Friday, November 19, 2010
Adventures in Public Restrooms, Part III of an Illustrious Series*
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Thursday, November 18, 2010
High/Low--It's All Culture
First, the High.
Zoey loves Shakespeare. That's what she tells me each time she asks to read The Book (much like The Bible or The Koran, she says it with all the Gravity befitting a bedside table drawer at Howard Johnson's).
It is certainly a pretty book, printed in 1941. Zoey asks why the pages are stained a bit brown but does not accept my explanation of age. She says it is blood; I'm pretty sure this is part of the reason she loves The Book. I tell her who Shakespeare was, recite the 3 sonnets I memorized my senior year of high school, then she sits quietly while I read a few other poems aloud, though mostly she just likes to sit alone with The Book. She whispers as she reads it, she makes it up each time, and more than anything I wish I could hear what story she is telling.
The Low.
Last night I watched 16 and Pregnant because I am the mother of a 4 year old girl who reads Shakespeare. The episode centered around a teenager with crispy permed hair and a terrible cliche of an accent. She was 22 months pregnant with twins, and smaller than I am at 11 weeks pregnant with one baby. I'm thinking of picking up a can of Aqua Net because in the grand scheme of things, these things matter. Everything matters.
xo,
S
Zoey loves Shakespeare. That's what she tells me each time she asks to read The Book (much like The Bible or The Koran, she says it with all the Gravity befitting a bedside table drawer at Howard Johnson's).
It is certainly a pretty book, printed in 1941. Zoey asks why the pages are stained a bit brown but does not accept my explanation of age. She says it is blood; I'm pretty sure this is part of the reason she loves The Book. I tell her who Shakespeare was, recite the 3 sonnets I memorized my senior year of high school, then she sits quietly while I read a few other poems aloud, though mostly she just likes to sit alone with The Book. She whispers as she reads it, she makes it up each time, and more than anything I wish I could hear what story she is telling.The Low.
Last night I watched 16 and Pregnant because I am the mother of a 4 year old girl who reads Shakespeare. The episode centered around a teenager with crispy permed hair and a terrible cliche of an accent. She was 22 months pregnant with twins, and smaller than I am at 11 weeks pregnant with one baby. I'm thinking of picking up a can of Aqua Net because in the grand scheme of things, these things matter. Everything matters.
xo,
S
Monday, November 15, 2010
And For a Hundred Visions and Revisions
I count time now between Thursdays, the seven day stretch a one-Mississippi bringing me a week closer to having this baby. This Thursday will be 11; the days before and after do not count. My life measured out in what-to-eat-next. (Tonight I served scrambled eggs and muffins with a side of pickles and then felt sad when nobody wanted to eat but me.) I swing back and forth between ravenously hungry, disgustingly full, nauseated at both, then so tired I no longer care about any of it. There is something very real about the fetal position.
. . . . .
I am happy, I am happy, please don't mistake this for anything but the hormonal ramblings of a girl who used to read poetry aloud in bed simply for the sound of the words. Which is why I give you this, one of my faves which I had forgotten about until I ran across this photo here. (Pinky swear that next time I post I will have stopped listening to The Cure.)
The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock
T.S. Eliot
LET us go then, you and I,
When the evening is spread out against the sky
Like a patient etherised upon a table;
Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets,
The muttering retreats
Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels
And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells:
Streets that follow like a tedious argument
Of insidious intent
To lead you to an overwhelming question …
Oh, do not ask, “What is it?”
Let us go and make our visit.
In the room the women come and go
Talking of Michelangelo.
The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes,
The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panes
Licked its tongue into the corners of the evening,
Lingered upon the pools that stand in drains,
Let fall upon its back the soot that falls from chimneys,
Slipped by the terrace, made a sudden leap,
And seeing that it was a soft October night,
Curled once about the house, and fell asleep.
And indeed there will be time
For the yellow smoke that slides along the street,
Rubbing its back upon the window-panes;
There will be time, there will be time
To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;
There will be time to murder and create,
And time for all the works and days of hands
That lift and drop a question on your plate;
Time for you and time for me,
And time yet for a hundred indecisions,
And for a hundred visions and revisions,
Before the taking of a toast and tea.
In the room the women come and go
Talking of Michelangelo.
And indeed there will be time
To wonder, “Do I dare?” and, “Do I dare?”
Time to turn back and descend the stair,
With a bald spot in the middle of my hair—
[They will say: “How his hair is growing thin!”]
My morning coat, my collar mounting firmly to the chin,
My necktie rich and modest, but asserted by a simple pin—
[They will say: “But how his arms and legs are thin!”]
Do I dare
Disturb the universe?
In a minute there is time
For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.
For I have known them all already, known them all:—
Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,
I have measured out my life with coffee spoons;
I know the voices dying with a dying fall
Beneath the music from a farther room.
So how should I presume?
And I have known the eyes already, known them all—
The eyes that fix you in a formulated phrase,
And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin,
When I am pinned and wriggling on the wall,
Then how should I begin
To spit out all the butt-ends of my days and ways?
And how should I presume?
And I have known the arms already, known them all—
Arms that are braceleted and white and bare
[But in the lamplight, downed with light brown hair!]
