I am having one of those days. You wake up and realize-it's one of those days. One of those days where you feel your hair is on fire and your skin is too tight. Where your shorts aren't sitting right and lemonade just isn't quenching. Where I'm angry at orange for being entirely too orange.

It's rare that I feel like this. Except for bouts of pretty big blues, I don't tend to get too upset about things. I generally don't get angry and I am one of those consumate morning people that everyone hates-I wake up feeling a-OK, thank you very much, how are you? But every so often, the bad mood just seeps in, and there's nothing I can do to keep it at bay.

One of those days.

I feel trapped in my job-despite managers telling me I have an impressive CV and that I am bright and able (FUCK bright and able), nothing seems to be a good fit. I feel hideously trapped and de-motivated. I have stopped caring, even a little bit. I have started looking outside the company, but mindful of the time when I was laid off, I am unwilling to jump into something that could lead to redundancies should the going get rough.

Life would be better if I had a vineyard. I could stomp on a lot of grapes, that'd be good. Rewarding and tremendously messy, all at the same time.

The study is reaching the finish line in being complete, but the PC is in bits all over the floor and the place looks like a bomb went off in a library-there are books and fucking maps all over the place. I feel like I should tie a rope around my waist to get in there. The study was hard enough in its re-building-I love Angus mightily and swear he's the man for me, but home improvement projects? They really try our relationship. Angus often looks at me and states, with a sanctimonious pencil over one ear: "Do you want this done half-ass, or do you want it done right?" One of these days I'm going to throw the paintbrush/screwdriver/pencil/planer on the ground and scream: "I want to do things half-ass! I love half-ass! I think half-ass is FANTASTIC!"

Or maybe not.

Maybe I should try to get a job in the Play-Doh factory. I could not only try to build the world's largest yellow Play-Doh yeti, I could also smell like fabulous Play-Doh.

I found a long gray hair this morning. I've previously battled with one short gray one that I have to pluck every once in a while, but this time, the little one is back and it brought reinforcements. A long. Gray. Hair.

Jesus H. Christ, time is marching on and it's doing it all over my body.

Nothing feels like it's getting any closer, they're all baskets of half-full dreams. I feel like there should be some kind of tonic I can drink supplied by Acme, some kind of blinding Lucille Ball moment that'll crack me out of this mood, but so far? Nothing. It's times like this I wish I could wander around and speak in a Spanish accent-"¡dios del oh! ¡un qué día de mierda horrible!". I would slap my hat against my leg, shaking my head feebly. Somehow, if I could speak Spanish and not resort to Babelfish for my examples, it would feel better.

Eh, fuckit.

There's always alcohol.

-H.

Posted by: Everydaystranger at 10:02 AM | Comments (12) | Add Comment
Post contains 586 words, total size 3 kb.

Gorby and Edward Scissorhands would've been great mates.

He hates the sawdust from the planer (and no, before you call PETA on me, he was nowhere near the planer, and never would be. Our little man, who has 1,000 toys and whose nose we religiously sunblock near power tools? Never.)

He also thriftily takes care of the fallen apples on the lawn.

We have the best dog ever.

-H.

Posted by: Everydaystranger at 07:12 PM | Comments (7) | Add Comment
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My mobile always has to have specialized ring tones. Has to. The handset I'm currently using doesn't because it's a trial handset, but I get a new phone next week to dick around with, so I'll be putting special tones on it.

And at Christmas I'm one of those people that you love to hate-I have Christmas songs as ring tones, and my SMS notification is a jingling bell. I LOVE Christmas.

Snow Patrol's "How to be Dead" is my general ring tone.

When my managers ring (and they are listed in my phone book as "Dickhead I", "Dickhead II", and "Half-Ass"), the theme song from "The Godfather" comes up (I couldn't find the theme to "Wicked Witch of the West", which somehow felt more appropriate.)

When Angus rings, it typically plays "Tainted Love", but I'm getting tired of that one.

And my project managers? When they ring it plays Schroeder's piano theme from Charlie Brown.

I like to know who's calling at all times, which doesn't really compute, as 75% of the time I don't answer the phone anyway.

************************************

I bounce around the house. My work laptop is making groaning screaming pains of agony. Angus (aka the Best Help Desk Ever) is dilligently trying to get it to work but hope is slim.

"Did you know that your work pc only has 256MB of memory?" he asks.

I stop bouncing.

"That's not very much, huh?" I reply.

He looks up at me.

"I have this Blondie song in my head," I say cocking my head. This is not unusual, I often have a song in my head, only I hate Blondie. "I can't understand what she's saying though," I add, mostly because Blondie often sounds as though she had the tendons holding her jaws together removed. I am so desperate to know what it is I hum it for him. "Do you know what she's saying in that song?"

He stares at me. "I don't know, I don't know of any Blondie songs where she sounds like she's in so much pain."

************************************

One of my colleagues and I are sitting through a presentation on the coming state of things in the company. Things are looking as though we are going to be working at 150% until the rest of my natural life, or at least through those quality years when all of my pubes are still dark.

Peter looks dazed at the content on the slides.

He leans over to me and whispers, "Jesus, Helen, what do you think?"

I keep my eyes straight ahead but bite my lip. "Do you think that when ants broadcast the news every evening they report the amount of ants killed per day? Like a little Walter Cronkite ant straightens his antenna and looks at the camera, shuffling his papers, and says: 'Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. Today 3,595,056,679 ants were killed. And in further news, Farmer Ted's grain is in, the rave is all set for tonight!'?"

Peter looks at me. "I think you need to take a few days off."

I nod, somehow unsatisfied with his answer.

************************************

Our local delivery man stops by-he delivers a box I had ordered from Lang. I squeal with girly glee and race upstairs to show Angus.

"Look!" I shout. "It arrived!"

He grins. Internet commerce is big in this house. "What have you bought?"

I rip open the box to show him 12 Christmas ornaments and a new 2007 calendar I bought. I rip open the packages and exclaim with such joy you'd think I'd won the lottery. "Look, look!" I shout, holding the tin ornaments in my hand. "Aren't they pretty?"

"Helen," Angus says patiently. "It's July. It's currently 35 degrees-(that's 95 to those in the F land)-outside. Why are you buying Christmas ornaments?"

I look up, my legs folded under me like a monkey. "Christmas is 5 months away," I explain, looking at him as though he's lost his mind. "I like to be prepared. You know, like when GI Joe attends a Barbie tupperware party."

************************************

One of my project managers has his revised project plan on the whiteboard, and he is walking us through it.

I bury my head in my hands.

"You don't like it, H?" he asks.

"Dude, your project plan is such a disaster the Red Cross wouldn't give it a blanket," I reply.

************************************

I walk down the tube hallways to the Jubilee Line, which leads me to my therapist (all roads lead to therapy). My long boho skirt drifts around my legs and the heat of the day hasn't penetrated into the tube station yet. People are rushing around in a hurry, jostling and stressing for whatever meetings mark their Outlook calendars and their minds. I pass a young man busking in the station, a guitar strung around his neck. He is singing "Mad World" in a clear and perfect voice-it's one of my favorite songs and he's doing it justice. I flip 50p into the hat at his feet. He stops playing and smiles at me.

"Thanks," he says, smiling.

"No worries," I reply. I smile back and remember the words a busker once told me. "Take it easy. We're all looking for a new god."

************************************

The fan is blowing cool air over us, but the sheen of the night is such that it's still too hot to spoon together. It's too hot to move, too hot to canoodle, too hot to touch.

From out of the dark comes Angus' voice. "There's a whole series of coincidences, some of them very small, that led to me meeting you. If just one of them had changed, I wouldn't have met you today."

"So you do believe in destiny?" I ask, smiling.

"No. I believe in coincidences," he replies.

"And are they good coincidences?" I query.

"Yes," he says kindly. "I am very, very fortunate."

And so he touched me anyway.

-H

PS-Houstonites and Dallasites, can I get a little help? Angus' brother is in Houston and Dallas in two weeks and is looking for a good camera store with staff who have a clue and decent prices. Angus and his brothers are looking for a specific lens, which they're having problems getting over here. Can a Houstonite/Dallasite recommend a good camera shop?

Posted by: Everydaystranger at 09:23 AM | Comments (9) | Add Comment
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Our house has been going through DIY lately.

The study is ongoing. It's been painted and now hand-built bookshelves are going up to accommodate our many books. Angus and I had the bright idea to build bookshelves on either side of the massive brick fireplace, so we went to a reclamation yard and bought 100 year-old floorboards to use as bookshelves.

It has taken more work than I thought it would.

We had to cut them to size (Angus did that with a big scary saw-I won't use the thing. I totally admit that men and women can use this big scary saw, I'm just saying that this woman refuses to use the thing. That fucker has "spread peanut butter on the pb&j sandwich using a prosthetic hand" written all over it.) Then the wood had to be planed. And planed again. And sanded-3 times. Then waxed.

We are nearly at the waxing stage, then we can hang them up this weekend.

Angus thoughtfully took pictures of me planing the wood.

As you can see, work clothes for me are diaphonous T-shirts and boxer shorts.

We all did take some time now and then to chill out and avoid the heat.

The kitchen has been re-painted. Again, we're only keeping the kitchen another few months before it all gets ripped out and the extension goes in, so we can afford to be a little wacky with the color, since we don't have to live with it forever. We are pleased that the whole kitchen is coming out-the work surface is tiled-TILED-with dark beige tiles that somehow always look unclean to me, no matter how much I clean.

The green in the pictures doesn't reflect it 100%-it's a bit darker than it's showing up here. As I painted it, I went from calling it to "Motherfucking Green" to "Frog in a Blender" to "Carmen Miranda Called and Wants Her Color Back".

(Seriously, I have no idea where those boxers came from. They were in one of my boxes from Sweden, and as my work wear at home consists of boxers and a T-shirt, they seemed to fit.)

I now call the kitchen color "Kermit the Frog Ejaculation".

I think it fits.

-H.

Posted by: Everydaystranger at 10:00 AM | Comments (9) | Add Comment
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1 Hmmm. If the color is Kermit the Frog Ejaculate, does your kitchen smell like Miss Piggy? Just curious.

Posted by: Victor at July 27, 2006 12:42 PM (L3qPK)

2 If that's what it is, then Kermit could ejaculate on my kitchen walls at any time. I love that color (albeit any color green is good for me).

Posted by: kenju at July 27, 2006 12:56 PM (2+7OT)

3 In the trend of Kermit: it's not easy being green!

Posted by: Hannah at July 27, 2006 01:03 PM (5w+E2)

4 Should you two really be wearing flip flops around a saw? I'm just sayin.

Posted by: statia at July 27, 2006 01:59 PM (NsnoE)

5 I was thinking kermit the frog.... more like kermit in a blender though. But I do like the color.

Posted by: caltechgirl at July 27, 2006 04:03 PM (bM7x1)

6 oh, what fun! i can't wait to delve into home ownership and the freedom to color my walls in whatever animal ejaculation i choose! the picture of angus and your pup chillin in the shade is too cute for words.

Posted by: kat at July 27, 2006 06:26 PM (xJGrF)

7 Reminds me of a joke, H. What do you have when you have two small green balls in the palm of your hand? Kermit the forg's undivided attention. Haven't thought of that one in about 20 years. Thanks for the reminder.

Posted by: RP at July 27, 2006 08:02 PM (LlPKh)

8 D'oh. Kermit the FROG, of course. I have no idea what a forg is.

Posted by: RP at July 27, 2006 08:03 PM (LlPKh)

9 lmao @ Victor's comment.

Posted by: Dana at July 28, 2006 11:28 PM (uXuyq)

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Julian grabbed Margot and looked deeply into her eyes.

"How could you jump ship and swim through shark infested waters?"

Margot looked up at Julian through limpid pools of blue. "My darling! I thought you were dead! I decided to fling myself into the saltwater crystalline waters to take me to my watery grave to be with you!"

His hands dug into her silky smooth shoulders. "Don't lie to me, you whore! You went looking for Marco Fredrik!"

Margot looked shocked. "I could never love another man! I love you! Only you! It's your eyes I love, your rippling chest I adore, your throat I kiss! I can never look on another man but you!"

"He's my identical twin brother!" Julian snarled.

Margot bit her lip. "He doesn't have your sense of humor?"

Julian ground his groin cock Woody Woodpecker big mama slamma jamma member against her. "You're mine, you harlot! Mine!"

Margot's bottom lip swelled with desire. "Take me! Take me now!"

Julian ripped Margot's bodice right open.

"Now hang on a minute! That was my best bodice! My best bodice from PARIS!"

"Oh, I'm terribly sorry. I just got caught up in the moment darling, I-"

"No, I'm sorry. I over-reacted-"

"Are you sure? I-"

"No, I'm silly. Come on, come roger me senseless darling."

Julian threw her to the bed and stood over her hungrily, the shadow from the lantern behind hm outlining his body like a Viking. "I am going to prove you're mine now," he whispered hungrily, as he descended upon her soft and molded peachy flesh.

Yeah, OK. So I can't write romance. I never claimed to be able to walk on water or anything, so there you go.

What prompted this? The other day, while painting the kitchen, Danielle Steele's Secrets came on, a made for TV movie. I didn't change the channel as we only have terrestrial on that TV, not satellite (and I know that doesn't get any sympathy-My 32-inch plasma screen only has terrestrial in the kitchen, unlike the 42-inch in the lounge! Wah!) So I kept it on.

It was fantastic. Big hair, lots of people slapping each other, shoulder pads, and above all? Gold lamé . Lots and lots of gold lamé. I have no idea what the plot was about but all that sleeping around and lurking was fucking perfect.

I've never been a real fan of romance novels. I don't really see the point-it's usually about a woman who's Weak But Strong, i.e. she's a delicate little flower with big blue eyes and a waist you could set your beer in, who is all helpless and shit until the perfect moment comes, then she defeats the Huns/kills the pirates/overthrows a kingdom. Of course, along the way is a shifty-eyed hunk of burning love who rides great big stallions, has great big constantly rippling muscles, talks in a husky voice and has a dong the size of New Mexico, and loves only her, despite some point in the book being about him doubting her and her fidelity (that WHORE!)

I read a few of Julie Garwood's books, which I could get behind. I remember one heroine was particularly clumsy, and that appealed. A chick who falls flat on her face and yet wins Big Schlong Richard? Sign me up. I read a few of them, then they promptly lost appeal. Formulas do my head in.

I don't read romance novels.

But I do have to confess-I read Diana Gabaldon's Outlander series, which depending on the bookseller is listed either as "romance" or "historical fiction". I started reading the series from the beginning many years ago (think of my first marriage and go north of that, and you'll have when I read the first one, called "Outlander" in the States and "Dragonfly in Amber" here.) I have re-read them many times, which is a rarity for me.

It's the story of an English nurse named Claire who falls through a time gate in the 1940's and lands smack in 1740's Jacobite Scotland (because that happens all the time. Totally realistic.) She's an average chick with a big arse who falls in love with the hunk o' burning Scot named Jamie. Claire is a tough fiesty lass that isn't put off by poo, blood, gore, or the average bear. Jamie is a chap who makes loads of mistakes and seems to have sex and honor pretty permanently on the brain, yet somehow he's a likeable character, someone real, someone who you would want to throw you to the ground and ravage you senseless. Claire and Jamie are broke most of the time, he's always getting smashed up somehow, and it seems like at any given moment they're riding into danger, away from danger, rutting like pigs, or being hunted by people that think rape is a national pasttime.

I should hate this kind of book.

Instead, I love it.

I have found I skip over the parts that I call "throbbing member". The slushy romance in the books, the trip and put the hot pulsating tumescent dick in the woman? Not my cup of tea anymore. The series is excellent, although the one I just finished-"The Fiery Cross" was a real slog. I didn't like that one and am pleased it's finally done, and luckily I've moved on to the next one "A Breath of Snow and Ashes", which so far I am enjoying.

