Fox News, Here I Come...

...Though I doubt they would have me, after giving my own analysis of what lately happened to the McCain campaign. Ah, well.

Keep in mind: My thoughts were written at the beginning of September, soon after the Republican National Convention, and so, are a bit expired, relevance-wise. But still. Cool, right?

Wii Fit Be Damned!

As I mentioned in my last post, I spent...okay, wasted, a bunch of time entering into a contest for a Wii Fit that I had so little chance of winning, I might as well of just put my name on the November presidential ballot. But there are two upsides to all this wasted time. As I was leaving my certain number of comments, which I'm not telling, I stumbled upon another Wii-wanting-to-win-ista who has a blog for mothers and left a comment like, "I'm having the same contest and I've only had 200 entries." So I clicked on the blog and found out it was a parent blog. All you had to do was leave motherly advice about how you, personally, are saving the environment. Not being a mother, but a committed dog owner, I figured this qualified me and so, I entered this contest a few times, with such gems as "Turn off the lights" and "Recycling is really great." Then, as I was leaving more comments on the original site and dreaming of being told I was overweight by the judgmental Wii Fit voice, I came across another contest from another blog that was for some CDs and some homemade peanut brittle. And I was like, what the hey? So I entered that contest, too.

This is yet another reason why online is often better than real life -- you have contests giving away actual desirable prizes, like potentially delicious baked goods, vs. the ten letters I get in the mail everyday that promise "$80 for two hours of your time giving your ideas about how to improve the Los Angeles Times." Not that I ever turn down $80. Like a good whore, I will go anywhere air conditioned in the summer and sit there for as long as I possibly can. Font size, you ask? I've got a treatise on it.

As one of eight contestants, I'm holding out hope that I'll receive the "you've won peanut brittle and CDs!" email someday soon.

Home

It's been a while, I know. I meant to write this post a little sooner, but I've been busy with this slightly-smaller-than-large obsession for the last two days. Once I entered into a sea of 40,000+ others, it was hard to stop raising my odds, no matter how minuscule the chance of success or how many other, much more pressing matters were on the table. Like, say, making money to keep us from crossing over from "cute bohemian artisan poor" to "total Dickens-style destitution." Yes, it is a fine line and Russ and I delight in toeing it all summer.

Another current obsession worth looking into? Wisecrackers and sun-dried tomatoes.

The great part about summer is that it's most convenient to engage in these minor indiscretions from the convenience of my couch. (Confession:) I've also taken to afternoon yoga sessions in my living room (truly bohemian, right?). If not for my love of getting the mail, I would probably never emerge.

This is all more poignant because about a month ago, I learned that my grandma, who is also very partial to her living room - she's slept on her couch ever since my grandpa died about 15 years ago - was going to have to give up her home. She's been there for over 50 years, and through phases of hideous rust-colored shag carpeting and heavily scotch-guarded draperies. The house, as I remember it, was famous for the clusters of carefully collected, dusty pitchers on shelves, an encyclopedia set written so long ago that the car was still depicted as a Model-T, and a downstairs bathroom that smelled so strongly of Lysol that you couldn't walk by it without being completely sterilized. My grandpa would spend hours in the there and when I was younger and a complete doof, I thought it was because he just really liked to read National Geographic. (The yellow tobacco stains didn't even register.) I grew up in that house; my real house was next door, but because both my parents worked so much and separated when I was eight, I found the orange shag a lot more comforting than the awkward silences at my house. Plus, my grandpa let me not only watch Unsolved Mysteries, which helped me develop an ever-present fear of being followed, but Cheers - and only with the promise that I would never engage in promiscuous sex in a classy bar/pub.

Gram was never the vocal one, but she was always in the background, always offering her famous peanut-butter-and-mayonnaise sandwiches, which have scarred me for life, but also, back scratches with those wonderfully long nails of hers. I'd just lean over her lap, even after I weighed more than her as a ten year-old, and she'd just scratch as long as I asked. Even now, when I think of heaven, I'm hopeful that there's back scratching like that involved. She was proud of how long she'd lived in that house, proud that they'd paid only $17,000 for it in the late 1950s, proud that she'd been content with it even after my grandpa made his first million. Her home was just fine, she always said. I have everything I need here -- why do I need a big, new home -- to spend more time cleaning? If there's anything my grandma and I share, it is a straight up abhorrence for keeping linoleum clean.

But now she's moving out, after she couldn't smell a gas leak. Her new digs are quite nice - she's moving in with my mom, who graciously offered her the bottom floor of her tri-level - but I've been in wistful mode every time I think about it. When I mentioned this to one of my aunts, she let me know that the house was most likely going to be bought by a family friend, who would have no problem letting us wander through, if we wanted. But that misses the point of my reverie. Because it isn't about the house at all.

