I wish you could buy H&M clothes online. Denver doesn’t have a lot of the basic stores you can find elsewhere in the US; stores that have pretty much been staples elsewhere for some time, like H&M, or IKEA. We only got Sephora here about 2 years ago, not that I buy anything there. I’m kind of a drugstore product person, from Eucerin red-skin lotion to Maybelline Great Lash. I do buy department store lipstick (MAC or Bobbi Brown) and blush (Lorac), but otherwise I have no idea what’s going on in the world of beauty and honestly, don’t really care. In fact, now that I think about it, I have really let myself go in that regard. I don’t remember the last time I got a pedicure, had my eyebrows waxed, wore my contacts and really did my makeup. It’s not that I think I’m some natural beauty that doesn’t need help, either; no, I’ve just become quite lazy. I would like to work on that a bit, especially with the whole being 39 thing making it all seem that much worse.
At lunchtime today I popped over to the gym for my “butts and guts” class (ouch) and then for a quick visit to see Eeyore. While there, I asked one of his teachers if she wanted to baby sit for him in a couple of weeks, because she’s always indicating she’d be up for it, all for the low price of $15 per hour (!). I’ve avoided it so far, because we have a couple of girls we use for $12 an hour, and I’ve always thought it could be a little weird having one of his teachers over to our house. I mean, what will she think, and what will she come back in and tell all his other teachers, because you know she will? But we really need someone for that date, and she and the babe really like each other so I decided to just get over it. I’m still thinking, though, about her impressions and the report back. Will she be surprised by how small our house is, so she’ll go back in on Monday morning and something like this will ensue:
Teacher Babysitter: “Now I know why Kate says she can’t afford to have another baby; she really can’t. You should see how tiny their place is!”
Lead Teacher: “Did she at least have nice things for you to eat? Baby A’s parents live in the foothills – they have an enormous house and they love me and they always have just what I want to eat. And Baby A loves me, too. And I baby sit for them all the time because they love me. I wouldn’t even have time to baby sit for Eeyore if they asked because everybody else always wants me and loves me. Eeyore loves me. He sits up and walks and runs and sings arias for me; I’m not sure why he doesn’t for Kate and R.”
TB: “They had a couple of cans of Coke and some string cheese, so no, not really. They had a lot of wine and bourbon, though. Maybe that’s where they spend their money. I looked through her closets; there was a lot of stuff but it was all kind of cheap. So was her makeup in the medicine cabinet.”
Oh, dear – do people do that? Go through your things, I mean? Not that I really care, now that I am a Buddhist, don’t you know.
Thursday, March 27, 2008
Wednesday, March 26, 2008
Tuesday, March 25, 2008
Not in the clique.
If I were not going to Paris in a few weeks, I would SO be somewhere tropical right now. Denver schools are on spring break, and so I imagine all the annoying families filling the resorts of places I would like to be. So actually, I would SO be somewhere tropical next week. It’s lovely weather here, but it’s not the same as having breakfast while looking out at the ocean, palm trees swaying in the breeze, thinking about the day’s activities of lying by the pool reading and occasionally hopping in the pool to cool off. Except those days are probably gone for me now that we have the heir; instead it will be a lot of entertaining the toddler. Whatever; it’s still better to be in that kind of weather. Next year, for my, ahem, 40th birthday (WTF!!??) we’ll definitely go somewhere warm – either to Hawaii or perhaps rent a villa in Mexico. I’m thinking Hawaii, though, since it’s been awhile since I’ve been there. Somewhere I can pretend 40 isn’t happening.
Last Friday I had the most junior high experience I have had in some time. After work, I strolled with Eeyore over to a friend’s house to hang out and meet some of her neighbors, who habitually congregate on the sidewalk in front of her house to drink wine and chat while their children all play. When I got there, there was one dad and a couple of moms, and I felt that little awkwardness that sometimes comes when arriving at a scene with new people. That soon multiplied into full-fledged self-consciousness as both the women showed that they had no interest whatsoever in talking to me. As I continued to try to make friendly conversation, the resistance I felt emanating from these two was palpable. All of a sudden my own voice sounded to me to be too loud; too eager.
To try to change the emerging dynamic I perceived, I lifted Eeyore out of his stroller to carry him up to sit on the steps with my friend. As I lifted him, my friend said “Eeyore’s crack is showing.” I said, “Yes, he’s got high crack. R. says he inherited that from me.” Bitch Number One said, “Oh, isn’t that nice. How lovely to meet you.” Properly chastised, I sat down with Eeyore and shut up to observe (since there wasn’t really anyone left to talk to at that point). Not one minute after I had made my remark that was apparently the height of crudeness, Bitch Number Two launched into a discussion with her child about pooping in the potty. Bitch Number One chimed in about poop in general. At this point, my friend offered me a glass of wine, but I had to get out of there. I mean, seriously. I can’t make an inoffensive off the cuff remark without being called on it, but it’s OK to sit around and talk about baby shit? No thanks. Still, as I walked home, I couldn’t help but focus more on having been rebuffed by these women than anything else, when I had been nothing but normal and friendly. When I got home and told R. about how it had felt like 7th grade to be largely ignored, I might have even shed a hot tear or two. And then I remembered that I am WAY too old for that shit, and fuck them, anyway.
Last Friday I had the most junior high experience I have had in some time. After work, I strolled with Eeyore over to a friend’s house to hang out and meet some of her neighbors, who habitually congregate on the sidewalk in front of her house to drink wine and chat while their children all play. When I got there, there was one dad and a couple of moms, and I felt that little awkwardness that sometimes comes when arriving at a scene with new people. That soon multiplied into full-fledged self-consciousness as both the women showed that they had no interest whatsoever in talking to me. As I continued to try to make friendly conversation, the resistance I felt emanating from these two was palpable. All of a sudden my own voice sounded to me to be too loud; too eager.
To try to change the emerging dynamic I perceived, I lifted Eeyore out of his stroller to carry him up to sit on the steps with my friend. As I lifted him, my friend said “Eeyore’s crack is showing.” I said, “Yes, he’s got high crack. R. says he inherited that from me.” Bitch Number One said, “Oh, isn’t that nice. How lovely to meet you.” Properly chastised, I sat down with Eeyore and shut up to observe (since there wasn’t really anyone left to talk to at that point). Not one minute after I had made my remark that was apparently the height of crudeness, Bitch Number Two launched into a discussion with her child about pooping in the potty. Bitch Number One chimed in about poop in general. At this point, my friend offered me a glass of wine, but I had to get out of there. I mean, seriously. I can’t make an inoffensive off the cuff remark without being called on it, but it’s OK to sit around and talk about baby shit? No thanks. Still, as I walked home, I couldn’t help but focus more on having been rebuffed by these women than anything else, when I had been nothing but normal and friendly. When I got home and told R. about how it had felt like 7th grade to be largely ignored, I might have even shed a hot tear or two. And then I remembered that I am WAY too old for that shit, and fuck them, anyway.
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
Happy anniversary.
I met my husband two years ago today. I can’t believe how little of my life that is, yet how much of the big stuff we’ve packed in:
It seems like only yesterday, and really, it almost was, that I had just started dating R. He lived in a two-bedroom apartment with his cat and an entire wall of books that thrilled me to see. One Sunday morning not too long after we’d started seeing each other, we sat on his couch and drank coffee, listening to Steven Malkmus and paging through one of his architecture books on Richard Neutra’s Palm Springs houses. That’s still one of my favorite memories in my life; I felt like I had stepped straight into my wildest dream of the world’s most attractive man. I mean, really; a brown-haired, well-read, cat-owning architect with good music on his stereo… I was in love.