I don't know what it means that I like this one series of books. They're well-written (except I have found two mistakes, which I wouldn't have noticed when I first read them. One is when Claire uses an Americanism in the first book that she'd never have used concerning the game Monopoly (and as I've now played the English version of it, I get the error), the other is when the author has a Swedish character who speaks only in German. As someone that speaks Swedish, these things stand out to me.), full of history, and I have to be honest-they're interesting. I actually like the characters of Jamie and Claire.

I like this romance line.

I hang my head in shame.

I also have the hots for Jamie.

I charge my rabbit up for that one.

-H.

Posted by: Everydaystranger at 09:57 AM | Comments (18) | Add Comment
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1 As an engineer and a strong woman, I don't usually go for romance novels either. However, I've been reading that series for a while, too. I started Outlander when I was going through my divorce and am on the 8th (or so) re-reading of the entire series. Somehow it never gets old. Whenever things get downright crappy, I haul it out and lose myself in Jamie. I admit it, I have a thing for big men with blue eyes...

Posted by: wicked at July 26, 2006 11:52 AM (WOOQd)

2 I admit it. I love romance novels. Though I love when the characters have depth, I'm not above reading formulas. I have a thing for series that end up having 4 friends and 4 different books about them. Bad thing about romance novels is when it gets thrown in your face by your husband in the middle of a fight...

Posted by: jadewolff at July 26, 2006 12:20 PM (cH5GO)

3 I'm sorry, but I hate romance novels - probably for all the same reasons you've suggested. I only regularily read one author, and that's just because she is a family friend who is published (8 books so far) and writes in that genre. I feel obligated to read them, you know? Other than that, the closest I come to romance is J.D. Robb and that's just 'cause they are sci-fi/detective with the romance not quite so blatent. (Okay, I like Roark, sue me...). Ahem... as I was saying...

Posted by: sue at July 26, 2006 02:46 PM (WbfZD)

4 Hi there! I love the Outlander books too, and have re-read them many times. Don't know what that says about us... I'm a Claire-like person (gardening, healing) without the redhaired hunk following me through Scotland. Sigh. "Outlander" and "Dragonfly in Amber" are two separate books ... the good news is that this may mean you've missed one of them and have a fresh new book to read.

Posted by: lambchop at July 26, 2006 03:11 PM (0bhhP)

5 You had me laughing up until the "changing of the rabbit". What does that mean?

Posted by: kenju at July 26, 2006 04:07 PM (2+7OT)

6 I have never understood the way people denigrate the romance novel. Ive done it sometimes but never really understood it. I think there are a lot of really good authors out there - Quick/Krentz, Phillips, etc. who write real-life people into their books, with problems everyone has. The "typical" romance novel has too-pretty characters with problems few people actually have. Once I found myself denigrating these novels precisly because the women were so "helpless" i wanted to smack them. And my bf said "Youre right, god forbid they dont write realistic woman into a fantasy novel." So I learned not to denigrate the novel while deciding that most of the romantic fantasies in them were not my particular ideal. God, that sounded pompous. Anyway, there's plenty of fine days you can find me curled up with a "Nora" wishing I didnt have to get off the couch to fetch my rabbit.

Posted by: That Girl at July 26, 2006 04:33 PM (oT4a3)

7 Um... changing of the rabbit is something they do in England, kind of like changing of the guard.

Posted by: Jen at July 26, 2006 04:54 PM (V45OB)

8 Always preferred noir novels for sex anyway. "She came at me like a slug from a .45. I barely had time to put my drink on the desk before she launched herself into me, sending my swivel chair into the radiator behind me" "Her lips were as hot as the grill at the downstairs diner, her hair draping over me like the bead curtains separating the "adult" section from the rest of the video store." Or something.

Posted by: Z at July 26, 2006 05:08 PM (ceOV5)

9 I just started reading Outlander. I'm only 2-1/2 chapters in, but so far so good!

Posted by: Melissa at July 26, 2006 05:15 PM (B3YpC)

10 This is my all time favorite series! I too am madly in love with Jamie!

Posted by: grace at July 26, 2006 06:08 PM (RM/z9)

11 I believe the lady said "charging up her rabbit", rather than changing it.... TMI, babe. TMI. I too am a fan of the Outlander books, despite LOATHING romance novels. I once found them in the Science Fiction section (the time-travelling, ya'know)

Posted by: caltechgirl at July 26, 2006 06:09 PM (/vgMZ)

12 Caltech Girl had it-"charge up the rabbit", as in "put extra batteries in the vibrator, lube up and dream of bodice ripping". Hey man-to each their own. And Lambchop, you're right-I had the titles wrong. "Outlander" and "Crossstitch" are the same books, only titled differently in different continents.

Posted by: Helen at July 26, 2006 09:31 PM (L2EWJ)

13 I like romance novels such as "Wuthering Heights" and my all time favorite, "Pride & Prejudice". Anything Jane Austen really. My MIL is the most conservative, proper, and really closed minded person I know. Imagine my surprise years ago when I found out she reads the cheap, tacky romance novels. The ones with Fabio on the cover and shit. I have never looked at her the same again-I think it was the day I began to respect her. ;-)

Posted by: Teresa at July 26, 2006 10:38 PM (f+o6m)

14 I used to love the romance novels of the 40's and 50's - my favorite all time author was Daphne DuMaurier......her novel, "The Loving Spirit" was one of my favorite all time books. Of course, when I read them I was much younger, but I never forgot them.

Posted by: suze at July 27, 2006 12:52 AM (6+DPO)

15 I've always been fond of romance novels that aren't listed as romance but are, nonetheless. Elizabeth Peters is one good example— her Vicky Bliss novels are mysteries, naturally, but they're only half a degree removed from romance (and have no awkwardly-described sex scenes.) For pure romance, I love Georgette Heyer, though she may be too tame for you. (Regency romances, no bodice-ripping. However, she actually has original plots.) And I've never read her, but I have a MALE friend who is very much into science ficiton who read books by Virginia Farmer after striking up a conversation with her and was utterly shocked to find out how good they were. Okay, he's gay. But he still is very much into the guy books.

Posted by: B. Durbin at July 27, 2006 03:52 AM (tie24)

16 I'm about to start the third novel in the series, it seems I'm a bit behind the curve.

Posted by: Donna at July 27, 2006 05:37 AM (Aanzg)

17 I think my mom recommended that series once, but I usually avoid the true "romance" books. From time to time I'll read stuff by Katie McAllister, mostly because she's just plain fun. I really liked the Corset Diaries, for example - the character seemed fairly real. Still, sometimes I get the feeling that all the authors do is add a new name and hair color and voila! one has a main character.

Posted by: Hannah at July 27, 2006 08:08 AM (5w+E2)

18 Add me to the list. Jamie? HOT. I waited until just a few years ago to read Outlander, and I loved it so much I read the next few books immediately after it. Fiery Cross was a snooze fest, but Snow & Ashes is much, much better. I really need to go back and read them again while I wait for the next in the series. Did you know there is a branch off series with the gay guy as the focus? I haven't read them, but they might be interesting. Mmmmm... Jamie.

Posted by: Christine at July 28, 2006 04:45 AM (g5yVi)

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When I was a little girl airplanes were a regular part of my life. With an Air Force pilot for a father I was guaranteed to have a life full of airplanes, everything from the model arplanes placed throughout the house to the pilot paraphernalia that came with having a pilot in the house-there was always something around that had my dad on it. His dark green flight suits, his silver pens that tucked into the chest pocket just so. His dog tags were usually on the dresser, and I used to touch them with wonder-they felt so thiin and flimsy and yet had so much information-my dad's name, his social security number, his blood type and the words "Roman Catholic" on them. I remember the velcro name badges and various labels and medals, small colored bars that got tagged onto the chest. He had a special medal in a special case that he never wore, and we never really talked about. He got it in Vietnam, and I never knew why he got it or what it was because he wouldn't talk about it-the war was an off-limits subject.

So yes, airplanes were a major part of my life. My mother later trained pilots, and my father is now not only a retired Lt. Colonel in the USAF, he's also an airline pilot for a major airline (no, I don't get to fly free. I don't even fly this company, they don't tend to go to where I want to get to and aren't in my frequent flier clubs I subscribe to.)

The irony is that they'd give rise to someone who's not keen on flying but who does it a lot anyway is not lost on me.

One of the main aspects of being the child of a pilot was that we went to a lot of airshows. I don't really remember a lot about them, I just remember that there were always airshows. Because my memory is a bt perforated and our history a bit blurred, the settings of the airshows sometimes play havoc in my timelines. Sometimes in my mind I see my parents there, my sister in an orange stroller. Once I remember deep, painful tension and a woman with dark hair. Mostly, I remember crystal blue skies and the sounds that come with airshows, of engines and afterburn and, years later, of sonic booms.

The highlight for me was always the Thunderbirds. Being an Air Force brat, the Thunderbirds were the best. It didn't matter that the Navy's Blue Angels had the reputation of being the best acrobatic pilots in the world, to me the Thunderbirds were the penultimate in grace and ability. I remember them screaming overhead, the display of agility pricking the back of the eyelids. I remember feeling my voice box explode in the space of my throat as sound of the engines caught up with me, and I would whip my head around, trying to see where the got to.

I don't have many pictures from my past, but I did find this one of the Canadian Snowbirds, taken when I was about 6 years old.

We had whole books of airplane pictures, and I wonder what happened to them.

My father flew C-141s, among others. Even as a little girl, I went with my brownie troop to see one (yes I was a brownie. Shut up. Sometimes, there are good little girls, too.)

That's me in the front row on the right. In the ridiculous brownie outfit (yes, I am wearing a dress and trousers. Back then, it was ok, it was the norm.) And a bow in the hair. I had no idea then that years later I would look back and wonder what was up with the polyester.

My life now is a lot less about seeing airplanes now than in being a passenger, hoping for an upgrade. Angus and his brothers are keen on airplanes though (specifically the older ones, like Spitfires and Lancasters, and in their heart of hearts they all want their own Vickers VC10). Our home now is just a skip away from Farnborough, which hosts a massive air show every other year (alternating between Paris and Farnborough). This year was the year to be here-Farnborough Airport is very near us but is pretty exclusively used by those with money-private Lear jets park there, as does a Saudi plane from time to time.

Airshows, whether as a little girl or as an adult, tend to make their way through my life. Airplanes take me to places, and away from them. Jet trails across the sky are as normal to me as the freckles across my nose and the scar on my knee. I found airshows to be a bit distressing-the last time I saw the Thunderbirds we were at a Target in North Carolina. My mother, sister and I got out of the car in the parking lot and watching them, perched on the hood of the car. They flew overhead and we all spent a moment remembering the military life, the stability of employment, the instability of location. I took a moment to remember a way of life lost, a sense of self bottled up.

Then we went about our business.

Airshows to me were about the past, and up until recently (thank you, Couch Man), the past was something to be avoided at all fucking costs. Things from the past were unanimously labelled as "Ugly" and filed away in some inner part of me that I have no access to. But things don't always have to be ugly, and they certainly don't need to be filed away (filing = bad).

Sometimes, the past can be something to smile over.

So for the past week airplanes have been flying overhead. We can hear a sturdy drone of a Rolls engine powering something overhead. One of Angus' brothers called yesterday to see if they could go see the airshow from a local vantage point. Angus asked me if I wanted to go, and I smiled and said no. I stayed home on the comfort of the couch and plowed through a book that's been troubling me. I heard the planes overhead and went outside to watch them-there, spiralling overhead were the RAF Red Arrows, the English Thunderbirds. Angus came back with some killer pictures of them.

I watched them from the garden and smiled as they flew overhead, that familiar feeling of my throat large, my neck whipped.

And I dug into a photo album I have and found a picture of me and my dad. My dad is wearing his pilot's jumpsuit, and I sit on his lap, my 7 year-old front teeth missing and my face scraped from a playground accident (I was playing tag and I turned to look behind me to see if the pursuer was behind me. I had conveniently forgotten there was a bench in front of me, and I tripped over it, skidding on my face. To this day, when I cry you can see the marks where I tore my face.)

I took that picture out, and for the first time in a long time, the past did not equal ugly.

I realized that although parts of me are fucked up and horrible, that although things hurt and scab and scar, I have had some incredible things in my life. It's something special to have a pilot for a dad. It's something special to have someone teach you the aerodynamics of an airplane wing, to know how it is the wind picks up a plane and carries it on. To have been able to see so many jets, to have Sunday mornings of sonic booms-not a lot of people can maybe claim that. Instead of running, this part of me is something that I can look into the blue skies and feel good about.

I watched the Red Arrows, and made peace with the airplanes of my past, and the airplanes of my today.

Thanks, Dad.

-H.

Posted by: Everydaystranger at 10:04 AM | Comments (13) | Add Comment
Post contains 1358 words, total size 8 kb.

1 Great pics (yay, Angus) and two good ones of you in 2 posts. Your dad looked sooooo young there, almost too young to have you already. Nice post, Helen.

Posted by: kenju at July 24, 2006 12:16 PM (2+7OT)

2 Heck, forget the VC10. If you're going to have the money for your own plane, this is the one to have: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PBY_Catalina Especially if you want to go island hopping.

Posted by: Z. Hendirez at July 24, 2006 12:35 PM (ceOV5)

3 Yup, Angus got some great pictures. But the one of you and your dad, I loved that one. What a smile you got.

Posted by: RP at July 24, 2006 03:08 PM (LlPKh)

4 Your father looks nothing like I was picturing in my head. Could we get some more family pictures please?

Posted by: SaraJane at July 24, 2006 03:27 PM (t5Xsa)

5 You look like your dad abs x

Posted by: abs at July 24, 2006 03:41 PM (pejJ8)

6 What great back to back photos- a then and now perspective. Sweet and oh so Helen!

Posted by: Marie at July 24, 2006 04:32 PM (PQxWr)

7 h... that is one happy grin remember it!

Posted by: stinkerbell at July 24, 2006 05:56 PM (p6odB)

8 That last picture is too cute. I remember those brownie outfits. Ugh. So glad I was never in scouts. I have other bad polyester uniform pictures, though, from other things.

Posted by: caltechgirl at July 24, 2006 06:17 PM (/vgMZ)

9 My grandfather was a radar operator in P-61 Black Widows during WWII. Dad would have joined the Air Force if not for allergies and asthma--he joined the Army instead (Viet Nam era.) So I grew up with air shows, and fly-ins, too. Dad likes the classic WWII planes the most. P-51 Mustangs. T6es. B-17s, B-19s, B-24s, B-29s. We, too, have photo albums upon photo albums with close-ups of the planes we've seen. Not just the planes, but the flour bomb explosions. When I'm back on the West Coast, which is becoming more and more rare, Dad and I go flying. He flies small planes as a hobby, renting a few hours to keep his pilot's license up to date until his own dream machine is restored. And I usually don't admit this, but there was a time when I swore up and down I'd be an Air Force pilot, or at least one of the aeronautical engineers who designed planes. Thanks for the memories.

Posted by: Marian at July 24, 2006 07:50 PM (A4ZL6)

10 I live in Vegas and Nellis AF Base is where the Thunderbirds are stationed when they aren't in air shows. My dad was in the Navy and I grew up going to 1000 different air shows and now my husband drags me to as many as I'll agree to go to. His personal favorite are the WWII reenactments which are kinda fun. BTW, I still have my brownie AND Girl Scout uniforms complete with badges.

Posted by: Tif at July 25, 2006 05:02 AM (rray8)

11 What a wonderful post. I'm glad to see you exploring the happy times. (I must confess that I also drag my kids to the airshow every so often.)

Posted by: ~Easy at July 25, 2006 12:13 PM (lSF29)

12 With my dad, it was firetrucks, and still is to this day. I spent countless hours in the firehouse as a kid, and raced to many a fire in the car with him. Today, I balk at the suggestion of having my wedding reception in a firehouse, or arriving at my wedding on a firetruck. Hopefully someday, like you, I'll look back and appreciate my dad's obsession with firetrucks.

