the same place as me.

i think work has stolen me away more than i would like to admit. and rod, a bit, but i'm still not sure on that one....that could be it's own post tomorrow but right now i am tired and i want to concentrate on gratitude.

1. i am grateful for relaxation and how transformative it can be--playing with the girls by the pool at diana's house.

2. i am grateful for see all the latinos at the market.

3. i am grateful for amazing food and getting excited to dress up for my date.

4. i am grateful for my yellow summer dress.

5. i am grateful for the way moods can change.

i love you harper!

Where have I been?

I have been away too long! I think it's the free time, goes to my head.
I'll get back into the swing of this with a simple list of gratitudes:
My new dress that I made, myself! (with a litte help from my Mom)
My awesome new sandals that will surely help me not to look too American when in Europe
The hot pink bows they put on Allie's ears after her shearing today
free time!
friendship and grace and imperfection

belated post.

i wish i had time to write more, but a few thoughts will do:

1. everything that is happening is because it needs to happen. i'm welcoming my life with open arms.

2. attitude is everything. i am consciously observing my bad, whiny attitude at work and laughing at it.

3. summertime isn't as much fun when you aren't getting let out of school.

4. my date with rod was weird last night at the end because he got really distant and pulled away. this made me feel panicky and i don't like how it changes my attitude to know that that duck isn't in a row. geez, this love stuff, i'll tell you.

5. this will all pass pass.

Happy Father's Day

Last night I went to a wedding. After the ceremony we were filing out of the hall and ended up standing behind a man that smelled terribly. He had a boot on his foot that you'd wear as you're healing from a break with a polo shirt and khakis. I found a way to pull Jim out of line and let this man walk ahead of us. When we got to the elevator here was the man again. I got to look at him while we waited. I tried to figure out where the smell came from, how a person could get comfortable in a smell like that. And then I realized how similar in build he was to my Dad- probably the same height, same size, similar hair, same borderline casual dress. All of a sudden I realized that I am my dad's family. Some day I may be the smell censor for my dad- time to take a shower, dad. Some day I may be my father's keeper. Freaked me right out. Note: I'm pretty sure that this guy at the wedding was an alcoholic and had some other afflictions working against him, unlike my Dad. It was no less haunting.
Tonight, after dinner, my Dad was watching the Braves game in my living room and asked me if I had any experience cutting hair. I said no and asked him why he didn't go to the barber. He said that he only needs a trim on the bottom, that his hair doesn't grow as fast on top anymore. This was the reason he gave for not going to the barber- because all of his hair on his head didn't need cutting. Oh yes it does. So I cut it, though I had no idea what I was doing. Well, OK, I did try to imitate some of the things I'd seen my hairdresser do. It turned out pretty good. While I was cutting his hair, and my Dad was watching the Braves game, he kept teasing me about how long it was taking me. The guy is too much some times. I'm giving you a free haircut! His hair had gotten really scraggly in the back. How had he let it grow this long? He said that he had a home haircutter (what does that even mean?) but that it was hard to get the back. Is this how it starts or has my dad just always been this "eccentric", everything's normal. I think it's actually just a natural progression, this is my Dad getting older.
I sent him home with the rest of the french potato salad (in America's Test Kitchen, very good) that he loves and also the rest of the half-pint Diet Cokes we'd gotten just for him. That's my Dad. He's not degenerating, he's still my Dad only older and maybe more concentrated.
Gratitudes to my Dad;
"the safest place you could be is in my pocket"
A taste for wry and ridiculous humor
my broad vocabulary
new pickles and lox
morning wake up songs in elementary school
Ethel Tuveson
adding his own lines to my favorite story books
Teaching me about anger and how to express it

haha, jealousy. it's a hard one. i wish more people would talk about feeling jealous, so we could take the shame out of it. i don't feel jealous around many people, but man, i have struggled with molly and how easy it is for her to make friends, have people like her immediately, find really great boys to be with....basically things that take me a little more time. in places where i am guarded, she is open. being around her makes me feel uptight, but then she is always late, always forgets to pay me back, leaves me hanging sometimes on important stuff. she's been traveling a lot which means i get comfortable not having her in my life and then she comes back for a few days and it's like, wham, all of the emotion comes flooding back. and her boyfriend and i, even though i do think we like each other, have a weird jealousy thing. i very much love molly and in our first two years of friendship i never could have envisioned feeling this way, but sometimes i think that the jealousy is the product of the love. these are feelings that are already inside us and it's only when we love and trust the other person that it's safe to really feel them. it's good to just talk about it and explore it, so hopefully molly and i can find balance again in our friendship...but i just think life is long and that it's okay to go through phases with our most important relationships.

