I was traipsing along Bennett Avenue this morning, smiling in the wake of a particularly good therapy session and in anticipation of meeting a friend for our weekly walk up to the farmers' market. I was traipsing along and bundled up against the bitter cold when suddenly I caught a whiff of coconut. It was such an anomaly, what with the frigid temperature, the leafless clattering trees, the piles of graying snow and ice, that I stopped and looked around, sniffing.
It took me a moment to realize it was me, or more specifically the conditioner I used this morning and which I haven't used I think since the summer. Unexpected tropical moments in this polar vortex of a winter make for a not unpleasant early morning surprise.
Showing posts with label miscellaneous. Show all posts
Showing posts with label miscellaneous. Show all posts
Saturday, January 25, 2014
Wednesday, December 05, 2012
teeth
When I was in high school my orthodontist, Dr. Gardner, joked that he'd started taking my before & after dental impressions with him to orthodontics conferences. The better to show, he said, all the things that can go wrong in a kid's mouth and how he brilliantly put them back to rights. Sadly, I'm pretty sure that he wasn't actually joking, and that he really did take my mouth with him to these things.
First, I had a huge gap between my upper and lower teeth caused in part by a tongue thrust developed in my toddler years, and also by years of finger-sucking.* The remedy for this problem, before the teeth could even be worked on, was to install a "fixed habit appliance," also known as a tongue rake or finger rake or hay rake or just, quite simply, the rake. This rake had sharpened wires that curved spikily upwards and back from a crosspiece attached to the inside of my bottom front teeth. These wire spikes oh so subtly retrained my tongue to stop going where it wasn't supposed to go. Tears and bloody tongue and rage ensued. For the better part of 4th grade. But now I can swallow without sticking my tongue between my teeth (mostly) so I guess it worked.
After that came years of wires and brackets and braces and retainers and the ubiquitous and dreaded "headgear" that was practically a suburban rite of passage back in those illustrious '80s.**
The worst of the next six years following the installment of the rake was several months spent at the mercy of another relatively benign-sounding orthodontic device: the "palatal expander," also known in some circles as the skeletal expander. This little lovely had the fun job of expanding my upper jaw to make room for my overcrowded upper teeth.*** It involved a dental plate fitted to the roof of my mouth, comprised of two halves and an "expansion screw" which had to be turned twice daily with a tiny metal key. This literally widened my head, caused excruciating (if fleeting) headaches with each turn of the screw, and was neither a good way to start nor a good way to end a day.
Regular old braces were pretty easy going after these two contraptions, and eventually my teeth magically straightened and Dr. Gardner could congratulate himself on a job well done. (And straight they remained for a good few years, though now they've slipped back into a subtle, more natural state of overlapping asymmetry.)
Recently, however, I've been needing quite a lot of work done on my disconcertingly rotting teeth. My new dentist asked me early on in this now-going-on-four-months endeavor, "Why didn't you come in sooner?" My only answer, and he looked a little taken aback by this, was that I'm used to a lot of mouth pain and learned early that it's normal and to be expected. (And also, who likes going to the dentist? Other than my sometimes weird boyfriend, I mean.)
Last week, mid-afternoon while typing away in my library office, a temporary crown came tumbling out of my mouth. I called my dentist's office in a panic, wanting to go right away to have it put back in, but they were booked for days and suggested I just buy some dental glue at the closest pharmacy and stick it back in myself. Being at work and shaking with anxiety, I couldn't get it in right and so spent the rest of the day closed-mouthed and sweating, tongue irresistibly poking at the hole -- that gaping alien void where once had been a tooth.
Evan met me at the door that night and took one look at me and gave me a hug, asked if I was okay. I explained that the only thing worse than the already paranoia-inducing feeling of having an alien ceramic object cemented into one's mouth is the feeling of having it fall out of one's mouth, of trying and failing to ignore the empty space left behind.
Monday afternoon I went in for yet another dental appointment, this time to have them remove the now-crooked temporary crown, do a more detailed impression for a permanent crown, and finally re-cement the temporary falling-out one. They warned me it might be uncomfortable despite being numbed up first, but I wasn't expecting it to hurt quite that much; to hurt in similar ways to when I was a kid and trying my damnedest to not let Dr. Gardner or my parents see me cry.
It hurt so much, the taking of this impression, that I climbed out of the dentist chair afterwards in a daze, started to walk out without my jacket and bag, almost forgot to check in with the receptionist about my next appointment. It hurt so much that I desperately wanted to call Evan on my walk to the train -- to whine and moan and beg for sympathy -- but couldn't bear the thought of moving my face enough to produce coherent words.
