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!

Tuesday

The day began at 4:26am...with a scratching at my bedroom door. Beyond the stronghold of my lair lingered a canine, fearful of thunder [and lightning]. I tossed and turned and because of his outcries, I also then laid awake bothered by the flicker and rumble of the storm.

Thankfully, sleep befell me once again, and I did not stir until the hour of 8 [90 minutes later than intended]. I awoke with a start, sensing the missed alarm and leaped from my bed to quickly calculate the one hour I had to ready myself for the day.

Shower. [check]

Dogs. [check]

Make-up. [check]

Hair. [check]

I've mentioned the recent trial of parking at school, a true debacle if you will, yet this morning was a circus all it's own. It mirrored the honking and jams of traffic that occur only in a Manhattan rush hour. I yelled and cursed before miraculously, a vacant space appeared [and choirs of angels sang halleluiahs]. I fled the vehicle in a haste spurred by tardiness. Off to class.

Then a college job fair [and more bad traffic] that I might only ever equate to a nightmare of capitalistic proportion. Like Sebold paints the victim's Heaven, my mail order Hell must resemble twenty-somethings herded into clusters of awkward suits and phony grins, and firm handshakes and eye-contact. If given but one wish in this lifetime, I would gamble in every other opportunity to somehow bypass the slimy grip of corporate America.

Yet again, off to class, which preceded a third bought of traffic vexation...[ah, a trend!]

Dinner included a re-indulgence of last night's turkey chili, that like a fine wine only improves with age. I had enough time to eat, check e-mail, and tend to the dogs before embarking on a new adventure: a writing group. We gathered, provided introductions - our purpose and expectations, and mixed the hues of one another's richly colored characters in an hour. It was lovely and motivating and hopeful. It was one more baby-step in the professional direction.

Oh, and I failed to mention the traffic fiasco well underway in the parking lot of our meeting place...when it rains it pours [and it did that all day, too...].

Following the empowerment of writer-speak, I headed directly for Starbucks [which I hear may be incorporating free internet???]. It's where I go to study because it boasts fewer distractions than the zoo of my apartment. I chatted briefly with the Staff Sergeant, then not-so-briefly with Dad. Between phone calls I swallowed excruciating doses of strategic management in preparation for tomorrow's test. I'm praying that the televised meteorologists mean blizzard when they say flurries are in tonight's forecast. I could really use a whole day spent snuggled between the covers, free of obligation...but I won't be holding my breath.

And that, my friends, was Tuesday.

just a cage of rib bones [and other various parts]

I posted a blog last night [maybe some of you read it]. Its life was short-lived. I was on the fence regarding its content - back and forth about standing firm or conceding to the fear of probable judgment. Leave it posted or remove it? To be myself, or leave parts of me out of view so as to seem stronger [more like him]?

Ultimately I took it down.

I knew he would eventually read it, and then think...the things I wish I he wouldn't. [I'm no soldier, Love.] I wear my heart on my sleeve. I don't normally alter my self for anyone. It's always take-it-or-leave it, granted I am courteous of my crowds and refine antics when need be. But I never hide.

We have a number of fundamental differences. He is so reserved, I am the most open book. He epitomizes his role of Soldier, and I, Artist...feely, impulsive, unrestrained [his opposite]. There are times I know that he wishes me to be more like him, and in the nature of balance, there are likewise times when I want him to be more like me. At the end of the day, though, the reasons I love him are those so foreign to my conceptual existence. He is brave, mellow, honest and convicted. He is sturdy, still, patient and wickedly funny. I have been known to uselessly confess my selfish desires...that his job would be less risky, that he wouldn't have to trek to the ends of the earth, that something would miraculously blanket the world in peace. His answer is always gentle, but matter-of-fact: if these things about him were different, then he would fail to be.

[occasionally even I wish I were more like him.]

"Never, 'for the sake of peace and quiet,' deny your own experience or convictions." - Dag Hammarskjold

The truth is, I will probably never be the best army girlfriend by societal standards. I'm not used to being a rock [or a conservative]. While most of the time I have an upper hand in my on-going war with patience, sometimes I buckle. Sometimes I just miss the hell out of him, and that's just who I am.

Last night's post, reborn:

By March, the seasons will have changed. Green buds will balance at the end of branches and the crisp of spring will hang in the air.

Tonight these thoughts are heavy in my mind. The time apart seems long as Winter begins to dissipate, and longer still with the extension of six unexpected days. It has already been several weeks, and they have passed more or less, without issue of separation...but when one hangs such hope and forward looking on a date, on a conceivable number of hours until reunion, it takes very little rescheduling to wound an ardent spirit. A change of plans that perpetuate the divide will do it.