i went to rod's house last night. thai food and looking at each other's artwork and then making out while eating cherries on his couch. i was worried about not feeling sexual chemistry with him, but it was difficult to pull ourselves away to say goodnight. when he drove me home he got out to give me a big hug before i walked in the door. i keep thinking to myself that he's such a catch and smiling at the phrase. i don't feel 100% connection with him but i really enjoy hanging out with him for a couple of nights a week and we'll see. definitely excited by the possibility of sex with somebody i trust, because it's been too long.

my first free saturday in a while. my ideas:

taking a walk on rock creek parkway
checking out the library
going to old town for a yoga class and antique shopping
going over to the portrait museum in chinatown
calling to see if ann wants to go find virginia/md thriftstores
cleaning my whole house (what i really should do)


congratulations on finishing the school year!!!

happy fun posts

I at least want to put a fun title on this post, I feel like everything I write lately is so gloomy or at least wistful. I really, really don't like the emotions I've been spending time with lately, I feel like a downer to those around me, but I'm just going to go through it and not fight it. I always bounce back.
I think I'm selfish and it makes me feel ashamed. I really hate the thoughts that distracted me from really being fully present in Buffalo. I feel so embarrassed at the thought that Priscilla might have noticed how envious I am of her new apartment in Chicago, how envious I am of all the time Kyle gets to spend with her when I only see her once in a while, how envious I was of her cute clothes and how I wished I had cute clothes too. I can't remember the last time we went shopping. It's all so fucking small of me and I hate it. I miss my friend that was just mine, but how selfish of me: OK, you're going to be my best friend and you only need to re-animate when I have time away from my life in Milwaukee with my husband. How long have I been moving forward and growing and expecting that? And my best friend has now lost her father but I'm thinking about how I can be there for her in a way that only I can?
When I graduated from college Priscilla and I flew to Europe and spent two non-stop weeks together. Then she went to CA to do AmeriCorps and I went back home to Chicago (well, Evanston...) We had talked alot about the men we'd eventually marry when we were in Europe, we actually made up stories of how we'd meet ( I said Priscilla would meet a professor-type, and now she's moving in with her pre-PhD boyfriend. I'm good) Jim and I (re)met while she was away in CA. She didn't even meet Jim until after he and I had moved in together, so she missed the shmoopy phase we undoubtedly had. She also missed the phase that I'm in now where I believe that I have some place in her life to lose and that I can still stake my claim, hold my ground. Did she even have time to feel jealous or did she figure what's the point? I just assumed that we'd still be the same best friends as always, but it was on my terms wasn't it? And Priscilla and Kyle's relationship will be on their terms, and I'll just have to be here in whatever shape being the best friend takes on from now on. I miss it being just us, I miss my best friend being just for me.

i'm just back from eastern market, having braved the heat and sunday buses to wander about looking antiques and dresses from india. i met a man who makes his own furniture who led me to a man from poland who led me to another man who lived near my grandparent's town in poland.

on the bus back from the market, we (liz and me) met miguel from chiapas. talking to him made me realize how i miss latinos in my life! yesterday, walking down the street in adams morgan drinking raspadillas, i got whistles from the pirated dvd booth on the street and it almost made me nostalgic for peru....even all the parts i hated at the time.

this week i watched oprah's interview with jill bolte taylor http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=jill+bolte+taylor&search_type=
a brain surgeon who had a stroke and was able to witness as her left brain shut down and the right side took over. she was able to understand that even as her language and numbers turned into mumbles and squiggles that her connection to the world became so apparent.