Posted by: geeky at July 25, 2006 02:01 PM (ziVl9)

13 Nice post. Hubs has always loved the planes, even tho' he was in the navy. Go figure. We've taken the kids in younger years to many an air show... You were (and still are) such a cutie! Oh, and I, was a blue bird first as they didn't have scouts in the small town I lived in, only Campfire girls. Then we moved and they didn't have Campfire, only Girlscouts! I got to be both!

Posted by: sue at July 25, 2006 02:57 PM (WbfZD)

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Bounce flash rules Hosted on Zooomr

Sorry, just trying to get my new Zoomr account working (thanks CalTech Girl!) I like the idea of Zoomr better than Flickr-you don't have to be a member to comment, which appeals. It's a bit rusty though and I can't work out some of the trackbacks. Plus the geotags are a bit strange (one of mine has shown up being tagged in eastern Denmark, which while interesting, isn't correct.)

Don't know that I'm succeeding here, though. I am a fuck muppet when it comes to HTML, but will endeavor to get it working before appealing to the Help Desk*.

-H.

*Help Desk is currently putting together bookshelves outside, but if I ply him with wine gums he may say yes and help me.

Posted by: Everydaystranger at 11:32 AM | Comments (6) | Add Comment
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1 That's a great picture of you and your Help Desk.

Posted by: Lisa at July 23, 2006 03:56 PM (ELUjU)

2 A lovely photo, Helen. Just lovely. That one should be enlarged and hung in that wonderful new home of yours.

Posted by: kenju at July 23, 2006 06:24 PM (2+7OT)

3 Yay!

Posted by: caltechgirl at July 23, 2006 10:12 PM (bM7x1)

4 Amazing photo. Goodness, look how beautiful you are. You are absolutely glowing. You seem more...at peace...now. There's a softness in your eyes now, keeping that twinkle company. Hold on to that picture. I think it marks a milestone.

Posted by: Dana at July 23, 2006 10:20 PM (uXuyq)

5 That is the best photo I've seen of you both - it's lovely. A real keeper. I mean him. You. The two of you. Aw, heck, you know what I mean...

Posted by: sue at July 25, 2006 02:46 PM (WbfZD)

6 Actually, that is a Flickr option. I think my account is just set to only allow members to comment. Hoping to avoid the spam.

Posted by: Christine at July 28, 2006 04:47 AM (g5yVi)

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The heat continues, and my motivation at work has completely sapped. This week has bee particularly stressful and hectic, and amongst the needles and pills comes the need to break off and spend some me time.

Today I'm going to bunk off work and paint the kitchen. It's going green. I'm calling it "Motherfucker Green", because it is seriously green (as we're ripping the kitchen out in less than a year, we can be as outrageous as we want with the coloring-it won't last.) Angus was keen on another color, but I felt it was a little too "The Banana Republic Just Vomited on My Kitchen" for me.

So today's post will be the cop out known as Picture Pages. Here are some pictures of the colors in my life, all natural, no Dulux, all brought to you by the color "organic" (crunchy granola much?)

The one thing the heat is good for is my orchids. My orchids are exploding in pots of color in the kitchen window. Orchids are notoriously difficult to grow but for some reason, they love me.

So I can now bore you with pictures of them.

One of them has become a waterfall of blooms, and new buds threaten the branches with heavy promise.

The plain white ones are, somehow, my favorite. They are simple, understated, and delicate.

Outside the heat has managed to make the roses bloom even more. We found a load of white roses growing in the very back of the garden.

They didn't last long, but they were beautiful.

One morning Angus saw a yellow rose growing alone from the side of the garden. It bloomed and made me smile-I wish I had a load of Texas Bluebonnets pockmarking the garden but a yellow rose (of Texas) was enough.

I am growing sweet peas up a trellis in the garden. They are going mad and flowering all over the place, I'm not sure I was ready for the onslaught (it feels a bit like a horror movie-"When Flowers Fight Back-II"). I pick them and put them in a French juice jar I kept, and the sweet peas fill the kitchen with perfume.

And yes, that is a giant bottle of bubbles in the background.

Finally, I took a picture of a dandelion fluff in the newly painted study yesterday. It was on Flickr, but it's a picture that makes me grin so I wanted to put it here.

Here's to catching falling stars in your hands.

Have a great weekend.

-H.

Posted by: Everydaystranger at 09:25 AM | Comments (8) | Add Comment
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I lifted the hair off the back of my neck, just to try to get some air to move back there. Long hair is great, but a curtain of long hair is just not a good idea right now. Streams of sweat trickled down the back of my legs. My shirt was suctioned to my back.

I looked around Waterloo Station and saw that I was not alone in this-we were all wilting.

If you've been reading the papers or browsing other websites, you'll see that England is currently in the midst of a bad heat wave. With the exception of a week of rain we had in June we've been faced with hot weather everyday.

Americans have one topic that they leap to upon meeting other Americans-that enigmatic "Where're you from?" It's the one thing that brings the Yanks together, and no matter how many times I explain it to people, it doesn't seem to sink in-America is so damn big that the greatest commonality is seeing if the person you're talking to is on the same wavelength, having experience from the same place.

The English seem to have their own version of community, and that is the weather. Without fail, if we bump into another English family while travelling, the first words out of their mouth will have to do with the weather. While the Americans tug at their baseball caps and squint, trying to recall if they've ever been to Dallas or Lincoln or Boston, the English smile and relay similar sentiments-have they ever seen this much rain, this much heat, this kind of sunset.

The weather here has united us all. Truthfully, we've been in a drought for months. We live in southern England, where Thames Water has put us under what's called a hosepipe ban (which illicits immature laughter from me everytime I hear the word "hosepipe".) This basically means we're not allowed to use the hoses, no watering of lawns, washing of cars, etc.

Our beautiful garden is nearly burnt to a crisp. The grass is brown. Everything is basically dead. We're lucky in some ways-we'd been warned that we may have to face what's called a standpipe ban, which basically means that the water to everyone's homes would be turned off, and we could only collect water from a single standpipe that Thames Water would put in each neighborhood.

The idea of collecting water in buckets for household use was enough to assure us that, should that happen, the rest of the summer would be spent on the continent.

The summer has been fantastic-warm, sunny, and lovely. But yesterday was just too much-we hit 97 degrees yesterday. I remember that in Texas that's considered a light breezy day, but there's one thing to remember-there's no air conditioning here. So while I know other areas have similar heat, at least you have respite. Here we just chug down frescatos during the day and beer at night (mmmmm.....beer....).

My beloved coffee has become something that you have one cup of in the morning to wake your ass up, then you don't go near again, as it will almost certainly cause your pores to go into meltdown mode.

We have one fan in the household, and it's going 24 hours a day. Even if work and Gorby needs meant we could sleep in, once the morning sun hits the house it's too hot to sleep. The windows are flung open to try to allow any kind of breeze whatsoever, but the upstairs (which we loved for being so full of light) is a little too full of light-Angus' study is up there, and yesterday he was working in this underwear (the day that video conferencing becomes a regular occurence is the day that I stop working from home). There's little movement in the house. The animals don't come to life until dark, they spend the day collapsed on the cool kitchen tiles (the kitchen gets very little sun so is luckily the coolest room in the house.)

At least I think it's the animals.

They just look like piles of hair, but that could just be my lax vacuuming.

London yesterday was a nightmare. Ironically, I have been in England on the hottest day in history, which was in August 2003. Yesterday felt no different. Most of my team showed up in shorts for a two hour meeting in central London-the idea of wearing a suit wasn't even debatable. I myself was in a tank top and skirt-it's just too sweltering to try to dress professionally, and we're all too hot to ogle. Everywhere we look everyone is dressed down, and suddenly you see loads of tattooes and more baps than you ever thought possible.

In this kind of heat you have to walk to where you need to get to. You just can't take the tube or buses, because the tube in this heat is really just an aluminum container used for cooking people-think mcrowave popcorn bag and you'll understand how it feels. Waterloo, with it's huge gaping glass and metal structure, felt like an oven. We all cart around bottles of water and pretend we don't see the sweat stains running down everyone's shirts because if we don't see theirs, they can't see ours.

It's hot, yes. It's unbearable, yes. The papers could be accused of sensationalism to some degree though-while it's true that some of the roads are, indeed, melting and true that people are dropping like flies in the midday sun, they make it sound like we're running around the streets with our faces melting off. Reading the headlines of papers around here, it would seem that there is a touch of madness, albeit with the proper British slant:

The Guardian: We Do Go a Bit Mad in the Sun

Or The Times: A sweltering day that outshone the glory of July 1911

It's true that life with this kind of heat means patterns have to alter. Angus and I don't cuddle when we fall asleep now, but that's because we'd spontaneously combust from the heat. I wave feebly at him from my side of the bed, and he lifts an eyebrow in response. This is "I love you" in tropical language. Sex is something that sounds good in theory, but we only indulge in it if it means neither of us has to move very much. The argument for who'll be on top suddenly takes on relationship proportions-I love you baby and I really want your body, but only if it means I can hold still in doing so.

The heat will go away.

Get back to me in November, when I'm freezing my breasts off and wishing for a good 97 degree day.

-H.

Posted by: Everydaystranger at 08:28 AM | Comments (13) | Add Comment
Post contains 1128 words, total size 7 kb.

1 So I'm moving in August, to England. Awaiting response from the British Consulate as to whether or not I have my spousal visa. But selfishly I don't want to move until the heat wave ends! I was there in August 2003 and it wasn't pretty. Roll on some proper English summer weather! Hope you can survive it without spontaneously combusting!

Posted by: Juls at July 20, 2006 11:51 AM (ka1Yp)

2 ugh, sounds horrid. Another thing that is sure to elicit anti-cuddle behavior is mutual sun burns.

Posted by: jadewolff at July 20, 2006 12:29 PM (cH5GO)

3 I am the heat miser because everytime I come to England it has a heat wave (this one is NOT my fault). The last time I was forced to wear a cocktail dress for the entire week because I had packed for London, not Costa Rica. It makes a girl paranoid, wondering if all the talk of cold damp London is just to throw people off since I have spent weeks in London during various years and never once has it even rained. -your suspicious American friend (from NJ who knows people from Austin)

Posted by: That Girl at July 20, 2006 01:21 PM (QzfsY)

4 Heh. Baps. I love that word. Hell, I love baps, themselves. I cut my waist-length hair when I moved to Texas in June of 2000 because the heat was so unbearable.

Posted by: Ms. Pants at July 20, 2006 01:31 PM (r6SJw)

5 I remember August 2003. I spent a lot of time drinking pims while sitting in Soho Square with a gaggle of gay men.

Posted by: some girl at July 20, 2006 02:43 PM (+3BZS)

6 I've been thinking about you everyday as I listen to Radio 1 and they go on and on about the heat. Yesterday was supposed to have been the hottest day of the year, and perhaps the hottest day in England's history. Although, I guess that didn't pan out or I'd have heard it on the news this morning. Try and stay cool. I'll be thinking about your plight as I lounge around in my air conditioned apartment.

Posted by: amy t. at July 20, 2006 02:44 PM (zPssd)

7 Um...so, dumb question. WHY no a.c. there? We, too, are having a heat wave, but thank goodness for a.c.!!!

Posted by: sue at July 20, 2006 02:47 PM (WbfZD)

8 If you can get a good enough plug converter (that can handle the load), I would be more than happy to send a window box (or two) as they are on massive sale at costco. You're an American, so why stiff upper lip it? Cave to the glories of the window AC!

Posted by: caltechgirl at July 20, 2006 05:59 PM (/vgMZ)

9 I'd much rather be hot than cold, but I agree, this current heat wave is too much already!

Posted by: kenju at July 20, 2006 07:16 PM (2+7OT)

10 If 97 qualifies as a heat wave, then I want to live there rather than Southern CA where it has been over 100 for the last week! Luuuuuucky. Although from experience, heat in the UK is far more humid. Hope you have some good AC!

Posted by: Ari at July 21, 2006 03:46 AM (/C7zM)

11 Don't be too sure about being able to flee to the continent. We're breaking heat records here in Holland, the entire country is miserable and water problems aren't all that far away... what I wouldn't do for airco...

Posted by: Hannah at July 21, 2006 07:31 AM (oHKkc)

12 Hehe.. a couple fans positioned just right and a partial tub of tepidly cool water would probably give you both reasons to move about a bit.. (Classicly wicked Grin). Lucky me it ONLY hit 100 one day last week.. and I had just installed my very first ever Air conditioner. Its not big enough for my apartment but as big as the VERY old fashion wiring will handle.. managed to keep the temperature down to the 80s in most of it... I sacked out on a sleeping bag right in front of it and cheerfull ignored the ocasional water it spit.

Posted by: LarryConley at July 24, 2006 01:54 PM (YH2rV)

13 My car has an outside thermometer, and you can read the temp in Celcius or Fahrenheit. 106º F, or 41ºC. Joy. Joy. Apparently, the Netherlands is experiencing its hottest summer ever. The temps are in the 70s! I think I can make a suggestion if you want to go to the continent...

Posted by: B. Durbin at July 26, 2006 01:49 AM (tie24)

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Last night my friend Lloyd and I went to see Superman in a dark and air conditioned movie theater. Lloyd is my movie date, as Angus is not so much a film buff and, more to the point, he hates sci-fi, special effects kinds of films. If he does films, he likes them gritty and depressing-think 'Angela's Ashes', depress it times ten, and you have an Angus film.

The film was just ok-I think Kate Bosworth (Lois Lane) needs to use both hands to eat several meals comprised of carbs alone, and while she's at it maybe she can take a few acting lessons because that weird pigment in her eye is not going to keep a career going for long. Surprisingly, I really liked Brandon Routh (the new Superman). He had himself some big tights to fill and I think he did it admirably-so admirably in fact, that I'll open myself up to some hate mail and confess I liked him more than I ever liked Christopher Reeve (yes I know he was paralyzed in a horse riding accident. I know he's since passed away. That doesn't mean I have to love his Superman or anything, it's not prejudice against those with challenges if I think Routh's saucy Superman curl is cuter than Reeve's.)

As I've seen both 'X-Men 3' and 'Superman' recently, I started thinking about action heroes. I never really read comic books (though I confess I had a few 'Archie and Jughead' ones when I was kid, although I have no idea where they came from. I do remember the propaganda ads in them, where they showed a fast couple with a fast car and the man with the thought bubble: 'We should have waited', and the woman, disheveled, in tears bubbling: 'I feel so ashamed.' On the opposite page was Archie, Jughead, Betty and whorish Veronica wearing chains with crosses around their neck, holding mugs of what could only be sarsaparilla, declaring how God wants us to have Good! Clean! Fun! See? Abstinence and sarsaparilla is fun! God is fun! Betty only gives blow jobs, they don't go all the way!)

When I play that Hall of Superfriends game-you know, which superhero would you do if you could choose one?-I always used to choose Aquaman, mostly because no one loves Aquaman and I love the ones that get picked last for dodgeball, but also because how helpful is it to have a fish as a boyfriend when global warming finally does polish off those polar caps? My second choice used to be Batman, as I love an angsty tormented kind of guy, and no character is as dark as Batman. Inventing toys to avenge the death of his parents? Can I get a little therapy and a few ribbed Trojans over here, please?

But watching the Clark Kent/Superman character, I was struck by what a diamond in the rough that little fucker is. Maybe because I never really liked the original Superman movies, he never really gelled with me. I thought Superman was Supergay, his little red shorts embarrassing, the fact that no one got that Clark Kent was his alter ego a little too much to handle. I wasn't a Margo Kidder fan, and by the time the trio in pleather showed up or that one where Superman fought a guy who turned his assistant into a robot, I had checked out of the series.

After watching this film (which again was just an ok film), I see that there is something endearing about Superman though. It's much the same way with the character Wolverine from 'X-Men'-these men are real men, these men have things that they push down deep, these men are damaged somehow, a little fragile.

The 'I can fix you' throbbing in me makes me want to address this, even though I know that it's impossible to fix someone, I know that John Gray would have something to say about this.