Tomorrow will be a new day, the beginning of another week to mark off the calendar. Monday will offer infinite chances to sew silver linings. I know that my heart will be well after a good night's rest. Tonight however, it aches...for missed kisses, for the expressions I can hear in his voice but cannot see on his face, for nights I haven't spent listening to the rhythmic change of his breath as he falls into sleep. I miss his chocolate eyes. I miss his pure voice having not been muddled by a flip-phone's speaker.

But I'm fine. [read as always fine, SSG.]

my cup runneth over

An unexpected outpouring of support followed that last post, more encouragement than I ever would have expected...thank you! I was reading one of Maggie's latest, and while I cannot directly relate to it's entirety, the notion of connecting with people you otherwise wouldn't is something of a techno-cliche that I love to hate. She said this of the phenomenon:

The thing about blogland is you get completely caught up in other worlds. You sit here in the privacy of your living room and you sift through archives and you subscribe day to day and you gradually learn all there is to know about a person. In a way, you come to love them.

And she's right. I feel as though we're friends who meet over bandwidths instead of coffee, and for whatever reason this tied into my gratitude for your kind words... La C left a composition in the comment window that greeted my sleepy Sunday eyes with a kind of inspiration I am in need of, being still very much in the infantile state of this thing. Gracie aligned with my snarky cynicism [as usual], which fuels the drive for my desire to prove wrong the nay-sayers. Maggie was uplifting, and SatinBarbie, whose identity is yet unknown, provided appropriate words of wisdom spoken by someone who shares my weaknesses. This is no attempt to provoke a moment of warm-and-fuzzies, but merely an honest thanks because I really needed it.

I struggle with the Writer dream.

If it were like art, a passion I've known all my life that grew in unison with bones and tissue and thick skin, it would be different. I'd know myself better in that role. I would be confident in my true abilities and able to decipher opinions from fact. Unfortunately, it isn't. I began a nonchalant blog on myspace without agenda, and as I like to say, the writing kind of found me. I had never thought about it as a profession until a year or so ago. Now here I am, trying to piece together a path that will lead me there. Take One opened my eyes to an occurrence I should have expected: there are an abundance of people who are waiting to knock you down. The world doesn't owe me a thing. Writing is a destiny I'll have to fight for if I want it [as are all destinies, I suppose].

Now having somehow produced an Oprah-esque tone, I'll first apologize, then retire the sensitive reflection and end with another Thank You. It really does mean a lot that you come here and read, and even more that you take the time to leave your comments. Often they are nearly the highlights of my day because it means that someone values the words I post enough to leave feedback. It means that my words have readers, and isn't that, after all, the purpose of writing?

What a bloody waste of time.

I wonder how many people have been discouraged only to find profound success in the very thing that was doubted.

She asked what it was that I wanted to do, and by this point in the conversation I was screaming profanities in my head at her invariable distraction among a sea of other tasks.

[HELLO! THAT'S WHY I'M HERE!]

Of course, if eye contact was asking too much, her taking the time to read a sample of my writing was absolutely out of the question. Write for the school paper, she suggested, or get an internship. Great advice except I'm one of those students who works to pay bills. You see, there isn't time for internships or extra curricular clutter. I just have to finish, already, and then decide what new frontier needs conquering. Here is where the prospect of grad school seems the next logical leap, but no, no, no, she thinks I've missed the boat and a master's degree isn't my life raft...

And as all hope obviously drained from my face, she told me to buck up, to send her my resume, to meet with the newspaper staff on campus.

[ARE YOU KIDDING!?]

With or without her blessings, I'll be steadfast in my future plans. I haven't been beaten down by one voice. I haven't quite loosened my grip on the dream. In grad school I imagine they teach you how to write, how to research, how to interview, and how to refine the glimmer of talent, if it's there. So she doesn't believe in me [she didn't even read a page]. She didn't bother to ask how I'd arrived at this place, in this seat in her office. She doesn't know me or my abilities from Adam's dog...

I was just. so. hopeful. Again that issue with expectations rears it's ugly head. I want too much from people, and when they can't deliver to my standards, I'm crushed. She jabbed and I stumbled from the impact, yet that was just round one. I guess I'm good for a few others before tapping out.

there's no place like home.

Last night CNN got a little caught up in some breaking news, reporting that a tornado was on the ground, moving toward downtown Nashville...or so I hear. It was ugly for about half an hour as the old roommate and I stood on her front porch stoop, poised and awed by the rage of Mother Nature. It rained [a lot], every siren in the city wailed, the lightning was so sharp that it seemed the sky would be divided, and the thunder quickly following might nearly have compromised the earth's position. It was the hail that finally made us nervous, the tell tale signature of a twister...but nothing more than strong, gusty winds accompanied the storm [here]. And we're thankful for that.

roses are red...

Did I mention that the Staff Sergeant sent a dozen roses for my birthday? Did I also forget to let you know that I'm the luckiest girl on earth?


After several days in their original state, last night I downsized them when it came time to change their water, and I remembered that I should share the photos - mostly because I'm still in awe :)