12.20.2013
the end of crisp sandpaper
I am feeling flush with good cheer, because after seven months of line-dried clothes, yesterday afternoon a dryer was installed in our little home, and after seven months of line-dried jeans, the ones I'm wearing today feel like heaven. Warm, soft heaven.
12.17.2013
pounced
Well, this morning the upstairs/outside cat pounced at me out of a basement shadow and oh my heart, and yesterday I stole a faux snowball and almost cried over a sandwich, but I'm still really happy. We have a tiny fake tabletop tree and it's topped with an owl, and my husband likes to light the oil lamp and read in front of it, and I'm doing better with the underpinnings of work stuff and relishing the chance to take a full two weeks away from it soon. I like the fact that I hear band music in my head and I like the fact that cold makes warmth divine.
12.10.2013
three snow days
On Sunday morning S and I woke to an empty fridge and snow already drifting down, so we bundled up, even pre-coffee, and within ten minutes were on the way to the grocery store for milk and bananas and cheese doodles, and stopped at Mr J's on the way home for an egg and cheese breakfast bagel for me and everything else they sell for breakfast at once for S. Home through the snowglobe fluffy powder, oil lamps lit, styrofoam containers full of steaming food and eventually coffee and the calm, quiet of a Sunday morning snow with nowhere to be. Later the day included short commute up the basement steps, and red wine and football and roast beef.
Monday morning we woke up to the odd sort of ice that Virginia always gets where it's too warm for straight snow and not warm enough for rain, and so every twig, branch, blade of grass is encased in ice. So were our cars, but S had the day off, even if I didn't, and he good naturedly volunteered to drive me into town, and between the two of us we chipped the solid block of ice back into something resembling a Ford Taurus and puttered in. I don't know what made work crazier--the ice, the non-delay, the start of finals week--the morning was a beast. The day was a beast. Later the day included cookies and a gift exchange and sitting in a living room with three girls I have really grown to love lately and discussing books-->discussing life-->making plans-->staying out much later than normal.
This morning instead of ice, there was a blanket of beautiful wet packing snow. And too much of it to be overruled by the importance of finals week, so the university closed for the morning. S unstuck his car and I made him text me when he made it to work safely and I sat in my robe on the couch and cried while I watched the previous night's Sing Off on hulu and then I put on boots and tramped around outside, turning my face up to catch the flakes and thinking about snowmen. I painted my fingernails gold instead. By 11:00 the snow melt was on, so I just drove the snow off my hood with my arms and inched down the driveway and into town. Everything is heavy and wet, and I'm the first one in the office so far, so I'm listening to Swan Lake and drying the cuffs of my pants and later today will certainly include chai and dripping and being helpful.
Monday morning we woke up to the odd sort of ice that Virginia always gets where it's too warm for straight snow and not warm enough for rain, and so every twig, branch, blade of grass is encased in ice. So were our cars, but S had the day off, even if I didn't, and he good naturedly volunteered to drive me into town, and between the two of us we chipped the solid block of ice back into something resembling a Ford Taurus and puttered in. I don't know what made work crazier--the ice, the non-delay, the start of finals week--the morning was a beast. The day was a beast. Later the day included cookies and a gift exchange and sitting in a living room with three girls I have really grown to love lately and discussing books-->discussing life-->making plans-->staying out much later than normal.
This morning instead of ice, there was a blanket of beautiful wet packing snow. And too much of it to be overruled by the importance of finals week, so the university closed for the morning. S unstuck his car and I made him text me when he made it to work safely and I sat in my robe on the couch and cried while I watched the previous night's Sing Off on hulu and then I put on boots and tramped around outside, turning my face up to catch the flakes and thinking about snowmen. I painted my fingernails gold instead. By 11:00 the snow melt was on, so I just drove the snow off my hood with my arms and inched down the driveway and into town. Everything is heavy and wet, and I'm the first one in the office so far, so I'm listening to Swan Lake and drying the cuffs of my pants and later today will certainly include chai and dripping and being helpful.
12.05.2013
recommending kindness and books
I hit a goose--a big white goose--and ran my car off the road. I think the goose lived.
I ate the same meal in the same restaurant twice in one week.
I had a private tear and snot fest over the fact that kindness and benefit-of-the-doubt-i-ness is Very Important to me and I don't know how to handle the fact that sometimes the same is not true of the people I rely on for their kindness. Relatedly, I am bone breakingly thankful for my husband and my husband's brother for how they have deliberately chosen to look at the world.
I read a few books, and watched a few movies. Was at the theater twice in one week, kind of like the restaurant thing. A year's quota at once. Saw Catching Fire, which made me goggle and ache and cry, and The Book Thief, which edged its way to the top of my favorite book ever list when I read it last month, and which, in movie form, made me goggle and ache and cry. Can't recommend either enough. Read, watch. Especially ensconced in the seats between fellow book lovers.
I'm wearing new socks today, and drinking chai, and am back into yarn-craft mode after months of relative apathy, and all of this feels very December. So does the eating gift fudge and sleeping in past workout time thing. Take a deep breath.
I ate the same meal in the same restaurant twice in one week.
I had a private tear and snot fest over the fact that kindness and benefit-of-the-doubt-i-ness is Very Important to me and I don't know how to handle the fact that sometimes the same is not true of the people I rely on for their kindness. Relatedly, I am bone breakingly thankful for my husband and my husband's brother for how they have deliberately chosen to look at the world.
I read a few books, and watched a few movies. Was at the theater twice in one week, kind of like the restaurant thing. A year's quota at once. Saw Catching Fire, which made me goggle and ache and cry, and The Book Thief, which edged its way to the top of my favorite book ever list when I read it last month, and which, in movie form, made me goggle and ache and cry. Can't recommend either enough. Read, watch. Especially ensconced in the seats between fellow book lovers.
I'm wearing new socks today, and drinking chai, and am back into yarn-craft mode after months of relative apathy, and all of this feels very December. So does the eating gift fudge and sleeping in past workout time thing. Take a deep breath.
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