It is perfume from a dress
That makes me so digress?
Arms that lie along a table, or wrap about a shawl.
And should I then presume?
And how should I begin?
. . . . .
Shall I say, I have gone at dusk through narrow streets
And watched the smoke that rises from the pipes
Of lonely men in shirt-sleeves, leaning out of windows?…
I should have been a pair of ragged claws
Scuttling across the floors of silent seas.
. . . . .
And the afternoon, the evening, sleeps so peacefully!
Smoothed by long fingers,
Asleep … tired … or it malingers,
Stretched on the floor, here beside you and me.
Should I, after tea and cakes and ices,
Have the strength to force the moment to its crisis?
But though I have wept and fasted, wept and prayed,
Though I have seen my head [grown slightly bald] brought in upon a platter,
I am no prophet—and here’s no great matter;
I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker,
And I have seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker,
And in short, I was afraid.
And would it have been worth it, after all,
After the cups, the marmalade, the tea,
Among the porcelain, among some talk of you and me,
Would it have been worth while,
To have bitten off the matter with a smile,
To have squeezed the universe into a ball
To roll it toward some overwhelming question,
To say: “I am Lazarus, come from the dead,
Come back to tell you all, I shall tell you all”—
If one, settling a pillow by her head,
Should say: “That is not what I meant at all.
That is not it, at all.”
And would it have been worth it, after all,
Would it have been worth while,
After the sunsets and the dooryards and the sprinkled streets,
After the novels, after the teacups, after the skirts that trail along the floor—
And this, and so much more?—
It is impossible to say just what I mean!
But as if a magic lantern threw the nerves in patterns on a screen:
Would it have been worth while
If one, settling a pillow or throwing off a shawl,
And turning toward the window, should say:
“That is not it at all,
That is not what I meant, at all.”
. . . . .
No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be;
Am an attendant lord, one that will do
To swell a progress, start a scene or two,
Advise the prince; no doubt, an easy tool,
Deferential, glad to be of use,
Politic, cautious, and meticulous;
Full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse;
At times, indeed, almost ridiculous—
Almost, at times, the Fool.
I grow old … I grow old …
I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.
Shall I part my hair behind? Do I dare to eat a peach?
I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach.
I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each.
I do not think that they will sing to me.
I have seen them riding seaward on the waves
Combing the white hair of the waves blown back
When the wind blows the water white and black.
We have lingered in the chambers of the sea
By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown
Till human voices wake us, and we drown.
. . . . .
I am happy, I am happy, please don't mistake this for anything but the hormonal ramblings of a girl who used to read poetry aloud in bed simply for the sound of the words. Which is why I give you this, one of my faves which I had forgotten about until I ran across this photo here. (Pinky swear that next time I post I will have stopped listening to The Cure.)
The Love Song of J. Alfred PrufrockT.S. Eliot
LET us go then, you and I,
When the evening is spread out against the sky
Like a patient etherised upon a table;
Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets,
The muttering retreats
Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels
And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells:
Streets that follow like a tedious argument
Of insidious intent
To lead you to an overwhelming question …
Oh, do not ask, “What is it?”
Let us go and make our visit.
In the room the women come and go
Talking of Michelangelo.
The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes,
The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panes
Licked its tongue into the corners of the evening,
Lingered upon the pools that stand in drains,
Let fall upon its back the soot that falls from chimneys,
Slipped by the terrace, made a sudden leap,
And seeing that it was a soft October night,
Curled once about the house, and fell asleep.
And indeed there will be time
For the yellow smoke that slides along the street,
Rubbing its back upon the window-panes;
There will be time, there will be time
To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;
There will be time to murder and create,
And time for all the works and days of hands
That lift and drop a question on your plate;
Time for you and time for me,
And time yet for a hundred indecisions,
And for a hundred visions and revisions,
Before the taking of a toast and tea.
In the room the women come and go
Talking of Michelangelo.
And indeed there will be time
To wonder, “Do I dare?” and, “Do I dare?”
Time to turn back and descend the stair,
With a bald spot in the middle of my hair—
[They will say: “How his hair is growing thin!”]
My morning coat, my collar mounting firmly to the chin,
My necktie rich and modest, but asserted by a simple pin—
[They will say: “But how his arms and legs are thin!”]
Do I dare
Disturb the universe?
In a minute there is time
For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.
For I have known them all already, known them all:—
Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,
I have measured out my life with coffee spoons;
I know the voices dying with a dying fall
Beneath the music from a farther room.
So how should I presume?
And I have known the eyes already, known them all—
The eyes that fix you in a formulated phrase,
And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin,
When I am pinned and wriggling on the wall,
Then how should I begin
To spit out all the butt-ends of my days and ways?
And how should I presume?
And I have known the arms already, known them all—
Arms that are braceleted and white and bare
[But in the lamplight, downed with light brown hair!]
It is perfume from a dress
That makes me so digress?
Arms that lie along a table, or wrap about a shawl.
And should I then presume?
And how should I begin?
. . . . .
Shall I say, I have gone at dusk through narrow streets
And watched the smoke that rises from the pipes
Of lonely men in shirt-sleeves, leaning out of windows?…
I should have been a pair of ragged claws
Scuttling across the floors of silent seas.
