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30 September 2008 : A Text from Cera
Monday, September 29, 2008 11:25pm --
My neighbor just got mugged in the courtyard.
Editor's note: I started this whole "text messages from Cera" thing because she regularly sends me random hilarity with no context. This decidedly does not fall under the heading of "hilarious," unless you count the part where I strapped my knife to my belt to walk to my car this morning (hilarious only because my knife would do me absolutely no good whatsoever against an assailant, and would result in one of two things: it being taken away and used to stab me as said assailant laughed at my pathetic attempts at self defense, or it being a catalyst in getting myself in WAY over my head for no good reason at all. Also hilarious in that "wow, that's so not even a little bit funny" way).
Also note that the only reason my (pregnant) best friend lives in this forsaken place is because I lived here when she moved to Indianapolis. Also note that said neighbor got mugged AT GUNPOINT, which renders my flea market knife thrice useless. To be fair, at the very least, Cera has a gentleman living with her who could probably cut a bitch if it came to that. I, however, am (among other things), a woman who lives alone. I have already once this year gone through a period of feeling like my safety here was dubious at best (remember that week that my bike was stolen from where it was locked to the banister outside the door of my third floor apartment in my locked hallway? and then two days later I caught some burly Jamaican dude trying to break into said hallway? word) and I'm SO TIRED OF IT.
So, I thought this was a good opportunity to announce that it is official. I have signed a lease, handed over a chunk of security deposit, and delivered my thirty day notice in writing. On November 1st, Jen and I are leaving the ghetto behind for the hood, where we have (thanks to my wicked rental-procurement talents) found ourselves one half of a beauty of an old house with original hardwoods, a fenced in backyard already sectioned for gardening (and composting!), a driveway, a front porch, and a washer and dryer.
Best yet, Lisa, James and Anniepants are moving into the other half on the very same weekend, and Pal will be joining Jen and I on our side once her lease expires in January. May I just say: ten steps closer to commune! It is the best of all possible outcomes for me, as I get to reintegrate into my most favorite of all neighborhoods and I get to take all of my most beloved people with me.
Won't you join me in raising a middle finger in salute of Meridian-Kessler south of 38th street?
posted by lindsay at 17:18 :: 1 comments
29 September 2008 : Important things
Today, I had what was maybe the best ever conversation with one of the randoms downtown. It was pure chance, really, because I tend to avoid the randoms whenever I can, lest I be entrapped by another charming gold-toothed gentleman calling me Mama who insists that I slow down to accommodate his bum leg, and rewards my patience with his phone number, email address, and myspace address.
This particular random, however, was legitimately in CVS, holding a mostly legitimate gallon jug of some random, nuclear green juice drink that she apparently meant to buy.
I waited, so she could get in line before me. It's a thing I do.
This small kindness caught her attention, and instead of taking her place in line, she vultured in on me. "Do you have fifty cents?"
I handed her a dollar out of my pocket. Sometimes its easy. I found myself wondering the green juice drink was in fact worth fifty cents or less. Still eyeing me as we stepped into line, her hand clenched around my dollar, she said, "Can you go through menopause early?"
I looked at her. Mid twenties, probably. Normal looking.
"Yeah, you can, but it's rare."
She nodded. "I have hot and cold flashes. Yeah, I think it's menopause."
End conversation.
Maybe I should stop avoiding randoms. Just a thought.
posted by lindsay at 17:42 :: 1 comments
28 September 2008 : Dazzlingly Apropos
Tonight I took a personality assessment (and an excruciating basic math skills assessment, and also some analogies and basically, I took the GRE again) for a job that I'm very excited about. It wasn't one of those MMPI type tests where they ask if you sometimes like to kill people or if Jesus has ever sent you a birthday card, no. It was the kind of test where 150 questions are actually 15 questions, each reworded ten times.
Apparently in order to get a job these days, you don't have to have a college degree or any experience, so long as you're consistent.
The second section consisted of a series of two juxtaposed activities, and you had to choose which activity you'd prefer to involve yourself in, with a scale of four allowing you to indicate the veracity of that preference.
About halfway down the list, after hemming and hawing, because honestly I feel pretty good about most of the activities they had listed (though I cast my vote firmly in favor of building a deck rather than balancing my checkbook), I see these two options: Studying Geology or Writing a story, poetry, or screenplay.
