off to a good start

Hey, look! I'm 26! The day started with THREE e-cards from hoops and yoyo - my friends, they know me well. Also, they've all gotten h&y cards from me before, clearly the enthusiasm is catching.

Plus also? How could you go wrong with getting woken up with kisses, coffee, fruit and warm muffins? I'm here to tell you, it's impossible.

Whee!

weekending

This weekend was worth the nearly-six-hour bus trip on Friday evening and the returnus interruptus of Sunday. As one of my birthday gifts, my parents sent Stuart and I to Gloucester (GLOU-cester! if I'm being irritating), Massachusetts, to go out on the Hurricane II, a whale-watching boat. It was a four hour trip and you may roll your eyes at my/our geekiness, but it's my second trip to the Stellwagen Bank to watch the humpbacks do their 40-ton thing.

It was awesome. I'm obviously married to the right person because Stuart thought it was awesome, too. We saw about 20 different humpbacks, one of them a calf, and watched them nap and play on the surface. Stuart even saw one of them breaching, but I missed it.

From four hours on the boat in Gloucester, we popped over to Rockport to get some coffee and wander along the exceedingly cute wharf - all these little shops selling knick-knacks and "local art". Gloucester was more a working town, with a cute but functional Main Street, but Rockport was clearly more touristy. I loved the houses in Rockport though, and Stuart might actually have gotten sick of me nearly crashing the car on Route 128 to slow down and look at them.

Then, with only one purchase from the kitschy wharf (delicious apple strudel to take home to my parents), we went home and relaxed over dinner with my parents, waking up the next day to barbeque with them in honor of me! Turning 26! TOMORROW! There was obviously cake.

There will be more cake tomorrow, when I drag all my friends to a cute little bistro in Queens to celebrate with me and eat strawberry shortcake, yes oh yes, because it's my birthday. Perhaps there will come an age where a whole day dedicated to feeling special and important topped off with cake will cease to excite me, but I hope I never get to that age. Wait, no, that sounds tragic - I hope I sail blissfully by the point where people stop caring about birthdays.

I love birthdays! So I'll be 26 tomorrow. Isn't that neat?

Unrelated to how neat my birthday is (AND IT IS), I get this strange sort of nostalgia every time we visit New England. Rhode Island counts too, of course, but going to Providence is all about visiting my parents and so my delight in the town is tied up in them. But we've been three times now - once, our honeymoon in Bar Harbor, last fall for camping in the Berkshires, and now to Cape Ann - and I'm not sure I can describe how happy the entire region makes me. Not so much the big cities (Boston, I'm looking at YOU) but the smaller towns and the coast and the mountains and the people and the seasons. I love it, love it, love it.

Who knows if we'll ever leave the city. I mean, we love it here, we have a home and a family of friends and good jobs. Even for someone like me, who's never imagined spending her whole life anywhere, I can see myself never leaving New York City.

But if we did, I hope it'd be for someplace like New England.

the charming westport motel for your convenience

$70 bucks a night. $32.95 if you want the room for 4 hours or less, between the convenient hours of 9AM and 4PM. And right off I-95, so when you've been stuck on an almost-immobile freeway for two hours, you can finally give up on ever making it back to the city in time to get a decent night's rest for work tomorrow.

Not that I work in the morning, mind. I live the life of eating bon-bons and ready trashy novels, obviously. But with the clock creeping towards midnight, we gave up and crawled into the damp open arms of the Westport Motel, strip-mall-driveup-stylee. It was, hands down, the dingiest motel I've ever stayed in that hasn't resulted in an enormous cockroach climbing across my face in the middle of the night. Not that I wasn't half-expecting it, mind.

So, I-95, you have defeated us yet again. I learned there's nothing like sleeping in a room that smells exactly like my favorite high school boyfriend's - years of stale cigarette smoke - to make waking up a singularly bizarre experience.

Of, course, Stuart one-upped me here. He aptly described our sheets as being old enough to vote.

passing through

A few days ago, we were sitting in Union Square watching the people go by when we got that sinking feeling of inevitability - someone with an earnestly outraged tee-shirt and a clipboard was heading RIGHT FOR US.