she says its just a matter of trying to see the world from the right brain perspective...that so many of our negative thoughts are just brain connections that we have said are valuable time and time again and that all we need to do to change that is tell our brain that other thoughts are valuable. we don't use our right brains because society has told us that they aren't valuable and in fact rewards all left brain (judgemental, critical) behavior patterns.

this just hit home for me to hear it in such scientific terms and i feel empowered by that---if i have to use my brain in some way, why can't i use it in the way that i want? it's my brain right?

my shopping cart from the farmers market today:

-turnips with a mess of greens that i'm throwing into a stirfry tonight
-thin asparagus stalks from a woman who just took over her parents family farm that she had always vowed to stay away from
-one yellow squash and one green zucchini
-a healthy head of green leaf lettuce

things are going well with rod--which is a change from what i was thinking before. we stayed out to 2 a.m. talking in dupont circle on friday night and he showed up and watched a dense, two-hour documentary about the darfur conflict because i invited him (this earned him some major points). i still don't 100% trust him, but i had a realization in my near heat stroke at the market today, that i don't have to trust him until i am ready. until he has given me good reason to trust him. his dedication to keep hanging out with me for three weeks without even one kiss says something, but i am a cautious girl when it comes to matters of the heart (unless i've had a few shots of tequila :).

i've been so into this idea of celebrating this weekend. my creative challenge to you is to find a way every day to celebrate some part of your life.

this heat is making me sleepy crazy lazy loose heady thirsty honest and i'm honestly digging it.

grateful for:

sitting on the grass and taking my shoes off at lunch.

making picante de papa and canchita for dinner (peruvian comfort food)

sitting in the lukewarm bath and reading anais nin after getting stuck in the rainstorm.

having awareness of my stress and misery during the rainstorm and then realizing i had the power to change that and then it transforming so rapidly.

i'm excited about obama! that's the number one thing i am grateful for tonight.

also, "sex in the city" and how it lifted my consciousness in a way i can't explain except to say that it feels like i've known those ladies for a while.

grateful for lara and how calming her presence is.

i'm very excited that this grant will be done tomorrow.

happy about my new dress/nightgown from ann taylor loft on sale!

watching observing my breath feeling myself as life

please help me hold my father and his wife in light and help us envision prosperity and positivity for them.

you should be in niagara by now. i've always wanted to go there in a funny honeymoon kind of way. give priscilla a hug from me.

it's been a while since i've had anything with marshmallows in it, which maybe could be saying a lot. i like casseroles with crunchy stuff on top, and i think homemade mac and cheese is the ultimate comfort food.

ah mondays, what would i do without you? i feel like i'm getting the hang of working yet i dont care about it as much as i think i should. does that make me motivated or a slacker or am i just in denial about feelings i really have?

my mind is on this loop of thoughts about saturday night, which range from savoring the exciting parts to cringing over the embarassing ones. i want to let it go because i really don't like this guy, but somehow i keep going back to being critical of myself. from my college indescretions, i know that it's always been this way, and it will pass in a week or so, but i'll probably always feel nervous around him.

i wish i had a little more insight into why i feel this way. there have been times that i wonder if i dont have some kind of repressed sexual experience from my past that makes me feel so nervous and vunerable and scared about casual sex (ive only enjoyed sex when i loved and trusted the person). or maybe no one should be having causal sex. yet i used to have a bad habit of doing this and the frustrating part is that i did it again.

i know it was just making out but its what it brings up for me. my shaman friend manu was doing a healing ceremony on me one and said that he could tell that i had some funky sexual energy lurking around. it felt good to give it a name, just like it feels good write about this.

its also a testament to the boring nature of thoughts, esp self-destructive ones. its the same shit over and over again and you can't even dance to it. you can laugh though. once i take a step back i laugh at the ridiculousness of it all.

you're sweet to go to niagra and i know that priscilla needs you there more than she can say.

take pictures, sweet lady.

