"spring" break

I want to cry.

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.  

thinking Spring

I'm ebaying from the floor of my living room, right in front of a heavenly space heater.  I just bought this poster for my study.  It says, "HELLO, Spring," while the snow outside says, "Stay warm in your jammies all day long because beyond your walls it is certainly Winter!"  I also like the poem: "Again the forest is fragrant/ The soaring larks lift up aloft/ With them the sky that to our/ Shoulders was heavy" - Rilke.

There are many hours in the day that I wish larks would lift aloft the weight on my shoulders.

Snow Day

Yesterday the ice came as predicted, though the worst of it was north of here [thankfully].  The skeletal limbs looked sugar-dipped and enchanted, and I can say that because I didn't lose power.  Paducah stole the spotlight on this morning's Today Show.  That's what I mean by "just north of here" - not so far North.  Driving into Nashville was incredible with the glimmering tree lines on either side and the frosted fields and rock walls adorned with icicles as tall as them.  For part of the day I didn't have cable or internet, but that's small in comparison to some others' inconveniences.  A friend of mine spent the night in a hotel after an outage at her home, making a memorable first birthday for her daughter.  

Today the weather softened with snow, weightless wafting snow that fell momentarily so thick that it was hard to see down the block.  It makes me wish that he was here instead of cooking in the desert.  It does this so rarely in Tennessee that even as an adult, it makes me giddy and excited, and I put on boots early in the morning to go out to snap photos and stomp around in the whiteness.  Unfortunately, I can't find the cord to upload my pictures from today, but trust that they look similar to that one up top and less like the ice-encased berries that I stole from a local news website to illustrate yesterday's conditions.  

I'm making snowball cookies to commemorate the snow day he's missing, thus increasing the cheese factor but I care not.  I care package with no shame.

Just when I thought sweet Tennessee wouldn't let me down, Winter returned quite unusually. Tonight, in fact, there are warnings of a second "ice storm" for this season. There's too much drama in that forecast, I think. It's more like, "possible inclimate weather," but you know how the news is these days. If they don't get your pulse racing, what's the point?

While I do like a justifiable excuse to spend my day in sweats doing lots and lots of nothing, I also DESPERATELY need a trim.  I'm still getting used to this small town business and having to drive an hour for a quality cut.  I have an appointment scheduled for tomorrow morning that I would very much like to make.  That's Plan A.  The contingency includes icy asphalt and a trial run at soft pretzels from this new cook book  I'm so itching to break in.  They are in the line-up for one of February's care packages. [Yes, I've planned that far...and further.]  But I'd like to practice at least once before shipping off a box of failure that he has to pretend was wonderful.

  

I live in the house of Murphy's Law, the bloody-cold house of Murphy's Law - with frozen kitchen pipes and my feet are numb.  And that's just the latest thing that could go wrong and did.  I hate this house...

But in the house of Murphy's Law cookies are love.  I made a special batch this afternoon with all of my heart and longing thoughts to find him in far off places:

Chocolate Peanut Butter Chip Cookies

2 c. all-purpose flour

3/4 c. cocoa

baking powder

1 tsp. salt

1 c. dark brown sugar

1 c. granulated sugar

1 c. unsalted butter at room temperature

2 tsp. vanilla

2 eggs

6-8 oz. peanut butter chips

Preheat oven to 325 degrees, line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper; sift together flour, cocoa, baking powder and salt in a medium sized bowl

In a large bowl beat butter, brown sugar and granulated sugar until fluffy.  Add vanilla and eggs and beat well.  Stir in the flour-cocoa mix, then fold in peanut butter chips

Drop the cookie dough by the tablespoonful onto the prepared baking sheets.  Bake 8-10 minutes, then let cool on racks.

wasting time

It's almost four in the morning and I can't sleep.  My mind is empty - alert but empty.  And it's really cold outside [and in].  If I didn't have Mom here, I'd clank around in the kitchen and make his cookies, watch the early sun burn the sky into rosy pinks, and fire up every stove eye for its bright orange heat.