. . . . .
And the afternoon, the evening, sleeps so peacefully!
Smoothed by long fingers,
Asleep … tired … or it malingers,
Stretched on the floor, here beside you and me.
Should I, after tea and cakes and ices,
Have the strength to force the moment to its crisis?
But though I have wept and fasted, wept and prayed,
Though I have seen my head [grown slightly bald] brought in upon a platter,
I am no prophet—and here’s no great matter;
I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker,
And I have seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker,
And in short, I was afraid.
And would it have been worth it, after all,
After the cups, the marmalade, the tea,
Among the porcelain, among some talk of you and me,
Would it have been worth while,
To have bitten off the matter with a smile,
To have squeezed the universe into a ball
To roll it toward some overwhelming question,
To say: “I am Lazarus, come from the dead,
Come back to tell you all, I shall tell you all”—
If one, settling a pillow by her head,
Should say: “That is not what I meant at all.
That is not it, at all.”
And would it have been worth it, after all,
Would it have been worth while,
After the sunsets and the dooryards and the sprinkled streets,
After the novels, after the teacups, after the skirts that trail along the floor—
And this, and so much more?—
It is impossible to say just what I mean!
But as if a magic lantern threw the nerves in patterns on a screen:
Would it have been worth while
If one, settling a pillow or throwing off a shawl,
And turning toward the window, should say:
“That is not it at all,
That is not what I meant, at all.”
. . . . .
No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be;
Am an attendant lord, one that will do
To swell a progress, start a scene or two,
Advise the prince; no doubt, an easy tool,
Deferential, glad to be of use,
Politic, cautious, and meticulous;
Full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse;
At times, indeed, almost ridiculous—
Almost, at times, the Fool.
I grow old … I grow old …
I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.
Shall I part my hair behind? Do I dare to eat a peach?
I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach.
I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each.
I do not think that they will sing to me.
I have seen them riding seaward on the waves
Combing the white hair of the waves blown back
When the wind blows the water white and black.
We have lingered in the chambers of the sea
By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown
Till human voices wake us, and we drown.
Friday, November 12, 2010
Two Things I Won't Be Doing This Weekend
First off, I will not be following this supposed trend, though apparently I was way ahead of my time in the 8th grade. (Next thing you know they'll be showing Yale sweatshirts on the catwalk paired over a turtleneck folded down.)
Honestly, people? You're kind of making me feel like an asshole here.
Speaking of which, I also will not be attending the Cuddle Mob this Saturday at Dolores Park, mainly because I already have plans but also because I would rather peel off my own skin with a pair of blunt tweezers than take part in the largest group hug, even if it is to support the Marine Mammal Center. This is where I make no apologies for my wide WASP-swath of personal space issues. Air kisses for Greyhound Rescue? I'm totally there.
No, instead I think I'll make an online donation to the Marine Mammal Center, and then stare at this cuddle mob, the only kind in which I would ever participate.
(But only if nobody has milk breath.)
Enjoy,
S
Honestly, people? You're kind of making me feel like an asshole here.
Speaking of which, I also will not be attending the Cuddle Mob this Saturday at Dolores Park, mainly because I already have plans but also because I would rather peel off my own skin with a pair of blunt tweezers than take part in the largest group hug, even if it is to support the Marine Mammal Center. This is where I make no apologies for my wide WASP-swath of personal space issues. Air kisses for Greyhound Rescue? I'm totally there.
No, instead I think I'll make an online donation to the Marine Mammal Center, and then stare at this cuddle mob, the only kind in which I would ever participate.
(But only if nobody has milk breath.)Enjoy,
S
Wednesday, November 10, 2010
Too Much Woman (Alt Title: Don't Read This Dad)
Once upon a 1991 in a faraway land called Right Off the 405 I was offered the chance to do a test shoot for Playboy. There are many things that should have tipped me off that this was not a good idea: the run-down office park location, the two modeling agents who said I was a shoo-in while glancing at each other, the fact that on my headshot my lipgloss was visibly applied over my natural lipline. But I was 18 and stupid so none of this deterred me. I said no only after calculating the time it took for the magazine to go to print and the thought that most likely both my brother and father would still be alive when my naked body hit newsstands. (This is also the story of How I Did Not End Up Dead in a Ditch off Miramar Road, though sometimes I admit to rewriting a draft and calling it When I Was Young and Hot, conveniently forgetting the subtitle: Don't Be Flattered When Scudsy Quote/Un-Quote Modeling Agents slash Opportunistic Pervs Want to See You Naked.)
Luckily for you, me and my boobs my brother and dad are still alive to this day, so it is not likely I will be posing for Playboy anytime soon, though surely that is the only thing stopping me. That and the fact that I am 38, love nutella, think Vitamin Water is healthy, don't exercise and will be 10 weeks pregnant tomorrow. My boobs are heavy, a roadmap of blue veins, my tummy a poooch with 3 oh's; I am the Venus of Willendorf had she been carved of gluten and not stone.