Not too long after that, because everything about our time together has been compressed, he began coughing a lot. We’d lie in bed at night, and he’d suck these gross Halls cough drops like they were going out of style. Finally, he told me he’d coughed up a little blood that day, and the next day he was in the hospital with a DVT in his calf and seven pulmonary embolisms (emboli? I don’t know) in his lungs. The doctors marveled that he had a large saddle embolus and was still alive; they usually only found those in autopsies. Five days later he was out of the hospital, newly fragile in the way only people who have been broadsided by their own mortality can be, and a few days later we were engaged.
Some people might think it was a little quick to be making that kind of decision on the heels of a medical emergency like that, but I prefer to think it just cemented what we already knew. In fact, driving home from my first date with him, I’d announced giddily to the ether that we were going to get married. Since then we’ve done everything at lightening speed, but it has all felt just right. I still (after all this time) feel like I hit the jackpot.
It seems like only yesterday, and really, it almost was, that I had just started dating R. He lived in a two-bedroom apartment with his cat and an entire wall of books that thrilled me to see. One Sunday morning not too long after we’d started seeing each other, we sat on his couch and drank coffee, listening to Steven Malkmus and paging through one of his architecture books on Richard Neutra’s Palm Springs houses. That’s still one of my favorite memories in my life; I felt like I had stepped straight into my wildest dream of the world’s most attractive man. I mean, really; a brown-haired, well-read, cat-owning architect with good music on his stereo… I was in love.
Not too long after that, because everything about our time together has been compressed, he began coughing a lot. We’d lie in bed at night, and he’d suck these gross Halls cough drops like they were going out of style. Finally, he told me he’d coughed up a little blood that day, and the next day he was in the hospital with a DVT in his calf and seven pulmonary embolisms (emboli? I don’t know) in his lungs. The doctors marveled that he had a large saddle embolus and was still alive; they usually only found those in autopsies. Five days later he was out of the hospital, newly fragile in the way only people who have been broadsided by their own mortality can be, and a few days later we were engaged.
Some people might think it was a little quick to be making that kind of decision on the heels of a medical emergency like that, but I prefer to think it just cemented what we already knew. In fact, driving home from my first date with him, I’d announced giddily to the ether that we were going to get married. Since then we’ve done everything at lightening speed, but it has all felt just right. I still (after all this time) feel like I hit the jackpot.
Tuesday, March 18, 2008
Tuesday.
I had the opportunity to use one of my dad’s stock phrases this morning; one I had never been able to use outside the family before. A guy stepped into the elevator and started sniffing.
Guy: “Every elevator I get into today smells like an Italian restaurant. You know, like pasta, with a little garlic.”
Kate: “Maybe it’s your upper lip.”
I couldn’t have him thinking I smelled like pasta with garlic, after all.
Meanwhile, R. and I took our first weekend trip with the baby last weekend; we stayed with some friends in their new condo in Vail. Eeyore was the perfect guest, ensuring we would be invited back with his gummy smiles and sleeping through the night. It was pretty encouraging, actually, that we could go somewhere and our lives wouldn’t implode between sunset and sunrise. Our next trip with him is a visit to my mom’s in Palo Alto in June or July; now I’ll only fear the airplane trip. And GOD, do I fear that. I suppose I’ll just need to be carrying enough cash to buy drinks for every passenger on the plane, especially me.
Speaking of trips, even though it’s two months until our trip to Paris and London, I’m already starting to reach a bit of a fever pitch thinking about it. I’ve taken to watching European travel videos; pointing out to R. every last café, market and plane tree as examples of the fabulousness we will experience together in Paris. He’s looking forward to it, too, but he doesn’t work himself into quite the lather about it that I always do. For me, though, I think it goes back to my last post about the rather mundane nature of everyday life; having a fun trip to look forward to can occupy me as intensely as and for much longer than the trip itself. It serves as a little escapism from:
7:00: Wake up to cooing from other bedroom. Change, feed and dress adorable progeny.
8:30: Get it together enough to leave for work. Pile daily necessities for me (travel mug full of aging yuppie staff of life: Peet’s Coffee, La Perruche brown sugar cubes and half-and-half) and Baby (formula, rattle, binky, random shit) into Audi wagon and drive well-worn path to school and work. Late for work.
9:00 – 5:00 (or so): Work, goof off, work, leave.
5:15: Pick up Baby or run errand while R. picks up Baby.
6:00 – 7:15: Play with Baby, clean up spit up, bathtime, bottle and lullabies, inhale deeply of Baby’s head, bed.
7:15 – 10:30: Romantic interlude with R. and/or make dinner, watch TV, get in bed, read, sleep.
So… I know there are much worse lives out there that need escaping. Still, I do like to daydream about vacations, don’t you?
Guy: “Every elevator I get into today smells like an Italian restaurant. You know, like pasta, with a little garlic.”
Kate: “Maybe it’s your upper lip.”
I couldn’t have him thinking I smelled like pasta with garlic, after all.
Meanwhile, R. and I took our first weekend trip with the baby last weekend; we stayed with some friends in their new condo in Vail. Eeyore was the perfect guest, ensuring we would be invited back with his gummy smiles and sleeping through the night. It was pretty encouraging, actually, that we could go somewhere and our lives wouldn’t implode between sunset and sunrise. Our next trip with him is a visit to my mom’s in Palo Alto in June or July; now I’ll only fear the airplane trip. And GOD, do I fear that. I suppose I’ll just need to be carrying enough cash to buy drinks for every passenger on the plane, especially me.
Speaking of trips, even though it’s two months until our trip to Paris and London, I’m already starting to reach a bit of a fever pitch thinking about it. I’ve taken to watching European travel videos; pointing out to R. every last café, market and plane tree as examples of the fabulousness we will experience together in Paris. He’s looking forward to it, too, but he doesn’t work himself into quite the lather about it that I always do. For me, though, I think it goes back to my last post about the rather mundane nature of everyday life; having a fun trip to look forward to can occupy me as intensely as and for much longer than the trip itself. It serves as a little escapism from:
7:00: Wake up to cooing from other bedroom. Change, feed and dress adorable progeny.
8:30: Get it together enough to leave for work. Pile daily necessities for me (travel mug full of aging yuppie staff of life: Peet’s Coffee, La Perruche brown sugar cubes and half-and-half) and Baby (formula, rattle, binky, random shit) into Audi wagon and drive well-worn path to school and work. Late for work.
9:00 – 5:00 (or so): Work, goof off, work, leave.
5:15: Pick up Baby or run errand while R. picks up Baby.
6:00 – 7:15: Play with Baby, clean up spit up, bathtime, bottle and lullabies, inhale deeply of Baby’s head, bed.
7:15 – 10:30: Romantic interlude with R. and/or make dinner, watch TV, get in bed, read, sleep.
So… I know there are much worse lives out there that need escaping. Still, I do like to daydream about vacations, don’t you?
Friday, March 14, 2008
Navel-gazing Friday.
It’s often someone else’s blog that starts me thinking about a topic, and in this case it’s Libby’s picture of her beach. It’s a reminder to me about the nature of “happiness,” and the importance of recognizing that feeling happy or positive is completely within our own control. Happiness doesn’t come from external things or circumstances, although certainly events can have a positive or negative effect on one’s mood, and a negative event or state of affairs can cause one’s happiness to take a hit if she lets it. Let’s face it, if the very worst thing I can imagine happened, which is that my husband and child were somehow taken from me, I would be devastated. But it would be up to me to find a way to continue to have an appreciation for my own life and find some happiness or peace with what would remain. Or, of course, kill myself because I’m not sure if anyone could ever really recover from that, but let’s just say I decided to stick around on the planet for the rest of my own preordained earthly tenure.