Guy With Earnest Tee-Shirt And Clipboard: "Hi, I'm with the Green Party, are you registered voters in this state?"

Stuart, in teeth-baringly friendly John-Cleese-Type Accent: "Oh, I'm TERRIBLY sorry, but we're just here on vacation."

I knew I married well. Now if I could just teach him to simply hang up on telemarketers.

from there to here

A few months back, I was head-hunted about a job at a foundation. Right before my trip to England, I went to the interviews, took the copy-editing test, and did my best. In the end, when the job was offered (while I was on vacation), I turned it down. Although the stability and organization of the work environment appealed to me, the job was essentially project-managing the creation of literature for the foundation and there was no writing involved. As a step, it wasn't up. It was sideways.

Two days after turning down the job and returning to my then-current job, my boss and I sat down for the conversation that led to my departure. It was scary but ultimately exhilirating, and I had a sneaking suspicion it was the right thing to do.

But in those scary moments, I couldn't believe - couldn't believe - that I had just turned down a job. My best friend, Erin, had this Bichon Frise, Niki. Niki was, like lots of Bichons, a big weenie. Every now and then, she'd run out the front door, euphoric at her triumphant escape from the house. Ten minutes later, she'd be at the back door, howling raggedly to be LET BACK IN WHERE IT'S SAFE.

I was Niki. I wanted to call the job that wasn't right for me and beg them to take me in, bring me in from the cold scary place where the signs are telling me to fucking make my own way, already, and do what I want to do.

This new job shouldn't need to confirm to me that I did the right thing, I'm doing the right thing. I should know that already and if you pressed me, I do. I know that each week it gets easier to sit down and write and that's a good thing. Each week my late-night freak-outs where I cry on Stuart get less frequent, and that's good, too. So I already knew I was on the right path.

But I wasn't expecting the right job, especially when I wasn't pounding pavement like a maniac looking for it yet. I was sending out a couple resumes a week, to only the jobs I wouldn't turn down, and this was one of them. Teaching, in an afterschool literacy program, for exactly the amount of time I was hoping to dedicate to something challenging and worthwhile. And then something challenging and worthwhile came along. And I start in September - the Powers That Be even granting me a few more weeks of intensive writing before I shift my schedule. It's difficult for me to believe, but it's what I need, exactly when I need it, just when I was worried I was asking too much.

For all my pragmatism (WHAT, it's IN there SOMEWHERE) there's a part of me that still firmly believes that if your goal is worthy, if you have a dream that you deserve and have earned, then what you need will come to you when you need it. The universe will conspire to help you, as Paulo Coehlo would put it. It's soppy as far as convictions go but I'm glad to keep hold of it for one more round at least.

And I'm glad I didn't run to the back door, howling for safety.

give yourselves a cookie

Do you know what's really nice?

You guys. I mean, you're niiiiiiiiiiiiiiice.

Isn't that a nice thing to hear on Friday? Well, it's true. You're all very nice. I wrote a very difficult, complicated and terrifying post about leaving my stable 9-to-5 job for a life of writing and worthwhile part-time work.

And do you know what you guys did? Go back and read it. You left me all these really wonderful, supportive comments about how you had every faith in me and that I'd find the right balance.

And you know, my parents, Stuart, my darling friends - they know me, and support every thing I do with enthusiasm and reality checks and glasses of wine toasted to new beginnings. I know them, and I can pay back to them my gratitude with my love and friendship every day, and I do. But I wanted to thank you, because you guys only know me from this medium, and yet you poured out your encouragement and ideas.

So, thank you. I have a lot to say about the new job but right now, there's a coffee and some writing in front of me.

Enjoy the cookie.

wherein I show you lots of pictures and sneakily bury the lede

Tonight we went on a long walk to dinner. We were headed for a Brazilian place on 36th Ave that we hadn't tried yet. On the way we talked about books, specifically, what Stuart finished reading today - Scott Westerfeld's Uglies. Then, we passed this sign. Right as we were talking about The Smoke. This is hilarious to you if you've read the books and nigh-incomprehensible if you haven't. I've weighed the pros and cons of sharing it with you regardless and decided to take that chance.