In this film, Lois Lane really did have the best of all worlds-a lust for the man with the big red boots, a loving and adoring fabulous fiancé (James Marsden, the Second Fiddle, aka He Who Never Gets the Girl in Superhero Films), and she has a good mate in Clark Kent (who no one ever goes for. I myself love a good nerd. Love them.) But she constantly goes back to her love for a guy who flies off into the night, rescuing strangers and taking a snoozer in the stratosphere.

The appeal of comics is huge, and comic book collections have reached new levels of norm-Spiderman just came out of the closet with his identity, comic book films are all the rage, and things as commonplace as The Simpsons started off as a book of inked drawings (I remember the Matt Groening books).

And why? Why are they so popular? Is it because the text and the graphics make it easier for the minds eye to see what the artist had intended for us to see? Is it because comics build on each other, story after story, and keep us glued in, a kind of manuscript soap opera?

Or is it because, from the advent of comics to now, we actually need to believe in superheroes?

In a life faced with the daily grind, maybe we need to believe that there is something more than just us. It's the same with religion-maybe things feel easier if we think there's someone looking out for us, watching over us. The idea that a chap with a cape may fly in and save the metropolis from a forest fire appeals. The belief that a woman in an invisible airplane can rescue a baby floating in a flood warms our hearts. When a masked crusader rescues a train from derailing we think all is right with the world and security, once again, is ours to be had.

Superheroes have alter egos, ordinary people in ordinary lives. The idea that our neighbor, our lover, our colleague or our friend can be the one who rescues us from peril is a comfort. The cost of oil may go up, house prices may come down, but just over the fence is someone that can dissipate hurricanes so dammit, we can sleep better at night. Just thinking that the average citizen can transcend the confines of a daily commute, car payments, and spilled mugs of Starbucks coffee inspires us and, let's be honest, life needs inspiration.

Superheroes are often born of extraordinary circumstances that alter them forever-look at our pal Spidey, who got too friendly with an arachnid. You have the Punisher (Kim's favorite), an average bloke who became an avenger after his family was killed. The Incredible Hulk, a nerdy (nerds!) scientist standing in the wrong place at the wrong time. These people were just like us, with a dash of sci-fi thrown in to show us that fucked-up genes? No problem.

Then you add in the other factors-the look of longing in the superhero's eyes. The yearning to be just as ordinary as the ordinary is the undercurrent in every tale. Above all, the tear of wanting to be in love while being able to spin a web from their wrist is something that we can relate to-while we may not be able to bore holes in the walls with our eyes but we have all seen the face of unrequited love. That a superhero is enhanced doesn't diminish their desire to spoon up behind someone at night, even if their monkey Gleek is in the way.

Superheroes appeal because they remind us that life doesn't always have to be so average. There could be someone looking out for us, someone that has chiseled cheekbones and the ability to leap tall buildings in a single bound. Superheroes hold many of the same morals we have-trust. Take care of the little guys. Rescue the lost and punish the wicked.

No, I don't read comic books. I have no idea how the Green Lantern came to be, and I don't really care if Batman never catches the Joker. I just find the idea of a superhero to be terribly romantic.

That, and I'm nursing a light crush on Superman.

At least I admit it.

-H.

PS-Yeah, I just have to ask-which Superhero would you do?

Posted by: Everydaystranger at 01:44 PM | Comments (15) | Add Comment
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As we progress, the time I head into the London office of my nice Couch Man becomes more and more valuable. It takes a chunk out of the day-if my appointment is at 10 then I have to leave the house by 7:45, and I won't be home again until 12:45 or so. I spend my time with men in suits dashing for trains, their minds full of charts and graphs and action points, I sit across from women with pinched lips and angry lines. I ride the empty trains out of London when it's done-no one has business the way I go, and the peace and quiet is something I'd pay for. It's a 5 hour journey for a 45 minute meet but more and more it dawns on me how worthwhile it is.

The iPod is strapped into my ears, chiming the likes of songs that serve the specific purpose to simply surf the brain waves, not churn them. I dress comfortably. I take care to do so, remembering even in my dark days in Sweden when I had my twice weekly meet with the therapist there I would take a shower beforehand.

I was terrified he would commit me otherwise.

My calm, gentle therapist has created a space for me the likes of which I have never before seen. His office space-a loft with Scandinavian design-is also his home. He has minimalist decorating and it suits me fine. In his space I find I can talk about anything and everything, there is nothing too painful and nothing that makes me cringe. I start opening up from the moment I set foot on the tube platform in his neighborhood-on one visit, I even crumbled into heaving sobs at that one gentle step, when I had been so controlled, so locked and contrived up until that very moment. Above all, I never ever step outside of myself in there. Something he has created, something he has gotten across to me keeps me locked inside myself. It doesn't mean I feel everything, it doesn't mean things get to me. All it means is I'm never standing in a doorway watching myself.

As time passes, I continue to appreciate, respect and admire him, and not in an icky way-he simply is, and I simply thank him for it.

Sometimes he finds the emotions for me. On one occasion, I sat there on the couch, locked inside myself. I wasn't watching me, but I wasn't upset either. I was a lonely little petunia in an onion patch, and the tears came from him for me.

The greatest part of the work we're doing is re-building my behavior. I have to start from the bottom up in terms of discovering and re-creating Helen, and this is both exhausting and victorious. My one big focus is to break cycles-throughout my past and throughout the history of my family we have recurring themes that come along and knock us down. I want the KO to stop, and I want to be the brick wall that does it.

Talking to him yesterday, he asked me about my weekend. I told him that I spent Sunday painting the walls of my study-two of them are a rich, deep burgundy color, balanced by the opposite walls painted in a smooth taupe. I tell him about my own personal bible-the Dulux catalog. I proceed into no known venture without my Dulux catalog. I love the damn thing so much, in fact, that I have 4 catalogs, all equally worn.

He smiled at me. "How is your house painted?"

I grin back, giddy. "Every room is a different color."

"And all the rooms are painted?"

"All of them but the hallway, which is the next project."

He smiles at me again. "You sound so young and happy when you talk about this. In your head, do you see anything?"

I smile. "Funny you should mention that..." The truth was, as I talked about the catalog and the painted walls, I did have a picture in my head. It was me, at about 5 years old. I was wearing my favorite dress from back then, a beige crochet number (hey! It was the 70's!) I was walking along a path through some woods, the light coming through the leaves. I had a rolled up piece of paper in my hands and my grin could have split my face open.

I tell him about it. I feel ridiculous, I don't subscribe to this.

"Helen," he says softly, "I think you're finally getting in touch with the you from the past. The young you."

"You know I don't believe in that stuff, Doc," I reply.

"I know. But it's there." He leans forward, maybe aware he's on new ground. "How do you feel about the 5 year-old you?"

I consider this. "I feel...protective. Calm. Loving. I want to warn her that life goes downhill from here, that there are horrible things coming. She's going to be lost forever."

"No," he counters. "You've just found her."

I don't know if I believe that or not. All I know is that there in my head is the little version of me, and she's smiling. There is light all around, light, light when the whole future she has ahead of her is darker than midnight.

"It sounds like she's a happy little girl. And it sounds like she likes color," he says gently.

I think about the entire lifetime of military white walls I've had. I remember all the apartments I've lived in, all the houses we've rented. We were never allowed to paint the walls, never allowed to have a stamp on who and what we were. A life behind industrial white emulsion, light bouncing off and away. Only once before moving to England had I ever painted a wall in the house I lived in. Only once had I ever felt I could.

"No more white walls," I say simply. "Every room needs to be a different color. And I fucking love it." I look out the window, and all I see is the 5 year-old me, smiling.

Welcome to color.

The first of many cycles has now been broken.

1 down, 4,346 to go.

-H.

Posted by: Everydaystranger at 09:48 AM | Comments (8) | Add Comment
Post contains 1052 words, total size 6 kb.

1 Hallelujah! That sounds like a good breakthrough to me. I think I need that therapist. Too bad he lives so far away.....LOL

Posted by: kenju at July 18, 2006 12:44 PM (2+7OT)

2 Go baby! Lots and lots of color! Woo-hoo!!!

Posted by: ~Easy at July 18, 2006 01:21 PM (18jln)

3 So similar. One of the best things I've done since my divorce is paint the walls of my house...the bedroom is a soft soothing periwinkle blue, the color I always imagined it being. The hallway is a vibrant apple green with framed black and white pics of my kids on the wall. The bathroom was recently painted a bright sea blue with white accents. I love the space I've created. It is my sanctuary, and it is healing.

Posted by: trouble at July 18, 2006 08:58 PM (j2vfb)

4 I couldn't help but think of this: She comes in colors ev'rywhere; She combs her hair She's like a rainbow Coming, colors in the air Oh, everywhere She comes in colors Happy painting, Helen!

Posted by: Deb at July 18, 2006 10:01 PM (GOFVL)

5 wall painting is the one thing I cannot wait to do.

Posted by: caltechgirl at July 18, 2006 10:04 PM (/vgMZ)

6 H... Here is to living a colourful life... and breaking the cycles for both of us

Posted by: stinkerbell at July 19, 2006 10:57 AM (p6odB)

7 I painted my family room 2 weeks ago. This is after over 10 years of being an adult with white walls. I loved it! My family room is now brick red. Very liberating! I'm happy that you have multi-colored walls!

Posted by: Suzie at July 19, 2006 11:06 PM (4rffT)

8 I'm about to buy a house but don't like the current color scheme. I've been thinking about what to do with it... so thanks for the link to the Dulux page, it's a lot of fun! Besides the fact that it should make sure my house doesn't clash.

Posted by: Hannah at July 20, 2006 07:39 AM (5w+E2)

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At our barbecue two weeks ago one of our friends said an interesting thing. Per-a Swedish ex-colleague to both Angus and I (at different points in our saga known as Working for Company X) and his family attended our shindig. Drinking a large pint of beer and standing casually against the kitchen counter, Per was looking around the kitchen while I chopped tomatoes for the salad.

'Wow, Helen,' he said, Swedish accent now under attack from his length of time now in England. 'You're very domestic. It's amazing. Do you hate it?'

I chuck the stems of the tomatoes into our little compost bin. 'No, why?' I ask, turning to him and wiping my hands on a towel I'd slung over my shoulder.

'It's just so unlike you. When I met you, you were this fast-moving, big city London girl. You know, late parties, constant travel, never living in a house with no restaurants nearby. It's so different.'

I stare at him. 'Are you sure you're thinking of the right person?' I ask him. Late parties? London girl? What the fuck?

'Yeah, absolutely. You were this nightclub chick. It's amazing to see you so domestic.' He slugs the beer and, upon being beckoned by his daughter outside, heads out to the call of parental duty.

I stare at his departing figure and wonder when it was that Angus snuck LSD into the veggie sausages.

I look after Per's retreating figure and have this insane desire to shout: "Do-over!"

And here is a strange theme I've been seeing. One of Angus' colleagues commented, upon hearing that we were headed to Santorini, that 'there might not be enough nightclubs there, Helen may be bored.' Saturday night Angus' brother asked me for a favor at a family barbecue-he needed to entertain some clients at a nice London restaurant-since I ate out there a lot, could I recommend one?

Since I what? Huh? What?

Curious about this, I asked Angus. Clad in a pair of boxers, no makeup, and a paint splattered Old Navy T-shirt we were making yet another run to the tip to drop off garden cuttings. Brushing a spider from my arm, I turn to him, propping my feet up on the dashboard.

'When you met me, did you think I was all '˜I'm little Miss City Action Girl'? Like, nightclubs and restaurants, and parties?'

He considers it. 'Well, yeah. I mean, you didn't really do '˜domestic stuff'. You ate out several times a week, you didn't want to own a house.'

'You used to worry I'd get bored if we were ever together,' I said, brushing blowing leaves off of me.

'I did,' he concurs.

I consider this. I have absolutely no idea how I got a reputation for being a bar-hopping club-banging all-night-partying kind of chick. The last time I went to a nightclub was a year and a half ago (it was ok, but not great music.) Before that? 2003. Before that? No idea. Nightclubs-not really my kind of thing. Expensive drinks, boys who get touchy-feely, sticky things on the floor and throbbing music that rides the techno wave. Gee, what's not to love?

The thing is, I fucking love this life. I love our house. I love that it's at the end of an unmade road. I love that people can't find the place.

It's fabulous to re-paint the walls whatever color I want. I have a garden that I am useless at, but goddamn it, it's my garden (and I'll cry if I want to). I read cookbooks occasionally for inspiration and like scouring antique shops. My favorite clothes are sweats, boxers and T-shirt, under which I nearly always am commando.

The image of me in a short skirt, a martini glass in one hand and a nightclub bracelet wrapped around the other is not something I see myself as, mostly because my green boxers with flamingos all over them would not be a welcome sight, I'm thinking. Might not match my pink sparkly strappy shoes.

We went to a neighborhood barbecue the other night. Sitting under a gazebo, glasses of wine in hand, we met our neighbors. It was nice to talk to them, they're incredibly polite...and the other end of the spectrum. I got to hear chapter and verse about the woman three doors down, and her grandkids. We talked about sewage drains-ours packed up a week ago and Angus and I got to spend an afternoon with a plunger the size of the Chrysler building unplugging about 10 years worth of grease and dog hair from our kitchen drain in the driveway. The neighborhood commiserated and they explored the issue far too much for my liking-they wanted to commiserate and bond over clogged drains while I wanted to burn the clothes and flesh from our bodies from the memory alone of the unclogging experience.

The night took a truly bizarre turn when they talked about their success last year at the village's yearly fete, in which one of the neighbors entered her tomatoes but-gasp-didn't win.

I thought my legs were going to fall off.

Later on, I climbed on top of the plasma TV box that we still had in the living room. Because...I could, and because...well...it was there.

'Tomatoes,' I winge. 'It was all about tomatoes.' I lay back, draped across the enormous cardboard box. This seems to be the dichotomy. You have appletini swilling on one hand, tupperware parties on the other. I can be the cool dancing hungover freak or the chick hand-making a wreath. I can be trying to lay the hottest guy in the bar or the one trying to get the best gladiolas on the block. Dick, flowers...it's such a choice.

It is fantastic to live in our little country home. It is also fantastic to occasionally have to take a train into London for work or mental health purposes. It's great to live in a little slice of rural bliss, but also calming to know that we're less that 45 minutes away from one of the biggest cities in the world. I love our home, but I also love our travels. Does loving where we are mean I have to start growing vegetables in earnest? Do I need to learn the names and interests of all of our neighbors grandkids? Must I spend my time wondering not only why people make their own jam, but how?

'There has to be a middle ground," I sigh. "I can't be Miss Nightclub, but I don't wanna be Miss 4-H. It can't be nightclubs vs tomatoes.'

Angus looks up, smiling. 'We don't grow tomatoes.'

Fair point.

-H.

Posted by: Everydaystranger at 06:39 AM | Comments (6) | Add Comment
Post contains 1110 words, total size 6 kb.

1 Living in the boonies and working in the city fills both my needs as well. My nightclub days are long gone but they are a part of me.

Posted by: Donna at July 17, 2006 04:21 PM (Aanzg)

2 The fun part is finding your own dichotomy. And then shocking hell out of the poor neighbours.

Posted by: caltechgirl at July 17, 2006 07:13 PM (/vgMZ)

3 I see no problem here. As Walt Whitman said: "Do I contradict myself? Very well, then I contradict myself, I am large, I contain multitudes." It's all one big adventure. Enjoy yourself and just roll with the changes.

Posted by: ~Easy at July 17, 2006 07:23 PM (CZPRx)

4 I don't see a problem with all that. Describes me perfectly too (well, years ago, anyway...LOL)

Posted by: kenju at July 17, 2006 08:21 PM (2+7OT)

5 Nothing wrong with being a bit "crunchy granola", and you still have London!...='s Awesome kinda people you are!!! We just got the first eggs from our first try at having chickens (Rhode Island Reds) and yesterday I was in the Anti-Flag mosh pit at Portland's Warped Tour!!!!YEAH BABY!!!

