So again, a long time since the last entry. Both of my fans (me and my mom) have stopped checking the site. I blame my lack of updates on two events in January:
1) I started dating CNK again.
2) A week after we got back together my house was broken into and my computer stolen.
I am not saying that there was any kind of causal relationship between those two events. CNK is an engineer and not a crack-head.
Please don't write in to tell me that not all crack-heads will steal your computer and that not all engineers won't...I know.
Regardless, I'm pretty sure that if CNK had broken into my house and stolen my computer he would have given it back by now because I definitely made him, and everyone around me, sorry that it happened.
So now it's July, nearly August, and here is the update in abridged form:
January 2008 - CNK and I give it another go. I am thrilled. I get ready to make him a "so-glad-we're-back" dinner and come home with a bag full of groceries to find my front door has been smashed in with a shovel. I know it's a shovel because I don't own the one inside my front door and my neighbor is missing the one she keeps on our shared front porch. She was home at the time that it happened but just "figured [I was] making a lot of noise at the front door". I think she must have been confusing me with her roommate who installed a full drum kit beneath my study. I call CNK and B to come rescue me. Neighbor and her roommate also hang around with us. Cops take TWO hours to show up and three phone calls. We all freeze on the porch while the squad car drives past us and doesn't stop.
On my third call, the dispatcher asks me if there is any kind of landmark that the officer can look for. "There are five people standing on the front porch waving and shouting at cop cars" I tell her. Among the items stolen were: my computer, my DVD player, my backpack, my ability to shut the front door for two days, my ability to sleep comfortably in the apartment for one month, and a half-full bottle of Chambord raspberry liquor.
February 2008 - I don't really remember anything of significance. I mean, it's not like my house got broken into again. Oh, CNK takes me on an awesome valentines date. We have the worst meal ever but it's so bad that we laugh about it the whole time and then he takes me to a show at the Virginia Samford. It was fun but we get sleepy and so leave early to sit by his apartment's pool, wrapped in jackets, eating jelly beans and chatting.
March 2008 - - People continue to not break into my house. I really appreciate it.
April 2008 - B turns 28. This is infuriating because I have been getting even deeper into my 30's and he's still only in his 20's. Jerk. CNK and I throw him a little sushi birthday bash and we all have a great time.
In addition, CNK takes his PE exam so suddenly we can see each other more often and not only from 10pm-10:30pm on Fridays. It is a difficult adjustment but we make it. I have a successful committee meeting where they tell me I have enough to graduate in December! YES!...(spoiler alert, the July entry will dash all excitement you may have for me). My friend DP comes for a visit and we see Allison Kraus and Robert Plant which was surprisingly fabulous.
May 2008 - I try to write a paper. I fail. I try to write a paper. I fail. I try to write a paper. I fail. I try to write a paper. I fail. My boss yells at me. I yell at her and then cry. I try to write a paper. I fail.
June 2008 - - Everybody moves or gets married. I help CNK move. He helps his friends move. My friend's Lx2 get married, I miss the wedding because my cousin gets married in ATL on the same day. My mom comes out for the cousin's wedding. We also see our dearest old family friends and spend an entire day in IKEA. It's my birthday month. I refuse to get my hopes up and end up having a truly nice time, making a large dinner of crab legs and salmon, which I don't eat...I'm a vegetarian. I receive absolutely lovely gifts from everyone. Wine, cookies, shoes, serving bowls, a backpack to replace the one that was stolen, bookcases, flowers, and paper masks of my face mounted on bendy straws that say on the back "The world would be a better place if everyone was a little more like M---"
I'm very relieved that they say "a little more" because it saves us all the trouble of picturing the petty, stressed-out, crabby, snarky horror that would be if the world were a LOT more like me.
Most significant though, my distant cousin, Mgn, dies. I find out at the wedding when I ask after her as I was expecting that we would be at the same reception table. Her death was sudden and efficient, just like her. The funeral at Spelman College is amazing. Her family legacy is amazing. I get to see people who I will miss by not attending this year's family reunion and I wish I could thank her for the opportunity, as strange as that sounds.
July 2008 - Work continues. My training grant is renewed for a year and suddenly my mentor doesn't think I'll finish in December. Now it seems like it will be next June but I'm sure that has nothing to do with the additional six months of free funding. More people move. CNK and I help his sister in T'loosa and his friend in B'ham. I try to write a paper...I sort of manage but not really. I collect more data, it's actually decent.
And there it is, seven months in a nutshell. Nothing to it. As of this morning my house was still okay. I think it helped to remove the shovel from the porch and to get a real doorframe that's not made out of rotten wood. I haven't replaced the computer or the chambord but it's been really nice to have a backpack again.