OK, that’s way grimmer than I wanted to get on this topic. So instead, let’s just backtrack to having an ordinary life and trying to stay happy with that. Life can get pretty boring sometimes and it brings its share of disappointments. I think, though, that with practice we can learn to accept those things a lot more readily and hold fast to the preciousness of the things we do have that fill our days, and find the beauty and occasional sparks of excitement there. Really, this is a lesson I need to learn because I am the kind of person who can get bored with the repetitive nature of my daily existence pretty easily. I’ve had this talk with myself a few times when I’ve noticed I’m getting particularly antsy with the then-current state of my life, but that’s not the best time to try to rein oneself in with arguments of accepting the beauty in the mundane. At those times I had let myself get too far down the path, and was in a position (i.e., alone and responsible only for myself) to change the circumstances of my life. So that’s what I did at those times, rather than take to heart the adage that wherever you go, there you are.
Now, however, I am in a period of naturally occurring happiness, where there is not too much about my life I would like to change. Sure, I’d love to be wealthier and have more control over whether and how I work, how much time I could be with the baby, etc., but that’s pretty much it. It would be a good time to work on improving how I meet the challenge of dealing with boredom or unhappiness the next time it rears its ugly little head. The $64,000 question, then, is how do I do this? It seems like the kind of thing that can only be learned through some sort of spiritual practice, which is an odd jumping off point for someone like me who dislikes religion and who is prone to panic attacks from too much rumination on the nature of existence. We’ve talked about looking into Buddhism for our household; that could be a place to start, but it ought to be easier than that. Maybe it’s just a matter of making a habit out of recognizing the beauty or potential for contentment in every moment, and even announcing it out loud to myself to reinforce the habit? I could put myself on an hourly schedule; set a reminder on my Outlook calendar.
OK, that’s way grimmer than I wanted to get on this topic. So instead, let’s just backtrack to having an ordinary life and trying to stay happy with that. Life can get pretty boring sometimes and it brings its share of disappointments. I think, though, that with practice we can learn to accept those things a lot more readily and hold fast to the preciousness of the things we do have that fill our days, and find the beauty and occasional sparks of excitement there. Really, this is a lesson I need to learn because I am the kind of person who can get bored with the repetitive nature of my daily existence pretty easily. I’ve had this talk with myself a few times when I’ve noticed I’m getting particularly antsy with the then-current state of my life, but that’s not the best time to try to rein oneself in with arguments of accepting the beauty in the mundane. At those times I had let myself get too far down the path, and was in a position (i.e., alone and responsible only for myself) to change the circumstances of my life. So that’s what I did at those times, rather than take to heart the adage that wherever you go, there you are.
Now, however, I am in a period of naturally occurring happiness, where there is not too much about my life I would like to change. Sure, I’d love to be wealthier and have more control over whether and how I work, how much time I could be with the baby, etc., but that’s pretty much it. It would be a good time to work on improving how I meet the challenge of dealing with boredom or unhappiness the next time it rears its ugly little head. The $64,000 question, then, is how do I do this? It seems like the kind of thing that can only be learned through some sort of spiritual practice, which is an odd jumping off point for someone like me who dislikes religion and who is prone to panic attacks from too much rumination on the nature of existence. We’ve talked about looking into Buddhism for our household; that could be a place to start, but it ought to be easier than that. Maybe it’s just a matter of making a habit out of recognizing the beauty or potential for contentment in every moment, and even announcing it out loud to myself to reinforce the habit? I could put myself on an hourly schedule; set a reminder on my Outlook calendar.
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
Hubris and other fun stuff.
Let me just start by saying that I feel terrible for his wife and daughters. But damn! What was Eliot Spitzer thinking? Actually, I find this kind of thing fascinating. Here is a man who has spent his public career making a big stink about fighting corruption and yet, as is often the case, has been naughty, naughty behind the scenes. What is it about some men whose personal peccadilloes cause them to be overly moralistic about the same issues in public? Take Mark Foley, for example, the erstwhile congressman whose public mission was the fight against child abuse and exploitation but who privately was sending lewd emails and text messages to teenage boys who had worked as congressional pages. It’s an interesting psychological phenomenon. Perhaps all we need to do is look to see which politician is moralizing the loudest to know who is up to no good; me thinks thou dost protest too much and all that.
In other news, I woke up this morning and almost immediately felt smothered by the fact that I had to go to work today. Then when I dropped Eeyore off at school, I felt quite miserable as I left him playing on the floor with the other kids. Not that I think it’s bad for him to be there; just that I wish I could be there with him, too. I can’t believe I am turning into this person, the potential “SAHM,” but I need to get over it because, like many Americans, I can’t afford not to work.
Only 2 months until our trip to France.
In other news, I woke up this morning and almost immediately felt smothered by the fact that I had to go to work today. Then when I dropped Eeyore off at school, I felt quite miserable as I left him playing on the floor with the other kids. Not that I think it’s bad for him to be there; just that I wish I could be there with him, too. I can’t believe I am turning into this person, the potential “SAHM,” but I need to get over it because, like many Americans, I can’t afford not to work.
Only 2 months until our trip to France.
Friday, March 7, 2008
Friday.
God just gave me a little smack on the wrist for bad behavior. Everybody’s talking about tee shirts today, so I attempted to post one I found to add to the mix:
As soon as I reached with my mouse to click “publish,” however, I knocked my coffee over and it spilled all over my desk – including my desk calendar and the contract I was working on. Apparently God doesn’t reward tackily partisan statements like that.
But anyway. Last Saturday we had beautiful weather here in Denver; so lovely that we decided to get out for a walk.
We headed to Wash Park, where the crowds were out in force. We found our own little patch of grass, and Eeyore had his first frolic outside:
This weekend isn’t supposed to be as nice. I am tired of winter. I want to be able to sit out in our back yard and have my morning coffee, maybe put a blanket under the tree and watch Eeyore crawl around. And the best: get out the baby pool! This year we have an actual baby for it, so that should be interesting.
Meanwhile, R. and I have been discussing what we want to do about our housing situation. We love our neighborhood, but we also really want a bigger house and we’d especially love something that he designed for us. We’ve talked a lot about buying some land in the mountains so he can design us a mountain house, because it’s hard to think of any part of town we’d like to live in, including our own, where we could afford the land to build something. We’ve talked about “popping the top,” which isn’t something I’d ever really heard of until we moved to Denver, but everybody is always doing it here for the extra space and the end result is almost always hideous. It’s hard to do anything attractive with a little Craftsman bungalow, which is frankly already designed to be its own little perfect self as is.
But here’s our little place:
As you can see, from the outside it’s no great shakes. It’s just this random, brick box, and I don’t even like brick unless it is served up as “exposed” or painted a nice, light color. Still, inside it’s very cute; light and bright with lovely wood floors, a good, open flow, nice arches between the rooms, and a great back yard. So it seems a shame to just rip it down and start over, but that’s what we are now thinking about doing. Our mortgage is not very large, so we could feasibly just scrape the house and build a new one and still have a smaller mortgage than we’d have if we bought a house in our neighborhood that was as big and nice as we would like. The downsides are (1) then potentially having a house too nice for our street, and (2) wondering whether a modern home would stick out like a sore thumb in a neighborhood full of houses from the 1920’s.
Still, others have already started scraping in our neighborhood, so we wouldn’t be the only ones. So far, the new houses have a tendency to look like this, however, so this could be our opportunity to improve things a bit.