Posted by: J.M at July 17, 2006 10:27 PM (k3v0Q)

6 The middle ground includes taking your twelve year old daughter (and a friend) to see MxPx and Reel Big Fish on Saturday night at an all-ages concert at a local club (with adult supervision) and spending kid-free weekends drinking far too late in the evening and being hungover on sundays. Trust me, there are plenty of us who don't care how big someone's tomatoes are (though i do grow them because I love tomatoes). There's plenty of fun insanity in the suburbs...you just have to know where to find it.

Posted by: trouble at July 18, 2006 09:14 PM (j2vfb)

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My iPod is a very precious thing.

Very precious.

When my previous iPod gave up the final whir of life there was no question in my mind that I needed another one post haste. Music calms the savage beast and I, for the duration of my NBC-life, have forever been a savage.

There are some songs that are always on the iPod. Before that, they were on the MD player. Before that, they were well-reached for and loved CDs. Some songs become a part of your mindset, no matter how little you can remember of who you are.

Some places see their own specifics-Sweden, for instance, is marked by the singer Lene Marlin (who is actually Norwegian) and music by the Manic Street Preachers (who are actually English). I played their music repeatedly there and to this day the songs make me think of Stockholm. Edwin McCain plays the soundtrack of my North Carolina days, accompanied by Far Too Jones. Texas is all over the place, but it is mostly packed with alternative music, like Beck's "Loser" (I'm a loser baybehhhh...so why don'tcha kill mehhhhhh...). I bypassed the cool Echo and the Bunnymen scene and went straight from Whale Songs to Beck. Might explain the need for therapy, really.

Here are some of mine (note, although Sarah McLachlan doesn't appear in the list, she's a given. Really.):

"Hearts"

The first CDs I ever got, upon receiving the first portable CD player I ever had at 16, consisted of a CD of Whale Songs (yes, I liked shit like that), Pink Floyd's "The Wall" (always popular amongst angsty and depressive teens) and Yes's "90125". To this day the song "Hearts" by Yes makes me think of being 16 and sitting on a brown shagpile carpet. A strange memory, but one I have all the same. The song should be sung at top volume, and you should as melodramatic as possible when it comes to the bridge:

One heart's for love
One's for giving
Two hearts are better
Than one
I hearing it
I living it
I believe in it
I loving it
Two hearts are better
Than one

Of course, the bad grammar means that today I wouldn't listen to the song, but at 16? Oh yeah. I was angsty.

"Solsbury Hill"

Petey, Petey, Petey. You're a weird bloke and you are getting old but Christ I love your music. Solsbury Hill has the ability to make me tap my toes and want to crack open a bottle of Fuller's. Your one word albums were the best-"So", "Cars", and "Us" were played endlessly but you lost the road with "Ovo". Still, I worship you and your "Solsbury Hill" always made me long to be in England.

In some ways, I guess I have you to thank then, Petey.

Please note: Sarah McLachlan, this is the one transgression you made. Make all the covers you want (I love your remake of "Unchained Melody" because it does not make me think of Tom the Poseur at all) but do not touch "Solsbury Hill" again.

"And So It Goes"

The Piano Man calms the savage beast with this song in seconds. In high school as punishment one of the teachers made us look up all the references of "We Didn't Start the Fire". I actually learnt a lot from that exercise and I became a closet back seat Joel fan. I don't have any of his albums but one, yet somehow I know many of his songs. "And So It Goes" is one to enjoy with a glass of whiskey in the hand and a winter's night outside the window.

"All I Want"

Toad the Wet Sprocket's song defies me to be calm and gloomy when it plays. My toes tap. My eyes relax. This song infuses me with light, so I play it when I need a bit of sun.

"Lightning Crashes"

Like the Toadies song "Possum Kingdom", "Lightning Crashes" by Live takes me back to the beginning of my senses, those electric days of living in Dallas. The later Dallas days are pockmarked with easier-going Collective Soul, but "Lightning Crashes" is a song that still makes the hair on the back of my neck stand on end. When I lived in Texas and couldn't live inside my mind, I'd walk in the powerful and reckless thunderstorms that would berate Dallas every summer. I would become completely soaked in seconds but the ferocity of the storms was what I needed, what drew me. I never found myself in those storms, but this song was there for me throughout.

"Lover Lay Down"

Dave Matthews came and countered the depression of Live, and in college I stumbled onto them. "Lover Lay Down" became a sweet song that romanced me and my love at the time. I would play it on my crappy college stereo in my college apartment-which I look back on with incredible fondness-and lie down on the floor with my cat Nick, while waiting for him to show up in the evening, to spend the night with me, to be with me.

Kim and I had radically different tastes in music, but "Lover Lay Down" and Ravel's "Bolero" was where our paths merged, and those two songs sweetly remind me of him.

"If You Could Only See"

Tonic's song was played at top volume on the rooftop of the Blind Lemon in Dallas's Deep Ellum district. The night was hot. Somewhere out there was a man I used to love completely. I had a job I hated and was partying with colleagues that I didn't actually like as people. I looked out over the Dallas rooftops and wondered what happened to me, then I went downstairs to buy more alcohol, where on the TV was a pcture of a smashed up Mercedes under a Paris bridge. It was 1997 and I was dying, much like a Princess had just died.

"Wicked Game"

Cliche, yes. Chick music? Probably. The song makes me want to throw Angus to the ground and ravish him every damn time I hear it. I first heard it when I was a teenager, but ever indicative of how behind the times I was, I didn't really twig it until I was older. I still love that song.

"Frozen Charlotte"

Natalie Merchant's solo trip hit the right note with me. "Frozen Charlotte" was sweet and wistful and saw me living along for the first time in my adult life. "Frozen Charlotte" saw me in my own home, then saw me move from Texas to North Carolina. "Frozen Charlotte" saw me lose my grandfather, and saw me drive across country to say goodbye to him.

I have a memory of wearing headphones and painting a wall while listening to that song, crying. I have no idea where it was, what wall I was painting, or why I was crying. All I know is the memory is real and I wish I could hug me.

"Iris"

The Goo Goo Dolls helped me believe in love again with this song. That is all.

"At Last"

Etta James kicks a clown's ass. This song is utterly charming and makes me dream of iced tea on back porches, with fireflies surfing the hot evening air. When I hear it I dream of quilts on porch swings and bare feet placed on the lap of the one I love. It's a song that reminds me of where I am.

"I Grieve"

One more Petey mention-this song has seen rivers of tears from me. It always has, and the moment that the second refrain hits, I stop breathing and watch the world move in slow motion.

"Rudie Can't Fail"

The Clash rule. This song makes me want to dance around like a monkey, and John Cusack's inclusion of it in one of the greatest films of all time, Grosse Pointe Blank, was a stroke of genius.

"Under Pressure"

The queens of camp, David Bowie and...well...Queen, hit the right note with this song. Angus is a huge Queen fan and I like most of their stuff but this song I love. Love. And I'm not even a Bowie fan.

"You Won't Be Mine"

Matchbox 20 played this long, slow sad one. The raindrops at the end of the song catch in my throat every time. The song hurts in so many ways, not least of which is the fact that it's the last thing I remember hearing before that eventful night when I went off the rails 4 years ago. I heard it in Sweden, just before the Bleakest Night.

The latest songs tend to be quieter and gentler. I think I have listened to Sia's "Breathe Me" one hundred thousand times and still going. Joshua Radin and Snow Patrol are faves, and Rachel Fuller's "Pleasure Seeker" writes my book for me in my head. Nina Simone's "Feeling Good" makes me want to belt out the song while drinking from a bottle of rum. Fort Minor and Holly Brook's "Where'd You Go" reminds me that work is not everything and I want to make love with the sun shining on me and all the windows open, curtains blowing in the breeze when I hear "Nessum Dorma" (which should be played AT TOP VOLUME).

And when I walk around the house doing various chores, I often sing Nat King Cole's "The Very Thought of You".

And when I do, I think of Angus.

-H.

PS-as I'm rebuilding my new iPod still, song recommendations are welcome.

Posted by: Everydaystranger at 10:57 AM | Comments (27) | Add Comment
Post contains 1595 words, total size 9 kb.

1 If you like "AT Last" and Nat Cole's voice, why not explore some more of the OLD songs?

Posted by: kenju at July 13, 2006 12:03 PM (2+7OT)

2 here is a possible list... what, no links? I´ll email you then, get ready for some Motown.

Posted by: miguel at July 13, 2006 12:25 PM (BUFQl)

3 And So It Goes is a fav of mine I love singing it soulfully too. And I'm right with you on Etta and Solsbury Hill... My iPod hasn't been updated in ages... I've lost the cable... Your post has reinforced that I'm jonesing for a fix and have to go and buy a new cable rather than keep waiting for it to show up (because the last ditch effort to find it would mean tidying my room... and we can't get toooo carried away right?)

Posted by: deeleea at July 13, 2006 12:26 PM (oijpn)

4 Very good stuff here. And So It Goes is one of my favorite songs, too, well pretty much every song you mentioned is a favorite of mine too. At Last was the song my husband and I danced to at our wedding (five years ago no one used that song, now it seems everyone does, but oh well.... we were original at the time.) In fact, we knew that would be our song within about a month of dating, well before we were even engaged. Love it. Oh and Lover Lay Down reminds me of many, many, many drunk nights in college, summer of 1995.

Posted by: donna at July 13, 2006 12:47 PM (F4Yeb)

5 I won't give any 'trendy' recommendations because well, those come and go....but I will say that one artists that I keep on my Ipod...who makes me smile TIME and TIME again is Tom Petty.....particularly "You don't know how it feels" and "Free Falling"....cheesy? CHECK.....awesome? CHECK CHECK CHECK

Posted by: wn at July 13, 2006 12:53 PM (ssT4d)

6 Kenju-I LOVE the old songs-Billie Holiday, Nat King Cole, Frank Sinatra? I'm there. Donna-"At Last" was the song I danced to with my ex-husband 6 years ago too. Let's be pleased we were ahead of a trend, yeah?

Posted by: Helen at July 13, 2006 01:04 PM (uf2SC)

7 wow, you managed to hit on every song I associate with a significant other in one post. weird, no? Iris - reminds me of my high school boyfriend for reasons I'm not entirely sure of. Solsbury Hill - i had heard the sarah mclachlan version in college, but my boyfriend at the time introduced me to the original Peter Gabriel version. he put it on a mix tape he made for me. then he broke my heart. If You Could Only See - my then boyfriend, now fiance, made me a mix CD when we first started dating with this song on it and we danced to it. he also saw Tonic play in London a few years before.

Posted by: geeky at July 13, 2006 01:23 PM (ziVl9)

8 My ipod is doing weird things and I'm worrying it's gone for good, too... haven't taken the time to really mess with it and see if it's salvagable or not... Diana Krall has that quality I enjoy about the "old" songs, too.

Posted by: sue at July 13, 2006 02:01 PM (WbfZD)

9 ""Kim and I had radically different tastes in music, but "Lover Lay Down" and Ravel's "Bolero" was where our paths merged, and those two songs sweetly remind me of him."" Ahh Bolero.... hehe I always get asked "Where did I hear this before?" (10) Hmm I always suggest Beethoven's 9th Symphony (3d movement) but that's me. Hmm Alice Cooper's Poison, Finch, a speedmetal band called Dragonforce I just got into (great for those moments where you want to kill someone), BOC Godzilla, One Tin Soldier, The Good ship Venus (hehe), The Theme song from Serenity (can send you the mp3 if you need). Various SF based filk songs.. (sputnik and promethious) .... err heh that's probably more then enough,, Me

Posted by: LarryConley at July 13, 2006 03:19 PM (PYxaj)

10 music soothes the savage breast, actually. no beast. (altho i've always thought savage breast offers a funny mental image.)

Posted by: cindy at July 13, 2006 03:40 PM (4dWnl)

11 Music has always been a huge part of my life. I'll send some suggestions. In fact, maybe I'll make a playlist for you on iTunes

Posted by: ~Easy at July 13, 2006 03:55 PM (CZPRx)

12 I love "At Last" (it got me through round one of American Idol auditions), but my favorite Etta song is "I'd Rather Go Blind." Snow Patrol are big with me right now, as are Keane. Pretty much anything by Janis Joplin makes me want to sing at the top of my lungs. My number one chill bump song is "Round Here" by Counting Crows. And "Wicked Game?" Who doesn't want to throw their partner down to that song? My newest happy songs are "World, Hold On" by Bob Sinclair and "Smile" by Lilly Allen (perhaps spelled differently). Okay, so I just babbled a lot.

Posted by: amy t. at July 13, 2006 04:07 PM (zPssd)

13 Lot's of similarirties on your list... Mine would also include: 'When you come back down' - Nickel Creek 'Kite' - U2 and lots' of Willy Porter, but that's probably an aquired taste. 'Watercolor', 'Rita' & 'Big Yellow Pine' to name a few...

Posted by: Clancy at July 13, 2006 06:54 PM (JxYJc)

14 "Solsbury Hill"? Yes 90125? "Wicked Game"? Finally! Someone else that loves what I love! Particularly 90125. Used to play the tape until the thing melted from sheer fatigue. No problems WHATSOEVER with your musical choices. My latest guilty pleasures (commonly played MP3's): "Romeo & Juliet" by Dire Straits. Heard the live version for the first time on my way to work the other morning and by the time the song was over, my eyes were actually WET. No way I could walk into a hyper-macho print shop environment in that state. God I'm turning into such a puss. "Bittersweet" - Big Head Todd & the Monsters "A Face In The Crowd" - Tom Petty and my signature song "Touch of Grey" by the Grateful Dead. I will get by, I will survive.

Posted by: diamond dave at July 13, 2006 08:00 PM (NvhA8)

15 "We'll Meet Again", Vera Lang. There's about 163 versions of this song, but this one from the end of Dr. Strangelove is the best. It also is one of a few songs that stops my son from crying. "Space Age Love Song" and "Wishing", A Flock of Seagulls. Strangely, I never knew these songs were theirs until recently. Good melody, somewhat mindless, and fun. "I'm Winning" Santana. Good memories. I'm totally with you on 90125, though "Leave It" is my favorite on that album. "Solibury Hill" is my favorite Petey, though "Games Without Frontiers" and "Red Rain" are close behind. "Sweet Caroline" is great to sing in groups or loudly in the car (especially the BAH Bah Bah part) Guilty 80s pleasures include Survivor, REO Speedwagon and Pat Benetar ("Shadows of the Night" was my first MTV video) And then, of course, the odd classical: "Unter Donner und Blitz -- Thunder & Lightning Polka" (186 Johann Strauss II

Posted by: Z. Hendirez at July 13, 2006 08:50 PM (otB//)

16 Oooh. I may have to e-mail you a list of some of my favorites. I love just about anything musical, so the entire list would be prohibitively long, but I do love me some 70's schlock. It'll have to be later tonight for me, though, I have to work to pay for internet connection. Heh. Love love love your list. xoxo

Posted by: Margi at July 13, 2006 09:09 PM (0BPNl)

17 My ist generation ipod died a few months back and I haven't been able to replace it yet as my Mac is 6 years old and the new ones are apparently no longer compatible with my OS (10.1.2). So I must wait to upgrade before retuning... Back in highschool, my "Holy Trinity" was Peter Gabriel, Kate Bush, and Laurie Anderson. Kate's newest album is a must (double disc, Aerial: A Sea of Honey & Aerial: A Sky of Honey). From songs in which she sings the numerical value of pi to numbers in which a child's voice describes the world outside in wonder, every track takes a hold of me. As for older stuff, The Red Shoes album is also fantastic! The song Rubberband Girl can not be heard without bopping along and The Song of Solomon is an amusing version of the poem from the bible where she makes clear that YES, the poem is about SEX, not "loving" god. As for Petey, well my life would not be complete if not for his album Passion - The Last Temptation of Christ soundtrack. Played from beginning to end it embraces my senses, sends them soaring, and then gently deposits me back on earth. Especially needed when soaking in a hot tub or bubble bath at the end of a rough day. If you end up enjoying that album, try Lisa Gerrard's Immortal Memory, it's a similiar type of groove. My newest Goddess of iTunes is Kirsty MacColl and her album Tropical Brainstorm. The woman can sing! She's done a wide variety of music, but this album is a tribute to Brazil and is very dancable. I think you would especially enjoy the song "In these shoes," in which she describes various men attempting to hit on her and ends up with the English man in the end. For a taste of the truly eclectic, I absolutely love the rap song about playing croquet done by Bitch and Animal on their album Sour Juice and Rhyme (song is aptly named "Croquet"). [FYI, I am not really a rap fan. But this is different] Another recent fav that I can't help but sing along to is Flaming Lip's Yoshi Battles the Pink Robots, part 1 (from the album of the same name as the song). The rest of my iTunes varies all over the place, including much of what you listed already. But, since you asked for suggestions, here's my 2 cents.