We laughed a lot and on the way back from dinner, I took a picture. It is quite possibly the dullest photograph I've ever taken but there you have it. I like to start off with small things, nothing too exciting or earth-shaking, just a funny literary joke.

The adorable dog brigade of Astoria was out in full force tonight. Every wide-eyed tail-wagging pup that could possibly tug on my puppy ovaries was out there doing its bit for the powerful Dog PR Machine. Also out in full force was the Old People Charm Me brigade, since on our way back to the apartment - laden with popcorn and soda for our movie night - the Italian-American Community of Queens was serenading the neighborhood in Athens Plaza with a snappy litle waltz, and boy, did the snappy OAPs come out to dance.

It was like watching one of those music box figurines, the way the whole crowd slowly but precisely waltzed around each other, not a dame or gent under 60 on that plaza. I must have looked crazy, grinning my face off at the shuffling dancers. Stuart could not be enticed to take me for a whirl but promises it was only a momentary lapse; at many other times in our life, he assures me, he will be able to lead onto a plaza and pretend we know how to waltz. Heck, maybe we'll even learn to waltz.

This next anecdote serves the purpose of making you feel better, you New Yorkers, who don't always take advantage of every single bitty free thing the city has to offer. On Monday night, I got to Bryant Park 45 minutes after the lawn opened for seating for their showing of Charade, and this is what faced me. By the time Stuart arrived at 7:45, I was getting sick of hearing the power-drunk security guard yell at people to STAY OUT OF EMERGENCY LANE as they bodily blocked people and thrust the sign in their faces. But I'd worked so hard to get us a halfway decent spot and Stuart had brought Chipotle!

So we sat down and ate. And then stared around. And then the conversation basically went:

"So, I just spent two hours here."
"Want to go home?"
"Totally."

So we did. We went home and played Book Lovers Trivial Pursuit and drank our Cabernet out of real wine glasses and not plastic cups, sitting in comfy chairs, and if we are old, then so be it, but I for one am willing to stand up and declare that Monday nights at my otherwise adored Bryant Park? Not worth it, peeps.

And this last picture, well, this was us tonight. As if Stuart's stellar professional review on Monday wasn't good news enough for the Brigouras household, today I got offered a job that I want, a part-time job that starts in September and is basically perfect for me - the right mixture of challenging and engaging and worthwhile, clocking in at 17 hours a week and netting me slightly above the minimum I decided I needed to earn from part-time work to contribute fairly to our household. Oh, yes, there was a good reason for dinner and a movie tonight, kids.

Details, as they say, to follow.

O, CANADA!

As if Canada hadn't given me enough blessings, now it's given me Slings & Arrows. Christ, Canada! You curse, on television, WHILST presenting me an entire SITCOM about SHAKESPEARE.

Canada, seriously, you spoil me. Is there anything I can do for you?

you want honest? here's honest

I woke up today full of leftover ennui from Wednesday. I don't know why. I wrote for three days this week, solid chunks of two to five hours writing. That's what I said I was going to do, wasn't it? I said I was going to enjoy these few months of paid vacation to write like hell and place my faith in the future, right?

On Wednesday, I wanted to take it all back. Nevermind that I'd just done what I said I was going to do. I felt like I hated it, hated every minute of slow and tedious creation and self-reliance. Thursday gave me a break with a slew of errands that couldn't wait any longer and Biscuit's lasik surgery to get him home from, plus dinner with friends in Chinatown. Thursday was a respite with things to do, to accomplish, outside the house.

Today, the crushing ennui and self-doubt, she is back for a special Friday appearance. I woke up with a house that needs some tending - nothing serious, dishes to do and clothes to put away. I had a light breakfast and stared at the new picture frames we ordered and realized they're all wrong, too many 2x3 openings and we don't have enough small pictures and talk about transferring emotions, but suddenly the effort to get those three picture frames filled and hung was like everything in my life - too complicated, too self-reliant, too creative.