If you get a chance, check out the links to my cousin Mgn. She really was an amazing woman and worth knowing.
I'll write again soon, or at least in the next seven months. Honest.
Friday, July 25, 2008
Wednesday, January 9, 2008
Just as good the second time around
I talked to my grandmother for an hour today. I’m a bad granddaughter because my aunt was going out of town so my mother made me promise that I would call my grandma every day from Saturday through Tuesday. I only remembered to do it today…Tuesday. I come by it honestly, the forgetfulness. My grandma has been forgetting things too and that’s why she recently moved into a retirement center. I shouldn’t say that she forgets, she just never remembers in the first place. Her brain is no longer bothering with information about how many yogurts she has in the refrigerator or what movie she just watched on TV and instead is laying out her memories of growing up on a farm in Stanwood, Washington with abundant detail.
We have all been taking her…I don’t want to say decline…her shift, in very different ways. My youngest aunt, who is the only daughter living close to my grandmother is shouldering most of the responsibility and it clearly worries her. My oldest aunt gets a little frustrated and tries to jog my grandmother’s memory by telling her when a story or fact has been repeated too many times. My grandfather, who doesn’t live with my grandmother, is losing one of his oldest friends and being constantly reminded of his own age. He can rebuild Packard cars from scratch, even sew the upholstery, but he can’t fix her. Me, I have found that I appreciate my grandma in a way that I never could when we were both younger.
I called from work, while I shuffled data around on my computer. We started our conversation by talking about the weather. It was 70 degrees in Birmingham but snowing heavily in Nevada City. Then she asks me about my mother, who is currently out of the country. We talk about water aerobics and agree that it is too cold for her to walk up to the pool in her bathing suit. She tells me that the center will send a van to pick her up at her door and then asks me to forget that she told me that because she would rather have an excuse to skip the pool. “Let’s just say I don’t have a good bathing suit for the snow in case anyone asks okay?” and then she laughs at her own joke. A few days ago, or maybe more, she had dinner with my youngest Aunt in the dinning hall and they had some Very Good Salmon. The Salmon, and some meatballs she had one other time were so good that she wondered if maybe the facility had hired a new, Norwegian cook.
I know when she mentions the cook that I will get to hear something about her childhood. Both of her brothers died in WWII and when I was growing up she didn't like to talk about them very often but lately that rule has been relaxed. She tells me about going to church when she lived in Stanwood. She and her twin brother would feign sick every Sunday but their mom would never fall for it and when they made it to the church they were always glad because all the other kids were there too. Before that, they lived in a county so rural that their cousin, who was 13, was allowed to drive the car every Sunday to take them to church. She tells me about lying to people when she got to college in Seattle so that they wouldn’t know she was Norwegian. When I ask her why she lied, she says that she just wanted to be an American.
“But you are an American, you were born here.”
“Well I know that. I guess it just seemed so corny to be Norwegian” she tells me.
I tell her that I have a first date planned for Saturday. She asks what he does for a living and when I tell her that he teaches liberal arts at a university she sighs with pleasure. I tell her that I had been dating an engineer and that makes her happy too. I never used to tell her about any dating unless it was quite serious. That sort of information would too quickly become family property and pressure. I always felt somehow guilty when it inevitably didn’t work out. I’m one of only two grandkids and the only one currently old enough to have children.
“That’s great! I might forget that you are going on a date so please remember to call me and tell me all about it.”
She asks me how old he is and when I tell her she says that she doesn’t think that the age difference (four years) means anything at my age.
“At least your not 17 and he is in his 30’s!” she says. She is talking about my mother’s first boyfriend and I ask her if she wanted to rip my mom’s face off when she went out with a man that much older.
“Rip her face off? No, I never wanted to do that. It was just very worrying. But I never wanted to rip her face off. I just loved her. Boy, it is really snowing outside! You know, I was thinking of going for a walk but I’m afraid that I’ll just break something.”
And then we are back to water aerobics and the Very Good Salmon with my aunt. She asks about my mom—still out of the country. When is she coming home? Still next week. I tell her again that I’m going on a date on Saturday just because it’s nice to say out loud and if she remembers me saying it before; she is just as enthusiastic as the first time and doesn’t seem to mind my repetition. We reprise our entire conversation in a slightly different order but this time leave out the part about Stanwood and being Norwegian. We are our own chorus.
I finish compiling documents together and reluctantly end the conversation.
“I have to go Grandma. I should really get back to work.”
“Okay, well I sure love you. I still have your note on my refrigerator.”