Posted by: KG at July 13, 2006 10:24 PM (rw/2F)

18 ohmigosh... you must have (get) "karma police"... Radiohead, sigh....

Posted by: lb at July 14, 2006 05:26 AM (uuZiy)

19 "I looked out over the Dallas rooftops and wondered what happened to me, then I went downstairs to buy more alcohol, where on the TV was a pcture of a smashed up Mercedes under a Paris bridge. It was 1997 and I was dying, much like a Princess had just died." I was sitting in my tiny studio apartment in North Dallas that night waiting for SNL to come on ... I hadn't lived there long which meant I hadn't been sucked in by Deep Ellum yet. Dallas holds a lot of memories ... and when certain songs come on I am instantly swept back there. (Of course working for a radio network might have had something to do with my over exposure to music - most of it was crap - at the time) I don't hsve any suggestions for music - you've already mentioned a few of my faves. I will second Radiohead though.

Posted by: Michele at July 14, 2006 04:12 PM (5VGFA)

20 oooh, i love all this music. pg's "grieve" kills me every time... that whole album is amazing. toad the wet sprocket, sia, at last. you have an ear for the sad, soulful stuff. me too. dreary days also call me to softer counting crows, ani difranco, howie day, modest mouse...and others.

Posted by: kat at July 14, 2006 06:04 PM (y68If)

21 Thank you, Kat-you were just my 13,000th comment.

Posted by: Helen at July 14, 2006 06:09 PM (uf2SC)

22 Knowing how you feel about Angus and Gorby , I felt this song by Pierce Pettis belonged on your iPod. He is great. http://www.piercepettis.com/index.php Don't Ever Want To Be Without You --Pierce Pettis It's a blessing in my life It's a lesson I have learned Standing naked in this blinding light Where there's no such thing as too young to die There's no such thing as to old to cry I don't ever want to be without you I don't ever want to lose your touch I don't ever want to be with out you I could never stand to lose so much But you know the man in me All the inconsistencies You manage to love me anyway Everybody feels the same desire Moving closer to the fire Everybody needs this warmth to stay alive I don't ever want to be without you I don't ever want to lose your touch I don't ever want to be with out you I could never stand to lose so much If it was all left up to me I shudder at the thought Of who or what I'd be...I'd be so alone Everybody feels the same desire Moving closer to the fire Everybody needs this warmth to stay alive Where there's no such thing as too young to die There's no such thing as to old to cry I don't ever want to be without you I don't ever want to lose your touch I don't ever want to be with out you I could never stand to lose so much

Posted by: Foggy at July 14, 2006 07:06 PM (WlHuv)

23 Some of my all time faves are: "Blister in the Sun"-Violent Femmes "Laid"-James "Africa"-Toto "Don't Stop Believing"-Journey "Ring of Fire"-Johnny Cash "Everyday"-Buddy Holly "In My Life"-Beatles There are many, many more-too many to list. These few always make me happy and think of something special. Its funny, but our closeness in age means the soundtrack of your life is very close to mine. Cool.

Posted by: Teresa at July 14, 2006 08:55 PM (f+o6m)

24 wowzers, 13,000. sweet! :-)

Posted by: kat at July 16, 2006 01:58 PM (xQYHR)

25 I can't recommend Michael Franti highly enough. Anything off of 'Everyone Deserves Music', but most especially the title track, 'What I Be', 'Pray for Grace' and 'Never Too Late'. Yes, most most especially that last one.

Posted by: Jennifer at July 16, 2006 10:51 PM (CEc5z)

26 I show some age. I'm all about David Bowie...and Queen. It just doesn't get much better than Freddie Mercury...gotta go watch RFD-the rural channel now and watch all about John Deere tractors with my husband. I know you're jealous :-)

Posted by: marie at July 17, 2006 01:17 AM (uA5dw)

27 I seriously recommend Sara Bareilles. I heard one of her songs in a movie, loved it, and then went and bought the whole cd. She's AWESOME, and the emotion in her voice blows me away. She has a website, that has samples of her music. Beautiful. Been reading you for a couple years now - you still rock, by the way. C

Posted by: Christina at July 19, 2006 03:42 PM (axrWz)

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Dear Gorby,

In the past few months you have become so much.

You have become a defender of the house. You bark at the milkman. You bark at the paperboy (and, in fact, when you see him you attack the wheels on his bicycle. Paperboy? Not a fan of the Gorby.) You bark at the mailman, and, most especially, you bark when his mail infringes on your personal space by dropping through the mail slot in the door. Mostly, you battle your mortal enemy, the vacuum cleaner.

You have learnt to play fetch. You stalk the ball like your natural mother, the border collie. You catch it like a professional.

Despite being neglected and abused, you have the most generous nature. You love children in a way I find incredibly endearing, and you will suffer anything just to be near them. Melissa chose to bury you at the beach but you were so happy to be loved on, you absolutely didn't mind.

In fact, you love the beach. You love the water, you love the run, you love the freedom of running around madly, swimming and being pet by those you love and trust.

You have also bonded with Jeff, and bravely face the waves with him.

You have a spirit and a sense of humor. You amaze me. You like to check on me while I'm at the PC by sticking your funky nose in my elbow. Your tail wags incessantly. You like to dance with me. Above all, when I least expect it, you're sticking out your tongue at us.

You have become a great part of my day. People tell us how patient and calm you are, how sweet natured. Children come and hang on you, you simply love them and look after them. Fireworks don't startle you, people aren't frightened of you. You have a funny look that people remember, and when I look at you I think that you are, absolutely, the most beautiful dog I have ever seen.

Your people mommy, she likes to pick you up. You're getting too big and too heavy, but your mommy still tries. She likes to pick you up because, surprisingly, you like to be held. She likes to pick you up because, surprisingly, she likes to hold more than she thought she ever could.

Someone was once mean to you. They abused you and neglected you. I fear that if I ever got my hands on them my pacifist ways would end. I look at you and think that you are a beautiful marvel, a miracle, a gift. You make the days brighter and the moments sweeter. That someone would neglect you means that they not only tried to deny you of the light, they denied themself, as well.

I am the lucky one, then. And I promise you I will spend the rest of your life trying to make your life beautiful.

I don't mean to wash over the beautiful memories of all the lovely dogs I have ever had the privilege to know. I just want you to know, my precious rescue puppy, that I have never loved a canine companion as much as I love you. It does not diminish their gorgeous memories. It just means that you have a spot in my heart that no other has ever filled and you will always own that part of me.

Someday, if you meet me at the Pearly Gates, I will know I have done something right.

I am not religious, but I thank God for you every single day.

Love,
Your Other Mommy

Posted by: Everydaystranger at 06:28 AM | Comments (16) | Add Comment
Post contains 609 words, total size 4 kb.

1 He is growing into a beautiful dog. And I love the shot of him buried in the ... sand? Can't say sand. Pebbles?

Posted by: jac at July 12, 2006 07:32 AM (X5LGy)

2 I was going to say the same as Jac said. That pic of him buried in the sand is precious - and I can't believe he lay still for that! I knew when you first posted his photo that he would likely become a great pet, and with your love, he has.

Posted by: kenju at July 12, 2006 11:43 AM (2+7OT)

3 Our pets are often reflections of their owners! I hope you share the same happiness as Gorby!

Posted by: osteff at July 12, 2006 12:03 PM (uKuUC)

4 What a great dog!! Interesting that a multi car accident on the news barely gets a nod from me, but the pic of you holding Gorby made me tear up. We hav an adopted dog who was also abused, and he is the sweetest dog ever. He's a 75 pound dog who is still under the impression that he's a lapdog. And really, he is...

Posted by: ~Easy at July 12, 2006 12:31 PM (CZPRx)

5 ooh, what a precious puppy. you are both so lucky to have eachother. he's gorgeous, you're gorgeous and the happiness just beams off the two of you. :-)

Posted by: kat at July 12, 2006 01:36 PM (xJGrF)

6 I've always found the critters that were abused or abandoned always seem to have the best dispositions. It's as if they are so thrilled to be treated the way they should be that they themselves can't believe it. Beautiful pics... he's really a lovely dog. I'm so glad you found each other.

Posted by: sue at July 12, 2006 02:13 PM (WbfZD)

7 Ahh he is so sweet, you are both lucky to have each other, we are of the same mind with our pets welfare, my darlin is my heart as well. Take care

Posted by: Cheryl at July 12, 2006 04:36 PM (WWLXT)

8 In Gorby you have found what is referred to as your "forever dog." If you can, you should get your hands on a sweet book called "For Every Dog, an Angel." The book changed they way I remember what I know now is my "forever dog," Max.

Posted by: Kat at July 12, 2006 04:53 PM (4g1jr)

9 What a beautiful, beautiful dog!

Posted by: Irina at July 12, 2006 05:27 PM (uSmBN)

10 No fair trying to break the German like that.

Posted by: statia at July 12, 2006 05:40 PM (NsnoE)

11 Such a sugar puppy. Awwwwwwww.

Posted by: caltechgirl at July 12, 2006 06:11 PM (/vgMZ)

12 oh. my. god. the picture of him buried in the rocks? hilarious! I can't believe how tolerant he is! that's awesome.

Posted by: girl at July 12, 2006 07:08 PM (ZIi+3)

13 Awww...what a beautiful post! I have a soft spot for those spotty dogs. I have one of my own that I love like no other. The photos are fabulous! Tammy

Posted by: Syd's Mom at July 12, 2006 07:11 PM (5SFzE)

14 What a lovely, lovely post. That picture with Jeff and puppy braving the waves? That made my heart catch in my throat. Love you. Love Gorby, too. xoxo

Posted by: Margi at July 13, 2006 06:56 AM (DMa0Z)

15 P.S. The sand? It's SUPERSIZED. Heh.

Posted by: Margi at July 13, 2006 06:57 AM (DMa0Z)

16 The thought of going through the pearly gates together got me all choked up. Have fun together!

Posted by: Hannah at July 17, 2006 05:51 AM (ImQx2)

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The best quote I ever read was by the actress Maura Tierney. It has become my favorite quote of all times, one of those simple things that has none of the inspiration or power that Churchill or Benny Franklin would add, and none of the twee shit you'd expect from Dave Berry or George Carlin.

It was this: We are less afraid of aging than of you watching us age.

Outstanding.

This is one of my all-time greatest fears. Growing old is incredibly frightening, growing old gracefully something that I yearn for, much like Old Yeller was keen on that final drink of water he had. If I have one girly prayer that can be answered, it's not "Dear God please don't ever let me be in an accident wearing Granny Panties," or "Dear God please keep my period from showing up while dressed in white at Elton John's Black and White Ball" (because, you know, that happens to me all the time). No, my girly prayer is this: "Dear God please let me grow old gracefully. And if you're into extra credit points, if you help keep me from having that turkey neck thing I promise to stop sitting around thinking of inventive phrases using the word 'fuck'. ThanksGodokbye."

See, it's harder for women. Men? They get distinguished. Women? We just get rode hard and put up wet. Men get salt and pepper hair. Women get told by Andie McDowell that we should use Clairol because she's worth it, never mind what we're worth (the hidden message here is: "Go ahead! Use Clairol and see if you can clean yourself up! I'm Andie McDowell for Chrissake, and yes ok it was me who said the most ridiculous line ever: 'Is it raining? I hadn't noticed.' but I'm getting paid big money here, ladies, and I'm doing it for YOU.") Men get sports cars and wear turtlenecks with leather jackets. Women get stretchy trousers and sensible shoes. Men get an earring or flash sunglasses. Women get housecoats and show up in public with pink sponge rollers in our hair.

Like many things in life-including but not limited to glass ceilings, longer life expectancies (because it is SO GREAT to imagine living out our years in a retirement home after our men have kicked off, fighting over Wenchell the Wonder Dweedle in the Palm Sands Home for Retirement as he's the only man left alive in there, never mind his collection of cicada carcasses), and that ever annoying bleeding out of the snatch once a month-the aging thing is yet another way that women get screwed.

Look at how Hollywood (ever the bastion of reality) phrases things-the 64 year-old Harrison Ford is considered "Rugged". The gorgeous 60 year-old Susan Sarandon gets things written about her "political belief system" instead of her beauty (never mind that she's not only nearly twice my age but she's way hotter than I am.) It's impossible to win when men are expected to age and women are expected to not just arrest the clock, but beat the fucking thing senseless while turning it back in a haze of liposuction and gym visits. Men pack 6 packs when they're younger and when they're older a paunch is ok. Women are considered to be "letting themselves go" if we get a love handle or two, and we don't get to have 6 packs when we get older unless they're stuffed with grey-covering hair dyes.

I worry about this myself. I don't want Angus to look over at me and think: Hmm. She's getting some Crow's Feet. May be time to patrol the latest clubs for her replacement.

Not that he would.

In fact, he thinks our age difference is a massive negative.

But I think he's the minority in this.

I don't worry that I'll be traded in for a younger model (no really, I don't.)

Although he did refer to me as "The Old Boot" last night.

No, my fear is getting older in front of the eyes of someone that I want to view me as immortal. I want Angus to think I look young and healthy (pay no attention to the gallon of Oil of Olay in the cupboard, baby. I don't actually drink the stuff. Mostly.) I want Angus to think I have smooth buttercup skin and a twinkle in my eye like moistened dew. I want Angus to think that the firmness in my thighs will be there forever, that my skin will never ever be like saltwater taffy in that he can hold onto it and I can walk into another room, using my skin as a windshield to stop the dog.

I don't want to grow old in front of his eyes, mostly because he hasn't grown older in mine. Maybe the truth is, I'm not growing older in his eyes. It's my own eyesight that is failing me.

*Sigh* just like fucking everything else falling apart.

-H.

Posted by: Everydaystranger at 06:46 AM | Comments (7) | Add Comment
Post contains 831 words, total size 5 kb.

1 You see older couples on the street, quite often. I wouldn't want to have anything to do with them right now, because they're old and squishy and... old. But I think as you grow old together, it just gets quite normal and comfortable, nothing all too weird about it. So I think in your case, Angus will probably still see you the same exact way (still beautiful) in 30 years. I've decided that there's no way I'm cutting my hair short and dying it one of those icky colors when it goes gray. What's wrong with going gray? My mom's gray but it's actually a really pretty silver color - wish she'd understand that.

Posted by: Hannah at July 11, 2006 08:04 AM (5w+E2)

2 You are way too young to be wiring a lament about etting older. Wait until you are 65! If there is true love present, your growing older is of no moment at all to your partner. Yes, you do mourn the lost youth and beauty, but you both do it - so it's nothing to be scared of. The only reason I dyed my hair is tht when it started to turn gray, it was completely unmanageable - wiry and fly-away. The dye controls that better than anything else.

Posted by: kenju at July 11, 2006 01:07 PM (2+7OT)

3 That was supposed to say "writing a lament about getting older". LOL

Posted by: kenju at July 11, 2006 01:08 PM (2+7OT)

4 You're right. We live in an age where "Men age and women rot." I think it was Gloria Steinem who said that.

Posted by: impossiblejane at July 11, 2006 01:58 PM (gNyGH)

5 I just accept it as part of life... getting old. I mean, it sure beats the alternative (not getting older, you know, dying...)