Next, Part II

If spring comes in like a grumpy lion, then the beginning of summer comes in like the slowly clacking roller coaster cars en route to the top. So much anticipation for what comes next, which in my case, is hopefully some much needed writing, reading, and tomato growing. So far, I’m deep into the tomato part, thanks, in part, to Christina, who graciously shares all her seeds and seedlings with her seed-needy friends. I have taken to calling the side of the house “tomato mania,” since I have fourteen different types of heirloom tomatoes and seventeen total plants. I had my first sample yesterday and it reminded me of what real tomatoes taste like: sweet, with a little pop of acidy goodness. It tastes like what I love about summer. As far as tomatoes are concerned, that clackity-clackity car could not be moving any more slowly, although I know once July hits, that drop will come fast and furious.

And there are different types of anticipation, too. I anticipate the rising temperatures with some amount of dread, being in my 1906 rambler of a cottage with a huge attic and only meager accoutrements when it comes to cooling systems. I find myself biting my fingers when I think about money and specifically, the lack of it in the summer. I look forward to the days of reading and writing, and more sunlight to hike through the canyons up the street from my house, but in the back of my mind, I also know that once the drop comes, those days fly by in a blur and all at once, I’ll be back to that mind-numbing week before school starts. I try to savor these days, like I would one of my tomatoes that took weeks to flower, set, and mature, but once July hits, that drop comes fast and furious. The knowledge that it’s all going to go so fast is always in the back of my mind. It makes summer so much more precious and at the same time, so much more anxiety-ridden. I know it's all going to end so much sooner than I want it to.

As you may have guessed, I am (Sarah and I’m) a reluctant teacher. I do it because I need to more than because I want to, and while I do enjoy my students – some of them have made a huge impression on me – I still do it with a bit of feet dragging. And though I enjoy it, even the students who look at me with a mixture of disdain and boredom when I’m pouring out my best thoughts, and even though I enjoy bettering my semesters with new ideas and activities, I still resent it. I resent that I have so little creative energy to exert on my own writing. I resent that all my attention is poured into others and never into myself. I resent that my abilities and time are not reflected by a decent health care plan. I resent that I spend hours commenting on drafts that are turned in just the same or with two more commas inserted. Yes, I know, I need to let go of being so resentful, but as a very wise person pointed out, then what would I do with the resulting free time?

But then, there are lots of things I don’t resent. I don’t resent getting paid (especially right now). I don’t resent getting to work with some wonderful people who are both artistic and total smarty-pantses. I don’t resent when my students grow and transform as writers and people and I have the front row seat to the event. I don’t resent getting to talk about issues that are important to me and, I hope, to the future of the entire world. I don’t resent opportunities to make writing, for a handful of select students, something fun and not dreadful. I don’t resent the sense of purpose I have from doing something that other people consider valuable to society. So see, between the resenting and the reading of papers, there are moments of brilliance.

This may be why the last season of Angel made such an impression on me and for the first time ever, Angel himself. Angel is the poster boy for reluctant service, especially when the service involves taking over the evil law firm Wolfram and Hart. He’s always been willing to work alone, to do whatever work he can to redeem his evil vampire past, and help the people in the world who most need help. But, as it turns out, he needs help from others to do this and once he lets those people into his orbit, it’s chaos: they get hurt, they die, they break his heart, their bodies are taken over by barely contained goddesses (Cordelia, Fred). Angel finds out that the person he may hate worst in the world – reformed-vampire-meets-Billy-Idol, Spike – is now the guy he desperately needs on his side. He, by turns, is resentful of his guiding mission and then at moments, is lost in the brilliance of how good it can be.

In the first part of this post, I was wondering how you know when you’ve stayed true to yourself. What if you’re really a writer, but do the teaching thing to pay the bills for a while – can you still call yourself a writer? Joss Whedon said this is the dilemma of your twenties, but when August rolls around, I will officially be out of my twenties, and yet, I don’t think this dilemma will necessarily go away. It hasn’t for others I’ve known who are way past their twenties and still, looking for a way to feel not so reluctant about the so many things that take up their lives.

There’s always that tension for people like me who find a gap between their passion and sustaining that passion while they’re working out the kinks, the timing, or the publishing rights.

Next, Part I

Much like early California spring, school has sprung. This means that I'm in classes from 12:00-10:00 on Tuesdays and Thursdays, Wednesdays and Fridays being mostly recovery days from so much brain and leg work. I have thought about shoes more than I ever have before -- I tend to be a pacer when I am at work in front of a class, an incessant pacer, more like, and the first day I came home from a full day of pacing, my feet actually felt a bit numb. And these were Naturalizers, no less! Some of my paycheck this month will be spent on (gulp) the most sensible of shoes. Something that can sustain my pacing and commuting and general on-my-feetness for these next 14 weeks.