I guess my real reservation is whether I think it’s appropriate to tear down a perfectly sweet little house that is just right for what it was built for.
As soon as I reached with my mouse to click “publish,” however, I knocked my coffee over and it spilled all over my desk – including my desk calendar and the contract I was working on. Apparently God doesn’t reward tackily partisan statements like that.
But anyway. Last Saturday we had beautiful weather here in Denver; so lovely that we decided to get out for a walk.
We headed to Wash Park, where the crowds were out in force. We found our own little patch of grass, and Eeyore had his first frolic outside:
This weekend isn’t supposed to be as nice. I am tired of winter. I want to be able to sit out in our back yard and have my morning coffee, maybe put a blanket under the tree and watch Eeyore crawl around. And the best: get out the baby pool! This year we have an actual baby for it, so that should be interesting.
Meanwhile, R. and I have been discussing what we want to do about our housing situation. We love our neighborhood, but we also really want a bigger house and we’d especially love something that he designed for us. We’ve talked a lot about buying some land in the mountains so he can design us a mountain house, because it’s hard to think of any part of town we’d like to live in, including our own, where we could afford the land to build something. We’ve talked about “popping the top,” which isn’t something I’d ever really heard of until we moved to Denver, but everybody is always doing it here for the extra space and the end result is almost always hideous. It’s hard to do anything attractive with a little Craftsman bungalow, which is frankly already designed to be its own little perfect self as is.
But here’s our little place:
As you can see, from the outside it’s no great shakes. It’s just this random, brick box, and I don’t even like brick unless it is served up as “exposed” or painted a nice, light color. Still, inside it’s very cute; light and bright with lovely wood floors, a good, open flow, nice arches between the rooms, and a great back yard. So it seems a shame to just rip it down and start over, but that’s what we are now thinking about doing. Our mortgage is not very large, so we could feasibly just scrape the house and build a new one and still have a smaller mortgage than we’d have if we bought a house in our neighborhood that was as big and nice as we would like. The downsides are (1) then potentially having a house too nice for our street, and (2) wondering whether a modern home would stick out like a sore thumb in a neighborhood full of houses from the 1920’s.
Still, others have already started scraping in our neighborhood, so we wouldn’t be the only ones. So far, the new houses have a tendency to look like this, however, so this could be our opportunity to improve things a bit.
I guess my real reservation is whether I think it’s appropriate to tear down a perfectly sweet little house that is just right for what it was built for.
Thursday, March 6, 2008
Birthday cipher.
So the whole birthday thing came and went in a rather sad little fizzle. On the upside, I don’t really have to focus on being any older because it no longer matters how old I am; to the world, I am officially Someone’s Mom and therefore, individually irrelevant. When I think about it that way, it kind of takes the pressure off, you know? But on the down side, it also means I’ve sort of ceased to exist.
As I told you, I had taken my birthday off of work to spend it gloriously, selfishly alone. The day started off well, as I lazily had another cup of coffee and admired the flowers and presents R. had waiting for me in the living room when I woke up. R. took Eeyore to school, and by the time he got back, I was showered and ready to hit the road for some shopping. He wanted me to open his presents first, so I did and they were good ones. But then his phone rang. And then our home phone rang. And then my mobile phone… who was it? Who do you think? Eeyore’s school, of course, calling to tell me he had a fever of 101 and I needed to pick him up.
Driving downtown to get my overheated little boy, I had some decidedly mixed emotions. Worry for his health; can’t we go for more than a week without some frigging mysterious disease from his school? But really, more selfish thoughts took precedence over my concern, and I had to remind myself sternly and out loud several times that I AM THE GROWNUP and this is just how it goes. So I picked him up, he fussed and bitched all day, and now he’s fine. And, you know, there are worse things than spending the day with my baby, so it’s not like it was awful. I just would have liked to have had the birthday I had planned.
I know I had some other things to talk about, like the Tory Burch flats my girlfriends gave me for my birthday, but I’ll leave that for later.
As I told you, I had taken my birthday off of work to spend it gloriously, selfishly alone. The day started off well, as I lazily had another cup of coffee and admired the flowers and presents R. had waiting for me in the living room when I woke up. R. took Eeyore to school, and by the time he got back, I was showered and ready to hit the road for some shopping. He wanted me to open his presents first, so I did and they were good ones. But then his phone rang. And then our home phone rang. And then my mobile phone… who was it? Who do you think? Eeyore’s school, of course, calling to tell me he had a fever of 101 and I needed to pick him up.
Driving downtown to get my overheated little boy, I had some decidedly mixed emotions. Worry for his health; can’t we go for more than a week without some frigging mysterious disease from his school? But really, more selfish thoughts took precedence over my concern, and I had to remind myself sternly and out loud several times that I AM THE GROWNUP and this is just how it goes. So I picked him up, he fussed and bitched all day, and now he’s fine. And, you know, there are worse things than spending the day with my baby, so it’s not like it was awful. I just would have liked to have had the birthday I had planned.
I know I had some other things to talk about, like the Tory Burch flats my girlfriends gave me for my birthday, but I’ll leave that for later.
Wednesday, February 27, 2008
Wednesday.
I’ve been trying to blog; really, I have. Work conspires against me, however, and when I get home there’s the usual beddy-bye routine and then dinner/sack out on couch with CNN. So let’s see; what’s been on my mind?
1. Why do the chocolate chip cookies that I bake in Colorado always turn hard 30 minutes after they are out of the oven? Before I moved here, I prided myself on my ability to turn out a perfect Nestle toll house cookie, but now following the same recipe yields lousy results (not that it stops me from hacking away at all of them with my pointy little choppers). I’m guessing it has something to do with the altitude, but what is it I need to change?
2. Hillary, Hillary, Hillary. I can barely even watch you anymore. I cringe every time I see what new “scrappy fighter” tactic you’ve embraced in your race to the bottom. Before the start of your campaign, I was a huge supporter; I was a die-hard defender and genuine admirer of you and Bill, lamented the passing of his administration, thought you were cool as grits, and was excited to throw myself wholeheartedly into supporting your campaign. Shit, I even voted for you in our caucus. But while in the abstract I still want a woman president, I’ve stopped caring if that woman is you. I don’t like how you’ve handled your campaign at all, and I do very much like how Barack Obama has handled his. Every time you throw some more nasty politics-as-usual his way, he manages to keep his cool and stay above the fray. I think that will be a real diplomatic advantage. Also, you can try to drum it into my head that he’s not experienced, or that he’s a cult of personality, but with respect to the experience issue: (a) I don’t completely agree with that, and (b) I don’t care as much as you think I should, and with respect to the personality issue: (c) I agree he is getting a lot of mileage out of his positive message and his easy charisma, but I don’t think it means he’s not a person of substance as well, and (d) I LIKE positive. You could learn from that. Basically, my support for you was yours to lose, and so you did.
3. My birthday is next week – 39 years old. I can hardly believe it. It’s not so much that the age itself freaks me out (although, okay, it does a little), it’s more that I’m not sure how I’ve already gotten to it. Have I really had 39 full years of adventures already? Does that mean I only have 39 more? And really, at least from the perspective of my 17-year old self, it just sounds fucking OLD. Over the hill. Irrelevant. Of course, from the perspective of my 38 years and 359 days old self, I know that’s a load of horseshit. If I could get off my ass and do anything new with my life, 39 would be a good age to start. That said, I have no plans on the big day to get off said ass; in fact, I’m taking the day off, taking Eeyore to school, and doing whatever I want all day long. So far that only involves reading and getting a pedicure, which might be enough.