Are you freaking kidding me? This test, it tried to kill me. I believe I spent at least half of my allotted hour gaping slack jawed at the screen, trying to decide how on earth I was supposed to choose between two so clearly awesome activities, both of which I have participated in and enjoyed in great drafty measures at various times in my life.
Now I'm at a loss. I'm not entirely certain I want this job anymore. I'm not entirely certain that there should not be a special place reserved in hell for the kind of people who would ask a girl to choose between Studying Geology and writing a story. Especially for a job in finance. The ambivalence, the indecision, it abounds. I am being suffocated by an atmosphere filled with swirling metaphor.
I'm no psychologist, but I'm pretty sure that this is just a bunch of tomfoolery, and mostly the creators of said test have been peeking in my windows at night, trying to figure out how to finally break me.
What have I done to deserve this? I just want a job, not another existential dilemma. Clearly we're all stocked up on those over here.
posted by lindsay at 23:02 :: 0 comments
: On Fashion
Woe are we who will inevitably be left behind, as fashion makes itself widely available to those of leggy teenage proportion, not those of atypical woman proportion (please note that at 5'6" I have a 23 inch inseam, and am thereby a freak of nature).
This of course, is not a new dilemma, nor is it particularly vexing, because some of us know better than to wear something ugly merely because it is trendy.
But we've been over that whole skinny jeans thing before, and I just thought I'd let you know that it still bothers me.
There has been a great deal of discussion about legs this year past, especially since mine have been headlining the daily papers. I've swelled up due to tendonitis. I've swelled up due to deep vein thrombosis (which, thanks to the tendonitis, was difficult to catch). I'm currently suffering a mysterious onslaught of tender muscles and deep bone ache that has been proven to be nothing visible on an ultrasound or an entire slew of blood tests (and which WebMD has informed me is most likely to be the early signs of multiple sclerosis).
I've been cheerfully informed by Mr. Lee, Keystone Avenue's master tailor, that my left leg is so much shorter than my right it's no wonder that I have a debilitating fear of snapping an ankle. The fact that I don't have more problems with my legs and feet utterly (he admits it) defies my podiatrist's entire understanding of the human body. Mr. Lee was not surprised.
(Skinny jeans would only make them look shorter.)
Today, driving my Pal to the bus station so she could embark on a journey to see her boyfriend, we drove through downtown Indianapolis scoffing at all the girls in their skinny jeans, hating each and every second we had to watch them being all nubile in fashion statements we'll never be able to wear, no matter how badly we want to.
Pal, looking out the window, sighed and said, "I'll never be able to wear those without my legs looking like they came from a bucket of Kentucky Fried Chicken."
It's a damn good thing that I got all the good friends, since this is the stuff that makes life worth living, even without skinny jeans.
posted by lindsay at 21:19 :: 0 comments
27 September 2008 : A Lot Like a Thing You Believe In
It has been my good grace recently to pretty much consistently come out on top. In fact, I think I should maybe stop bargaining, because I'm always getting more than I ask for and as much as I can appreciate good fortune, maybe I should leave some for the rest of y'all. I've recently inherited a place to crash in Bloomington, which in itself doesn't make for freestanding joy, Bloomington not being anywhere close to the list on which I secret away my favorite cities. But what it has, being home to one of the largest universities in the country, is a better music scene than the city I call home. Now that I have a place to crash, I can pop down there on weekends to see shows without worrying about driving home late, tired, under the influence.
I've missed shows. And I'm not talking about Verizon Wireless Music Center 10$ Coors Light two football fields away from the stage shows, I'm talking ratty little indie shows where everyone bobs unconsciously to the music, where the concrete floors are unfinished, where even when there are only two people in the audience the bands show up in old minivans and play to the empty room before retiring dirty and sweaty to the floor of whatever living room they can find.
When the Irving Theatre closed its doors last fall, I was bereft - through the two years it was open, the owners graciously allowed me to work the door and concessions in exchange for seeing all the shows for free (it so pays to have friends in the right places). The kind of musical camaraderie I experienced there is still unparalleled, and I doubt I'll ever find it again.
