free speech for that matter, it's when you, who knows nothing about me begins to explain how my entire ethical make-up is skewed.  I don't wage war on those who are different from me on the sole basis of difference, in fact, The Staff Sergeant himself is rooted in an opposing thought process.  But it burns me up when your self aggrandized notions are compelled to leap above such a simple and humble element as respect.  

What I don't understand is how you don't get that.  Despite the refuse of the last eight years and the continual fracturing of The Church, I don't think I pass personal judgment so simply.  I don't think you're wrong for not voting the same way as me or for praying to God or whomever your prayers reach.  I just wish I could be myself without threatening you or causing a heated debate over coffee.  I wish that I didn't feel the need to mask the pieces that make me because good people come in all flavors.  There is no need for immediate divisions, we're all left behind, we're all directly attached to war whether or not we agree with it, whether or not we reach upward or outward with our minds or politics or scriptures.  Life is very, very gray for you to have painted your vision of it so black and so white.  

you know all the rules by now

I'll preface the following with this character flaw: I can be a little neurotic.  

I missed Thursday's call and then Friday's.  I blogged that already.  

I was crossing the street when I noticed the second one and I thought, though just for a fleeting second, about stopping mid-stride.  To say that I was angry with myself would be an understatement.  Both prompted minor episodes of...[cough]...graceful disappointment but life went on.  I kept the phone close all day Saturday and Sunday but by Sunday night I could no longer stave off the throes of absolute hysterics.  

I struggle with the lack of control that this deployment seems to yield.  Two missed calls back-to-back is one thing.  Worrying that he might think it was intentional is another.  After four days of furious festering, all I could think about was the probability that he had concluded I no longer loved him.  In retrospect I can acknowledge the level of ridicule that this deserves, however in the moment it was reasonable fuel for a kind of discord that unhinged me.  I couldn't tell him that I was punishing myself for the simple error of a silenced phone.  I couldn't tell him that he had done nothing but make this easier for me, that I love him to pieces, that I was sorry.  I couldn't do anything more than watch for a tiny screen to light up, "unknown."

This morning I finally got to talk to him.  My mouth opened and apologies gushed like dammed water released -  

IloveyouandI'msosorryandpleasedon'tthinkIwouldignoreyouonpurpose

[breath]

I don't think I could be too angry to want to hear your voice.  Please don't think I don't love you.

I think he phrased it as, "jumping to extreme conclusions," and I'm pretty sure he said so laughing.  After all he knows me and how I let the cynical committee of judges in my head take over sometimes.  He assured that he never once entertained any one of the crazy things that I had assumed and that he had never questioned how much he is loved.  

After our conversation, I was too relieved to feel as embarrassed as I should have.  He is the Reason and Strength in this couple.  I grip tightly and sink in my heels, all the while hoping for just enough prowess to portray a state of sanity.  

Look out, Martha...

It was a very crafty day at Chez Moi.  I finally conquered those pretzels and might I say, they look and taste fabulous.  I'm not sure I have completely mastered the twist, but I'm not going to complain.  They'll go great with the raspberry honey mustard pretzel dip I'm sending.  I care package gourmet style.  I did not, however, make it to the post office in time.  I crossed my fingers that they were open until 5:30pm.  They weren't.  I'll have to send it off tomorrow but a couple days late isn't so bad.  He hasn't asked for a thing, it's my freak schedule I'm trying to keep to - every two weeks, sent on Thursdays.  We all get through this differently.  It's probably okay that I turn into the package Nazi, right?  

After my failed attempt at the post office, I went by Hobby Lobby to pick up the print I got yesterday.  It wasn't ready but they assured that if I occupied myself for a half hour they could have it ready to come live on my dining room wall.  Of course, what would a day in my life be without 100 totally absurd things going awry?  Naturally the print was printed crooked.  Naturally I had to double mat it for an extra $14 to center it up.  Naturally I got it home and noticed the middle mat was off center.  So I'll be back, Hobby Lobby, tomorrow.  Grr.