In other news, Cindy over at Figs tagged me for a meme, and now I have to come up with five things about myself. As if the 100 self-absorbed comments in the sidebar weren’t enough!! But hey, I’m always happy to talk about ME:
1. I live 45 minutes away from some of the best skiing in America, and I can’t ski. As is the case for lots of things in my life, because I can’t already do it I say I don’t want to do it. Then I feel secretly upset with myself for letting myself constrain my own existence.
2. After spending most of my life in major urban areas (Atlanta, D.C., the Bay Area, London and Paris), I find I am happiest with the scale of little ol’ Denver. It surprises me a little, because it is a slightly dinky city, but it’s a very easy place to feel comfortable. My biggest complaints about the place are the lack of proximity to water and the expense of flights out of here.
3. I’m not proud of it, but I have a hard time identifying with people that I think are, by my own definition, a little rough around the edges. I suspect my bafflement and vaguely disdainful lack of identification is written all over my face, which surely endears me to these delightful, undoubtedly salt-of-the-earth folk. It’s like that slogan from Café Press: “Intellectual Elite – you say that like it’s a bad thing.” So I like the obvious fruits of an education: reasonable grammar, a decent haircut. Is that so wrong? (Yes, thanks, I know it is.)
4. I regret the loss of some of my most important friendships; some of them have ended for reasons I still don’t completely understand. Still, I do believe that friendships wax and wane according to where we are in our lives, and that some friendships are not meant to outlive the parameters of the microcosms in which they flourished. See, e.g., most of my law school friendships.
5. In the interest of living a peaceful life I keep trying to convince myself otherwise, but try as I might I just don’t like my choice of career that much. I would love to stay home to write a newspaper column, books of essays, a novel; but this is the real world and baby needs a new pair of shoes. Or he would if he wore shoes, so maybe that’s no excuse after all.
1. Why do the chocolate chip cookies that I bake in Colorado always turn hard 30 minutes after they are out of the oven? Before I moved here, I prided myself on my ability to turn out a perfect Nestle toll house cookie, but now following the same recipe yields lousy results (not that it stops me from hacking away at all of them with my pointy little choppers). I’m guessing it has something to do with the altitude, but what is it I need to change?
2. Hillary, Hillary, Hillary. I can barely even watch you anymore. I cringe every time I see what new “scrappy fighter” tactic you’ve embraced in your race to the bottom. Before the start of your campaign, I was a huge supporter; I was a die-hard defender and genuine admirer of you and Bill, lamented the passing of his administration, thought you were cool as grits, and was excited to throw myself wholeheartedly into supporting your campaign. Shit, I even voted for you in our caucus. But while in the abstract I still want a woman president, I’ve stopped caring if that woman is you. I don’t like how you’ve handled your campaign at all, and I do very much like how Barack Obama has handled his. Every time you throw some more nasty politics-as-usual his way, he manages to keep his cool and stay above the fray. I think that will be a real diplomatic advantage. Also, you can try to drum it into my head that he’s not experienced, or that he’s a cult of personality, but with respect to the experience issue: (a) I don’t completely agree with that, and (b) I don’t care as much as you think I should, and with respect to the personality issue: (c) I agree he is getting a lot of mileage out of his positive message and his easy charisma, but I don’t think it means he’s not a person of substance as well, and (d) I LIKE positive. You could learn from that. Basically, my support for you was yours to lose, and so you did.
3. My birthday is next week – 39 years old. I can hardly believe it. It’s not so much that the age itself freaks me out (although, okay, it does a little), it’s more that I’m not sure how I’ve already gotten to it. Have I really had 39 full years of adventures already? Does that mean I only have 39 more? And really, at least from the perspective of my 17-year old self, it just sounds fucking OLD. Over the hill. Irrelevant. Of course, from the perspective of my 38 years and 359 days old self, I know that’s a load of horseshit. If I could get off my ass and do anything new with my life, 39 would be a good age to start. That said, I have no plans on the big day to get off said ass; in fact, I’m taking the day off, taking Eeyore to school, and doing whatever I want all day long. So far that only involves reading and getting a pedicure, which might be enough.
In other news, Cindy over at Figs tagged me for a meme, and now I have to come up with five things about myself. As if the 100 self-absorbed comments in the sidebar weren’t enough!! But hey, I’m always happy to talk about ME:
1. I live 45 minutes away from some of the best skiing in America, and I can’t ski. As is the case for lots of things in my life, because I can’t already do it I say I don’t want to do it. Then I feel secretly upset with myself for letting myself constrain my own existence.
2. After spending most of my life in major urban areas (Atlanta, D.C., the Bay Area, London and Paris), I find I am happiest with the scale of little ol’ Denver. It surprises me a little, because it is a slightly dinky city, but it’s a very easy place to feel comfortable. My biggest complaints about the place are the lack of proximity to water and the expense of flights out of here.
3. I’m not proud of it, but I have a hard time identifying with people that I think are, by my own definition, a little rough around the edges. I suspect my bafflement and vaguely disdainful lack of identification is written all over my face, which surely endears me to these delightful, undoubtedly salt-of-the-earth folk. It’s like that slogan from Café Press: “Intellectual Elite – you say that like it’s a bad thing.” So I like the obvious fruits of an education: reasonable grammar, a decent haircut. Is that so wrong? (Yes, thanks, I know it is.)
4. I regret the loss of some of my most important friendships; some of them have ended for reasons I still don’t completely understand. Still, I do believe that friendships wax and wane according to where we are in our lives, and that some friendships are not meant to outlive the parameters of the microcosms in which they flourished. See, e.g., most of my law school friendships.
5. In the interest of living a peaceful life I keep trying to convince myself otherwise, but try as I might I just don’t like my choice of career that much. I would love to stay home to write a newspaper column, books of essays, a novel; but this is the real world and baby needs a new pair of shoes. Or he would if he wore shoes, so maybe that’s no excuse after all.
Friday, February 22, 2008
Women rock, too.
Reading Libby’s blog this morning made me nostalgic for playing the guitar. It’s been over a year since I played mine with any regularity, which is sad. Here are my guitars:
They’re all shuttered up in their cases and stuck down in the basement these days; I haven’t had any time to play them and I’ve figured the loud music would bug Eeyore. Maybe I should pull out my Les Paul and learn to “rock” like Laurie Berkner, that chick who sings for the toddler crowd. Before that, though, I’m tempted once again to go to Ladies Rock Camp. I heard about this last year and thought seriously about going, but I was too scared to perform in front of other people so I decided not to go. This would be yet another of those opportunities in life that I’ve screwed up because I am too scared to try anything new.
For those of you not in the know, Ladies’ Rock Camp is actually a fund-raising arm of the Rock ‘n’ Roll Camp for Girls, which is a summer camp in Portland, Oregon for girls who want to rock. The idea behind it is that the world of rock has been traditionally male-dominated, and so girls should have the opportunity to learn to make music, express themselves and generally rock out in an all-female environment. Obviously, this has a broader social goal of encouraging girls to embrace their individuality and to be comfortable with themselves, as well as to provide an all-female environment where the girls are taught to support each other (as is not always the case with day-to-day female adolescent life).
A few times a year, the camp sponsors weekends for grown women who wish that THEY could have gone to rock camp when they were girls, and the fee for the weekend funds the summer camp for the girls. For $350, you get a full weekend of musical instruction, form a band with other campers and write an original song, then perform it at a showcase on the Sunday night (the part I struggle with).