I made it home in one piece of course, downed one of the extra-strength Motrin from the root canal back in September, eventually had some soup for dinner. The Motrin kicked in at last, my power over the spoken word came back, and I stopped feeling quite so broken, quite so sorry for myself, quite so mired in my ten-year-old self too afraid to talk for fear of letting on how much it hurt.
Now, just two more appointments until this saga is complete: an initial, and then a final, fitting of the permanent crown. But the thing is (and I can't quite acknowledge or fully get my head around this), apparently I need another root canal soon in a tooth on the other side of my mouth.
*I sucked that finger so ferociously and continually that it was constantly wrinkled and gross and awful, to the point that it earned its own nickname, my Awful, as in,"Emily Kate McNeil! Get your Awful out of your mouth!"
**Some of us, so certain we were fated to endure the horror that is headgear, were known to unfold paper clips and shape them into vague mouth-shapes and tuck them behind our lips, preparing for the pain and humiliation to come.
***My dad joked for years about how funny it was that my problem, of all people, was having a too-small mouth -- given the vast amounts of noise that came out of it, you see.
First, I had a huge gap between my upper and lower teeth caused in part by a tongue thrust developed in my toddler years, and also by years of finger-sucking.* The remedy for this problem, before the teeth could even be worked on, was to install a "fixed habit appliance," also known as a tongue rake or finger rake or hay rake or just, quite simply, the rake. This rake had sharpened wires that curved spikily upwards and back from a crosspiece attached to the inside of my bottom front teeth. These wire spikes oh so subtly retrained my tongue to stop going where it wasn't supposed to go. Tears and bloody tongue and rage ensued. For the better part of 4th grade. But now I can swallow without sticking my tongue between my teeth (mostly) so I guess it worked.
After that came years of wires and brackets and braces and retainers and the ubiquitous and dreaded "headgear" that was practically a suburban rite of passage back in those illustrious '80s.**
The worst of the next six years following the installment of the rake was several months spent at the mercy of another relatively benign-sounding orthodontic device: the "palatal expander," also known in some circles as the skeletal expander. This little lovely had the fun job of expanding my upper jaw to make room for my overcrowded upper teeth.*** It involved a dental plate fitted to the roof of my mouth, comprised of two halves and an "expansion screw" which had to be turned twice daily with a tiny metal key. This literally widened my head, caused excruciating (if fleeting) headaches with each turn of the screw, and was neither a good way to start nor a good way to end a day.
Regular old braces were pretty easy going after these two contraptions, and eventually my teeth magically straightened and Dr. Gardner could congratulate himself on a job well done. (And straight they remained for a good few years, though now they've slipped back into a subtle, more natural state of overlapping asymmetry.)
Recently, however, I've been needing quite a lot of work done on my disconcertingly rotting teeth. My new dentist asked me early on in this now-going-on-four-months endeavor, "Why didn't you come in sooner?" My only answer, and he looked a little taken aback by this, was that I'm used to a lot of mouth pain and learned early that it's normal and to be expected. (And also, who likes going to the dentist? Other than my sometimes weird boyfriend, I mean.)
Last week, mid-afternoon while typing away in my library office, a temporary crown came tumbling out of my mouth. I called my dentist's office in a panic, wanting to go right away to have it put back in, but they were booked for days and suggested I just buy some dental glue at the closest pharmacy and stick it back in myself. Being at work and shaking with anxiety, I couldn't get it in right and so spent the rest of the day closed-mouthed and sweating, tongue irresistibly poking at the hole -- that gaping alien void where once had been a tooth.
Evan met me at the door that night and took one look at me and gave me a hug, asked if I was okay. I explained that the only thing worse than the already paranoia-inducing feeling of having an alien ceramic object cemented into one's mouth is the feeling of having it fall out of one's mouth, of trying and failing to ignore the empty space left behind.
Monday afternoon I went in for yet another dental appointment, this time to have them remove the now-crooked temporary crown, do a more detailed impression for a permanent crown, and finally re-cement the temporary falling-out one. They warned me it might be uncomfortable despite being numbed up first, but I wasn't expecting it to hurt quite that much; to hurt in similar ways to when I was a kid and trying my damnedest to not let Dr. Gardner or my parents see me cry.
It hurt so much, the taking of this impression, that I climbed out of the dentist chair afterwards in a daze, started to walk out without my jacket and bag, almost forgot to check in with the receptionist about my next appointment. It hurt so much that I desperately wanted to call Evan on my walk to the train -- to whine and moan and beg for sympathy -- but couldn't bear the thought of moving my face enough to produce coherent words.