I wasn't planning on filling and hanging the goddamned picture-frames today anyway. It was just the act of evaluating them that made me want to crawl into bed and sleep for another twelve hours. It's when I want to go bed right after I've woken up that I know I'm in trouble. Sleep is my ostrich-in-the-sand tactic.

Why do I want to do this to myself? Why did I agree with myself a few weeks (months?) ago on this crazy scheme? Why don't I just drop all this bullshit and go study to become a librarian so I can always have a job, sweet merciful employment complete with someone else telling me what to do? WHY?

Can I just give up and say nevermind, I don't want to be a writer, UNCLE. Can I fold? No, see, I can't fold. Because I've got all this pride that keeps me from folding, which is probably a good thing but I hate it right now, and I hate that I know what I have to do, which is be productive through the maelstorm of ennui and negativity and self-doubt. I have to keep saying to myself (and other concerned parties) that yes, I'm unemployed, and no, that's not the end of the world, and yes, I'm writing every day instead of working for someone else.

It'd help a little if I believed that was the best thing to do. It'd help if I didn't feel like I was letting everyone and myself down by switching gears this abruptly. It'd help if squeezing words out every day felt more satisfying than this, if they really erased the questions and the ostrich impulse.

I guess it'd help if I knew where this was taking me.

addendum: because I love all of you and don't want anyone to worry needlessly (especially those of you related to me), I figured I'd let you know I'm dragging this laptop and this brain to the Rose Reading Room and seeing if all the marble and intellect can calm my worried mind enough for those good rare words to slip out onto the page. Also, it gets me away from this apartment that I adore too much to pace around with this foul humor. All Big Questions will just have to wait.

monday

This is how I rewarded myself on this cool, gray afternoon for two hours spent writing. It may not sound like a lot but I didn't check my email once and I only got up a few times, to refresh a water glass or answer the phone [I only answer when I can just tell by telepathy that it's my parents calling].

So, the writing. It is going slowly, and well. I think it's like running - every day, your endurance for the quietness and concentration gets better. So last week had a lot of interruptions but a good solid six to eight hours over the course of the week. This week has started out better, and I'm proud of that. Because this is scary, you guys. Two months or so where my only obligation is to keep up my freelancing gigs and write, write, write? After this, I'll have to find part-time work and I accept and rejoice in that, but once I've made the decision to take this break as a godsend and write, well, damnit, that means I have to write like I've never written before and pray that the learning I'm doing will only benefit me along the way.

So today, I wrote and then gave myself a cup of tea and three cookies as a reward. I was also going to meet friends in Brooklyn for a Manu Chao concert but the skies, they are threatening and heavy with rain.

Which means I should move my caboose and get to the grocery store - why ruin the quiet satisfaction of a day well spent by ordering takeout? No, no - it's tacos [recipe being swiped from Deb] and guacamole for us. Now if I just had confidence that I could pick out avocados to save my life. Oh, well, one life lesson at a time.

Today's life lesson: tea is better with cookies.

G, D7, C, G ...

"What are we going to do today?" is the game we played today from 2:45 to 3:30 PM. After a lazy morning of breakfast and reading and video games, I was restless for something new and exciting that didn't require I leave the house unless it was to get somewhere quickly and air-conditioned, or cost a lot of money. Plus, it had to be fun and entertaining. Those were my parameters - Stuart's parameters were sort of whatever made me happy since I wouldn't stop whining about how bored I was. Some of the suggestions bandied about were:

"Let's go buy stuff at Toys R Us."
"We'd just spend loads of money."

"Let's play guitar."
"No."

"Let's go to Home Depot."
"And build a man with a helmet for a head and oven mitts full of toilet paper for hands and we'll put him on the roof and knock him down by throwing things at him."
"We're out of toilet paper."

"Let's build a robot."
"We'd need a brain. We don't have any."

"Let's go to the Queens Museum."
"Too far."