While I killed what ended up being about an hour, I browsed for a few little things I needed and considered this sweet idea I had seen in a magazine recently, probably Domino, for monogrammed stationary.  Since I'm a whore for a good notecard set, I grabbed a little something here for myself and then there for a couple upcoming occasions that call for gifts.  Who doesn't love a hand crafted surprise...as long as it's sober-looking?  Then I came home, got cozy in the floor, turned on House and stamped to my little heart's content.  These are some samples of what happened:

Mmm...Tiffany blue, I love you.

[and in other news, I had the phone surgically attached so as to avoid any further missed calls.]

bad karma?

I missed another call.  

I can't even talk about it...

My latest mistake

After The Staff Sergeant left I simply didn't bother refilling my birth control prescription.  My first thought was, "I just don't really want to go by Walgreens."  The second one was the money I would save by letting The Pill be a little absence in my life, and the third was something along the lines of, "What's the point?"  We've all known a good dry spell, why fight what cannot be changed?  All very innocent and well-meaning thoughts in the beginning.  

Now, cut to me fulfilling every stereotype of PMS that history has ever known.  I am the epitome of short tempered and icky feeling, broken out like a teenage boy, millimeters from absolute meltdown at all times.  I. am. a. disaster.  I won't go too much into the I-can't-find-the-goddamn-yeast-packets-I-know-I-bought episode that plagued the hours before bed last night and led pretty quickly to sobbing and shouting and growling as I tore apart the kitchen...to no avail of course.  It was ugly, I'll give you that much.  I contemplated opening a bottle of pinot grigio with the full intent of downing it entirely, but in a moment of surprising wisdom I curled up fetal style in bed instead and eventually fell asleep.  

My hormonally imbalanced alter-ego clearly had her heart set on making those soft pretzels last night.  In an effort to appease her I got up early-early and drove to Kroger to re-purchase yeast packets.  The dough is now rising, and with any luck at all I'll keep her manageable and get them finished in time to complete this week's care package before the post office closes for the day.

UGH!

I missed my first call this afternoon. I wasn't doing anything worthy of it or too-busy for it. It was a careless mistake; I forgot to turn the ringer back on after driving around with a friend's napping baby. It was less than an hour after he had called that I discovered the notice on the screen of my cell. What a small event it takes to deliver such a crushing blow. I cried. I emailed him. I prayed to my phone god that by technological miracle he would call back (just then), but he didn't. It's late where he is so I'm hoping for the maybe that tomorrow holds.

In an effort to pull myself together, I'll end on a positive note. Baby Girl's mom and I went antique shopping and I got this vintage reprint for my dining room:
And an adorable miniature ice bucket for the bar-in-progress.  It looks something like this one:

a meditation on pilates

I have almost decided that my bi-weekly Pilates-at-the-Apollo is an intolerable waste of time. There simply must be a better soundtrack for working out. Laying on my back breathing through The Hundred while Whitney-Houston-or-whoever-the-fuck gets her groove back channels more hostility than motivation. As my arms bounce rhythmically at my sides and I'm huffing through each set of five, I am also imagining taking aim at the pretty white Bose speakers that hang from the ceiling and pulling a trigger. The bullet moves too quickly to track the motion and then they shatter and fall to the floor. There are no more slow, soulful leg circles and I can suffer through plank position in peace.

I haven't totally written off the group fitness idea, I'm just saying that the playlist could really use revamping, and the instructor could use some instruction, and the 18-year-old majority could use some serious maturing.  Other than that, it's going great.  The backs of my thighs are still a little sore from Monday's class.  

I really miss my pole dance fitness classes.  I do better in a setting where there are concrete goals to reach.  I get bored easily with monotony; luckily the pilates instructor finally decided to change up the routine after several weeks.  I'm sure she's a really great health science major but perhaps it's possible that she isn't a born leader.  I would like her to once explain the importance of posture, breathing, or for the love of lean muscles, to tell us to "pull our bellybutton into our spine and lengthen."  

my REAL Valentine's gift(s):

I've been meaning to write about Valentine's Day.  The last post featured a little self indulgence, but the real surprise was these gorgeous roses that came on Friday.  He wanted me to get them a day early so I'd have them all day on Saturday and to maintain the element of surprise.  Saturday I got to talk to him for ALMOST AN HOUR!  It was the best 47 minutes in the last two months because it felt like we got to be ourselves.  An even bigger surprise was his nonchalance regarding the ring info I sent. I was absolutely certain that he would 1) panic and 2) never, never bring it up.  He did.  A reenactment is as follows - 

The SS: "I got the latest package - with a sack of potatoes and the jewelry quote."