The October camp still has a bunch of spots open. I really want to do it, and yet I still feel that weight pushing against me about the live performance…
They’re all shuttered up in their cases and stuck down in the basement these days; I haven’t had any time to play them and I’ve figured the loud music would bug Eeyore. Maybe I should pull out my Les Paul and learn to “rock” like Laurie Berkner, that chick who sings for the toddler crowd. Before that, though, I’m tempted once again to go to Ladies Rock Camp. I heard about this last year and thought seriously about going, but I was too scared to perform in front of other people so I decided not to go. This would be yet another of those opportunities in life that I’ve screwed up because I am too scared to try anything new.
For those of you not in the know, Ladies’ Rock Camp is actually a fund-raising arm of the Rock ‘n’ Roll Camp for Girls, which is a summer camp in Portland, Oregon for girls who want to rock. The idea behind it is that the world of rock has been traditionally male-dominated, and so girls should have the opportunity to learn to make music, express themselves and generally rock out in an all-female environment. Obviously, this has a broader social goal of encouraging girls to embrace their individuality and to be comfortable with themselves, as well as to provide an all-female environment where the girls are taught to support each other (as is not always the case with day-to-day female adolescent life).
A few times a year, the camp sponsors weekends for grown women who wish that THEY could have gone to rock camp when they were girls, and the fee for the weekend funds the summer camp for the girls. For $350, you get a full weekend of musical instruction, form a band with other campers and write an original song, then perform it at a showcase on the Sunday night (the part I struggle with).
The October camp still has a bunch of spots open. I really want to do it, and yet I still feel that weight pushing against me about the live performance…
Thursday, February 21, 2008
Today's blah de blah.
Here’s something I bet won’t surprise you: I’m not a fan of John McCain. Not only am I not interested in hopping on the Straight Talk Express to the nadir of world opinion, where we’ve already been headed precipitously over the last 8 years, I don’t like most of his viewpoints and I don’t like his grumpy old man attitude. He seems to get pissed off so easily – is that a good trait in a president? Then there’s his wife. I’m sure she’s a lovely person, but man, is she weird looking. She looks like she should be a resident on the Starship Enterprise. And what is she hiding in that hairdo? And of course today there is the article in the New York Times dredging up talk of an improper relationship with a lobbyist; he says it’s untrue and that he doesn’t take articles in the New York Times at face value. Maybe it’s because I’m liberal, but that statement is ridiculous to me. The NYT isn’t some gossip rag, for Christ’s sake. I should probably get on over to Fox News, where they are undoubtedly reporting the true story.
Back in the Democratic camp, I am frankly depressed by the whole thing. Each of Obama and Clinton has his or her strengths and weaknesses, but the race for the nomination has taken on a sour tone that I think has blemished them both. Obama’s inspirational tone has blunted her real achievements, and despite/because of her scrappy, nasty attacks on the wunderkind, she can’t seem to get any traction. Meanwhile, he rides a tidal wave of momentum on his message of hope and change, but nobody seems to be able to get a true grasp on just what he could really do for this country. Many of his promises seem destined to run up against old school bureaucracy when he arrives in Washington; I think it’s naïve to think that just because this charismatic guy has a hopeful message that he is going to be able to get the entrenched political machine to bend to the will of his cheekbones and oratory. I get the idea; the change is supposed to come from us, the citizens of the U.S. of A., but… since I can’t motivate myself to change my own life when I know I could only improve it, how am I going to get off my ass to rally for America?
Maybe having a kid will help that; when he’s older I can take him with me to be a walker at Planned Parenthood. Just kidding; I would never expose him to the freaks that hang around there. I have thought about volunteering there myself, but I get so incredibly angry I don’t know if I could stay calm when walking women from their cars to the front door. One time when I visited a P.P. clinic someone yelled at me from off the property and I gave them the finger. When I lived in D.C. during law school, there was a P.P. right around the corner from my Dupont Circle apartment. On Saturday mornings, a group of Christian teenagers, their heads bowed in silent prayer, would walk in a bovine circle in the front of the building. They would try to stuff fliers in my hand as I’d walk by, and I’d tell them to mind their own business. I was thinking much worse thoughts, but I’m sure it would have just added even more to their sanctimonious feelings on the matter.
Well! Politics and abortion; two conversational turds-in-the-punchbowl if there ever were any.
More outfits, you say? OK; I got this dress, too, but in blue and white.
Won't I look cute in it?
That’s pretty much still what I look like even if it was taken before being put through the wringer of motherhood. I guess I am feeling a bit exhibitionist today!
Back in the Democratic camp, I am frankly depressed by the whole thing. Each of Obama and Clinton has his or her strengths and weaknesses, but the race for the nomination has taken on a sour tone that I think has blemished them both. Obama’s inspirational tone has blunted her real achievements, and despite/because of her scrappy, nasty attacks on the wunderkind, she can’t seem to get any traction. Meanwhile, he rides a tidal wave of momentum on his message of hope and change, but nobody seems to be able to get a true grasp on just what he could really do for this country. Many of his promises seem destined to run up against old school bureaucracy when he arrives in Washington; I think it’s naïve to think that just because this charismatic guy has a hopeful message that he is going to be able to get the entrenched political machine to bend to the will of his cheekbones and oratory. I get the idea; the change is supposed to come from us, the citizens of the U.S. of A., but… since I can’t motivate myself to change my own life when I know I could only improve it, how am I going to get off my ass to rally for America?
Maybe having a kid will help that; when he’s older I can take him with me to be a walker at Planned Parenthood. Just kidding; I would never expose him to the freaks that hang around there. I have thought about volunteering there myself, but I get so incredibly angry I don’t know if I could stay calm when walking women from their cars to the front door. One time when I visited a P.P. clinic someone yelled at me from off the property and I gave them the finger. When I lived in D.C. during law school, there was a P.P. right around the corner from my Dupont Circle apartment. On Saturday mornings, a group of Christian teenagers, their heads bowed in silent prayer, would walk in a bovine circle in the front of the building. They would try to stuff fliers in my hand as I’d walk by, and I’d tell them to mind their own business. I was thinking much worse thoughts, but I’m sure it would have just added even more to their sanctimonious feelings on the matter.
Well! Politics and abortion; two conversational turds-in-the-punchbowl if there ever were any.
More outfits, you say? OK; I got this dress, too, but in blue and white.
Won't I look cute in it?
That’s pretty much still what I look like even if it was taken before being put through the wringer of motherhood. I guess I am feeling a bit exhibitionist today!
Wednesday, February 20, 2008
I know I left it around here somewhere...
I'm down and irritable today, and I was all set to launch into some bitchy diatribe about everyone and everything, when R. sent me this picture of one of our cats:
I found it very cute, and so maybe I’ll just let that other stuff go.
OK, except for one thing: I am hungry. I want to lose the last bit of my pregnancy weight, since I’m getting pretty tired of having a closet full of cute clothes I can’t wear, but I’m tired of thinking about everything I put in my mouth. And it’s not as if thinking about it has kept me from shoving a metric ton of chocolate down my gullet in the last week or two; instead I’ve just rammed the guilt on down in there with it. I’m on Weight Watchers, and I’m allocated 19 “points” a day. At about 50 calories a point, with a few points-free veggies thrown in, that equates to between 950 and 1100 calories a day. That’s starvation mode. I’m allowed 35 extra points a week to use as I choose, but the weekend comes and I blow through that without fail. The whole thing is frigging tedious.