"Let's go to McCann's and play Trivial Pursuit."
"We don't need to go to McCann's to play a game and drink $80 worth of alcohol."
"Mmm, $80 worth of alcohol ...."

"Let's go rollerblading."
"In September."

"Let's make fake flyers selling nonsensical stuff and plaster them around Astoria."
"And hand them to people!"

Oddly enough, after all that time, what we ended up doing was taking the guitars down and tuning them. I've never tuned my guitar before. It was actually my guitar for three years before I gave it to my brother having learned nothing but a badly-played Silent Night, and my brother learned the entire 1960's worth of songs before moving on to three electric guitars (I'm telling you, some people just have muscial talent and some of us don't). Since he has three electric guitars, he gave me back my roundback acoustic Applause and it's mostly sat there, looking reproachfully at me from the wall.

So then, after tuning them, I learned how to play Hey Jude and I've Just Seen A Face. I've Just Seen a Face has my favorite chord of all time - the E Minor, which I refer to as the Leonard Cohen Chord because it's so morose. And Hey Jude has this sweet little switch between D7 and C that I mastered surprisingly quickly, okay, when you think about it, it's not that hard, but SMALL HANDS HERE. There's even some snippets of a recording of me singing both songs and trying to be quick about those chord changes - not that you'll ever get to listen to it. Well, maybe you, Mom.

My left three first fingers are numb. So that's what I did today. You?

damn those glass slippers

I have a tiny piece of glass in my foot, the outer rim of my left foot, to be precise. Stuart checked it yesterday, trying to pull it out with tweezers, but it's either too small or too deep.

I'm of the opinion that it should be haughtily ignored until it decides to stop being such an immature brat and comes out of my foot on its own, preferably shamefacedly. This popular doctrine of "Ignore It Until It Goes Away", however, might have its downsides.

Like, I might lose a foot.

So, anyone have any advice? Experience? Suggested means of extraction? Magic crystals that'll do it for me because I'm such a HUGE pansy about pain?

feminism(s)

I've been thinking a lot about BlogHer, which was this past weekend, because I said last year that I wanted to attend some day, and although this year passed me by, I've got my sight set on next year and a certain roomie.

Although I liked looking at the pretty pictures and being jealous of Amalah's perfect hair and everyone's huge cameras and omg Ariel's shoes, what I've most enjoyed is how the experience seems to really make these amazing women step back and look at themselves, at their blogs, at their roles in this still-very-much-male-dominated society and see how these things are interacting, are interconnected.

On that note, Susie Bright's post from August 1st about her impressions of the conference have made an absolutely enormous impression on me. I read it twice, seeing connections and implications that I had only hazily imagined in the more Sarah-Lawrence-esque moments of reflection. And it reminds me that although I usually play down the importance of this blog in my life, especially when explaining (or, more often, defending) the concept to non-bloggers, it's changed my life for the better.

Everyone should read that post. And, while you're at it, this one, too. Feminisms, indeed.

powerless

I got about an hour, total, of sleep last night, because our A/C didn't work and it was 87 degrees in our apartment. Stuart woke me up at 5:45 AM because I was burning up to the touch, and I buckled a little when standing up. I was getting dehydrated.

He poured water into me and took me to the diner for food and air conditioning. On the way, we stopped into Trade Fair for a huge bottle of water for me, and I nearly started crying because the cold air was such a relief, reminding me so much of bed and how tired I was.

Now he's off to work on not much more sleep than I have, and I've come home to an almost completely powerless apartment - barely any lights, no wireless (sorry, guy that I'm borrowing this from) and just the charge left on my computer battery.

I need to sleep but I'm not sure how I'm going to without a fan. I promised Stuart that I would drink gallons of water. I'm too tired and exhausted to leave the house for someplace more air-conditioned.

And there are more news vans than Con Ed ones on my totally powerless street.

Update: I may just have gotten interviewed by Channel 4, hanging out my window desperate for some air when the power went away completely. It's back now, at least the low voltage is, but the A/C is still a no-go.

*whimper*

Update: It's BACK, sweet baby jesus it's back. I can sleep now. Sleeeeeeeep.