the full significance of a character

It's the second of two acts: World War II era, South Pacific. "Peggy the pin-up" takes the USO stage in a sequined red dress. The sparkle of scarlet in contrast with her platinum wig and the soft spotlight and the quintessential period microphone set the scene. We are the "soldiers," the audience. This song is dedicated by the Marilyn Monroe look-alike to us, to them. She wraps her delicate fingers around the microphone's base and as the piano cues, her sultry lips part to shape the words that I can almost entirely sing along to.

I'll be seeing you in all the old familiar places...

She slowly swings her hips into the lounge-like performance, maintaining her persona of deliberate sensuality. Peggy croons through the second verse, the third, and in the fourth she unexpectedly falls out of character. Her bright lips fight against the stage smile that she so diligently attempts to hold against the weight of reality. Stepping back from her microphone, she turns away from the audience. It takes longer than a moment for her to regain composure, long enough that the accompanist glances up from her music, concerned and confused, long enough for those of us in the audience to realize that this is not scripted. Her grief ripples through the dark theatre--contagious. I see the silhouettes of other women subtly wiping tears from their cheeks, just as I stretch the sleeve of my cardigan over the inside of my wrist. Pressing it to my face, trying to stifle my own sadness, I blot at tears more slowly than they fall dripping down the front of my dress. The actress uncoils a couple of times, fans her face in efforts to reestablish the order of necessary existence, and eventually turns again to face us smiling. She finishes the song breathy and with a wink. She finishes not as the Army wife we catch a glimpse of, but as "Peggy Jones", starlet, pin-up, community theatre actress-in-role.

a place for everything::everything in its place

I can't believe it's already Friday. Another week down is a good thing both in deployment terms and in grad school terms. This semester has been far less magical than last and less inspiring and less motivating. I've dragged through it because I had to, much like the days that he has been gone. The day he left I lived through the coming months in big bites, overwhelming concepts that drew my stomach up into my throat and left an empty chasm where it belonged. I felt like crawling out my skin in the most desperate and panicked way. Looking back, that seems so long ago, but then again, we're already on the other side of all my enormous measurements - seasons, semesters, length of daylight. And for most of the time that I've powered recklessly through British Romance poetry and fallen asleep without his arms around me, I've been surprisingly okay.

I have found little things to occupy my mind and stories that I've gathered to color all the hours. Though one of my biggest fears was learning to live on my own, misery-free, I've come to love most of it. There are times, like yesterday when I really do wish that he was here, but not in the cry-myself-to-sleep way, more in the he-knows-how-to-shoot-big-guns way. Not that I don't...

(me topping the badass scales - Winter '07)

...but he's better.

I pulled out of my driveway en route to the post office and to the vet. I backed out, righted my direction only to see three police cars pulled haphazardly onto the curb of my street, three doors down. Lights were flashing, a few cops were coming around the corner, an obvious exit from the premise, and a stand up gentleman stood cuffed behind the trunk of the closest vehicle. This falls into the "ignorance is bliss" section of life. I felt much more settled not knowing that a criminal lived on my block. I'm making double sure that the doors are locked and that every outdoor sound is over-analzyed and that I sleep with one eye open.

In other news, the garden project continues to prosper. The back-up patio tomato (the one not grown from seeds) and the homegrown zucchini squash, along with my window box of sprouting spinach and romaine lettuce all found homes outside yesterday. They're growing up so fast! My herbs are nestled in a sunny corner of my porch and the poppies continue to explode into thread-thin stems with miniature leaves. Inside my summer squash and sweetie tomato have just this morning shown through the soil, and I'm still giving the sweet pepper and straight eight cucumber a chance to do the same.

It's safe to say that this endeavor has become far more involved than I ever expected. I awoke in the night to a mild thunderstorm and thought briefly of running out in the rain to bring their pots inside. I kept seeing visions of disrupted root systems and disturbed onion seeds, over-watered failure, etc. Luckily, for the sake of preserving some dignity, I stayed curled up in bed and let Mother Nature induct them into Her realm without me. Using a calming mantra I talked myself down from pathetic actions - they are Hers, not mine.