So that's where I am today, the heroine of a Once Upon a Time in a Land Called Suburbia, pop. +1. Nobody wants to see me naked except Zoey, who thinks the blue veins look like lace, the tale of a pregnant playmate who can eat feta cheese, so long as it's been pasteurized.
Luckily for you, me and my boobs my brother and dad are still alive to this day, so it is not likely I will be posing for Playboy anytime soon, though surely that is the only thing stopping me. That and the fact that I am 38, love nutella, think Vitamin Water is healthy, don't exercise and will be 10 weeks pregnant tomorrow. My boobs are heavy, a roadmap of blue veins, my tummy a poooch with 3 oh's; I am the Venus of Willendorf had she been carved of gluten and not stone.
Redundant?
There was a moment in my last pregnancy that I stood naked in front of my full length mirror looking at what I had become. It was not in shock or even awe, and then Bryan passed by and said something like Wow--I'm pretty sure there are fetish websites out there that would love a picture of you right now. I think he was trying to say I was sexy (missing by a mile), but he was right. A pregnant woman is almost too much woman, all exaggerated breasts and stomach, overblown nipples and vagina--yes, vagina. There is even a name for this fetish, maiesiophilia, though it cannot be that common because as you type in "pregnant women fet..." Google finishes it off as "pregnant women feta cheese."So that's where I am today, the heroine of a Once Upon a Time in a Land Called Suburbia, pop. +1. Nobody wants to see me naked except Zoey, who thinks the blue veins look like lace, the tale of a pregnant playmate who can eat feta cheese, so long as it's been pasteurized.
Monday, November 8, 2010
Thoughts on a Monday (Can You Tell It Rained Yesterday?)
I like to think that had I been a woman in 1970something I would have been this woman, all flaunt and heel with the bitchin'est car I ever did see. That in the 20's I would have been a flapper, in the 30's a member of The Lost Generation, that in the 50's I would've been first in line to buy Howl, obscene or not, the coolest chick smack dab in the middle of whatever time, an iconoclastic poster child of something avant and slightly scary. But of course I am not that woman, not then and not now, me in my sensible flats and dependable Toyota.For most of the twentieth century, doctors routinely operated on babies without anesthesia, believing them exempt from pain. I wonder, sometimes, what modern day norm will seem horrific to us in the future. Remember when we actually ate preservatives while pregnant? we might say to one another in the old folk's home, or for that matter remember when we used to put people in old folk's homes? Shaking our heads, how could anyone have possibly denied two people in love the right to marry, a 5-point harness the lap belt of can you believe, our children admonishing us for not putting them in helmets every time we turned the ignition.
What am I doing right this very second that will one day seem at best cutely antiquated, at worst ghastly and inhumane? What is going on to which I am not privvy? A movement, a scene? A way of thinking like an optical illusion, after which you can never not see the old lady?
But the car, yes--the car is freaking beautiful.
Friday, November 5, 2010
Did Someone Say Blog Fodder?
Here we go. I'm pregnant. 9 weeks, due June 9th, 2011. I am ecstatic, it's a miracle, Bryan is happy, Nacho perplexed and Zoey is thrilled. But enough about that.
Because I suck at being pregnant. Which is okay, I think, because I'm a good mom, but the truth is it's quite possible to suck ass at being pregnant, and I do. Of course before Zoey I totally thought I'd be one of those moms on the cover of Pregnancy magazine, glowing like a goddamned cliche, thin fingers resting on some sort of strap-on styrofoam belly. But I was not and am not. Pretty much from the minute Bryan rolled over I looked up and snapped WTF? I am tired and cranky, emotional, nauseated, spacey, sick, hungry and much too full. I throw up when I brush my teeth. It's beautiful, really. Wish you were here.
The difference between this pregnancy and my first is that this time I know what to expect, and it's not pretty. Because with Zoey I got pregnant face, which I didn't even know existed until months after I gave birth and saw a picture of myself still pregnant. Fat face, wide nose, flushed skin, double chin--when I smiled my face felt wrong and I could not breathe at all. Of course nobody told me then that I looked as if I had eaten Anne Geddes' darkroom but we all laughed about it later which was funny because it was over and I was normal again. Now of course I am staring down the barrel of bloat and the room has gotten suspiciously silent. It's like when you have a blowout fight with your boyfriend and all your friends trash him to make you feel better, but then you get back together and no one knows what to say. What? You think you have something to say? Really? Here--see for yourself:
Previously unseen to anyone because good god lady, this photo was taken 2 weeks before I gave birth to Zoey. Compare and contrast with my profile picture, i.e. what happened to my face? Yeah, good times ahead.
To summarize: I am totally over the moon happy that I am pregnant, my fetus the size of a grape, happy that leggings are on trend and overly grateful for steamed milk with vanilla syrup. But. That is all. But.
Because I suck at being pregnant. Which is okay, I think, because I'm a good mom, but the truth is it's quite possible to suck ass at being pregnant, and I do. Of course before Zoey I totally thought I'd be one of those moms on the cover of Pregnancy magazine, glowing like a goddamned cliche, thin fingers resting on some sort of strap-on styrofoam belly. But I was not and am not. Pretty much from the minute Bryan rolled over I looked up and snapped WTF? I am tired and cranky, emotional, nauseated, spacey, sick, hungry and much too full. I throw up when I brush my teeth. It's beautiful, really. Wish you were here.