Last night in Bloomington I found a little bit of that again. The club was centered around youth, and aside from someone's parents, I was the oldest person in the room by maybe 5 years. No one was there save a group of giggling teenagers, the staff, the bands, and me. Though I hate that everyone had gone home to the debate by the time the last band (the entire reason I was there) hit the stage, they charmed their way into my heart with a beautiful, terrible cacophony of sound that left me alternately hugging my knees tight to my chest and grinning from ear to ear.
Sometimes, especially at the Irving, where it was my delightful responsibility to wristband the musicians, I'd get so caught up in the delirium of New and Interesting People! I'd forget about the music entirely.
It was nice to sit and let it just wash over me.
I am not a musician. I don't hear technicalities in songs the way that some musicians I know, and I consider myself lucky for that: I get to delight in a key change or a particularly hard break or a perfectly plinked note falling like water from a keyboard without distraction, and I get to fall in love with things as they are, completely whole.
But beyond this musical rediscovery of myself, which has been waxing and waning for the last few months in a way I can't quite catch the tail of, was something else: some kind of hope for the future, for the world.
The third band to play was a girl and a boy with one acoustic guitar. They might have been sixteen, maybe. They broke away from the group of awkward, adorable teenagers who had been in and out of the staff room all night, clearly fixtures at this particular venue that among other things, is a gathering place for the youngsters, to climb nervously onto the stage and play a video they'd made themselves. When they stepped up to microphones, they were all elbows and angles, giggling through their nerves, and played a short set of acoustic songs, the girl's voice high and clear, their harmonies wavering but true to tone.
I was charmed. To borrow a phrase from someone else, their palpable awkwardness was a sight to behold, and it was so obvious that in a couple of years they'll throw high school out the window and become something amazing.
It felt like the same kind of hope I understand when my family gathers, watching my nephew in all his sweaty, soft skinned toddlerness, and I sit back breathless, knowing that something is right in the world if there are children in it who are loved so purely and so completely.
There are kids, there are kids who are not smoking weed or taking guns to seventh grade, there are kids who like art and like music, who create things that are worth appreciating. There are kids who are polite, who have futures, whose minds are focused on more than sex, or defiance, or deviance. There are kids who are being taken care of, kids who know love.
In light of the political and financial themes of the last few weeks, it was nice to stop worrying about the future for a second, nice to stop thinking about all the things I need to learn in order to survive the breakdown of the lives we know, and just be awash in the inevitable continuation of humanity.
Yeah, I liked that.
(P.S. The band I went to see last night was Detroit's The Silent Years, who came very highly recommended to me by two other bands I dearly love, These United States and, of course, The Scourge of the Sea, all three of whose discographies you'll go purchase if you know what's good for you. I was not disappointed.)
posted by lindsay at 14:25 :: 1 comments
25 September 2008 : During which I make an art form out of parenthesis and run on sentences
A couple of weeks ago, I walked past a cardboard box in my spare bedroom, and it (or something in it - lately my suspicions have fallen on my drafting ruler (why do I have a drafting ruler?) as the likeliest suspect) got very, very angry.
I was only upstairs for a few moments, long enough to pee and put on a sweater before I returned to the courtyard where Jen, Pal and I were doing that thing where we sit outside and talk until the sun goes down and we realize we've spent another evening accomplishing little more than giggling.
When I came back downstairs, proclaiming, "I cut my leg in half," I wasn't kidding, and when I reminded them to be grateful that I'd stopped taking blood thinners a week before, I SO wasn't kidding. They both gaped at my leg, unable to process their own reactions though I was to the point of giggling, and I sat down with cotton pads and a bottle of the best thing ever to lick my wounds. Metaphorically.
Also, I'm not kidding about that whole best thing ever. I know most of you are lucky enough to not be nearly so hairy as I am (have I ever mentioned the sideburns? and the mustache? and the beard? and the SIDEBURNS?), but if you've ever been (god forbid) facially waxed or, my new favorite thing: threaded by sweet indian women who give your eyebrows the most perfect god-intended arch possible, then you should probably know about this shit. Not only does it numb you, but say goodbye to ingrown hairs and/or pimples that last until all the hair grows back, so what was the point anyway?