Me:  "...I'm sorry, what?"

The SS: "I got the jewelry quote.  I thought that kind of thing was supposed to be a surprise."

Me:  "...I'm sorry, what?"

The SS:  "That stuff doesn't freak me out anymore."

Me:  "Oh...yeah...nobigdeal..."

It was one of those moments when the tables suddenly turned, I panicked having been caught completely off guard and I really didn't think that this was an appropriate time for shrieking-with-overwhelming-joy into the phone.  That we'll save for something more official with sparkly deal-sealers and whatnot.  It was a GOOD day!

Then I went shopping.  My way-too-expensive jeans will be ready at the tailor tomorrow.

Happy Valentine's Day to me.

The most sizzle I can expect will be coming from my kitchen.  This ruby red Kitchenaid grill pan is en route thanks to Amazon, and my extreme levels of excitement speak highly of the sexual dry spell occurring in these parts.  

The recipe that made it irresistible: grilled pineapple rings, Mascarpone dollops in the center, warm Nutella drizzled overtop, and chopped hazelnuts sprinkled for a little festivity.  

I'm going to the gym...

Because if I write it, I'll feel held accountable.

Because I've forgotten that I live in the body of a 25 year old adult, not a 5 year old calorie-burning-inferno.

Because The Staff Sergeant keeps asking about those lofty plans I had to get in shape while he was gone.

Because he's in the gym daily and I don't want him to come home flaunting it and find that I am left with no counter argument.  

Because of today's Nutella, Starburst Gummies, and heavy-on-the-chocolate chocolate milk.

Because I can't kick the blues...and working up a sweat is supposed to help.

grumble, grumble

It didn't start out as a shit day.  

I woke in his bed, albeit late, and hurried to get at least a shower before my standing babysitting date with Baby Girl.  Her mom called to cancel as I was en route to my house, so I turned the car around - I had left a dryer-ful of wet clothes tumbling, and the heat turned up, and all of my stuff.  Nevertheless, the day began in his bed, in his room where parts of him still permeate the space.  

Once I returned to his house I ceremoniously made breakfast out of Dunkin' Doughnut's coffee and an Odwalla bar.  I opened the back door to listen to the wind howl through trees and in and out of the eaves, and told myself not to move until my coffee was finished or Caligula was read in entirety.  I think it was the suggestive winds that moved me from the sofa, though, the ones that made me think I should make my way to the half bath beneath the stairwell.  It was a crazy storm but short-lived, and it ended just about as quickly as it had suddenly come on.  The wind calmed and my last load of clothes buzzed - finished.  I folded and stacked them in the basket and left for my place.

Wordsworth's "Prelude."

A glance at Knights of the Round Table. 

Class.

A quick errand to public relations for a grad newsletter for which I needed to get approval.  Except the "communications specialist" who was merely supposed to okay a photo I borrowed from the school website took her own creative liberty to rape my work of any personality or style.  No, I'm not talking about corrected comma splices, I'm referencing RI-diculous editing.  I tried to maintain composure in the pub. relations office, also crossing campus, through a phone call that I thought might save my slipping grasp of emotion, and entering the upstairs lady's room where I eventually let myself unravel.  Picture the absurdity of my adult self sobbing in the vintage-teal refuge of a public restroom stall.  Mascara ran.  Snot ran.  Tears stained my shirt.

So that's where the captive feelings have been hiding, waiting for something trivial to unleash them.  Granted, I'm still livid about the newsletter and the arrogance it took to edit the free speech and character out of it, but it really didn't call for a total meltdown.  There's still time for this deployment to make me a crazy person.  I'm only hopeful that this is a rare occasion...

Because I'm required to write [creatively]...edited

One down, five to go for the final portfolio.  Writing poetry feels extremely awkward.  We'll see what everyone else has to say maybe not in tonight's class but soon enough...  [Soon enough was tonight.]