The difference between this pregnancy and my first is that this time I know what to expect, and it's not pretty. Because with Zoey I got pregnant face, which I didn't even know existed until months after I gave birth and saw a picture of myself still pregnant. Fat face, wide nose, flushed skin, double chin--when I smiled my face felt wrong and I could not breathe at all. Of course nobody told me then that I looked as if I had eaten Anne Geddes' darkroom but we all laughed about it later which was funny because it was over and I was normal again. Now of course I am staring down the barrel of bloat and the room has gotten suspiciously silent. It's like when you have a blowout fight with your boyfriend and all your friends trash him to make you feel better, but then you get back together and no one knows what to say. What? You think you have something to say? Really? Here--see for yourself:
Previously unseen to anyone because good god lady, this photo was taken 2 weeks before I gave birth to Zoey. Compare and contrast with my profile picture, i.e. what happened to my face? Yeah, good times ahead.To summarize: I am totally over the moon happy that I am pregnant, my fetus the size of a grape, happy that leggings are on trend and overly grateful for steamed milk with vanilla syrup. But. That is all. But.
Wednesday, November 3, 2010
Oh! One More Thing!
I totally forgot to tell you about the other thing I did on my Blogcation...
Yup. You're looking at something I peed on.
Tuesday, November 2, 2010
What I Did On My Summer Vacation...in October
I did not visit my grandmother. Or go to camp. I did not get you a shirt that said "My Blog Friend Went On A Break And All I Got Was This Lousy Shirt," though I would have had I thought of it before now because for some reason I always coveted *those shirts when I was ten. No, this Summer Vacation...in October I did not kiss a boy, catch a fish or work evenings at the DQ, though I did start a new job. A kick ass happy new job, which is all that needs to be said about that. A job that makes me happy.
I also ruined my hair on my Summer Vacation...in October. One fine morning I flat ironed my hair, as I have been doing since I was 15 and slid the crimping plates off my Conair Hair Styler to try out the flat plates. It was a revolution, let me tell you, and now all these years later I am still ironing out the cowlicks and the frizz. In a fugue state, it would seem, as that fateful morning it took me a few thick sections to register the dead body stench of burnt hair. To make a long story short, my faithful 4th generation flat iron (now with tourmaline!) had gone on the fritz and singed half my head into a Brillo pad of aw fuck, no. 4 hours and don't tell Bryan how much $$ later, I have much shorter, darker hair that is still brittle and iffy and, no, I am not happy.
Of course there was also the traditional Halloween festivites that occur each Summer Vacation. Zoey was Medusa.
I also ruined my hair on my Summer Vacation...in October. One fine morning I flat ironed my hair, as I have been doing since I was 15 and slid the crimping plates off my Conair Hair Styler to try out the flat plates. It was a revolution, let me tell you, and now all these years later I am still ironing out the cowlicks and the frizz. In a fugue state, it would seem, as that fateful morning it took me a few thick sections to register the dead body stench of burnt hair. To make a long story short, my faithful 4th generation flat iron (now with tourmaline!) had gone on the fritz and singed half my head into a Brillo pad of aw fuck, no. 4 hours and don't tell Bryan how much $$ later, I have much shorter, darker hair that is still brittle and iffy and, no, I am not happy.
Of course there was also the traditional Halloween festivites that occur each Summer Vacation. Zoey was Medusa.
A stunningly cute Medusa, if I do say so myself, though she did turn me to stone when she suddenly wanted to pull the snakes from her hair. I had a bit of a Toddlers & Tiaras moment when I yanked her into another room to hiss at her that she had to wear the snakes, you are not Medusa without snakes, no one will give you candy when you trick or treat if they can't tell you are Medusa. Because apparently Medusa's mother was the suburban Gorgon Susannakaplolis, a split-tongued sea monster who waits off the Isle of Hormonos to feast on the flesh of little girls who just want to look pretty.
Baby steps, people. Tomorrow I will be back with something better, I promise. Big. GER. And better...
*Also? Inexplicabley those Go Climb a Rock shirts. I have not climbed many rocks in my time, nor have I harbored a secret desire to do so, but those shirts always seemed so freaking cool to me.
xo,
S
p.s. I missed you.
*Also? Inexplicabley those Go Climb a Rock shirts. I have not climbed many rocks in my time, nor have I harbored a secret desire to do so, but those shirts always seemed so freaking cool to me.
xo,
S
p.s. I missed you.
Tuesday, October 19, 2010
We Need to Talk (Dun Dun DUUUNNNNNN...)
Pinky swear, I am totally not breaking up with you. True Love Forever, I have practiced writing my name with your last name all over my Pee-Chee folder, remember? (BTW, it is one long-ass hyphenated last name.)
I just...I need a break.
Sidetrack with me: 'member these posters from The Book Mobile? God, how I loved me the order forms, circling everything I wanted and handing it to my mom, the day the packages arrived.
Anyway, it's not you, it's me. And I know that a break is usually the precursor to the irreparably broken, but I swear this is not the case here. Just give me a few weeks and I'll be back better than ever.