I made it home in one piece of course, downed one of the extra-strength Motrin from the root canal back in September, eventually had some soup for dinner. The Motrin kicked in at last, my power over the spoken word came back, and I stopped feeling quite so broken, quite so sorry for myself, quite so mired in my ten-year-old self too afraid to talk for fear of letting on how much it hurt.
Now, just two more appointments until this saga is complete: an initial, and then a final, fitting of the permanent crown. But the thing is (and I can't quite acknowledge or fully get my head around this), apparently I need another root canal soon in a tooth on the other side of my mouth.
*I sucked that finger so ferociously and continually that it was constantly wrinkled and gross and awful, to the point that it earned its own nickname, my Awful, as in,"Emily Kate McNeil! Get your Awful out of your mouth!"
**Some of us, so certain we were fated to endure the horror that is headgear, were known to unfold paper clips and shape them into vague mouth-shapes and tuck them behind our lips, preparing for the pain and humiliation to come.
***My dad joked for years about how funny it was that my problem, of all people, was having a too-small mouth -- given the vast amounts of noise that came out of it, you see.
Wednesday, April 18, 2012
Friday, April 06, 2012
this gorgeous thing
Cris and I were chatting in my office the other morning about nothing in particular, in that early morning way that people do. After a few minutes I noticed that her eyes kept drifting upward to look at something above me. Finally I looked around to see what she couldn't stop staring at and was amused to discover she'd found my stamp holder.
I salvaged it from the library garbage a few weeks back, fell in love with it, took pictures of it and had every intention of finding a good home for it.* It's just so pretty, this battered rusty thing, sculptural and delicate as well as practical. (At some point in its clearly long life it held dozens of library stamps, back before the age of computers and scanners and printers.)
I saw one listed on Etsy not long after salvaging mine, but couldn't quite bring myself to try to sell it, or even find a good home for it -- so it's been lurking on a shelf near the ceiling in my office.
Cris has liberated it from its dust-collecting days in the upper reaches of my office shelves, though, and is determined to decorate and display it somewhere in the library. (Or rather, she's determined, in her ever cheerful and wonderful way, to make the rest of us take turns at decorating it -- about that, we shall see.)
But for now, at least, I'm just glad that someone else found herself as smitten with this ridiculous, gorgeous thing as I am, and that I alone am no longer responsible for keeping it out of the trash.
* Not my home, which I am trying with limited success to empty of things, not to fill with yet even more things.
I salvaged it from the library garbage a few weeks back, fell in love with it, took pictures of it and had every intention of finding a good home for it.* It's just so pretty, this battered rusty thing, sculptural and delicate as well as practical. (At some point in its clearly long life it held dozens of library stamps, back before the age of computers and scanners and printers.)
I saw one listed on Etsy not long after salvaging mine, but couldn't quite bring myself to try to sell it, or even find a good home for it -- so it's been lurking on a shelf near the ceiling in my office.
Cris has liberated it from its dust-collecting days in the upper reaches of my office shelves, though, and is determined to decorate and display it somewhere in the library. (Or rather, she's determined, in her ever cheerful and wonderful way, to make the rest of us take turns at decorating it -- about that, we shall see.)
But for now, at least, I'm just glad that someone else found herself as smitten with this ridiculous, gorgeous thing as I am, and that I alone am no longer responsible for keeping it out of the trash.
* Not my home, which I am trying with limited success to empty of things, not to fill with yet even more things.
Saturday, March 24, 2012
sleep, and the things one thinks about when one loses it
I woke up just after 5am to garbage trucks caught in their daily cacophonous ballet and tried for nearly an hour to go back to sleep after staying up late watching too much Dexter (because this is how we roll here in the big city on a beautiful Friday night). I lay in bed in the dark whispering to the cat (who came for a snuggle, pleased to have someone awake in the midst of her nocturnal prowls) and thinking about some gorgeous silk I bought recently and all its myriad possibilities for becoming something even more beautiful.
Two mornings ago it was a foghorn at half past four booming its way up the Hudson -- an unusual noise despite many recent foggy mornings (thick enough to disappear New Jersey, the river, the buildings across the street), and enough to startle us from sleep and keep us awake until it was far enough north, twenty minutes later, to become just a diminishing echo of itself.
This morning, after sleep ran off with the garbage trucks and refused to come back, I lay in bed cuddling with the cat (who purred and curled her fluffy sweet self into my side, hoarding my warmth in the pre-dawn chill) and thinking about ivory-colored silk and springtime brides and that damnable foghorn. I thought about how odd it was that we had never heard that sound before, booming out again and again, echoing across the river, ricocheting off the cliffs of New York and New Jersey, our windows and dreams and nightmares quaking in its path. It seems like such irresistible power: blowing that horn and single-handedly dragging hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands of sweetly or not so sweetly sleeping citizens from their beds.