On the Freezer Door

We are staring back against
A gloss-pane, beyond camera’s eye,
Wrapped in Georgia heat,
And a moment’s brief paragon.

Held up with words like together, like entwined.

A boy, olive faced, squinting eyes,
A girl, blushing-hot, striped with noon-light,
Her white, white dress against July skin,
His strange complexion of small squares,
Collecting in desert boots.

This is Certainty--

She smiles to the right and he laughs,
At something she can’t remember.

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Now I picture things

He called today and my fingers startled.  I was in class in the midst of a heated discussion of Wordworth's "Prelude."  I was feigning some level of interest with my mind and my hands wrapped around a phone clasped beneath the table, not the epic, not the story.  

It had been five days (which maybe isn't that long considering deployment) but it was long enough to make an anxious woman out of me.  Last week was more challenging than the ones before.  Late at night I ached for him, I still ache for him - just to make faces at me from the other side of the sofa or grab me in the kitchen for an exaggerated dip, the crown of my head nearly brushing the floor, or the word trying to glide from his lips, "sweetheart."  

I've gotten used to feeling nothing, but it isn't me.   Even though I wear it, it feels funny on.  Then on the phone he thanked me for this silly card I sent a month ago, sprayed with my scent and covered in lipstick kisses.  He said that it made his day and despite his delayed gratitude he wanted me to know.  There is so little of us in this condition.  We are maintaining what exists when he's home and so the blips of thoughtfulness have a fracturing effect.  This painful equilibrium crumbles so that I can hear him again in my thoughts.  

He says, "That wet towel on the bed will mildew."   

He says, "Half a jar of Nutella will spoil dinner."

And, "Sweet dreams.  I love you."

The road to Domestic Goddesstry continues...

I've had a new burst of domestic inspiration in the last day or two, most of which followed the great triumph of taming my dining room.  It wasn't that it was waiting, packed in tidy boxes, but instead that the whole house had been unpacked in that single room and never again touched.  But now I can breathe easy and walk taller.  It has been rescued from disaster.  

My focus has now turned to streamlining it's beauty.  The bar needs to be stained and I'm hunting down a mini-fridge for mixers and white wine; it will fit just bellow the bar/counter/recycled IKEA shelf.  I took some art to Hobby Lobby to have it framed for wall accessorizing, picked up some silk Gerber daisies for the table, and the super cutest best part - big gold letters in his and my first initials with a swirly "&" to go between them.  I think they will have to hang above my bar-in-progress, the pièce de résistance.  The Container Store (online) is next.  I need to find some hardware for holding bottles and barware.

But before that, I wanted to share these recipes from this morning's Rescue Chef.  This menu most certainly screams, "Welcome home, Sweetheart!" especially since I don't eat red meat.  It will reappear for a certain homecoming-to-be later this year-- 

• Flaming Filet Mignon with Chive Butter
  
• Pan-fried Asparagus with Shallots
  
• Potato Gratin "Boome-style"
  
• Molten Chocolate Baby Cakes
  

The Advice of the Dream

The dream that escaped the dream

went to live in a field.  It was happy,

being undreamt, snapping dead sticks to add

to the fire it warmed itself around.

All night, in order to stay awake, it counted places.

How many oceans?  How many mountain trails

lined with fern and woodchip, with flower?

And how many windows in the evening strangely lit?

The arms.  Avenues.  Estuaries

of ancient rivers, markets of spice, cumin

shifting in the barrels like sand,

like the desert, like anything in the open air.

It happens that the characters inside the dream

mill about, awkwardly, lost.

They've been knocked from the epic,

loosed from line of plot, from story.

The index cards have gone blank in their hands.

What's my line?  When do I enter?  And where should I stand?

Evenings in the field, there's the rustle

of autumnal husks, and beyond that,

a slight creek running.  The advice of the dream?

It's important to stay unattached

to an actual happening.  This makes you fleet-footed,

able to be everywhere in the world.

- Kate Northrop, Back Through Interruption

your head will collapse if there's nothing in it

Tonight is going more smoothly than the last few.  It seems to be helpful when I move faster than my brain can follow.  If there is no time to dwell then dwelling is bypassed.  Simple.  