Posted by: sue at July 11, 2006 02:17 PM (WbfZD)

6 My Sweet, Was that a Freudian slip? Angus sees it as "a massive negative"? I sincerely doubt THAT. You will be an adorable and wise, old "boot," regardless.

Posted by: Deb at July 11, 2006 04:23 PM (GOFVL)

7 I am twice your age, so I get to comment. Angus will not think you have crows feet. His eyesight will be diminished a little. He will not see your imperfections. In fact, Angus will look at you and consider himself very lucky, all his friends significant others are getting old, but you are not getting old. As a man,one of the pure joys of getting old is that more and more women look good. When you are thirty, men don't look at sixty year old women. When you are 60 you look at all the women from 70 on down. It is like finding a whole new garden of flowers to admire. So based on poor eyesight and an active libido, I hope that you will be able to keep up with Angus.

Posted by: iowaslovak at July 12, 2006 04:48 AM (vBa9j)

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Lately, my head has been a bit fuzzy. I've lost my thoughts again, even though I have my voice back. I never lost my every day speaking voice, my "I'd like a non-fat grande mocha" voice, my "Return travelcard to London, please" voice. That voice I've always had. What I had lost was my other voice, the voice that says "Fuck you," and "You don't get to talk to me like that," and most especially, "What I want is this".

In a moment of breakthrough, I got my voice back.

I lost it many years ago. I lost it and, like the civil rights of the nation I come from, I didn't even realize that it had gone. There was no me, there was only a "What can I do for you?"

But now I'm coming back. I'm slowly returning-I'm not all there yet, but I am starting to get back inside of me, piece by piece. And I cannot fucking believe how fantastic the skin inside my forearms feels.

This is a small step, a first. There are more to come. I have celebrated this moment with Angus and tomorrow I get to tell my Couch Man about it, and we can celebrate then, too.

In the meantime something has me quiet. I'm not sure what it is, but I suppose if I had to wager a guess it'd be related to children. I feel quiet and solemn and have concentrated on cleaning out. Yesterday I yanked out half the contents of my closet and the clothes are going to charity. I stood before the open doors and, wordlessly, just started ripping.

It was that or sit around in the kitchen, cleaning out the cupboards with my head inside of them like Sylvia Plath. I chose the path of least resistance. The Great Wardrobe Purge of 2006 has only just begun.

I recently looked back at comments here, and I did a chase on the internet to see who linked to me-my links are down and that's ok with me. I don't really comment on other sites, but I'm often there. On some sites I saw interesting things-specifically I saw that people have written sentiments intimating that I have such a good life, it's better than theirs, what's my issue?

Huh. Interesting. I wonder if it's something in my writing that makes me seem ungrateful because trust me-I'm not. This life I live now is something that I love with a ferocity that sometimes scares me-loving things means giving them value. Giving value means introducing vulnerability. After 32 years I have a home, I have a place that I can't wait to come home to every single day. I have a lovely boy that can make my toes curl. And I have the one other thing that I have always wanted, as far back as I can remember - I get to travel and see the world.

It's the only thing I wanted when I was a little girl and I treasure it more than I can say.

None of what I have was received lightly. I did not have an easy path, things didn't happen overnight and it wasn't handed to me on a platter. My past is marked wth times of poverty. I have been raped. I have been hit. I have been abused in ways I am only just now working out in a weekly session in Operation Save Myself. I don't blame anyone, really-all it takes is someone who will be the victim before the house of cards falls down.

I lost my job and, consequently, my mind. Only I really lost my mind before that, when I went all out and rode the Suicide Train. I lost one of the greatest loves a person can have when he died and left the world behind. I continue to monitor the skin cancer front, which may ultimately be the way I take my check-out. I only speak to one family member now (although this was a choice). I have few memories, and some of those I have I don't want. I have no friends from the past and only a tiny inner circle now. I struggle with fertility treatment and am mindful of one of the two possible outcomes-a lifetime of regret, when what I long for is a lifetime of song.

Am I so lucky? Well, I certainly think so, and not in a "let me rub it in" kind of way. I'm the kind of chick that could just as easily have wound up in the gutter as wind up in a house in the countryside. I don't exactly know how I got this life, I only know that it was fucking harder than hell to get to here. I think I have an incredible world that I inhabit. I have someone helping me fix me. I have a man that I love very much. I have the world's most handsome dog ever, as well as the world's laziest cats (but that's ok, it makes it easier for me to pick them up and love on them that way). I get to travel and I have a job that, while incredibly stressful, is doing wonders for my CV.

But I don't think I can compare my life to yours. I don't think lives can be compared like that. Maybe I have a few extra stamps in my passport, but maybe you get to read bedtime stories to someone who smells like Johnson's Baby Shampoo and Cheerios. Maybe I have a nice house and a nice garden, but maybe you have loving phone calls with your family, where throats don't catch and angry words get exchanged. Maybe I have a man that I love very much, but maybe you have someone, too. Maybe maybe maybe.

Am I lucky that I have these scars on my wrist? Am I ungrateful when I scream at the sky and beg for the chance to be a mother? When I have a bad day, must it be tempered by the fact that I got a good bonus?

Life is hard enough. I've spent enough time being silent and hiding myself. Don't hide yourself either-vent away. We all have a voice, even those whose glasses are a bright pearly pink.

After all, I guess even Zach Braff must have a bad day from time to time.

My site is my apple-I'm happy to slice it open and give you a taste. It doesn't mean I can compare to your clementine slices. It just means that this is me, with all of my baggage, with my now re-appearing voice.

I like my life, with all its bruises and shininess. I honestly, truly hope you like yours, too.

-H.

Posted by: Everydaystranger at 10:11 AM | Comments (18) | Add Comment
Post contains 1133 words, total size 6 kb.

Yesterday was National Indulgence Day. I know this-it was on my calendar. I'd specifically marked it in Outlook, and if you know one thing about me know this-I'd use Outlook to tell me when to tie my fucking shoes if I could, I am that dependent on Outlook. Moses may have had two stone tablets, Bill Gates may have lines of code, and me? My guide is Outlook. So suffice to say that if Outlook tells me it must happen, then it is so. So it is written, so it shall be.

National Indulgence Day it was then. We needed it-true, we've been to Greece recently. True, we had a big successful party. True, we'd both gotten incredible bonuses. But the real world was coming back in, and doing it hard. My stress-related facial tick has gotten so bad I look like I'm permanently under a strobe light. I'm eating antacids like a hardcore stockbroker. And I have developed another mouth ulcer, a sure sign that I'm not coping well. I have been so crushed by actions of others at work that I am completely demotivated. I'm not working as hard as I should do, and when I sit down to try to work hard I just get consumed with bitterness and anger. I am still job hunting, but summer is not the best time to do this.

National Indulgence Day started off thus-a plop on the doormat marked the arrival of something I'd ordered from Amazon months ago. A cool chick with great taste in home renovations had turned me on to Mo Willems, and I'd seen this book on Amazon. Once I saw it, I knew I had to have it. It took ages to arrive but once it did it was just as amazing as I suspected it would be.

The afternoon I spent in a spa. I booked a waxing, a full body massage, a facial, and a manicure. This was huge for me-I have never in my entire life had a manicure before, ever. I cannot stand the sound or feel of nail filing and I knew I'd have to overcome this. I made my way to the spa, face makeup-less and body tense. The waxing was as un-fun as ever. The manicure was also un-fun-my teeth were sweating buckets as she filed my nails. When she got to my thumbnails I had to be pried off the ceiling using the latest in cuticle technology, but once that was done she went about painting my nails.

Now, I'm a girl in that I like dresses and skirts and sparkly things. I am not a girl in that I never, ever paint my fingernails. Call me crazy (and believe me, some do) it makes my fingers feel too heavy. Fingernail polish make me feel like I've got weights attached to my fingers. But she painted them a nice, clean neutral color and I still have the polish on-it looks pretty and my fingers just feel a wee bit heavy but nothing I can't live with.

It came to massage and facial time. The facial was brilliant-I think she used about one hundred different unguents on my face, rubbing my temples, my hair, my chin, my throat. I had the anti-aging facial, so a special collagen gel was rubbed on at the end and remarkably, I do look a bit younger now.

Anti-aging facials. I am one step away from ordering a thighmaster and getting out the muumuus.

The massage was the final step. Soft music playing, the curtains drawn and incense drifing in the room, she started off with an Elemis treatment of a body scrub followed by lots of Japanese massage oil. At first my mind was fillled with Things Of A Serious Nature-the recent betrayal at work. The rewards of others betraying me. Babies. My therapy session. IVF. What I would be when I grew up. How to quit and become a writer. Those kinds of Things of a Serious Nature.

Then, suddenly, I was away. None of those things were on my mind anymore. I don't remember what I thought of, but nothing hurt, nothing was on my mind. I was Lisa in the flotation tank, I was Jean-Marc Barr diving deep.

Some time later I sighed contentedly. She pulled off the eye mask and smiled at me. "You don't relax, do you?" she asked.

"No, I find it quite hard to do." I replied ruefully, sitting up and tucking the towel around me.

"I've never had a client as tense as you are. You fell asleep for a little while, and I thought you needed the rest. We're all done here, but do leave the oils on your skin for a while, as your skin needs to absorb them."

I looked at my watch-I'd been gone for an hour. I get dressed and head home, as I'm meeting Lloyd to see the new Pirates of the Caribbean film in an hour. I take her point and don't rinse off the oils but I do wash my hair out-the massage oils left me looking like Medusa, and that whole Tara Reid trailer-trash look really didn't suit me.

I felt soft and pampered when I finally met up with Lloyd. The theatre was packed as it was opening night for the film in England, and as we'd suspected it would be full, I'd booked tickets online. There was only one machine out of 5 working, and the one working machine didn't recognize my booking, so we headed upstairs to get tickets from the refreshments counter. The area was heaving with people trying to buy tickets. The guy scanned my card but there's still no booking. Frustrated, I asked him to try again. Still no joy.

I decided last week that the New Helen needed to be stronger, less accepting of all the negative. I have picked my battles recently, with success. I have started standing up for myself. I decided that their machines not recognizing my card was not my problem. I reached out to lean my forearms on their glass counters, stern words of admonishment already out of my mouth-"Look, your company advocates booking online and I've done so, only you're machines are rubbish and-"

Here I leaned on the cabinet.

And because I'm a total fuck monkey, I'd forgotten I was still covered in massage oils.

My arms shot out from under me and my face hit the counter with a bang so loud that people in other queues looked over.

I sat up, my face the color of the red Frostees that they serve. "Ummm....ow." I said meekly, rubbing my forehead.

The guy gave me two tickets anyway.

When stern doesn't work, apply slapstick.

We did one other thing for National Indulgence Day in our house-click on the extended entry to see our new baby.

-H.
more...

Posted by: Everydaystranger at 08:04 AM | Comments (13) | Add Comment
Post contains 1228 words, total size 7 kb.

1 I am impressed with the TV and jealous of the full day at the spa. I'd love to have seen the splat on the counter; slapstick will get you in every time!

Posted by: kenju at July 07, 2006 10:48 AM (2+7OT)

2 Congrats on the new tv - quite quite beautiful. and on a successful indulgence. My missus has the same issues with nailpolish. She also sometimes says that it makes her feel like she is having trouble breathing... me? I love the nailpolish, when I can keep it from chipping, that is.

Posted by: martha at July 07, 2006 01:11 PM (Ez1LO)

3 We're laughing WITH you, not AT you, you realize... *loud laughter* Gratz on the new "addition"... cool!!

Posted by: sue at July 07, 2006 01:17 PM (WbfZD)

4 I'm sorry but I laughed so hard that my coworkers came over to see what I was cackling about. You just started my day off beautifully! I knew when you said "massage" that your therapist would tell you that your muscles are like rocks. I've worked on people like you. That's when I bust out the elbows and get as much height as I can (at my towering form of 5'1) to lean in. The upside? Y'all are the first to fall asleep so it's easier to work on you once you're out. You don't fight the touch that way. So um. When are you coming to Houston? Table's in my closet....

Posted by: Ms. Pants at July 07, 2006 01:36 PM (GefuU)

5 I totally want a massage now. Must book one. Loving the new boob tube. When you go to Houston to visit Ms. Pants, drop by Louisiana to seem me!

Posted by: Ice Queen at July 07, 2006 02:05 PM (Lyl8J)

6 You are now the owner of the coveted "My favorite post of the day award." You should feel honored and amused. Also, you are the inaugural winner of the "My favorite post of the day award" thus you should have some sort of day named after you. You note your special day in Outlook. Also, you should use the day to get a massage. IÂ’ve heard that you enjoy being covered in oil.

Posted by: Some Girl at July 07, 2006 02:11 PM (+3BZS)

7 I have the same issue with nail polish... it does feel heavy and I can't move my fingers right and they just feel *wrong*. And they look wrong too with polish on. Great TV, and isn't that Big Love? Is it still showing over there?

Posted by: nuala` at July 07, 2006 03:17 PM (DSTDJ)

8 Good thing I didn't start my dinner yet. My monitor would have been covered with it, after reading about you "standing up for yourself". (yes, I tend to eat dinner quite often at my computer.) Hope the work situation improves soon. And in the meantime, have Angus work on your back and feet (foot massages can do wonders). Sounds like more relaxation would do you good.

Posted by: diamond dave at July 07, 2006 08:38 PM (LfElj)

9 Do we really need an excuse to indulge?

Posted by: Buffy at July 08, 2006 08:52 PM (FDZl5)

10 Great post.. This is why i never stay away too long. gotta stay away from stress..cause stress did slay ken lay..(wouldnt doubt darth cheney did it though) I apologize for getting political...just trying to make a point. take care.

Posted by: J.M at July 09, 2006 05:16 AM (k3v0Q)

11 My husband can't take the sound of a nail file, either can his mom. And ditto on the nail polish. What I find ironic is why I was waiting for the page to load I was finally trying out some soft pink nail polish, and decided I must remove it because I have to put 10 coats on just to see it and now my fingers are weighed down. Crazy. Glad you got to relax, get your tickets, and fantastic t.v. I would love to pray at your altar anyday.

Posted by: Teresa at July 10, 2006 03:00 AM (f+o6m)

12 I have to comment here, since there is no link to the post above. Whomever would link to you and indicate that they think you are whining is mean-spirited and nasty. Pay them NO mind at all. I like my life and you deserve yours as much as anyone does. None of us is perfect and none of our lives are perfect either. Please allow us (all of us) to whine if we want without getting snarky!

Posted by: kenju at July 10, 2006 10:29 AM (2+7OT)

13 Sleepover/movie party at Helen's!

Posted by: Hannah at July 11, 2006 08:07 AM (5w+E2)

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I had a phone call onthe 4th of July from someone who works with a consulting company we sometimes work with. It was a woman that I'd been exchanging emails with about work things, and had I not heard her voice I'd have never guessed she was an American so there you have it- another example of this weird and wild thing called technology. After listening to her voice mail, I rang her back.

It was the usual business issue before she did It. You know, It. It. The "So where are you from?" It. She did It, and I answered that I am a Texan.

"How funny!" she replied. "I'm from Boston!" Because, you know, it is.

"Cool," I said. "Boston is seriously cool."

"I had just read from my page-a-day scripture today that [and here she went off into something about Ezekial 22:7 something or other.] Isn't that funny?" she chirped.

"Umm....yes." I replied. I am not an expert on the Bible. I read it many years ago, but if I tried to hold one these days it'd either spontaneously burst into flame or beat me about the head like a Harry Potter magified book.

"How'd you celebrate the 4th of July?" she asked.

"Oh we celebrated on Saturday. We had loads of friends and family over, we had massive quantities of food and a load of alcohol. Then we lit up fireworks and stayed up too late. What'd you do?" I replied.

"On Sunday we went with some American friends and worshipped at the house of the Lord."

Okaaaaaaaaay.

"Do you celebrate Thanksgiving, too?" she asked hopefully.