Now, two days ago I sat in my doctor's office (and yesterday again in the ultrasound room), apologizing profusely to doctor (and ultrasound tech) about my current state of lower extremity hirsuteness, my doctor who has a tendency to say the most awesome things said, "Did you have bone surgery without telling me?"
I explained the situation, and he said, "You know in a fair fight, I would have bet on you, but you did not win." This of course, does not translate, because I can in no way describe to you the frowning state of perplexed with which he uttered this statement, in his dignified gold-rims leg fondling way (though it really has nothing on that time when I was taking two different antibiotics and he gestured, open palmed and with great valor, to his nether regions and said, "I have to ask...are you having any, uh...yeast...issues?").
I'm telling you this because there's a reason for the knee-high swampgrass on my legs, which is that I save up my shaving for special situations, because my sensitive skin scoffs at razors and lotions and makes me miserable if I expose it to more than air or sunlight in any given month, and one of those special situations is tomorrow. I'm going to visit the kind of friend for whom you make sure to shave your legs (even though said friend does not reciprocate), and I'm pretty pumped about seeing just how gnarly the mess on my leg is going to be.
You know, once you can actually see it.
I know I've said it before, but it bears repeating: I like scars. I like scars because they're proof that you've lived through something, and having lived through something just recommends you as a better person. Maybe that's short sighted or naive of me, but I'm pretty sure there's a gentleman on the other side of the world somewhere who once conned me out of my clothes by showing me the bullet scars on his back (this after even his charming Aussie accent couldn't make "I'll trade you a backrub for a backrub," less lame).
And yeah, when I go visit this friend tomorrow, I'm pretty sure that showing him the mess on my leg (which, to be honest, is sort of a hallmark of our relationship, and now that I think about it, both of us have sustained some pretty nasty injuries in the time we've known each other, and really, maybe I should find a better hallmark) is going to be exactly what we need to break the tension during that part of the evening where we feel like we ought to at least have an excuse to take our pants off.
posted by lindsay at 17:12 :: 0 comments
24 September 2008 : Not a Very Bad Day
I thought all of you (two) who read this would like to know that my ultrasound this morning came out squeaky bitchin' clean, by which I mean not only did they not find a blood clot (well, the same one, really) anywhere, but they also did not find any scar tissue or anything else abnormal, which means that as far as DVT survivors go, I TOTALLY WIN.
In your face, suckers.
And though I have yet to get word on the 18 million vials of blood drawn to be tested today (which was better than the 27 million drawn on my birthday last year), for the time being I am assured that I am as healthy as I am capable, despite that nagging pain in my leg. The final absolute word in DVT diagnosis should be in by this time on Friday.
Until then, I'm going to eat some ice cream and read some more of this awesome book, and listen to some more of this amazing album (at least until my package arrives from amazon containing every other item in his discography), and be grateful for the sunshine, and my pretty hair, and my supportive friends, my mother, and maybe even my (annoying) (hairy) cats.
I hate to be a cliche, but relief is a wonderful, giddy thing that makes the sky bluer and the coffee smoother. Now if only it would shave my legs for me.
posted by lindsay at 16:22 :: 1 comments
21 September 2008 : A Text from Cera
BTW I don't care if you're staking a claim or playing poker w/high stakes, never say that word to a pregnant lady. I want to punch a cow and eat its face now.
posted by lindsay at 03:31 :: 0 comments
17 September 2008 : brief rundown
Tonight, I've discovered, after 25 years of intense hatred, that there is a way to rectify peanut butter.
Salt.
This is why, my entire life, I have hated peanut butter. Because it needs salt.
It's amazing what the bravery a couple of glasses of wine can lead you to discover.
Other things of note:
Today, I had a salad for lunch. And THEN I had a salad for dinner. I should feel like a rebel, but mostly I feel tired.
I learned on Monday that as of the end of this month, I am unemployed, so if you wondered why I haven't delivered any updates of substance or a promised redesign, its because my spare time has been all eaten up by monster.com and resume writing.
Oh, and by the novel I'm apparently writing, which has hit the 80 page mark as of this evening.
Bizarre.
posted by lindsay at 22:03 :: 2 comments
Monday, September 29, 2008 11:25pm --
My neighbor just got mugged in the courtyard.