I wondered how it is they manage to stop themselves from sounding that horn all the time.
Two mornings ago it was a foghorn at half past four booming its way up the Hudson -- an unusual noise despite many recent foggy mornings (thick enough to disappear New Jersey, the river, the buildings across the street), and enough to startle us from sleep and keep us awake until it was far enough north, twenty minutes later, to become just a diminishing echo of itself.
This morning, after sleep ran off with the garbage trucks and refused to come back, I lay in bed cuddling with the cat (who purred and curled her fluffy sweet self into my side, hoarding my warmth in the pre-dawn chill) and thinking about ivory-colored silk and springtime brides and that damnable foghorn. I thought about how odd it was that we had never heard that sound before, booming out again and again, echoing across the river, ricocheting off the cliffs of New York and New Jersey, our windows and dreams and nightmares quaking in its path. It seems like such irresistible power: blowing that horn and single-handedly dragging hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands of sweetly or not so sweetly sleeping citizens from their beds.
I wondered how it is they manage to stop themselves from sounding that horn all the time.
Friday, February 24, 2012
Friday, February 17, 2012
friday night
The discordant chorus of coughs ricocheting between us, the sniffles and snorts and ear-blasting throat-clearings, are enough to wake the dead (or at least enough to chase the Llama-monster into safe retreat beneath the bed in the other room).
This is our Friday night: each of us curled at our respective end of the couch with box of Kleenex strategically placed between us, honey-ginger or peppermint tea forgotten at our elbows, and one last episode of Community playing so that we can at least say we didn't go to bed before ten o'clock.
It's a good thing the promise of house-guests this weekend has not come to pass.
This is our Friday night: each of us curled at our respective end of the couch with box of Kleenex strategically placed between us, honey-ginger or peppermint tea forgotten at our elbows, and one last episode of Community playing so that we can at least say we didn't go to bed before ten o'clock.
It's a good thing the promise of house-guests this weekend has not come to pass.
Wednesday, February 15, 2012
everyone loses their glasses (sometimes)
Monday morning it was a woman on the bus, suddenly running back to the front from the back (if that makes sense), asking everyone along the way, "Do you see my glasses? I just realized they're not on my face!"
Today it was a customer wandering through my bagel place, looking perturbed, and then a whispered explanation from the cashier that he had misplaced his glasses (again) and now couldn't see to find them.
Saturday evening it was my old friend Janey laughingly reminiscing about our freshman year in college, when she had taped a box to my dorm room wall with strict instruction to just always put my glasses in the damned box. (Janey is and has always been a great one for practical solutions. Except of course it didn't work.)
Evan just smiled at her knowingly. There's not a week that goes by without me dashing around the apartment at least once, looking frantically for keys or wallet or metrocard (I've gotten a bit better, in these intervening years, about my glasses at least) before heading out the door. It's hard to be a scatter-brain sometimes, even if nine times out of ten whatever it is I'm looking for is just in yesterday's pants.
Today it was a customer wandering through my bagel place, looking perturbed, and then a whispered explanation from the cashier that he had misplaced his glasses (again) and now couldn't see to find them.
Saturday evening it was my old friend Janey laughingly reminiscing about our freshman year in college, when she had taped a box to my dorm room wall with strict instruction to just always put my glasses in the damned box. (Janey is and has always been a great one for practical solutions. Except of course it didn't work.)
Evan just smiled at her knowingly. There's not a week that goes by without me dashing around the apartment at least once, looking frantically for keys or wallet or metrocard (I've gotten a bit better, in these intervening years, about my glasses at least) before heading out the door. It's hard to be a scatter-brain sometimes, even if nine times out of ten whatever it is I'm looking for is just in yesterday's pants.
Tuesday, September 27, 2011
confession (again)
I bought a pack of cigarettes last Friday. In the midst of a torrential downpour, I found myself wading through ankle-deep water across College Walk just to go to the news stand where I've always bought my cigarettes, or almost always. Rose looked surprised when I asked for a pack of Camel lights, looked a little sad as she broke my twenty and gave me back a mere eight dollars. Usually when I stop by her stand these days, I am just picking up the daily papers for the library.
I've written about my on again off again love affair with smoking before, or mentioned it in passing in ways that make me remember all over again how integrated it was into certain periods of my life. Its role in keeping a single freshman year after my roommate moved out. The fact that nearly everyone in BG smoked. (A lot.)