Day of the Dead? You know how I like things a little macabre. Let's make a date for Day of the Dead. Meet you back here November 2, mkay? In the meantime, I will try not to look at my sitemeter to see how you're not coming around anymore, i.e. surely seeing other blogs. I understand.
Hang in there. (We'll come out of this stronger.)
xo,
S
I just...I need a break.
Sidetrack with me: 'member these posters from The Book Mobile? God, how I loved me the order forms, circling everything I wanted and handing it to my mom, the day the packages arrived.Anyway, it's not you, it's me. And I know that a break is usually the precursor to the irreparably broken, but I swear this is not the case here. Just give me a few weeks and I'll be back better than ever.
Day of the Dead? You know how I like things a little macabre. Let's make a date for Day of the Dead. Meet you back here November 2, mkay? In the meantime, I will try not to look at my sitemeter to see how you're not coming around anymore, i.e. surely seeing other blogs. I understand.
Hang in there. (We'll come out of this stronger.)
xo,
S
Friday, October 15, 2010
Jules, Come On Down!
Your comment #9 was chosen by random.org as the winner of the Tea Giveaway!
Send me your address so that we can get you your $100 gift certificate.
And behind door #2? I was featured on 5 Star Friday. Check me out here to see some great reads of the week. Thanks Schmutzie!
Happy Friday all.
xo,
S
Send me your address so that we can get you your $100 gift certificate.And behind door #2? I was featured on 5 Star Friday. Check me out here to see some great reads of the week. Thanks Schmutzie!
Happy Friday all.
xo,
S
Thursday, October 14, 2010
Koo Koo Ka Choo Corey Hart
Let's lighten things up 'round here, shall we? In News of Things That Don't Matter At All: I finally bought a leopard coat!
No, I am not nudey beneath said coat, and yes, I am wearing sunglasses even though it's clearly dark outside. It was 11pm and I had already washed my face and gotten in my nightie when I thought to post this bit of drivel so I asked Bryan to snap a pic since I knew he had to leave early this morning. I thought the sunglasses hid the I'm-going-to-bed-ness of it all.
Anyway, longtime readers will know that I have been coveting a leopard coat forever and ever, amen. (Now if only the temps would dip below 90 degrees so I could wear it before 11pm.)
Operation Benign Blog Post: Out.
No, I am not nudey beneath said coat, and yes, I am wearing sunglasses even though it's clearly dark outside. It was 11pm and I had already washed my face and gotten in my nightie when I thought to post this bit of drivel so I asked Bryan to snap a pic since I knew he had to leave early this morning. I thought the sunglasses hid the I'm-going-to-bed-ness of it all.Anyway, longtime readers will know that I have been coveting a leopard coat forever and ever, amen. (Now if only the temps would dip below 90 degrees so I could wear it before 11pm.)
Operation Benign Blog Post: Out.
Wednesday, October 13, 2010
My Dot
Lately it seems I can hardly speak as my mouth is full of Barbie shoes (like those dreams you have in which your teeth fall out, how they rattle loose and useless). Wedged sharp in my throat sits a toy car that we got in a Kinder-Surprise, and yes, it required assembly; at night I brush my hair with a doll's brush, the plastic points bending rather than actually going through my hair. It smoothes.
Once when Zoey was a teeny tiny baby I sat with some other mothers that I did not know very well, (back when I was ashamed to mix formula in public). One of the other women had an older child--a boy, maybe 5--and as we sat there she swatted at him to stop crawling on her, to get off of her, to stop it! I did not understand since all I wanted to do was take my breast out like the rest of them, me with my pre-measured packets of Similac stashed. Why would you ever swat your child away?
At dinner now Zoey eats two bites of whatever is palest on her plate and then slides off her chair to hang on the rungs of mine. Zoey, I say, get down, sit in your own chair. Instead she pinches the skin on the back of my hand as she has done since birth, though she really favors my neck. The food falls off my fork. 1, 2, 3... I say, the deep foreboding of numbers a strange parental tradition for a girl that thinks thirty-thirteen is forty-three, though in a way I guess it is. 
I know that I am lucky, that my life is a snow globe shaken gently, diffused yellow light floating with motes of dust suspended on sunbeams full of kings and peasants, every saint and sinner, of every couple in love, that I am no different than you or Carl Sagan. But when I cannot speak for the plastic Barbie shoes in my throat it helps to sometimes say it, to voice the folly of my conceits. Right now, I do not want to be touched. 
These photographs of albatross chicks were made in September, 2009, on Midway Atoll, a tiny stretch of sand and coral near the middle of the North Pacific. The nesting babies are fed bellies-full of plastic by their parents, who soar out over the vast polluted ocean collecting what looks to them like food to bring back to their young. On this diet of human trash, every year tens of thousands of albatross chicks die on Midway from starvation, toxicity, and choking.