Editor's note: I started this whole "text messages from Cera" thing because she regularly sends me random hilarity with no context. This decidedly does not fall under the heading of "hilarious," unless you count the part where I strapped my knife to my belt to walk to my car this morning (hilarious only because my knife would do me absolutely no good whatsoever against an assailant, and would result in one of two things: it being taken away and used to stab me as said assailant laughed at my pathetic attempts at self defense, or it being a catalyst in getting myself in WAY over my head for no good reason at all. Also hilarious in that "wow, that's so not even a little bit funny" way).
Also note that the only reason my (pregnant) best friend lives in this forsaken place is because I lived here when she moved to Indianapolis. Also note that said neighbor got mugged AT GUNPOINT, which renders my flea market knife thrice useless. To be fair, at the very least, Cera has a gentleman living with her who could probably cut a bitch if it came to that. I, however, am (among other things), a woman who lives alone. I have already once this year gone through a period of feeling like my safety here was dubious at best (remember that week that my bike was stolen from where it was locked to the banister outside the door of my third floor apartment in my locked hallway? and then two days later I caught some burly Jamaican dude trying to break into said hallway? word) and I'm SO TIRED OF IT.
So, I thought this was a good opportunity to announce that it is official. I have signed a lease, handed over a chunk of security deposit, and delivered my thirty day notice in writing. On November 1st, Jen and I are leaving the ghetto behind for the hood, where we have (thanks to my wicked rental-procurement talents) found ourselves one half of a beauty of an old house with original hardwoods, a fenced in backyard already sectioned for gardening (and composting!), a driveway, a front porch, and a washer and dryer.
Best yet, Lisa, James and Anniepants are moving into the other half on the very same weekend, and Pal will be joining Jen and I on our side once her lease expires in January. May I just say: ten steps closer to commune! It is the best of all possible outcomes for me, as I get to reintegrate into my most favorite of all neighborhoods and I get to take all of my most beloved people with me.
Won't you join me in raising a middle finger in salute of Meridian-Kessler south of 38th street?
Labels: Text messages from Cera, Two steps forward
posted by lindsay at 17:18 :: 1 comments
29 September 2008 : Important things
Today, I had what was maybe the best ever conversation with one of the randoms downtown. It was pure chance, really, because I tend to avoid the randoms whenever I can, lest I be entrapped by another charming gold-toothed gentleman calling me Mama who insists that I slow down to accommodate his bum leg, and rewards my patience with his phone number, email address, and myspace address.
This particular random, however, was legitimately in CVS, holding a mostly legitimate gallon jug of some random, nuclear green juice drink that she apparently meant to buy.
I waited, so she could get in line before me. It's a thing I do.
This small kindness caught her attention, and instead of taking her place in line, she vultured in on me. "Do you have fifty cents?"
I handed her a dollar out of my pocket. Sometimes its easy. I found myself wondering the green juice drink was in fact worth fifty cents or less. Still eyeing me as we stepped into line, her hand clenched around my dollar, she said, "Can you go through menopause early?"
I looked at her. Mid twenties, probably. Normal looking.
"Yeah, you can, but it's rare."
She nodded. "I have hot and cold flashes. Yeah, I think it's menopause."
End conversation.
Maybe I should stop avoiding randoms. Just a thought.
posted by lindsay at 17:42 :: 1 comments
28 September 2008 : Dazzlingly Apropos
Tonight I took a personality assessment (and an excruciating basic math skills assessment, and also some analogies and basically, I took the GRE again) for a job that I'm very excited about. It wasn't one of those MMPI type tests where they ask if you sometimes like to kill people or if Jesus has ever sent you a birthday card, no. It was the kind of test where 150 questions are actually 15 questions, each reworded ten times.
Apparently in order to get a job these days, you don't have to have a college degree or any experience, so long as you're consistent.
The second section consisted of a series of two juxtaposed activities, and you had to choose which activity you'd prefer to involve yourself in, with a scale of four allowing you to indicate the veracity of that preference.
About halfway down the list, after hemming and hawing, because honestly I feel pretty good about most of the activities they had listed (though I cast my vote firmly in favor of building a deck rather than balancing my checkbook), I see these two options: Studying Geology or Writing a story, poetry, or screenplay.