Getting some

Speaking of instinct, sex is one of those primal needs we have maintained since before we were walking upright. An itch was scratched. True it's disappointing to wake up next to someone who turns out to be an idiot, but he served his purpose. I say, put this one on the tab of the women who initiated our sexual revolution, pat yourself on the back for the sexiness part and forgive yourself for the awkward part.
Love all of your needs.
( a part of me is jealous. I never ever would have had the moxy to make eyes or invite a guy back to my place)

instinct, or who we are before we stop to think about it

Priscilla called yesterday morning to tell me that her Dad had died. It was not a sudden event, her father had been making his way through terminal cancer for at little more than two years. Lately more systems were being stressed and he had begun a slow transition. She was able to go home to visit over Memorial Day, and had talked to him the night before he passed, making sure to tell him that she loved him. Robert Andrews waited for his wife to leave the room for a minute and then he went. I have heard of it happening this way before, either the person waits until somebody can arrive and say goodbye or they wait until the caregiver leaves to finally exhale. This must be instinct, we must be somehow wired to know how to die when the time comes- a deep and instinctual letting go.
She let me know what had happened on my voicemail. When I called her back, the first thing she said was, "was that wrong of me to leave that on your voicemail?" Who the hell cares? "yes, don't let it happen again" I'm lucky that we have the same sense of humor. Dealing with loss is also based in instinct I think. When a loved one is lost, everything else stops, time expands and changes directions, and you don't think you just do. I asked her if she'd like me to come to Niagara Falls and she said she didn't know how to answer- she felt awkward saying yes and awkward saying no. I called her right back and told her I was going to unburden her from another thing to think about and just book my ticket. I'm proud of my priorities. I could have talked myself out of going for many practical reasons, but I want to be a person who puts the people she loves before a job and logistics and practicalities.
I leave Tuesday for Niagara Falls and when I arrive I'll be in charge of the meal following the wake. My instincts tell me to include "salads" made with marshmallows and dished that end in casserole. Is it wrong of me to perpetuate the myth that salads could possibly include a marshmallow? Again, who the hell cares?

better.

after greasy brunch, laughing with emily, carino from molly, oprah, laundry, crying...i feel better.
whew.

yea for low cut shirts and june!

so hungover; our horoscope for the week

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21): Most astronomers are irrationally
prejudiced against us astrologers. They typically deride our ancient art
without ever having read any of the masters whose work articulates the
core principles of astrology. It's the equivalent of speaking about the
theory of relativity without ever having studied Einstein. Despite their
disdain, I don't hate them back. On the contrary, I celebrate their efforts
to understand the universe, and I make abundant use of the information
they've gleaned. Be like me in the coming week, Sagittarius. Appreciate
those who don't appreciate you, especially if they are doing good work
that can benefit you and others.

***

i partied way too hard last night, which is starting to become a reoccuring theme for my saturday and sunday mornings.

long story short: i danced, i drank tequila, i danced more, i made eyes with a cute boy, i drank more, he walked me home, i invited him up to my room, we made out--stopped short of sleeping together--and in the morning we made awkward conversation and then he left.

i don't feel good about it. he was an asshole which i didn't realize because we spent most of the evening dancing instead of talking. he made fun of the self-help books on my bookshelf and interest in meditation. i felt insecure about my body in a way that i haven't in a while. he made me feel like a depthless cliched old hag. being emotional and hungover doesn't help that.

i think i just wanted to get some, even though there wasn't a moment that he was in my bed that i actually felt turned out.

this was actually a pattern in college of drinking dancing making out feeling bad in the morning. i have so much sexiness in me the night of, but in the morning it's like the spell breaks and i can't figure out why i started the whole thing. i want to relax and be myself, but i can't.

why couldn't i have just left it at dancing? how does one thing lead to another?

it was only after remembering my horoscope for the week that i felt a little better...maybe having to stand up for myself to someone who is making fun of me when i'm naked (esp when it's the first time i've been naked with someone in a very long time) is just what i need to do, as painful as it is. i keep thinking about something that eckhart tolle said about the more unacceptable a situation is, the greater the power is when you find acceptance.

it still hurts. i still feel embarassed and ashamed for not standing up for myself, for taking someone home that i don't know, for not honoring myself.

the lesson is here though...i'm considering some options of how i can choose to think about this, if there space for change here. i have a greasy brunch set up with my best friend emily and brother. i'm making slow movements to get my day together. yoga later might be in order.