The note she is referring to is one that I left when my mother and I visited her just before Christmas. My grandfather installed the board on her refrigerator so that he could leave her reminders about appointments. When we arrived in California it had the dates of our arrival and departure listed. Upon leaving I erased the dates and replaced it with a note of our own: ‘M—-- and M--- love you very much. You have lots of yogurt in the fridge. Look in the crisper drawers when you want apples and tangerines.’
I ask her what she’s going to do for the rest of the day and she says that she’s headed down to the lobby to see if anything is going on. It’s really snowing and she might see if they are having salmon or meatballs for dinner which can both be Very Good. She says goodbye again and tells me again that she sure does love me -- it sounds just as good the second time around.
We have all been taking her…I don’t want to say decline…her shift, in very different ways. My youngest aunt, who is the only daughter living close to my grandmother is shouldering most of the responsibility and it clearly worries her. My oldest aunt gets a little frustrated and tries to jog my grandmother’s memory by telling her when a story or fact has been repeated too many times. My grandfather, who doesn’t live with my grandmother, is losing one of his oldest friends and being constantly reminded of his own age. He can rebuild Packard cars from scratch, even sew the upholstery, but he can’t fix her. Me, I have found that I appreciate my grandma in a way that I never could when we were both younger.
I called from work, while I shuffled data around on my computer. We started our conversation by talking about the weather. It was 70 degrees in Birmingham but snowing heavily in Nevada City. Then she asks me about my mother, who is currently out of the country. We talk about water aerobics and agree that it is too cold for her to walk up to the pool in her bathing suit. She tells me that the center will send a van to pick her up at her door and then asks me to forget that she told me that because she would rather have an excuse to skip the pool. “Let’s just say I don’t have a good bathing suit for the snow in case anyone asks okay?” and then she laughs at her own joke. A few days ago, or maybe more, she had dinner with my youngest Aunt in the dinning hall and they had some Very Good Salmon. The Salmon, and some meatballs she had one other time were so good that she wondered if maybe the facility had hired a new, Norwegian cook.
I know when she mentions the cook that I will get to hear something about her childhood. Both of her brothers died in WWII and when I was growing up she didn't like to talk about them very often but lately that rule has been relaxed. She tells me about going to church when she lived in Stanwood. She and her twin brother would feign sick every Sunday but their mom would never fall for it and when they made it to the church they were always glad because all the other kids were there too. Before that, they lived in a county so rural that their cousin, who was 13, was allowed to drive the car every Sunday to take them to church. She tells me about lying to people when she got to college in Seattle so that they wouldn’t know she was Norwegian. When I ask her why she lied, she says that she just wanted to be an American.
“But you are an American, you were born here.”
“Well I know that. I guess it just seemed so corny to be Norwegian” she tells me.
I tell her that I have a first date planned for Saturday. She asks what he does for a living and when I tell her that he teaches liberal arts at a university she sighs with pleasure. I tell her that I had been dating an engineer and that makes her happy too. I never used to tell her about any dating unless it was quite serious. That sort of information would too quickly become family property and pressure. I always felt somehow guilty when it inevitably didn’t work out. I’m one of only two grandkids and the only one currently old enough to have children.
“That’s great! I might forget that you are going on a date so please remember to call me and tell me all about it.”
She asks me how old he is and when I tell her she says that she doesn’t think that the age difference (four years) means anything at my age.
“At least your not 17 and he is in his 30’s!” she says. She is talking about my mother’s first boyfriend and I ask her if she wanted to rip my mom’s face off when she went out with a man that much older.
“Rip her face off? No, I never wanted to do that. It was just very worrying. But I never wanted to rip her face off. I just loved her. Boy, it is really snowing outside! You know, I was thinking of going for a walk but I’m afraid that I’ll just break something.”
And then we are back to water aerobics and the Very Good Salmon with my aunt. She asks about my mom—still out of the country. When is she coming home? Still next week. I tell her again that I’m going on a date on Saturday just because it’s nice to say out loud and if she remembers me saying it before; she is just as enthusiastic as the first time and doesn’t seem to mind my repetition. We reprise our entire conversation in a slightly different order but this time leave out the part about Stanwood and being Norwegian. We are our own chorus.
I finish compiling documents together and reluctantly end the conversation.
“I have to go Grandma. I should really get back to work.”
“Okay, well I sure love you. I still have your note on my refrigerator.”
The note she is referring to is one that I left when my mother and I visited her just before Christmas. My grandfather installed the board on her refrigerator so that he could leave her reminders about appointments. When we arrived in California it had the dates of our arrival and departure listed. Upon leaving I erased the dates and replaced it with a note of our own: ‘M—-- and M--- love you very much. You have lots of yogurt in the fridge. Look in the crisper drawers when you want apples and tangerines.’