It's been awhile since I last bought a pack of cigarettes (one year, one month, two weeks, six days, if the little quitting-smoking thing Evan set up on my computer last year is to be believed, which I believe it is), and even that was a one-off in the midst of another year of not smoking (or at least not buying) cigarettes. I've never given it up entirely (with two good friends who still smoke, and with whom I go out for drinks after work on a semi-regular basis, it's been hard to give it up entirely), but it's been a couple years since I thought of myself as a smoker.
Today I am trying to remember that feeling: the feeling of not feeling like I want a cigarette. Oh how I enjoyed my weekend of smoking, despite the noxious smell, the slight ache in the lungs, the constant hand-washing, the sore throat. But it will come back (that feeling, I mean), and in the meantime I fear I am eating instead. Pizza for lunch. A mid-afternoon chocolate break. Something delicious for dinner from the boy tonight. And there is some sort of Ben & Jerry's ice cream in the freezer, I'm almost certain. S'mores, I think. S'mores are way better than cigarettes, right?
I've written about my on again off again love affair with smoking before, or mentioned it in passing in ways that make me remember all over again how integrated it was into certain periods of my life. Its role in keeping a single freshman year after my roommate moved out. The fact that nearly everyone in BG smoked. (A lot.)
It's been awhile since I last bought a pack of cigarettes (one year, one month, two weeks, six days, if the little quitting-smoking thing Evan set up on my computer last year is to be believed, which I believe it is), and even that was a one-off in the midst of another year of not smoking (or at least not buying) cigarettes. I've never given it up entirely (with two good friends who still smoke, and with whom I go out for drinks after work on a semi-regular basis, it's been hard to give it up entirely), but it's been a couple years since I thought of myself as a smoker.
Today I am trying to remember that feeling: the feeling of not feeling like I want a cigarette. Oh how I enjoyed my weekend of smoking, despite the noxious smell, the slight ache in the lungs, the constant hand-washing, the sore throat. But it will come back (that feeling, I mean), and in the meantime I fear I am eating instead. Pizza for lunch. A mid-afternoon chocolate break. Something delicious for dinner from the boy tonight. And there is some sort of Ben & Jerry's ice cream in the freezer, I'm almost certain. S'mores, I think. S'mores are way better than cigarettes, right?
Sunday, September 25, 2011
mystery woman
I was looking through an old journal the other day and found this passage, written sometime in the spring of 2007. It's odd, because I have absolutely no idea about whom I was writing:
"There's this woman I know, a woman with a particular talent. She has a knack, should you run in to her on the street, for keeping you tied up in her conversation while somehow giving the impression that you're keeping her there."
"There's this woman I know, a woman with a particular talent. She has a knack, should you run in to her on the street, for keeping you tied up in her conversation while somehow giving the impression that you're keeping her there."
Monday, September 12, 2011
Thursday, September 08, 2011
september rain, take two
It rained a lot last night (the splatter and crash of it making for hours of restless sleep), and it was raining this morning when I left my apartment, and as I stood waiting for the bus, and as I got my coffee and walked across campus and squeaked through IAB in wet sneakers across wet floors all the way down to the library.
I try to come in to work early on rainy mornings, especially rainy mornings following rainy nights. I come in early and I stand in the quiet of the lobby -- in that particular wonderful stillness of a vast and empty space -- and I listen for water.
Today there were already two bins catching water when I got in. I scrounged up three more and placed them as strategically as possible, and then there was more standing still, and then minute adjustments, and eventually the hushed noises of water hitting carpet and the staccato noises of water hitting floor tile were gone entirely.
I stood there a bit longer, head cocked, listening to the rhythm of water hitting my five bins, some more full with run-off than others, and found myself thinking about water glasses lined up across a table and the little-kid magic of playing them with spoons.
Today the rain made me smile.
I try to come in to work early on rainy mornings, especially rainy mornings following rainy nights. I come in early and I stand in the quiet of the lobby -- in that particular wonderful stillness of a vast and empty space -- and I listen for water.
Today there were already two bins catching water when I got in. I scrounged up three more and placed them as strategically as possible, and then there was more standing still, and then minute adjustments, and eventually the hushed noises of water hitting carpet and the staccato noises of water hitting floor tile were gone entirely.
I stood there a bit longer, head cocked, listening to the rhythm of water hitting my five bins, some more full with run-off than others, and found myself thinking about water glasses lined up across a table and the little-kid magic of playing them with spoons.
Today the rain made me smile.
Wednesday, September 07, 2011
september rain
It's been wet the last few days, and fall-like, and sad. Or maybe that's just my usual autumn moodiness settling in for a little visit: it's hard sometimes to be sure of these things, or to read the differences between them.