Now there all sorts of adorable spring clothes appearing in the stores, but I’ve held off on buying anything much because I want to get back down to my old weight first. Still, I have bought a couple of little things that I figure I can wear now or weighing 10 pounds less:
In this second one, it’s the Liberty-print shirt I bought, as I’m not quite sure just yet how I am going to handle bathing suit season. I’ve never worn anything but a bikini, but I fear those days might be gone – at least until I see my friendly neighborhood plastic surgeon. I’ve always been your typical, clean cut J. Crew kind of girl when it comes to bathing suits:
But now maybe I’m destined to be this girl:
I think my grandma had a bathing suit like that.
So perhaps the compromise:
That’s reasonable, right?
I found it very cute, and so maybe I’ll just let that other stuff go.
OK, except for one thing: I am hungry. I want to lose the last bit of my pregnancy weight, since I’m getting pretty tired of having a closet full of cute clothes I can’t wear, but I’m tired of thinking about everything I put in my mouth. And it’s not as if thinking about it has kept me from shoving a metric ton of chocolate down my gullet in the last week or two; instead I’ve just rammed the guilt on down in there with it. I’m on Weight Watchers, and I’m allocated 19 “points” a day. At about 50 calories a point, with a few points-free veggies thrown in, that equates to between 950 and 1100 calories a day. That’s starvation mode. I’m allowed 35 extra points a week to use as I choose, but the weekend comes and I blow through that without fail. The whole thing is frigging tedious.
Now there all sorts of adorable spring clothes appearing in the stores, but I’ve held off on buying anything much because I want to get back down to my old weight first. Still, I have bought a couple of little things that I figure I can wear now or weighing 10 pounds less:
In this second one, it’s the Liberty-print shirt I bought, as I’m not quite sure just yet how I am going to handle bathing suit season. I’ve never worn anything but a bikini, but I fear those days might be gone – at least until I see my friendly neighborhood plastic surgeon. I’ve always been your typical, clean cut J. Crew kind of girl when it comes to bathing suits:
But now maybe I’m destined to be this girl:
I think my grandma had a bathing suit like that.
So perhaps the compromise:
That’s reasonable, right?
Friday, February 15, 2008
So really, it's my own fault.
Ah, the start of another weekend; the start of another 48 hour period without exhaling. I love that baby, yes I do, but weekends are pretty non-stop and no longer involve things like sleeping in, reading a book, shopping leisurely or eating other than on the fly. It’s now “what can we do that will keep the baby entertained and not screaming? Read him a book? Bounce him on my knee? Let him wobble on his back like a cockroach on his play mat? Wheel him around a mall or museum in his stroller?” Yippee! I’m teaching that kid to read by age 2 if it kills me.
I do have something nice and low key to look forward to this weekend, though, and it’s a massage – a Valentine’s gift from my husband. I am really looking forward to that, but even better was his gift to me of a subscription to Us Weekly! A husband who indulges his wife’s need for salacious celebrity gossip - THAT is a loving husband.
Tonight I am having drinks after work to celebrate my friend’s recent promotion to a vice president position in her company. I think am now the only one of my group of female friends who is not a vice president. Of course, there are not that many lawyers that are also vice presidents in companies, but there are some and I am not one of them. Sometimes I manage to comfort myself by telling myself that being a lawyer is totally different anyway, and I have my big, fine, expensive education to keep me warm at night, but honestly I find it kind of frustrating. Business people (that amorphous breed) make more money than I do, and at least in my own organization I don’t always see that they contribute more or work harder than attorneys. I think they see themselves as more on the front line, however, responsible for generating revenue, while lawyers are perceived mainly as an impediment to that goal. We’re so hung up on the minutiae of everything, and plus, you know, we’re boring.
I’m pretty well known at work not to fit that stereotypical mold; not to toot my own horn or anything (although Lesson One: If I Don’t, Who Will?), but I have helped to close several hundred million dollars worth of business for my company. So where’s my love? A while back, I complained to a friend about how I sure would like to make more money (as one of the aforementioned “business people” she makes probably about 3 times what I do). She told me if I wanted more money I should work for a law firm. I bit my tongue, but boy, was I pissed off. I’m an equal partner on teams tasked with closing deals for our company, so why is my contribution any less valuable?
I had my review yesterday and I discussed my prospects for advancement with my boss. It’s pretty much as you’d expect: if I want to move up the food chain then I need to put on my tap shoes for the powers that be. The eternal dilemma: more work/prestige/money vs. pretty good money/time to concentrate on home life? Will my thoroughly apathetic nature take over again?
I do have something nice and low key to look forward to this weekend, though, and it’s a massage – a Valentine’s gift from my husband. I am really looking forward to that, but even better was his gift to me of a subscription to Us Weekly! A husband who indulges his wife’s need for salacious celebrity gossip - THAT is a loving husband.
Tonight I am having drinks after work to celebrate my friend’s recent promotion to a vice president position in her company. I think am now the only one of my group of female friends who is not a vice president. Of course, there are not that many lawyers that are also vice presidents in companies, but there are some and I am not one of them. Sometimes I manage to comfort myself by telling myself that being a lawyer is totally different anyway, and I have my big, fine, expensive education to keep me warm at night, but honestly I find it kind of frustrating. Business people (that amorphous breed) make more money than I do, and at least in my own organization I don’t always see that they contribute more or work harder than attorneys. I think they see themselves as more on the front line, however, responsible for generating revenue, while lawyers are perceived mainly as an impediment to that goal. We’re so hung up on the minutiae of everything, and plus, you know, we’re boring.
I’m pretty well known at work not to fit that stereotypical mold; not to toot my own horn or anything (although Lesson One: If I Don’t, Who Will?), but I have helped to close several hundred million dollars worth of business for my company. So where’s my love? A while back, I complained to a friend about how I sure would like to make more money (as one of the aforementioned “business people” she makes probably about 3 times what I do). She told me if I wanted more money I should work for a law firm. I bit my tongue, but boy, was I pissed off. I’m an equal partner on teams tasked with closing deals for our company, so why is my contribution any less valuable?
I had my review yesterday and I discussed my prospects for advancement with my boss. It’s pretty much as you’d expect: if I want to move up the food chain then I need to put on my tap shoes for the powers that be. The eternal dilemma: more work/prestige/money vs. pretty good money/time to concentrate on home life? Will my thoroughly apathetic nature take over again?
Maybe I should hang it all up and become a painter, because I am REALLY talented:
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
Seeing the real me.
Today’s the big day where I work that bonuses and promotions are announced. There is a bonus, which is exciting, but less so for me because it will be prorated to exclude the time I was on maternity leave. Still, it’s way more than I ever got as a law firm bonus, so I can hardly complain. I also can’t complain about not getting promoted, since it’s only been a couple of years since I was promoted to corporate counsel and normally it would take at least one or two more to be considered for AGC, but it does put into relief for me that I don’t feel like quite the golden girl at work anymore. I’m worried that now that I have a baby, I am seen as unreliable or not a very hard worker. Honestly, I feel unreliable and like I don’t work hard enough, but then again I felt that way even when I was childless and promoted, so perhaps it’s all just insecurity. Being the mother of an infant just gives me new fodder for self-criticism, self-loathing, self-flagellation.
Speaking of babies, I have discovered something very new about myself in the last couple of months. If you read my old blog for the couple of years before I started this one, you know that I was pretty self-absorbed and spent a lot of time indulging myself. Why not? As a 36 year old, single lawyer with no apparent prospects for a husband or children, I might as well fill my time with whatever I enjoyed. I really didn’t mourn not having kids, because I had never had any exposure to them in my life, and really, I didn’t like them very much. So it has come as a real surprise to me that the best part of my day now is visiting my baby and all his little classmates at lunch. Of course I love seeing Eeyore, but the surprising part is that I am also happy to see all the other babies. I know them all by name, and they all recognize me now, too. Last Friday, this one tiny little girl who when I first brought Eeyore in had horrible stranger anxiety, so she would cry whenever anyone new came into the room, crawled onto my lap and held her arms up to me to be hugged. As I hugged her and stroked her nap-tangled hair, I could hardly believe I am the same person that I was before all of this.