I ask her what she’s going to do for the rest of the day and she says that she’s headed down to the lobby to see if anything is going on. It’s really snowing and she might see if they are having salmon or meatballs for dinner which can both be Very Good. She says goodbye again and tells me again that she sure does love me -- it sounds just as good the second time around.
Saturday, December 8, 2007
Salamanders don't have irons
Today has been freakishly warm. 70 degrees or some such craziness. I saw two salamanders on the street. They were moving slowly, waking up to their temporary spring. It's not good for salamanders to wake up in December. It gives them a really strange feeling of unrest, like they left the iron on and can't even find it to turn it off because...well salamanders don't have irons* so you can imagine how discombobulating it must be.
I felt a little the same since I had decided to buy my Christmas tree today. I was sweating by the time I got it into the house and it just didn't feel like the holidays in shorts with the windows wide open. In the future, like next year, we will all celebrate winter holidays by sipping lemonade** in lawn chairs while we roast fresh salamander over an open tar pit. Global warming is starting to freak me out.
I'm still using my whole oven when I want to make one piece of toast.
* Salamanders do not have irons because they do not have clothes or linens. It is not some sort of choice they make to reduce their carbon footprint.
** 'Lemonade' is what we will euphemistically term cool glasses of 'acid rain'.
I felt a little the same since I had decided to buy my Christmas tree today. I was sweating by the time I got it into the house and it just didn't feel like the holidays in shorts with the windows wide open. In the future, like next year, we will all celebrate winter holidays by sipping lemonade** in lawn chairs while we roast fresh salamander over an open tar pit. Global warming is starting to freak me out.
I'm still using my whole oven when I want to make one piece of toast.
* Salamanders do not have irons because they do not have clothes or linens. It is not some sort of choice they make to reduce their carbon footprint.
** 'Lemonade' is what we will euphemistically term cool glasses of 'acid rain'.
Wednesday, December 5, 2007
It's all relative
Top ten worst things I've heard in the last month:
10) We only have one tube of TGFβ
9) I just saw someone having sex in the park.
8) It appears that, since your neighbor moved in, we have been charging you for her electric bill and vice verse.
7) Your power has been disconnected.
6) Did you authorize 21 charges for $5.06 over the last three days?
5) He finally admitted to me that he did sleep with _____ so I cried for like, one week, and tonight I'm packing up all of his things.
4) I'm not really cut out for anything other than...you know...like a platonic bosom-buddy thing.
3) It will just be a small laser inserted in your anus.
2) There was a fire, barn burned down, all the pigs are gone.
1) While he's taking a nap, I just wanted to let you guys know that he has cancer.
Top ten best things I’ve heard in the last month:
10) I’ll split it with you.
9) It wasn’t anybody I knew.
8) It looks like it will work out in your favor. On average you over paid about $10 each month. You can probably expect a large credit given back to you.
7) Since we never managed to actually disconnect your power we’re not going to charge you anything extra.
6) We will be crediting $385.00 back to your account
5) I’m really doing well now and I can’t wait to see you soon. We make plans okay?
4) Well, it doesn’t matter what he said because I think you’re amazing.
3) There is no blood in your stool.
2) I love you.
1) We found out that they caught it really early so that’s the best news we could have.
10) We only have one tube of TGFβ
9) I just saw someone having sex in the park.
8) It appears that, since your neighbor moved in, we have been charging you for her electric bill and vice verse.
7) Your power has been disconnected.
6) Did you authorize 21 charges for $5.06 over the last three days?
5) He finally admitted to me that he did sleep with _____ so I cried for like, one week, and tonight I'm packing up all of his things.
4) I'm not really cut out for anything other than...you know...like a platonic bosom-buddy thing.
3) It will just be a small laser inserted in your anus.
2) There was a fire, barn burned down, all the pigs are gone.
1) While he's taking a nap, I just wanted to let you guys know that he has cancer.
Top ten best things I’ve heard in the last month:
10) I’ll split it with you.
9) It wasn’t anybody I knew.
8) It looks like it will work out in your favor. On average you over paid about $10 each month. You can probably expect a large credit given back to you.
7) Since we never managed to actually disconnect your power we’re not going to charge you anything extra.
6) We will be crediting $385.00 back to your account
5) I’m really doing well now and I can’t wait to see you soon. We make plans okay?
4) Well, it doesn’t matter what he said because I think you’re amazing.
3) There is no blood in your stool.
2) I love you.
1) We found out that they caught it really early so that’s the best news we could have.
Thursday, November 29, 2007
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