Are you freaking kidding me? This test, it tried to kill me. I believe I spent at least half of my allotted hour gaping slack jawed at the screen, trying to decide how on earth I was supposed to choose between two so clearly awesome activities, both of which I have participated in and enjoyed in great drafty measures at various times in my life.
Now I'm at a loss. I'm not entirely certain I want this job anymore. I'm not entirely certain that there should not be a special place reserved in hell for the kind of people who would ask a girl to choose between Studying Geology and writing a story. Especially for a job in finance. The ambivalence, the indecision, it abounds. I am being suffocated by an atmosphere filled with swirling metaphor.
I'm no psychologist, but I'm pretty sure that this is just a bunch of tomfoolery, and mostly the creators of said test have been peeking in my windows at night, trying to figure out how to finally break me.
What have I done to deserve this? I just want a job, not another existential dilemma. Clearly we're all stocked up on those over here.
posted by lindsay at 23:02 :: 0 comments
: On Fashion
Woe are we who will inevitably be left behind, as fashion makes itself widely available to those of leggy teenage proportion, not those of atypical woman proportion (please note that at 5'6" I have a 23 inch inseam, and am thereby a freak of nature).
This of course, is not a new dilemma, nor is it particularly vexing, because some of us know better than to wear something ugly merely because it is trendy.
But we've been over that whole skinny jeans thing before, and I just thought I'd let you know that it still bothers me.
There has been a great deal of discussion about legs this year past, especially since mine have been headlining the daily papers. I've swelled up due to tendonitis. I've swelled up due to deep vein thrombosis (which, thanks to the tendonitis, was difficult to catch). I'm currently suffering a mysterious onslaught of tender muscles and deep bone ache that has been proven to be nothing visible on an ultrasound or an entire slew of blood tests (and which WebMD has informed me is most likely to be the early signs of multiple sclerosis).
I've been cheerfully informed by Mr. Lee, Keystone Avenue's master tailor, that my left leg is so much shorter than my right it's no wonder that I have a debilitating fear of snapping an ankle. The fact that I don't have more problems with my legs and feet utterly (he admits it) defies my podiatrist's entire understanding of the human body. Mr. Lee was not surprised.
(Skinny jeans would only make them look shorter.)
Today, driving my Pal to the bus station so she could embark on a journey to see her boyfriend, we drove through downtown Indianapolis scoffing at all the girls in their skinny jeans, hating each and every second we had to watch them being all nubile in fashion statements we'll never be able to wear, no matter how badly we want to.
Pal, looking out the window, sighed and said, "I'll never be able to wear those without my legs looking like they came from a bucket of Kentucky Fried Chicken."
It's a damn good thing that I got all the good friends, since this is the stuff that makes life worth living, even without skinny jeans.
posted by lindsay at 21:19 :: 0 comments
27 September 2008 : A Lot Like a Thing You Believe In
It has been my good grace recently to pretty much consistently come out on top. In fact, I think I should maybe stop bargaining, because I'm always getting more than I ask for and as much as I can appreciate good fortune, maybe I should leave some for the rest of y'all. I've recently inherited a place to crash in Bloomington, which in itself doesn't make for freestanding joy, Bloomington not being anywhere close to the list on which I secret away my favorite cities. But what it has, being home to one of the largest universities in the country, is a better music scene than the city I call home. Now that I have a place to crash, I can pop down there on weekends to see shows without worrying about driving home late, tired, under the influence.
I've missed shows. And I'm not talking about Verizon Wireless Music Center 10$ Coors Light two football fields away from the stage shows, I'm talking ratty little indie shows where everyone bobs unconsciously to the music, where the concrete floors are unfinished, where even when there are only two people in the audience the bands show up in old minivans and play to the empty room before retiring dirty and sweaty to the floor of whatever living room they can find.
When the Irving Theatre closed its doors last fall, I was bereft - through the two years it was open, the owners graciously allowed me to work the door and concessions in exchange for seeing all the shows for free (it so pays to have friends in the right places). The kind of musical camaraderie I experienced there is still unparalleled, and I doubt I'll ever find it again.