Yesterday it was pouring when I left work at five but for some reason I decided to walk up to 125th Street to catch the train anyway, and of course got drenched. My slightly embarrassing Columbia umbrella (because who really wants to advertise where one works, but still, it was free -- a practical thank you for ten years of service to balance out the inanity of a crown-shaped lapel pin) is coming unmoored from its wires and was no match for the wind and rain. I had been so pleased in the morning that the air was cool enough for my new corduroy pants (soft and black and already comfortable despite not yet being broken in), and that I finally matched the season, but there's nothing nice about walking around in soaked cords. When I got home I had to peel them off and dry myself and curl up with a cup of tea before I could do anything else.
Eventually I made some dinner and pulled out one of my knitting projects and watched Let Me In, and then dreamt all night about frozen branches and glass cracking and eyes.
This morning it's still raining but a different kind of rain. The kind of misting rain that seems almost to not be there, at least as long as you are perfectly still. The kind that collects on the surfaces of things -- clothes, hair, eyebrows, skin -- and takes so long to sink in that you don't quite realize how cold and damp and miserable you are until much later.
Yesterday it was pouring when I left work at five but for some reason I decided to walk up to 125th Street to catch the train anyway, and of course got drenched. My slightly embarrassing Columbia umbrella (because who really wants to advertise where one works, but still, it was free -- a practical thank you for ten years of service to balance out the inanity of a crown-shaped lapel pin) is coming unmoored from its wires and was no match for the wind and rain. I had been so pleased in the morning that the air was cool enough for my new corduroy pants (soft and black and already comfortable despite not yet being broken in), and that I finally matched the season, but there's nothing nice about walking around in soaked cords. When I got home I had to peel them off and dry myself and curl up with a cup of tea before I could do anything else.
Eventually I made some dinner and pulled out one of my knitting projects and watched Let Me In, and then dreamt all night about frozen branches and glass cracking and eyes.
This morning it's still raining but a different kind of rain. The kind of misting rain that seems almost to not be there, at least as long as you are perfectly still. The kind that collects on the surfaces of things -- clothes, hair, eyebrows, skin -- and takes so long to sink in that you don't quite realize how cold and damp and miserable you are until much later.
Wednesday, August 31, 2011
walking while oblivious, or, the facilities guys & me
I've been walking around even more oblivious than usual lately, and that's saying a lot. (Once I got a phone call from my best friend, laughing uproariously, because her husband had just walked in the door concerned that somehow he'd pissed me off -- apparently I'd walked right by him on the street without acknowledgment despite his repeated hellos and it took her a long time to convince him that's just how I am.)
Anyway, I've been walking around lately happily staring up at the trees or something, I don't know what. And I keep running in to the same guy from Facilities. Now, I like the Facilities guys and they like me, which means that when I call them at 4:50pm on a Friday because water is pouring down from the ceiling over one of the tables in the computer lab, they come running. And I like it like that.
But this one guy, a very nice guy, has begun to just chuckle when he sees me walking anywhere, and starts waving his arms around like a windmill from afar just to get my attention. I suppose at least it's become something of a running joke between us -- lord knows that's preferable to him thinking I'm ignoring him or mad or just being bitchy. Because next time the entrance doors to the library come slightly off their hinges, or it rains, or there is a strange padlock on the exit doors when I get to work in the morning, I want him to still come running when I call.
Anyway, I've been walking around lately happily staring up at the trees or something, I don't know what. And I keep running in to the same guy from Facilities. Now, I like the Facilities guys and they like me, which means that when I call them at 4:50pm on a Friday because water is pouring down from the ceiling over one of the tables in the computer lab, they come running. And I like it like that.
But this one guy, a very nice guy, has begun to just chuckle when he sees me walking anywhere, and starts waving his arms around like a windmill from afar just to get my attention. I suppose at least it's become something of a running joke between us -- lord knows that's preferable to him thinking I'm ignoring him or mad or just being bitchy. Because next time the entrance doors to the library come slightly off their hinges, or it rains, or there is a strange padlock on the exit doors when I get to work in the morning, I want him to still come running when I call.
Sunday, August 28, 2011
gloria
4th grade was an eventful year.
It was the year the Challenger blew up -- live on televisions dragged into classrooms all over the country, including mine. (I ran into my 4th grade teacher, the incomparable Mrs. Owens, years later at some school function and we were reminiscing about that year. She mentioned that she'd applied to be the teacher on board and how disappointed she'd been to never hear back about it, only to get the official NASA rejection letter later that February, weeks after the explosion.)
It was my year of antibiotics. (Wasn't there some silly book called "My Year of Meats"? Maybe I've got my first book title.)