Amidst thinking about shoes, I've also been watching the series Angel, long after I finished Buffy and Firefly. There are reasons for this, the most important being that I never liked Angel. I thought he was boring. I tend to dislike gloomy brooding on screen for long stretches of time; this, perhaps, is why I can never seem to get through dramas like The English Patient. So much brooding compels me to check People.com to see what new, stupid, exciting thing Britney has recently done, to everyone's shock and horror. Maybe it's sensational of me, but because I feel like I spend so much time in my own mind, milling around, brooding about lessons or writing or how much writing I'm not lately getting done, when I'm outside of it, I like to be compelled.

But now I've arrived at the end of fourth-beginning of the fifth season and all the sudden, Angel is fascinating. At the end of the fourth season, the Angel Investigations team has been fighting against the nefarious metaphyscial law firm, Wolfram and Hart, who have been working on AI's destruction since season one. After a series of unfortunate events, Wolfram and Hart decides to GIVE the law firm to AI, with no provisos except that they use the facility however they want. For good, for evil -- Wolfram and Hart is fine with whatever. And through another series of unfortunate events, Angel makes an executive decision and takes this deal.

What is fascinating to me, and will be fascinating to watch, is where the dividing line between good and evil falls. In creating Angel, Whedon and Co. were trying to find a metaphor for life in your twenties and in this, they've found it. For me, my twenties have been a constant besiege of whether or not to abandon the artistic aspirations I started them with -- in other words, do I follow my dream of being a writer and continue to do so, even when I can barely pay my bills? Do I go to grad school for my MFA, a completely impractical degree, or do I pursue a degree that will allow me some security while marginally incorporating my love of writing into it?

I, in my infinite wisdom, decided to go with the unabandoned dreams of writing route. And I've been well-served by this. I've grown as a person, as a writer, as a thinker, and hopefully, in other, more undefinable ways. But there are moments, as my feet are paining me and my computer is being used not for creating stories, but for lesson plans and assignment handouts, that I start to wonder if I made the right choice.

I Am Slowly Becoming The Woman Who Throws Her Arm Across The Passenger Side and Decorates In Cubs Blue

I grew up in one of those households who screamed at the TV whenever sporting events were on. My parents saw no oddness about screeching and jerking and jumping up and down when any of the various teams they supported were doing well or mostly, doing badly. This includes, in short succession, the Bears, the Bulls, the Cubs (mom); a majority of the screeching dealt with any team either of my parents felt in any way threatened their team's dominance and/or good cheer. Which was everyone. There were nights I would stare at my ceiling as they screeched downstairs and I wished for parents with pearls, good china, and inside voices.

Somehow, I ended up not being a sports watcher. This, of course, bars the Olympics (by which I mean Summer; the Winter Olympics are iffy -- as Kenneth says, "From the glory and the pageantry of the summer Olympics, to the less fun Winter Olympics..."). In fact, one of my primary reasons for working is to be able to buy cable for this summer's Olympics so that I can orgy out on multiple events that no one else wants to watch, like Judo and Trampoline. My parents know this about me and it was never a big deal, more like a lovable quirk, the kind of patronizing grin you'd give to Joey on Friends after he said something so boneheaded you weren't sure that his brain wasn't composed of chimps pounding on broken typewriters. The fact that I have no Cubs throw pillows or Bears blankets is just one of those "look what we made!" moments of parental amusement.

But, like flu season, the Superbowl arrives and somehow, my TV is on and I am watching. Like the summer Olympics, there's a lot of pageantry, in the form of truck commercials, jets streaking smoke, and Tom Petty on a guitar shaped stage. Sometimes, this watching is as my most cynical teenage self, sometimes as an indifferent passerby, and once in a while, as genuine interested participant.

It was in this last capacity that I heard myself yesterday. Because late in the fourth quarter, as the ball was launched, I leaned forward, clenched my fists, and screeched.

A Eulogy With Resolve

Last week, my friend Mary died.

She was the first someone who died after my dad, who I knew, who I cared about, who I had laughed and cried and eaten and partied with at length. We were both on the Elder board at Church and I sat by her when I wanted to exchange looks and notes with someone who I knew would be as bored as I was when going over the endless financial statements.