Winter Song

a baby of the south, I'm twenty years of clean

By Nashville standards, this is a blizzard...4 inches of powdery winter glory! Last night the snow rolled in and fell all through the dark hours. I awoke to a text: We are closed today! Have fun! Interpreted: NO WORK ON ACCOUNT OF SNOW! I GET TO SLEEP IN [AND STILL GET PAID]!

Now having the whole day to seize in whatever capacity I choose, I'll probably sit down and write something that has meaning and weight. Until then, I'm gonna keep sitting here in my favorite hoodie and messy sleep-hair simply because I can.

consistency

I've finally rebounded enough to live once again in some semblance of normalcy. I still become engulfed by fits of coughing, and I tend to tire a bit more easily, but I can sleep on flat surfaces instead of last week's rising range of pillows [to keep the mucus flow maintained]. I can work an entire shift, sit through a day of class, and can sleep without the aid of medicinal remedies.

[relief.]

Everything else is also back to the usual, current state. I quickly readjusted to the single-dating life I left last week and it feels like a dream to have seen him, to know his environment as fact over imagination. Perhaps I put the thought of his skin against mine out of my head on purpose. A numbness about the separation makes it more bearable to be away from the object of one's true affection.

I've spent too much time focussed on these subjects. They have been somewhat overpowering in my presence, though.

...on another note, outside tiny flecks of glittering snow fall beneath street lights. As always I am hopeful for a day off due to inclimate weather. I'll not hold my breath, but I might cross my fingers.

It's short and choppy, but at least it's something to say I'm here. The bed calls, it's been a long day.

on my nose and eyelashes

So, it wasn't quite a blizzard by common standards, but it definitely surpassed the banality of flurries. I love, love, love snow days!

all that was and all that was lacking

Have you ever noticed how silent true winter is? The temperatures loom low and flurries float on icy breezes...and there is nothing but the hollow moan of Winter in the trees, and all the world is strangely hushed. Perhaps it is that everyone, like me, is simply taken by the cold, waiting, still, shaken with the dead quiet of a dead season. I felt today, as though I could have raised my voice to the gray heavens and all four corners of the earth would have heard my words. Everything seemed that full [or empty] of peaceful discord.

And I was full and empty, appeased and disturbed, lonesome and surrounded all at the same time...

Finally

"So comes snow after fire, and even dragons have their ending."

- J.R.R. Tolkien

A story as uncharacteristic as the phenomenon itself: Snow falls in Baghdad. Sometimes the good news does manage to fall through the cracks. And so I am once again, but only slightly, challenged to consider the possibility that humanity might not all be destined for disaster. I'm sure tomorrow will act as confirmation that it is, but today, this is good enough.

"For last year's words belong to last year's language and next year's words await another voice.”

I could write about this day last year. I could tell you how different I am, how much I grew, about the hardships I conquered. But we all grow and we all overcome, and life continues to mold each one us into something different than we once were. It's no secret that 2007 had its less than ideal moments, and though I can only speak from my own experiences, I am certain that I am no isolated case.

Instead of reliving 2007, I'd rather write about the snow that christened January [2008], that spit and spun beneath the low-cast wintry clouds. It only fell and hovered momentarily in undulating waves whipped across the contrast of asphalt before melting. I'd rather note the morning, ablaze in golden sunlight that filtered in through bamboo blinds and fell like fresh sheets unfurled [on us].

I'd rather get lost in this irrepressible bliss.

Merry Christmas!

I wish that this was my photograph and that it looked like this here, but alas, Southern Christmas's rarely see snow. In fact, I have witnessed one in my lifetime.

I'm borrowing Dad's computer to check e-mail and such, and am back-logging blogs on my iBook. Once all of the holiday chaos dies down, expect a slew of new posts. I hope everyone is well and having a more merry season than mine with divorcing parents. I'm ready for Christmas to be over...it just seems to have lost all of it's magic this year.

A Hazy Shade of Winter

I wish I could have captured the frost-laden hill, yellow with the casualty of summer's foliage, rising to the crest of skeletal trees, set before the glowing orange of day-break. It was gorgeous in its wintry nature. I'm glad another season has taken up residency here.