That said, I'm glad to be typing from the comfort of my very spacious dining table, which has finally been cleared of moving debris.  I made it my mission to tackle the dining room tonight instead of vegging in front of the television, a wise decision made in rare form.  It took several hours to shovel boxes and lost trinkets and plates and glasses into more appropriate spaces, but it's done.  My once very lonely vintage china hutch is now full and ready for entertaining.  My poppy arrangement is a wonderful focal point and coordinates with the new drapes just as I had imagined. 

As for the bar idea, I'm going with something a little different because I am a limited-income grad student and because I found an old IKEA shelf that has already been purchased.  It just so happens to be the perfect size for the designated wall and has been left raw, a blank canvas open for any kind of finish or paint I choose.  I'm contemplating its destiny with each glance-over this nearly completed room gets.  I will be sure to post pictures once it is painted, hung and complete.

During other episodes of Friday's frenzied productivity, I got Valentine packages sent out to the The Staff Sergeant's mom and brother and a plain 'ole care package sent to him.  Actually, it held a sack of potatoes so I'm not sure it can claim any titles of "ordinary".  I'm sending potato guns through Amazon to the guys he's with, thinking that the long days and nights could use some comic relief.  I'm fairly certain the box from me will arrive first and with it a likely, "WTF?, why the hell is she sending potatoes in bulk?!"  

I might have also included the specs on a certain eye-catching piece of jewelry - super nonchalant...thus proving my prior point (see above reference to "the rarity of wise decisions").  With that recap in brevity, I'm off to bed or rather to read Kate Northrop's Back Through Interruption [since I didn't last week].  

Oh yeah, and there's this:

1. What were you doing before you started this post?
Snoozing my alarm

2. What is the last thing you read/are currently reading?
About a half dozen plays, poems, essays and books of poetry.  (That's English Grad School)

3. Do you nap a lot?
No.  Naps make me feel disoriented and like I'm missing something.

4. Who was the last person you hugged?
Baby Girl

5. What is your favorite TV series?
Currently I'm hung up on TLC - Jon & Kate Plus 8, What Not to Wear

6. What was the last thing you said out loud?
I called my dog into the living room

7. What websites do you always visit when you go online?
E-mail and my site meter

8. What was the last item you bought?
2 white summery tops, a light weight gray sweater and clover boxers for the St. Pat's care package, all from Gap outlet (yesterday)

9. What is your most challenging goal?
being content in the now

10. If you could have a house totally paid for, fully furnished- anywhere in the world, where would it be?
A big-ass apartment in NYC

11. Favorite Vacation spot?
New York but I would settle for any big city.

12. Say something to the person who tagged you:
Tania, thanks for offering so much support and positive energy!  

13. Name one thing you just can't resist no matter how bad it is for you:
Chocolate

14. What is your favorite item of clothing?
Trapeze dresses 

15. What would your American Gladiator name be and why?
Is there a formula for this that I didn't get?

16. Name one thing you can not live with out:
This pretty little MacBook

17. Has a celebrity's haircut ever influenced you on your own hairstyle?
Right now I'm sporting something close to the VERY short Katie-Holmes-bob

18. What is your drink of choice.
Water or something caffeinated with as few calories as possible.

19. What would you eat for one meal, if you could eat anything and not gain the calories or fat grams, etc?
Macaroni n' cheese, Southern cornbread dressing, black-eyed peas, and fried chicken.  Yes, I'm a Southern girl.

20. What are you wearing right now?
An old high-school t-shirt and pale green flannel pj pants

21. What's your favorite room in your house?
My dining room, if I can ever get it unpacked

22. If you were to have a baby boy and girl tomorrow, what would you name them?
"Veda Love" for a girl and I'm not sure about a boy's name...

Home-sick

I wonder if it's just me that ever feels this kind of weightlessness, like tugging on strings that never pull tight--just small.  Tonight I think that I could jump up and down and shout without acknowledgement from the universe.  And really this is just about realizing how little control I can possibly have at all.  

I'm not sure to what I should attribute this existential panic.  Maybe realizing that he will always leave as long as he does this.  Or perhaps it came when I concluded that the emails I send him don't really get checked, and I can't call and that makes me feel completely...powerless.  It could be a number of other things, really, but those are the likely culprits this time around*.  