Last night in Bloomington I found a little bit of that again. The club was centered around youth, and aside from someone's parents, I was the oldest person in the room by maybe 5 years. No one was there save a group of giggling teenagers, the staff, the bands, and me. Though I hate that everyone had gone home to the debate by the time the last band (the entire reason I was there) hit the stage, they charmed their way into my heart with a beautiful, terrible cacophony of sound that left me alternately hugging my knees tight to my chest and grinning from ear to ear.
Sometimes, especially at the Irving, where it was my delightful responsibility to wristband the musicians, I'd get so caught up in the delirium of New and Interesting People! I'd forget about the music entirely.
It was nice to sit and let it just wash over me.
I am not a musician. I don't hear technicalities in songs the way that some musicians I know, and I consider myself lucky for that: I get to delight in a key change or a particularly hard break or a perfectly plinked note falling like water from a keyboard without distraction, and I get to fall in love with things as they are, completely whole.
But beyond this musical rediscovery of myself, which has been waxing and waning for the last few months in a way I can't quite catch the tail of, was something else: some kind of hope for the future, for the world.
The third band to play was a girl and a boy with one acoustic guitar. They might have been sixteen, maybe. They broke away from the group of awkward, adorable teenagers who had been in and out of the staff room all night, clearly fixtures at this particular venue that among other things, is a gathering place for the youngsters, to climb nervously onto the stage and play a video they'd made themselves. When they stepped up to microphones, they were all elbows and angles, giggling through their nerves, and played a short set of acoustic songs, the girl's voice high and clear, their harmonies wavering but true to tone.
I was charmed. To borrow a phrase from someone else, their palpable awkwardness was a sight to behold, and it was so obvious that in a couple of years they'll throw high school out the window and become something amazing.
It felt like the same kind of hope I understand when my family gathers, watching my nephew in all his sweaty, soft skinned toddlerness, and I sit back breathless, knowing that something is right in the world if there are children in it who are loved so purely and so completely.
There are kids, there are kids who are not smoking weed or taking guns to seventh grade, there are kids who like art and like music, who create things that are worth appreciating. There are kids who are polite, who have futures, whose minds are focused on more than sex, or defiance, or deviance. There are kids who are being taken care of, kids who know love.
In light of the political and financial themes of the last few weeks, it was nice to stop worrying about the future for a second, nice to stop thinking about all the things I need to learn in order to survive the breakdown of the lives we know, and just be awash in the inevitable continuation of humanity.
Yeah, I liked that.
(P.S. The band I went to see last night was Detroit's The Silent Years, who came very highly recommended to me by two other bands I dearly love, These United States and, of course, The Scourge of the Sea, all three of whose discographies you'll go purchase if you know what's good for you. I was not disappointed.)
Labels: Charmed I'm sure
posted by lindsay at 14:25 :: 1 comments
25 September 2008 : During which I make an art form out of parenthesis and run on sentences
A couple of weeks ago, I walked past a cardboard box in my spare bedroom, and it (or something in it - lately my suspicions have fallen on my drafting ruler (why do I have a drafting ruler?) as the likeliest suspect) got very, very angry.
I was only upstairs for a few moments, long enough to pee and put on a sweater before I returned to the courtyard where Jen, Pal and I were doing that thing where we sit outside and talk until the sun goes down and we realize we've spent another evening accomplishing little more than giggling.
When I came back downstairs, proclaiming, "I cut my leg in half," I wasn't kidding, and when I reminded them to be grateful that I'd stopped taking blood thinners a week before, I SO wasn't kidding. They both gaped at my leg, unable to process their own reactions though I was to the point of giggling, and I sat down with cotton pads and a bottle of the best thing ever to lick my wounds. Metaphorically.
Also, I'm not kidding about that whole best thing ever. I know most of you are lucky enough to not be nearly so hairy as I am (have I ever mentioned the sideburns? and the mustache? and the beard? and the SIDEBURNS?), but if you've ever been (god forbid) facially waxed or, my new favorite thing: threaded by sweet indian women who give your eyebrows the most perfect god-intended arch possible, then you should probably know about this shit. Not only does it numb you, but say goodbye to ingrown hairs and/or pimples that last until all the hair grows back, so what was the point anyway?