It was the last time I was in or near a hurricane. Gloria. Other than being sick that year, my most vivid memory is walking with my father in the wind and rain, water swirling over our boots and down the street, tugging us down the hill to the lake which of course had overflown its banks and was creeping up towards the road.
I remember feeling so brave and strong, standing there in the onslaught and looking out over all that water, holding my father's hand. I haven't gone out much in this Irene storm, and I wonder a little bit where my sense of adventure went.
It was the year the Challenger blew up -- live on televisions dragged into classrooms all over the country, including mine. (I ran into my 4th grade teacher, the incomparable Mrs. Owens, years later at some school function and we were reminiscing about that year. She mentioned that she'd applied to be the teacher on board and how disappointed she'd been to never hear back about it, only to get the official NASA rejection letter later that February, weeks after the explosion.)
It was my year of antibiotics. (Wasn't there some silly book called "My Year of Meats"? Maybe I've got my first book title.)
It was the last time I was in or near a hurricane. Gloria. Other than being sick that year, my most vivid memory is walking with my father in the wind and rain, water swirling over our boots and down the street, tugging us down the hill to the lake which of course had overflown its banks and was creeping up towards the road.
I remember feeling so brave and strong, standing there in the onslaught and looking out over all that water, holding my father's hand. I haven't gone out much in this Irene storm, and I wonder a little bit where my sense of adventure went.
Wednesday, August 24, 2011
not yet fall but longing for it
I've been knitting on my lunch breaks this week, which you may be surprised to learn is not something I often do. I'm working on a stole in a particularly soft and wonderful chunky wool, and it's such a pleasing change from all this thin and overly delicate lace stuff I've been knitting all summer. It's thick and soft and vibrant in cozy browns and warm beiges and pinkish burgundies and a pleasingly slubby white silk peeping out here and there. It's thick and warm and soft and makes me long for late October, early November, and having this thing wrapped around my shoulders or curled up against my neck.
I've been perching on benches overlooking Morningside Park and it's been cool enough to wish I had long sleeves, and a smattering of dried leaves have caught in my hair and swirled up against my feet.
Two nights ago -- Monday night I guess -- I woke up in the wee hours and couldn't figure out what was wrong. Eventually I realized I was cold, for the first time in three months, and went routing through the closet for a blanket to crawl under.
So many people seem to be sad at the waning of yet another summer, but I am ready for crisp afternoons and cold nights and hot cider and sweaters. That isn't really so weird, is it?
I've been perching on benches overlooking Morningside Park and it's been cool enough to wish I had long sleeves, and a smattering of dried leaves have caught in my hair and swirled up against my feet.
Two nights ago -- Monday night I guess -- I woke up in the wee hours and couldn't figure out what was wrong. Eventually I realized I was cold, for the first time in three months, and went routing through the closet for a blanket to crawl under.
So many people seem to be sad at the waning of yet another summer, but I am ready for crisp afternoons and cold nights and hot cider and sweaters. That isn't really so weird, is it?
Saturday, July 09, 2011
date night
Coming back from walking the bluffsat Fort Ebey State Park. It was getting
on finally toward dusk (these long
northwestern days still take me
by surprise) and the shadows were
growing long, and the wind and
the sun and the salty sweet air made
us hungry. So we went in search
of steamed mussels at Tobey's,
and they were good.
Saturday, June 25, 2011
pride
Very proud to be a New Yorker today, after the folks up in Albany finally got it right last night. It took a long time, but in the end the timing is impeccable as New York City gears up today for another Pride weekend.
I remember attending my cousin's wedding sometime in the spring of, I want to say, 1996 out in Washington State, and how he and his wife-to-be had the officiant acknowledge even back then that though we were celebrating a joyous occasion, until all of their loved ones had the same right to such a joyous occasion, their own beautiful celebration was tempered by sadness.
I remember thinking on the morning after President Obama was elected and Proposition 8 was approved, how sadly ironic an occasion that was, and how grateful I was to come from a family whose progressive worldview goes back generations.
I wrote my grandmother a letter that week thanking her for enshrining in her children and in her grandchildren such a sense of justice, such a sense of fairness and fair-play.
Our "fierce advocate" may have let us down these last two years, but four Republican senators up in Albany crossed the aisle last night and chose to treat all of their fellow New Yorkers with respect.
Today I am proud to be a New Yorker, and can't help but feel a certain sense of coming full circle: this beloved city, this huge state*, the birth place of the gay rights movement as we know it, is once again in the vanguard of civil rights. And yeah, that makes me a little bit teary-eyed.
*With the passage of same-sex marriage in New York (the third most populous state in the Union, after California and Texas) last night, the percentage of Americans living in states that recognize marriage equality has more than doubled, to 11% of the total population.