Everything here is a little off balance.  I like to think that I've mastered this, that I am exempt from any more rough days and that the short calls I do get are perfectly enough.  When I overlook the telling symptoms that a hard night is coming, I not only feel the initial want for him, but am then also angered for being caught off guard.  This is another one of those nights.  I can be found planted on my sofa in sweats, dwelling on the stories he doesn't get to hear.  Those that he does are abridged or outlined with lost punch lines and a diminishing presence of laughter.  They feel boiled down to hurried transactions, and knowing that he doesn't read the heartfelt emails only adds to my overall sense of impotence.  I am pretty much an ineffective little thread in this great, grand scheme and I hate that.  He can call me, but I cannot reach him even through methods that should.  I am cookies and quickly penned notes with smiley faces, minor and inessential.

-------------------------------------------------------

*this panic surrounding things I cannot control is my usual disposition 

stunted progress

[the manic state wanes, giving way to something more familiar.]

My smile curls into something less...cheerful.  Meanwhile, I want him come home with an incalculable desire.  If I had the energy I'd throw myself in the floor and wail and thrash my limbs.  But I don't have the energy and I'm pretty sure people would talk about me behind my back.

It hasn't felt like home [before you]

The end of another day, and a busy one, busier than most Mondays. I stayed at his place last night to do laundry, and yes, also to be around his stuff. But I overslept and had a babysitting commitment this morning. Even rushing I got my coffee made and drove his monster truck to keep the battery charged. I pulled in a mere seconds before Jen and baby, luckily. Then an hour coaxing her stand, and because we are both so fashion forward, Baby Girl and I paid our daily homage to What Not to Wear.

After Children's Hour at Chez Moi, I had to go back to his house to get my clean clothes and drop off his gas-guzzler...and take the trash to the dump before my afternoon class. I also stopped by an antique store to look for a subject for my latest project idea--a bar for my giant, beautiful dining room.  In one of the latest Domino issues, they made a bookshelf into a bar/sideboard.  Something kind of like this:

(thanks apartmenttherapy.com)

...except I want a dark wood for the outside and an orange background, something warm and pumpkin-ish, not periwinkle.  I devised a plan for said [untouched] dining room: if I can get myself excited enough about decorating it, then I will surely be compelled to fill the china cabinets with china and stemware currently forgotten in boxes, and to clear off my sprawling dining table turned catch-all and care-package-central.  To accomplish this task I raided Pier 1 this weekend, stocking up on an armful of [fake] poppies and varied greens and four curtain panels in rich browns and firey red-oranges.  It's the final room to be tackled and my favorite, not to sound like the rest of the house is finished.  My bedroom is painfully in need of painting and cleaning, and all of those clothes that hang so gracefully on the closet bar are still scattered in my floor.  Still, the dining room has been neglected and it's time to wrap up this "getting settled" bit.  

I got to give The Staff Sergeant a virtual tour when we spoke via chat/webcam.  He said that the living room at least, looked completely different in a good way, which made my efforts seem momentarily worthwhile.  Until it's all finished, I power on.  I've hung curtains continuously for weeks...ok, maybe not exactly continuously, and found places for crap that laid homeless and lost in the corners of chaotic rooms.  All of this has reminded me of how much I dislike the moving process, and yet I know within a year I'll be doing it all again.

How good is a man that lets you look past the strife of separation, of uprooting, of packing all the minuscule pieces of your existence painstakingly in boxes to leave places that feel like home for new uncharted ones and then each night, also leaves you drifting off to sleep with a smile? 

I hate the phone [but I wish you'd call]

...or IM.

And then he did, rousing me from a Sunday morning slumber. I've never been more happily woken, except, well, there were some mornings when he was here... We christened our webcams with funny faces and smiles and then mimed along with the text. There was a problem with the sound so we made do with written words and motions, though they were lagging on a typical delay.

Now it's finally time for coffee. Oh, sweet caffeine!

And the rest of Bye Bye Birdie - Oh, sweet mid-century culture!

[One day you find out

This is what life is all about,
You need someone who
Is living just for you.
One guy,
One special guy,
One guy to live for,
To care for,
Be there for...]