Now, two days ago I sat in my doctor's office (and yesterday again in the ultrasound room), apologizing profusely to doctor (and ultrasound tech) about my current state of lower extremity hirsuteness, my doctor who has a tendency to say the most awesome things said, "Did you have bone surgery without telling me?"
I explained the situation, and he said, "You know in a fair fight, I would have bet on you, but you did not win." This of course, does not translate, because I can in no way describe to you the frowning state of perplexed with which he uttered this statement, in his dignified gold-rims leg fondling way (though it really has nothing on that time when I was taking two different antibiotics and he gestured, open palmed and with great valor, to his nether regions and said, "I have to ask...are you having any, uh...yeast...issues?").
I'm telling you this because there's a reason for the knee-high swampgrass on my legs, which is that I save up my shaving for special situations, because my sensitive skin scoffs at razors and lotions and makes me miserable if I expose it to more than air or sunlight in any given month, and one of those special situations is tomorrow. I'm going to visit the kind of friend for whom you make sure to shave your legs (even though said friend does not reciprocate), and I'm pretty pumped about seeing just how gnarly the mess on my leg is going to be.
You know, once you can actually see it.
I know I've said it before, but it bears repeating: I like scars. I like scars because they're proof that you've lived through something, and having lived through something just recommends you as a better person. Maybe that's short sighted or naive of me, but I'm pretty sure there's a gentleman on the other side of the world somewhere who once conned me out of my clothes by showing me the bullet scars on his back (this after even his charming Aussie accent couldn't make "I'll trade you a backrub for a backrub," less lame).
And yeah, when I go visit this friend tomorrow, I'm pretty sure that showing him the mess on my leg (which, to be honest, is sort of a hallmark of our relationship, and now that I think about it, both of us have sustained some pretty nasty injuries in the time we've known each other, and really, maybe I should find a better hallmark) is going to be exactly what we need to break the tension during that part of the evening where we feel like we ought to at least have an excuse to take our pants off.
Labels: Charmed I'm sure
posted by lindsay at 17:12 :: 0 comments
24 September 2008 : Not a Very Bad Day
I thought all of you (two) who read this would like to know that my ultrasound this morning came out squeaky bitchin' clean, by which I mean not only did they not find a blood clot (well, the same one, really) anywhere, but they also did not find any scar tissue or anything else abnormal, which means that as far as DVT survivors go, I TOTALLY WIN.
In your face, suckers.
And though I have yet to get word on the 18 million vials of blood drawn to be tested today (which was better than the 27 million drawn on my birthday last year), for the time being I am assured that I am as healthy as I am capable, despite that nagging pain in my leg. The final absolute word in DVT diagnosis should be in by this time on Friday.
Until then, I'm going to eat some ice cream and read some more of this awesome book, and listen to some more of this amazing album (at least until my package arrives from amazon containing every other item in his discography), and be grateful for the sunshine, and my pretty hair, and my supportive friends, my mother, and maybe even my (annoying) (hairy) cats.
I hate to be a cliche, but relief is a wonderful, giddy thing that makes the sky bluer and the coffee smoother. Now if only it would shave my legs for me.
Labels: it's a sickness
posted by lindsay at 16:22 :: 1 comments
21 September 2008 : A Text from Cera
BTW I don't care if you're staking a claim or playing poker w/high stakes, never say that word to a pregnant lady. I want to punch a cow and eat its face now.
Labels: Text messages from Cera
posted by lindsay at 03:31 :: 0 comments
17 September 2008 : brief rundown
Tonight, I've discovered, after 25 years of intense hatred, that there is a way to rectify peanut butter.
Salt.
This is why, my entire life, I have hated peanut butter. Because it needs salt.
It's amazing what the bravery a couple of glasses of wine can lead you to discover.
Other things of note:
Today, I had a salad for lunch. And THEN I had a salad for dinner. I should feel like a rebel, but mostly I feel tired.
I learned on Monday that as of the end of this month, I am unemployed, so if you wondered why I haven't delivered any updates of substance or a promised redesign, its because my spare time has been all eaten up by monster.com and resume writing.
Oh, and by the novel I'm apparently writing, which has hit the 80 page mark as of this evening.
Bizarre.
posted by lindsay at 22:03 :: 2 comments