24 of 31: giving (a little more than usual)

Dissension

She is on the kitchen phone.
And I am perched on her slow-rocking hips,
Too old to be lulled like this

My jaws lock up with bursts of sweet and sour—

The toppled chair on our back porch,
Heaved from the living room,
Reads clearly: Opposition.

There is an undercurrent—
red wine and disdain.

Praise Jesus! High-five!

My father by the woodpile,
Tells me to pedal and pushes my small body toward Motion.

The pink training wheels he tossed
Into tall grass shrink, and I leave them

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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...

Presidential Debate [no. 2]

Welcome to my alma mater, Belmont University.  We may be a small, private school you haven't ever heard of, but who cares?  You know us now.

The audience begins to arrive via Gray Line tour buses. 

(This is the same building where I graduated!)

One of several viewing parties.  

We are live from Bongo Java, home of the Nun Bun.

Before our mesmerized gazes is a giant screen and all around our hungry ears is the booming volume of arguing politics.  We are pretending we aren't mere yards away from the Great Hoorah, but that we are there as well.  

Even more impressive was the crowd watching the outside screen in the 60 degree, pouring rain.  They are the true rockstars of the evening, and their numbers are many, many times those of us sheltered by the coffee house.

photo credits owed to tennessean.com

One Year: an elaboration

Happy you're-surviving-the-unceremonious-Suck. Happy I-can't-believe-he's-really-real. Happy how-the-hell-were-you-always-this-unknowingly-strong?

It's already been a year and though there have been opportunities aplenty for a dramatic exit, I have plowed through what seems like one hundred heavy trials of will. On paper, the ratio of time apart exponentially outweighs our time together, and yet I have never been more happy and in love than this.

I wish that I were in the position to grab you by your theoretical hand and carry you off on a sickening retelling of the celebratory event. Reality, however, would so quickly snatch us back to earth and serve us the cold reminder that, "this is The Army!" So far Murphy's Law rules the land. Instead of wining and dining, tonight he is playing in sand and I am staring down this unfamiliar window of blog space. The circumstances are unfavorable but reliable and tolerable and unwavering. And the good news: it only took a year to wrap my head around these simple truths.

August 16, 2007 - He has picked the date location around my demand for coffee. I have either forgotten or disregarded his unfamiliarity with the area, and I haven't yet learned that he doesn't really entertain the fluffy coffee-house scene. The only thing I have offered is my new found disdain for a specific establishment in town that has readily decided to evolve from espresso and pastries to dinner and alcohol. My art studio sits across the street and they have recently begun refusing to cater to my late night hankering for bagels, AND they have ruthlessly covered up their laptop friendly outlets. Once a haven, this place is now on my lengthy Summer of '07 Shit List. His suggestion, Portland Brew. Why? Because he has already called to confirm the 'round the clock bagel service and ample plug access.

I am careless in my clothing selection and off-beat in the way I style my hair. I honestly don't care after a roller coaster summer of shit-for-first dates, mental masochism, and the final split of family. But what's the harm in coffee? Does it matter that my heart's not really in it or that I've already written him off for his pride in unemployment? He's a[n out of work] writer. I want to be a writer, maybe he's got something to offer in the way of quality brain picking. My roommate thinks I'm untamed, ridiculous. You can see Disapproving in her eyes, but I pull on that billowy babydoll top anyhow, and I push the unlikely headband through unnatural, brunette hair. I am meeting him for coffee at nine on 12th even if he's on welfare and writing books on scraps of grocery bags because at this point in my life, I feel like the world is sorely indebted to me.

I arrive before him to make use of free internet. I stake out a table for two away from the front door where we hug the corner a little cozy-like, an invite for conversation. It seems that I would be watching the clock, but his arrival is unanticipated. He steps around a wall to face me and I cease to breathe. He asks my name just in case I'm not who he thinks I am. The way the syllables roll from his perfect lips and his amber-chocolate eyes catching mine and the Heaven smell of roasting beans and his immaculate tall-dark-and-handsomeness are all almost too much for one body to contain. From memory, I can't quite wrangle the moment my lungs unfreeze. I never pass out so I can only assume that they do. In my head I'm moving at Mach speeds, tallying all of the outward flaws and assessing which inner ones to mask. I am like a duck, attempting Calm while beneath the surface I have surrendered to a chaos of stark, raving panic.