To document this phenomenon as faithfully as possible, not a single piece of plastic in any of these photographs was moved, placed, manipulated, arranged, or altered in any way. These images depict the actual stomach contents of baby birds in one of the world's most remote marine sanctuaries, more than 2000 miles from the nearest continent. --Chris Jordan, photographer
Once when Zoey was a teeny tiny baby I sat with some other mothers that I did not know very well, (back when I was ashamed to mix formula in public). One of the other women had an older child--a boy, maybe 5--and as we sat there she swatted at him to stop crawling on her, to get off of her, to stop it! I did not understand since all I wanted to do was take my breast out like the rest of them, me with my pre-measured packets of Similac stashed. Why would you ever swat your child away?At dinner now Zoey eats two bites of whatever is palest on her plate and then slides off her chair to hang on the rungs of mine. Zoey, I say, get down, sit in your own chair. Instead she pinches the skin on the back of my hand as she has done since birth, though she really favors my neck. The food falls off my fork. 1, 2, 3... I say, the deep foreboding of numbers a strange parental tradition for a girl that thinks thirty-thirteen is forty-three, though in a way I guess it is. I know that I am lucky, that my life is a snow globe shaken gently, diffused yellow light floating with motes of dust suspended on sunbeams full of kings and peasants, every saint and sinner, of every couple in love, that I am no different than you or Carl Sagan. But when I cannot speak for the plastic Barbie shoes in my throat it helps to sometimes say it, to voice the folly of my conceits. Right now, I do not want to be touched. These photographs of albatross chicks were made in September, 2009, on Midway Atoll, a tiny stretch of sand and coral near the middle of the North Pacific. The nesting babies are fed bellies-full of plastic by their parents, who soar out over the vast polluted ocean collecting what looks to them like food to bring back to their young. On this diet of human trash, every year tens of thousands of albatross chicks die on Midway from starvation, toxicity, and choking. To document this phenomenon as faithfully as possible, not a single piece of plastic in any of these photographs was moved, placed, manipulated, arranged, or altered in any way. These images depict the actual stomach contents of baby birds in one of the world's most remote marine sanctuaries, more than 2000 miles from the nearest continent. --Chris Jordan, photographer
Monday, October 11, 2010
*For Little Citizens of the World: GIVEAWAY!
When I was 4 my mom dressed me in the trends of 1976: lots of corduroy, ponchos, turtlenecks, culottes. Sometimes I pined for something ticky-tacky and primary-colored that screamed kid, but for the most part I knew I was au courant. As does Zoey.
At 4 Zoey is very opiniated about what she wears. And so I was a little worried when approached by Tea Collection. They offered to send me something to review to be followed up with a giveaway, and I thought: what if Zoey doesn't want to wear it? After all, her closet is full of cute kurtas she refuses to wear (but that I bought anyway because I wished they were my size). As soon as I opened the package from Tea, however, I found I had nothing to worry about because Zoey loved the outfit. We're talking insisting-on-holding-it-to-sleep loved it, wearing-it-three-days-in-a-row-until-I-told-her-we-had-to-wash-it loved it, a super soft plaid flannel dress (that she mysteriously calls her karate dress because apparently karate is big in Hungary) and a pair of pointelle leggings. Oh yes, she rocked this look and attitude all weekend long...
Now it's your turn. Visit the Tea website (check out their blog, too! So cute!) and then leave a comment here for your chance to win a $100 gift certificate to be used on their collection of baby clothes, girls clothing or boys clothing. (Super secret gimme gimme tip: they also have a women's collection should you take seriously the idea that "every day is Mother's Day." Just sayin.') I'll announce the lucky winner this Friday, October 15th.
Because even though my mother saved some of my clothes from when I was little something tells me Zoey would not wear patchwork bell-bottomed overalls. But she would wear anything and everything in the Tea Collection, as would I. Happy shopping!
*Yes, this is a sponsored post, but I think we can agree--cutest tagline EVER.
At 4 Zoey is very opiniated about what she wears. And so I was a little worried when approached by Tea Collection. They offered to send me something to review to be followed up with a giveaway, and I thought: what if Zoey doesn't want to wear it? After all, her closet is full of cute kurtas she refuses to wear (but that I bought anyway because I wished they were my size). As soon as I opened the package from Tea, however, I found I had nothing to worry about because Zoey loved the outfit. We're talking insisting-on-holding-it-to-sleep loved it, wearing-it-three-days-in-a-row-until-I-told-her-we-had-to-wash-it loved it, a super soft plaid flannel dress (that she mysteriously calls her karate dress because apparently karate is big in Hungary) and a pair of pointelle leggings. Oh yes, she rocked this look and attitude all weekend long...Now it's your turn. Visit the Tea website (check out their blog, too! So cute!) and then leave a comment here for your chance to win a $100 gift certificate to be used on their collection of baby clothes, girls clothing or boys clothing. (Super secret gimme gimme tip: they also have a women's collection should you take seriously the idea that "every day is Mother's Day." Just sayin.') I'll announce the lucky winner this Friday, October 15th.Because even though my mother saved some of my clothes from when I was little something tells me Zoey would not wear patchwork bell-bottomed overalls. But she would wear anything and everything in the Tea Collection, as would I. Happy shopping!
*Yes, this is a sponsored post, but I think we can agree--cutest tagline EVER.
Thursday, October 7, 2010
Upside Down
We took Zoey to see her first concert last night--Jack Johnson at the Greek Theater. (No matter that my first concert was Stray Cats so before they were cool that it wasn't cool or that I don't think I had a professional pedicure until I was 24.)