My reactions evolved over the week before the funeral. When I heard she passed, I was talking covertly in a dressing room and between the hip music and the conversations about florescent-induced skin tone, it was hard to understand, to fully comprehend. Then, there was dinner with the kids on Wednesday nights, where I talked to them like I normally would, about school and the Superbowl and then, listened quietly as Russell got to the real stuff -- how it happened, what happened. The tragedy of it all made me sad that night, but sad deep inside and not out my eyeballs. On Friday, I was driving somewhere and the Grateful Dead song "Box of Rain" came on and between the beauty of the words, the melody, and the snow-capped foothills to my right, I was suddenly tearing up, remembering someone who probably loved this song and loved the foothills, too. The tears were there, but as I remembered her dancing in her kitchen around Thanksgiving turkeys, they disappeared and were replaced by smiling and my loud singing.

Another song I played a lot this week was Iron and Wine's "Naked As We Came," a song I have always loved and loved to play, and I thought about making a CD for the kids with both this and the Grateful Dead song, songs that to me, make death-sense. They helped put some words to something so senseless. But on a second listen, I hesitated -- they were so perfect that it was sad and hurtful and hard to hear these songs without thinking of Mary's untimely death. I didn't want to make things worse, so I quietly tucked away these songs for myself, and proceeded to the funeral.

At the funeral, the three kids - whom I only call kids as an endearing term and has no bearing on their maturity and general coolness - performed a trio rendition of "Naked As We Came." And my sad insides were suddenly all over my outsides, running down my cheeks and out my nose. I sobbed and went through tissues, until I had mounds of them in my purse, like small, white bats hiding in the corners. That pew in the front, where she slid in late every Sunday, would never be filled in the same way. As the final chords were struck, I looked up and saw both the misery and the resolve in each of the kids' face. It was in this moment that I was aware, not only by the power of words that so perfectly fit who I was missing, but by the power of us, to move forward, even despite what seems like impossibility.

Pursing Without Shame

A while back, I was listening to This American Life, as I am wont to do when the powers that be deny me a new hour of Car Talk, and I heard David Segal explaining why he just couldn't get a couch. It was sort of funny, in a weird, I'm-totally-going-to-gossip-about-you-behind-your-back-now way, and I didn't think about it much until the other day.

See, it's all about how David Segal was on a search for the perfect couch, not for religious or allergic reasons, but just to replace the train wreck that was his first couch. The only problem? He went looking with a specific image in his mind and it really didn't fit with the Ikea reality at all. Sort of like Goldilocks syndrome, an affliction in which nothing is ever right and the Mama and Papa Bear are ultimately responsible. This all culminated in visiting an artisan furniture maker who was custom designing couches, with these supremely cool materials, and even then, David Segal just couldn't bring himself to buy it. It just wasn't what he imagined. And so, welcome back the old, ratty couch.

When I heard this, partly because of his nasally voice, I figured he was a Woody Allen type. Extremely neurotic except Segal's neurotics just focused on upholstery instead of emotionally unavailable women. Because, I thought, who would ever spend so much time reflecting on a fucking couch? And while this bad attitude could possibly be attributed to hunger pains, hangover, or itchy bra strap, I'm pretty sure that it was just eight minutes spent ranting about couches.

But the other day, I realized I'm just like this guy. In fact, I am the couch guy. And here's why: I cannot find a purse/bag/junk carrier that I like. And reason? Because I somehow envisioned this idealized purse and now, cannot find one individual with leather binding abilities who has executed what was in my own mind. I've been going a little nutburgers trying to find my vision, dashing in and out of Pasadena stores, searching across eBay, enduring the jumbled mess that is Craigslist -- all for bupkis.

I will try not to go on here - I am about hitting the eight minute mark on typing and starting to feel slightly guilty that I am doing a David Segal here. But I have to say that I'm not sure if I will ever be able to buy a purse again and if I do, it will only be the purse that I sort-of-kind-of-can-live-with, instead of the purse I live-to-dream-about. And, I have to say, I understand Segal -- it's sort of a letdown to find out that what you really want is unattainable. I can even say that it's worth spending eight minutes talking about it on National Public Radio, without shame. Because it's not just a couch or a purse anymore.

As a matter of interest, if any of you, searching around, find a battered leather purse, big enough for library books and notebooks, but not bigger than my entire rib cage, with a little hardware on the front (perhaps in the form of pockets) and both a sling shoulder strap and two shorter carrying handles, email me immediately.

How Does Your Fondness Grow?

I've been gone a long while, so hopefully, that has made you all the more interested in where I've been and what I've been doing. Unfortunately for both of us, it's dreary and uninteresting, a bit like one of Shakespeare's kingly dramas. Luckily for both of us, I feel no need to publish it at all.

And my resolution? Short entries. Nonfiction abounding. In other words, watch this space.