Shortly, he suggests that we make our way to the counter to order and dumbfounded, I follow while trying to appear effortless and cool. Somewhere between our table and the register he unloads the truth. The whole Writer bit turns out to be mostly a sham and The Army makes its debut like a sucker punch I never saw coming. I figure myself to be only a few paces from the swinging glass door, but at this juncture I am in thought overdrive and operating on obligation. I have suffered this guy enough with my bitchy antics. The least I can do is sit down, sip the coveted coffee owed by the Universe, and redeem some bloody Karma. We open with the usual niceties and still I cannot believe how struck I am by the gentleman sitting across the table. Maybe just for the duration of coffee I can discard my certainty that The Army just isn't for me. We talk about where we have come from, shallow specifics of his profession, favorite bands, then Kerouac. On the Road weaves its way into our introductions like a flawless thread. We are both strangely privy to the beatnik travels of Dean and Sal. It's somewhere among these pivotal streets and the, "yeah, man's," and the trippy meditations between an East and West coast that I begin to know defeat is near. I am already falling for this man no matter my anger with life or his pact with Uncle Sam.

At eleven, they ask us to leave. My skin is on fire. I am aware of each echoing pulse as we stand and he guides me to the door. He opens it and escorts me to my car in back of the building before asking if he can take me on a second date on Saturday. As the moment to part hangs between us like an obvious fog, he breaks it with, "good night" and a hug. His long arms wrap around me ten times and I melt and I'm giddy like school girls and Army or not, he'll be picking me up for dinner in 48 hours.

show's over

Ah!, the sweet relief of life returned to it's eccentric and unconventional Normal. I feel like I've trekked the earth, lived lifetimes upon lifetimes, over-driven my mental driver, and I've had it easy. I could explain the last four days from my perspective, but it would truly be unjust. You'll never meet another man comparable to my soldier. Never. And I'm not just being biased. To do the things that he does, to simply be capable of enduring his Army is plainly out of [my] reach.

Now subjects flow to me like rivers after rain - I could use my blank space to expound on an array of thoughts. Choice being one that comes to mind. I could choose the self aggrandizing road and boast of newfound strength, pride, and tenacity. But my heart is humbled tonight by him alone. I feel sad that most of you will never know him as more than a character of this blog, an anonymous Staff Sergeant in a vast sea of camouflage. You have no idea of the man that he is. You have no idea how much respect he commands, how much admiration he summons and reserve he carries. He is the epitome of greatness and I am gifted each day to stand beside him. To this praise, he would arm himself with a snarkish remark and tell me that he's glad he has me fooled, but every word is truth.

Out of the Dark

I was sitting in the floor of the not-so-spacious stockroom, yet again recording inventory prices. In truth I was trying not to give into late afternoon sleepiness fueled by post-lunch digestion and my strategic position in front of the toasty little space heater I had childishly lugged along for the task.

11 at $23...

...65 at $32

3 at $22...

And suddenly, only two holes peering through to the outer storefront window were visible. Two eyes askew at the opposite end of the long, narrow space left to guide us out of the darkness into the only slightly less dark belly of the store.

An unexplained blackout had descended upon us, and the street lights, and the gas station across the road, and all other major establishments within a four to five block radius. It was as though we had regressed from 21st century order to third world chaos. It's amazing to me how poorly prepared the civilized masses are for such an occurrence. Treat the stop-lights as four-way-stops? Absolutely not. No access to credit card machines? What will we do? When I arrived at Panera to take advantage of my afternoon's extra hours of freedom they tried to give me my hot tea because they couldn't tender currency. While I dug for exact change the employees succeeded in several charitable pastry donations to others.

Due to the crippling events of the afternoon, we eventually closed up shop and in unison, cut into yesterday's leftover birthday cake...and entertained the possibility of heavy liquor consumption. Really, would there have been a more logical answer than lighting the store's display candles and stuffing our faces with sugary confections? No. We decided to wait on the bourbon. That may be better suited for a more dire affair.