She really felt the opening bands. Though, to be honest, it could have been a contact high from the freedom that is felt in an open-air venue in a college town that is known for being über-liberal and prone to nudity.
My own little Janis Joplin sans the demons. Unfortunately, by the time Jack Johnson strolled onstage she was done. As in I want to go hoo-o-oome! done, antsy, picky, thirsty, I-have-to-go-pee-even-though-the-line-is-1,000-people-deep done, nose to the ground, toes to the nose, bear butt done.
Totally been there. Still, I'm glad we got to stay through a few songs including Upside Down because I remember this song from when we first brought Zoey home from the hospital. I think it was Bryan's first day back at work, my first day alone with my new life. I had already spent the morning crying over a Nick Lachey video and feeling as if the world was raw, crumbling and stupid when I put this song on and held Zoey and danced. Our first dance.
Who's to say
I can't do everything
Well I can try
She really felt the opening bands. Though, to be honest, it could have been a contact high from the freedom that is felt in an open-air venue in a college town that is known for being über-liberal and prone to nudity.
My own little Janis Joplin sans the demons. Unfortunately, by the time Jack Johnson strolled onstage she was done. As in I want to go hoo-o-oome! done, antsy, picky, thirsty, I-have-to-go-pee-even-though-the-line-is-1,000-people-deep done, nose to the ground, toes to the nose, bear butt done.
Totally been there. Still, I'm glad we got to stay through a few songs including Upside Down because I remember this song from when we first brought Zoey home from the hospital. I think it was Bryan's first day back at work, my first day alone with my new life. I had already spent the morning crying over a Nick Lachey video and feeling as if the world was raw, crumbling and stupid when I put this song on and held Zoey and danced. Our first dance.Who's to say
I can't do everything
Well I can try
And everything felt so SO. So much more and expanding, so we twirled and I sang to her and slipped upside down, happy, scared, both of us new. Knew. That this is how it was supposed to be. Still is, so we left early last night, stepping over people carefully in the dark to go home.
Tuesday, October 5, 2010
Me on a Mauve Carpet
When we first got Nacho we lived in the city so he was an indoor cat with pretty ears. One day I bought him a leash and took him for a drag through the iceplant at the beach. He was not happy. Then we moved to the suburbs where he became an indoor/outdoor cat with serrated ears and burrs in his tail. Now he is a very happy roast beast. The End.You heard that right--today I am writing about my cat on a leash because this is how I feel, me on a mauve carpet. So what? A little bit prickly today, if you must know. Question (total non-sequitur at that): so many of my go-to reads are closing up shop these days so I need some new blogs to peruse. Any suggestions? Also, I've noticed that more and more blogs do not feature their fave reads and I have to ask: why? I thought blogging was about supporting one another, the blogosphere and all that. Any idea why people aren't listing so-called blog logs anymore?
Like I said: prickly. Off to go pee behind the ficus.
Friday, October 1, 2010
XOXO
I was 11 and just wanted to do something. Not that I knew what, really, just something, ya' know? Toes tracing hatch marks on the sidewalk. The boys--all of them shorter than I was with their thin, tanned necks. I think I wanted to touch their hair maybe, lace my fingers between theirs, ride my bike super fast hard down the hill on the precipice of possibility. At night I would slip onto my belly in the bathtub and make out with the cold cast iron sides.
Yesterday when I picked up Zoey from school her teacher told me that there had been a bit of an issue. *wink* *wink* ha ha, and it was, really. They are only 4. Apparently a boy named T loves Zoey and wants to marry her and I can't say I blame him. (I want to marry her, too.) So he followed her around and wouldn't stop kissing her, on the mouth, the shoulder, her head, hair, back. When the teacher told him to stop he said he couldn't, that it was just something he needed to do. (Again, I know the feeling.)
Later Zoey said she does not want to marry anyone anymore. That T's mouth was slimy. Part of me wanted to tell her that it won't always be. That someday the world will narrow down to mouths, everything lips, two tongues and the sweet salted plum of somebody else's secrets. But I didn't. Instead I just smiled, my throat thick with strawberry milk. Hands black with newsprint and back page memories. The smell of grass and how on a hot day you can actually taste it.
Photography from here.
Yesterday when I picked up Zoey from school her teacher told me that there had been a bit of an issue. *wink* *wink* ha ha, and it was, really. They are only 4. Apparently a boy named T loves Zoey and wants to marry her and I can't say I blame him. (I want to marry her, too.) So he followed her around and wouldn't stop kissing her, on the mouth, the shoulder, her head, hair, back. When the teacher told him to stop he said he couldn't, that it was just something he needed to do. (Again, I know the feeling.)Later Zoey said she does not want to marry anyone anymore. That T's mouth was slimy. Part of me wanted to tell her that it won't always be. That someday the world will narrow down to mouths, everything lips, two tongues and the sweet salted plum of somebody else's secrets. But I didn't. Instead I just smiled, my throat thick with strawberry milk. Hands black with newsprint and back page memories. The smell of grass and how on a hot day you can actually taste it.
Photography from here.
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