I remember attending my cousin's wedding sometime in the spring of, I want to say, 1996 out in Washington State, and how he and his wife-to-be had the officiant acknowledge even back then that though we were celebrating a joyous occasion, until all of their loved ones had the same right to such a joyous occasion, their own beautiful celebration was tempered by sadness.
I remember thinking on the morning after President Obama was elected and Proposition 8 was approved, how sadly ironic an occasion that was, and how grateful I was to come from a family whose progressive worldview goes back generations.
I wrote my grandmother a letter that week thanking her for enshrining in her children and in her grandchildren such a sense of justice, such a sense of fairness and fair-play.
Our "fierce advocate" may have let us down these last two years, but four Republican senators up in Albany crossed the aisle last night and chose to treat all of their fellow New Yorkers with respect.
Today I am proud to be a New Yorker, and can't help but feel a certain sense of coming full circle: this beloved city, this huge state*, the birth place of the gay rights movement as we know it, is once again in the vanguard of civil rights. And yeah, that makes me a little bit teary-eyed.
*With the passage of same-sex marriage in New York (the third most populous state in the Union, after California and Texas) last night, the percentage of Americans living in states that recognize marriage equality has more than doubled, to 11% of the total population.
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
Monday, June 13, 2011
in the pink, or, staving off the buzz cut
I've been fighting off that old compulsion lately to shave my head. Again. The last time I succumbed to said compulsion was five years ago, June 2006, right before my thirtieth birthday. I started letting it grow out in March of 2009, so it was short for a long time (and adorable at Nathan's wedding, not that I'm biased or anything). Next week I will be thirty-five.
There are so many reasons to love the buzz cut!
The feel of wind caressing my scalp, when I am first readjusting to the quarter-inch look, is a feeling I love beyond most others.
Using bar soap instead of shampoo and conditioner makes for a damn quick shower, and also saves money! I can go showerless for days when sporting the short 'do, an act of rebellion otherwise curtailed by overly oiled locks (and now that I'm dating my beloved hippie, who wants to take me to Rainbow Gatherings and sleepovers in the woods, this is definitely a bonus for an urban girl like me).
I can perhaps convince myself that a part of me is still that twenty-year-old girl who first chopped it all off back in 1997 (even though most of me is very glad not to be).
Self-inflicted haircuts means no hairdresser anxiety -- and believe me, this is no small thing!
So I've been flailing in the other direction instead, growing into a girlishness that for years I publicly despised but sometimes undeniably craved. I've been sporting dresses every so often in lieu of black corduroys (though this began last summer when it got so damned hot). I dragged Jill to get pedicures last week (talk about role reversal) -- and picked pink polish! And finally, I recently bought a skirt -- a tropical gaudy confection in white and pink and green -- and I absolutely adore it.
Erica had to remind me the other day that unlike my all-blacks, I should remember not to wear this skirt on a daily basis -- people might notice. This was when she came over to trim and dye my hair. Pink(ish).
But there is still a huge part of me that wants to run around in sandals and tropical print skirts with my toes sparkly pink and my hair buzzed close. Is that really so very strange?
There are so many reasons to love the buzz cut!
The feel of wind caressing my scalp, when I am first readjusting to the quarter-inch look, is a feeling I love beyond most others.
Using bar soap instead of shampoo and conditioner makes for a damn quick shower, and also saves money! I can go showerless for days when sporting the short 'do, an act of rebellion otherwise curtailed by overly oiled locks (and now that I'm dating my beloved hippie, who wants to take me to Rainbow Gatherings and sleepovers in the woods, this is definitely a bonus for an urban girl like me).
I can perhaps convince myself that a part of me is still that twenty-year-old girl who first chopped it all off back in 1997 (even though most of me is very glad not to be).
Self-inflicted haircuts means no hairdresser anxiety -- and believe me, this is no small thing!
So I've been flailing in the other direction instead, growing into a girlishness that for years I publicly despised but sometimes undeniably craved. I've been sporting dresses every so often in lieu of black corduroys (though this began last summer when it got so damned hot). I dragged Jill to get pedicures last week (talk about role reversal) -- and picked pink polish! And finally, I recently bought a skirt -- a tropical gaudy confection in white and pink and green -- and I absolutely adore it.
Erica had to remind me the other day that unlike my all-blacks, I should remember not to wear this skirt on a daily basis -- people might notice. This was when she came over to trim and dye my hair. Pink(ish).
But there is still a huge part of me that wants to run around in sandals and tropical print skirts with my toes sparkly pink and my hair buzzed close. Is that really so very strange?
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