Oh Jesus, I can't even begin to imagine the degree of prayer needed for that holiday in her house. I wonder what it'd be like to have a face to face with her-I'd sit down across the table from her, her halo on bright and shiny. "Have you found God, Helen?" she'd ask. I'd pull my bottle of Stoli off my leather chaps and plunk it on the table. "God? Yeah. I done found him. He owes me money." I'd say, swigging and wiping the spillage on my arm, and then proceed to suck the absorbed Stoli off my ratty plaid shirt.

I always wonder, when talking to people that are religious, if they will try to convert me. I don't think that is actually the case, that there's a thermometer drawn on a piece of white paper in their bedroom with the top label "Only 20,000 more souls to save!" I'm likely just paranoid. No really. Stop looking at me like that. Are you talking about me behind my back?

Conversion is a popular theme in my life lately. Last weekend when I served up the waffles, it turned out most of the guests had never had waffles.

*Pauses for effect*

Were you as shocked as I was? Good. Not only had they never had them, but they found the idea of maple syrup on waffles to be revolting.

I tell you-I'm surrounded by luddites.

Everyone tried it and, to my delight and smugness, they loved it.

Conversion complete. I hereby baptize thee as Carb Lovers.

They in turn have converted me as a Pimms lover. Pimms, a lovely elixir you mix with lemonade and chuck fruit into. Pimms, a soft warmly-colored drink that knocks the legs out from under you when you least expect it. Pimms, the highlight of the summer. I drink the stuff now, and I love it.

See? Not all conversion is a bad thing.

-H.

PS-Conversion continue (a la Circle of Life nonsense). I am a believer again, thanks to the good news here.

PPS-I have no problem with those who have a god, just in case you were thinking of sending hate mail. Just because god owes me money doesn't mean I rubbish those who have religion. You have a god? Cool.

Posted by: Everydaystranger at 09:22 AM | Comments (12) | Add Comment
Post contains 644 words, total size 4 kb.

1 what? people in england don't eat waffles?!

Posted by: geeky at July 06, 2006 12:05 PM (ziVl9)

2 No one had ever had waffles! What in the world do they eat for breakfast over there? I am very curious. Are there no pancake houses? Next you'll tell me no hashbrowns, either!

Posted by: Teri at July 06, 2006 12:36 PM (K7jOL)

3 And I am converting Colorado to Pimms lovers...I can't help it - it's the fruity goodness.

Posted by: K at July 06, 2006 02:00 PM (ks9RP)

4 I don't know why, but I'm always so surprised to hear about that the overenthusiastic variety of Christian exists in Europe. I tend to think of it as a very American thing.

Posted by: mac at July 06, 2006 02:39 PM (4sb5H)

5 Pimms is definitely the stuff of the gods... I alternate between craving Pimms and craving Pastis during the summer.

Posted by: martha at July 06, 2006 03:07 PM (Ez1LO)

6 Dunno Mac-the only enthusiastic Christians I've met since moving to Europe? All Americans.

Posted by: Helen at July 06, 2006 03:28 PM (e4NUE)

7 Hey, now that you mention it, I think he owes me some serious money too.

Posted by: Halo at July 06, 2006 05:51 PM (wypb3)

8 You seriously have to try spreading peanut butter on your waffle before you pour on the syrup! Let me know what you think about that "flavor"!

Posted by: Steff at July 06, 2006 06:25 PM (fIFtd)

9 For me, baseball is proof of the existence of God. However, to each his/her own. As one who lived in TX myself and worked as a waiter, I often had customers ask me questions like "Have accepted Jesus Christ as your personal savior?" I found it was easiest to turn it right around on them by simply saying "Haven't you?" It stops them in their tracks everytime.

Posted by: ~Easy at July 06, 2006 07:09 PM (CZPRx)

10 The American woman you speak of reminded me of a character in Absolutely Fabulous...Marshall's girlfriend? Bo? Yay on the waffle conversion...I converted my mother-in-law into a french toast (or eggy bread?!) with maple syrup lover - yum!

Posted by: Juls at July 06, 2006 10:50 PM (ka1Yp)

11 oh weird! well, i can tell you that not everyone from boston is that scary! ;-) and, now i'm hungry for waffles. mmmm

Posted by: kat at July 10, 2006 02:43 PM (xJGrF)

12 My personal favorite is converting people to liking cranberry sauce. The secret? They go from hating cranberry sauce to liking *my* cranberry sauce... because I use things like orange juice and cinnamon. But that's better than not liking cranberry sauce at all... (I utterly love cranberry sauce on waffles, BTW. But only the orangey-cinnamon kind.)

Posted by: B. Durbin at July 12, 2006 12:37 AM (tie24)

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Our Saturday Independence Day loomed large-we'd spent over £250 on food alone (and had a bust-up as I'd bought an entire pig's worth of spare ribs. Actually make that two pigs. I felt many spare ribs were the way to go, he felt two enormous beef joints were the way to go, and the showdown would have to take place over the grill that night.) It took us ages to set up in the garden-we hastily made a table and then laid out tablecloths draped with American flags, and I had various antique enamel pitchers and French juice jugs drifting around filled with flowers from our garden. We'd made nearly all of the food beforehand, and so Saturday was spent getting the house ready and trying to keep cool-the sun was hot, there were no clouds, and the temperature was fucking blistering (and in a land of no air conditioning, we felt it even more so).

Here's the garden in its patriotic glory (along with our homemade table and a number of science stools that we grabbed from a pile of to-be-kindling):

If the lawn is looking a bit dry, it's because it is. England is hosting a massive drought just now and no one is allowed to water their lawns. Our entire front garden is now brown and the lush back garden is getting hit pretty hard, too. It's not fun.

And all of Gorby's toys are scattered all over the place, as per usual.

The candles on the table are things I put together from the Sale bin at Habitat, which I think worked out ok. The green enamel pitcher on the table is about 100 years old, and all the flowers in it are from our garden. I really suck at flower arranging but those kinds of flowers? They arrange themselves.

All patriotic paraphernalia got pressed into service, like this bear that someone gave me many years ago.

Even the table with the dishes was dressed up.

I was given this table about 12 years ago. It's travelled to Europe with me as I love it dearly. It also got put into service, armed with an antique yellow French milk pitcher that we filled with the silverware.

People slowly started trickling in to watch the game on our big fuck-off TV (which is about to be relegated to the kitchen as we are planning on buying a 42 inch HD plasma for the living room. We'd go LCD but they don't make them big enough just yet. Like alcohol, we take our TVs very seriously.) More people arrived. The stock of chips and dips were distributed. The keg was tapped and the wine was uncorked. Soon our entire living room was filled with people as we sadly watched England lose in the penalty shoot out.

Then even more people arrived. We all went outside, the grill was fired up, and the party really started (the flowing alcohol helped ease the post-World Cup loss blues.) Gorby was the darling of the evening, going from hand to hand as everyone remarked what a calm and sweet dog he was. Kids settled into the lounge watching Jurassic Park with the surround sound on full blast (say what you like about the movie being naff, but there's nothing cooler than listening to the Tyrannosaurus' footsteps vibrating in the cup of water in surround sound.) The adults pooled around in the back garden, and I am enormously pleased that everyone talked to everyone. We had about 30 people come over for the festivities, all from different areas in our lives, and everyone seemed to get on.

Everyone relaxed.

Dinner was a massive affair-baked beans, potato salad, a pasta-garden salad, corn on the cob, spare ribs, beef joint, sausages, hamburgers and drinks to spare. People kept coming for food in waves. Angus kept grilling and I kept running around refilling pitchers of Pimms (a fabulous English mixer which I have become a devotee to) and refilling the food on the table. When, at the end, Angus and I finally got the chance to grab something small to eat for ourselves (I had a tofu sausage and he had a beef and horseradish-filled baguette) the food had almost disappeared. We had just a few ribs, a couple of slabs of beef, a few scoops of potato salad and baked beans each. The corn, garden salad, and all other dead animal products were gone.

We fired up the candles placed all over the garden and kept going. Out came the fabulous fudgy brownies Angus had made. I had caved and made a homemade yellow cake with white frosting and strawberries and blueberries in the form of an American flag on top. An ice-filled bowl of watermelons was on standby. Every single piece of cake and brownie disappeared, but the guests? Not fans of watermelon (a sad, sad thing indeed. Who doesn't like watermelon? And why?).

It was about eleven once the dessert course concluded and so it was time to light off some fireworks. Massive rockets, sizzling screamers, and roman candles galore all marked the sky above our countryside. We'd put Gorby in his kennel in the locked-up kitchen with the radio on loud, but the truth is he wasn't bothered anyway. We let him out halfway through and he couldn't have cared less about the fireworks (God I love this dog).

Some guests left after the display of us literally burning our money up, but happily the majority stayed. In the end, we had 16 people throughout our house and in tents in our front garden (and isn't that the sign of a good party? Tent City being erected on your lawn?)

We all went to bed around 2 (Angus and I were completely sober as we'd been running around too much to get drinks in-next year I will get the beer ready via IV, then we can be sure to clog our veins with booze) and were awakened around 7 when one of the 4 year-olds decided it was time for everyone to get up and so got voluble (and Jesus H. Christ it put Angus' and my teeth on edge.) The breakfast production started and we doled out cup after cup of coffee to hungover guests. I fired up the waffle iron and became a one-woman waffle making menace. Angus made scrambled eggs and we had rashers of bacon (our barbecue has contributed to the decimation of many pigs, and for that, I am sorry. But they all were organic happy pigs, that much we made sure of. Sorry, Wilbur! I love you, man!)

People said their good-byes around lunchtime with smiles of what a great time they'd had. I was glad about that-to me the 4th is about family and friends, good food and good company. I believe this is how the founding fathers would have wanted it to be-it's about having a life that we can relax in and love. Flag-waving and hardcore patriotic gestures are not what means the most to me, it's not what embodies the 4th of July in my book. Sure, be happy to be American, be proud to remember the day that a little fledgling country took a stand. But for me, the day is about being happy, about having the chance to relax and look up at exploding stars. It was Jefferson who said: I am a warrior so that my son can be a merchant, so that his son can be a poet.

They fought the battle for us.

We get to love our lives for it, and one day a year, raise a glass in gratitude.

After everyone left Angus and I finished the cleaning up. We showered, then I napped in the hammock. I was later joined for some action in said hammock, and then we got drunk on nice white wine before collapsing in an exhausted heap by 9:00 at night.

It was, overall, one of the best Independence Day celebrations ever.

-H.

PS-I am thinking of trying to move my domain off of mu.nu and Angus and I will run it ourselves. Anyone have any experience doing this? Any tips gratefully received. I own two domain names, everydaystranger.net and a new one, which is here. I know I need to buy server space, etc, and I am not interested in using blogger, typepad, or anything else. I want final say over my own site, and I don't really want to be associated with things I don't support.

Posted by: Everydaystranger at 08:00 AM | Comments (7) | Add Comment
Post contains 1434 words, total size 9 kb.

1 Hi H, *delurks* I've moved domains on and off MuNu more times than I care to remember. Feel free to smack up the ole inbox if you need a hand. Rob

Posted by: RobRob at July 05, 2006 11:08 AM (8zoV4)

2 Party sounds fab, Helen! Glad you had such a good time!

Posted by: sarajane at July 05, 2006 01:29 PM (t5Xsa)

3 The party sounds awesome! I hope that when I finally make the move to that side of the pond I'll get an invite. I'm down with people that plan for camping after a party. Glad it was a success!

Posted by: amy t. at July 05, 2006 02:43 PM (zPssd)

4 My two cents: I host at www.fuitadnet.com, a nice bunch of folks who do what they do because they like doing it. Very reasonable rates, and if you need help *now* you can hop on IRC and get a tech in a chatroom. If you're looking for a change of pace, I can't recommend an install of Wordpress enough. Highly customizable, lots of interesting plugins to make it your own, lots of fun. If I can be of any assistance, please feel free to send me a note. Glad you had a good 4th. Got to spend the dark part of mine on a friend's roof, watching about 12 fireworks shows at once. Yay for high elevations. Luck, Michael

Posted by: Michael at July 05, 2006 03:24 PM (gDkSs)

5 Can you discuss the grill Angus used. is it gas , charcoal? is it a big big thing, etc..

Posted by: iowaslovak at July 05, 2006 09:11 PM (vBa9j)

6 Glad you had such a nice 4th! Definitely, Wordpress all the way.

Posted by: Hannah at July 06, 2006 12:56 PM (THPgF)

7 There are some hosts out there that have stuff like Wordpress already instealled on the sever when you become their customer. Mine, back when I had paid hosting, did not and even I was able to get both MT and Wordpress up and running. The instructions are pretty straightforward and there are some great support boards too. I preferred Wordpress over MT ... but I've heard (and seen) some pretty coold things with Expression Engine - but it's not free (I don't think) and I'm flippin' cheap. Looks like you had an awesome 4th!! We had a very great one here too - loads of time spent at the beach .... multiple parades ... and a front row seat to some awesome fireworks.

Posted by: Michele at July 07, 2006 03:27 AM (5VGFA)

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It's not often I feel homesick-after all, I've been away from the States for many years now. But today is often one of those days I feel a little twinge, I miss just a little of where I am from. It's just another day here (a day where Angus' newly arrived son Jeff and I will go to the movies and see Over the Hedge), a day of conference calls in the morning and normal life in the evening reign. We had our own brilliant party this weekend that I loved and more on that later however here, in my new country, it's just another Tuesday.

But in my heart it's a day of barbecues and fireworks, of laughter and corn on the cob, of the scent of foamy beer and hot afternoons.

Happy Independence Day, America.

I miss you today.

-H.

Posted by: Everydaystranger at 06:59 AM | Comments (10) | Add Comment
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1 I miss it, too... no barbeques or parties, no relaxed fun-in-the-sun. I still can't believe little things like this make me homesick. And that nobody even seems to realize that today's a special day.

Posted by: Hannah at July 04, 2006 07:37 AM (4Wiye)

2 I feel future-homesickness. I'm not gone yet, but I know I will be so today is a bit emotional in that respect. Have a good 4th of July, Helen!

Posted by: Juls at July 04, 2006 02:26 PM (ka1Yp)

3 Happy 4th to you Helen!

Posted by: Jen at July 04, 2006 03:17 PM (mcnrx)

4 Happy 4th of July to you from Houston TX. We've got the bbq pit ready for hamburger patties and hot dogs, lots of potato salad and corn on the cob.

Posted by: kim at July 04, 2006 05:40 PM (Jfcmk)

5 Happy Independence Day from Pompano Beach, Florida! Fireworks have been going off for two weeks now, so maybe we'll get some sleep after tonight. Ah... what do they call the 4th over in the motherland? 'ungrateful colonist uprising'?

Posted by: pam at July 04, 2006 06:09 PM (l6NIn)

6 thanks for remembering. We will go listen to the symphony and watch fireworks

Posted by: iowaslovak at July 04, 2006 08:05 PM (vBa9j)

7 I miss it too even though I was only in the US for 6 1/2 years. I got a beautiful email from my friend with photos of her 18 month old son running down the sidewalk with a flag in his hand and grinning. It made me heartsick for baseball (go Mariners!), hot dogs, fireworks, slurpees, the US flag on a flagpole and fresh cherries from our tree at the perfect stage of ripeness on the 4th...*sigh*

Posted by: Annalisa at July 04, 2006 10:18 PM (/kKbf)

8 We are just about to go outside and eat some homemade ice cream and set off our own fireworks...I'll watch some and think of you. And for those of you who are other than here: Nothing has changed. The 4th of July is exactly the same as it ever was.

Posted by: Marie at July 05, 2006 02:30 AM (qWBjl)

9 Happy 4th! I just got home from watching the fireworks in Foster City- had a BBQ earlier, some left over beer, so I'll go open one and lift a toast to you.

Posted by: Jen-Again at July 05, 2006 05:49 AM (QmzRL)

10 We miss you too!

Posted by: ~easy at July 05, 2006 02:11 PM (18jln)

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