The more I think about it, it sounds like a case of Stockholm syndrome - I’ve come to identify with my captors. My entire existence is ruled and dictated by a baby; it’s all I know now and so I’ve given in and embraced it. Cue the photo of me with drool pooling in the corner of my mouth.
I’m trying to decide if I want to make this a blog that includes pictures of me and my life beyond Eeyore. I couldn’t really do that with my old blog, and when I would post the occasional photo of myself I got comments like “you’ve jumped the shark,” as if I was a television series or something. Basically, people didn’t want to see what I looked like because it somehow spoiled the story. I don’t know if that would be the case anymore, since (1) there’s not much of a story anymore, and the things I say are unlikely to get me in much trouble if people knew who was saying them, and (2) all the people whose blogs I read currently and who seem to be reading mine all have pictures of themselves on their own sites. It’s a different kind of community – it seems friendly and homey, not something to hide behind with all my bad language and tales of Yankee Swaps. However, my husband doesn't think it's smart or safe to let the world know who you are. Part of me agrees with him, but then the other part of me notes that only about 30 people read my blog, so does it really matter if they see me?
Speaking of babies, I have discovered something very new about myself in the last couple of months. If you read my old blog for the couple of years before I started this one, you know that I was pretty self-absorbed and spent a lot of time indulging myself. Why not? As a 36 year old, single lawyer with no apparent prospects for a husband or children, I might as well fill my time with whatever I enjoyed. I really didn’t mourn not having kids, because I had never had any exposure to them in my life, and really, I didn’t like them very much. So it has come as a real surprise to me that the best part of my day now is visiting my baby and all his little classmates at lunch. Of course I love seeing Eeyore, but the surprising part is that I am also happy to see all the other babies. I know them all by name, and they all recognize me now, too. Last Friday, this one tiny little girl who when I first brought Eeyore in had horrible stranger anxiety, so she would cry whenever anyone new came into the room, crawled onto my lap and held her arms up to me to be hugged. As I hugged her and stroked her nap-tangled hair, I could hardly believe I am the same person that I was before all of this.
The more I think about it, it sounds like a case of Stockholm syndrome - I’ve come to identify with my captors. My entire existence is ruled and dictated by a baby; it’s all I know now and so I’ve given in and embraced it. Cue the photo of me with drool pooling in the corner of my mouth.
I’m trying to decide if I want to make this a blog that includes pictures of me and my life beyond Eeyore. I couldn’t really do that with my old blog, and when I would post the occasional photo of myself I got comments like “you’ve jumped the shark,” as if I was a television series or something. Basically, people didn’t want to see what I looked like because it somehow spoiled the story. I don’t know if that would be the case anymore, since (1) there’s not much of a story anymore, and the things I say are unlikely to get me in much trouble if people knew who was saying them, and (2) all the people whose blogs I read currently and who seem to be reading mine all have pictures of themselves on their own sites. It’s a different kind of community – it seems friendly and homey, not something to hide behind with all my bad language and tales of Yankee Swaps. However, my husband doesn't think it's smart or safe to let the world know who you are. Part of me agrees with him, but then the other part of me notes that only about 30 people read my blog, so does it really matter if they see me?
Monday, February 11, 2008
For love of the mundane.
Thank Christ the writer’s strike is apparently ending. Sure, I’ve been able to entertain myself pretty well with a nightly dose of political commentary from the talking heads over at CNN, but I’m ready to have something else to watch again besides Max Headroom and his team of political hacks. So imagine my surprise last night when, after just winding up a Tivoed episode of House Hunters International, I flipped over to what appeared to be a brand new episode of Brothers and Sisters! Oh, happy day! And even better, despite a progressive sub-plot of the liberal Sally Field and Republican operative Danny Glover supposedly falling in love even while they clearly have no chemistry, there is another new one next week. Yay!
Speaking of House Hunters International, do you watch that show? It’s fun to see real estate in all sorts of different international locations, and it is ever so much better than the bizarrely mundane, original House Hunters set here in the U.S. of A. The American version seems to show people with not a lot of money circling classified ads for one bedroom condos and places with tacky, outdated kitchens. Why would I want to see that? R. and I tried watching one the other night, and it was like watching paint dry. A cheesy-looking young couple in Wisconsin wanted to move out of their beige rental into a house that would provide him with more “man-space” (“Look! Plenty of man-space for my two grills!) and her with more “girl-space” (“I loved my walk-in closet, but now I have my own room where I can sew and talk on the phone with my mom!”). Yes, it was truly fascinating. You know, like descriptions of what’s on TV these days.
So my mom left today for the annual arbitration competition in Paris that she helps to judge, and to which I accompanied her last year, and I am very, very jealous. She arrives tomorrow and her program doesn’t start for a couple of days, which means she has blessed time alone to do things like stroll, check out museums and SHOP. If I were there, I would throw Weight Watchers to the wind as I washed down my morning baguette slathered with Nutella with a lovely grand crème, knocked back my lunchtime croque monsieur with a nice glass of Sancerre, and shoved in my evening serving of foie gras with at least half a bottle of a St. Julien or St. Estèphe (not to mention the actual dinner and probably some profiteroles). Sure, I’d feel like shit by the end of each day, but so what? It all tastes so, so good. And then I’d bring home the magic with gourmet items like Monoprix-brand salad dressing and canned sauce for steak au poivre (Monoprix is like, oh, maybe Target?). Because like I’ve said, I’m all about the grocery shopping in foreign lands.
I can hardly wait until May.
Speaking of House Hunters International, do you watch that show? It’s fun to see real estate in all sorts of different international locations, and it is ever so much better than the bizarrely mundane, original House Hunters set here in the U.S. of A. The American version seems to show people with not a lot of money circling classified ads for one bedroom condos and places with tacky, outdated kitchens. Why would I want to see that? R. and I tried watching one the other night, and it was like watching paint dry. A cheesy-looking young couple in Wisconsin wanted to move out of their beige rental into a house that would provide him with more “man-space” (“Look! Plenty of man-space for my two grills!) and her with more “girl-space” (“I loved my walk-in closet, but now I have my own room where I can sew and talk on the phone with my mom!”). Yes, it was truly fascinating. You know, like descriptions of what’s on TV these days.
So my mom left today for the annual arbitration competition in Paris that she helps to judge, and to which I accompanied her last year, and I am very, very jealous. She arrives tomorrow and her program doesn’t start for a couple of days, which means she has blessed time alone to do things like stroll, check out museums and SHOP. If I were there, I would throw Weight Watchers to the wind as I washed down my morning baguette slathered with Nutella with a lovely grand crème, knocked back my lunchtime croque monsieur with a nice glass of Sancerre, and shoved in my evening serving of foie gras with at least half a bottle of a St. Julien or St. Estèphe (not to mention the actual dinner and probably some profiteroles). Sure, I’d feel like shit by the end of each day, but so what? It all tastes so, so good. And then I’d bring home the magic with gourmet items like Monoprix-brand salad dressing and canned sauce for steak au poivre (Monoprix is like, oh, maybe Target?). Because like I’ve said, I’m all about the grocery shopping in foreign lands.
I can hardly wait until May.
Friday, February 8, 2008
Feminism springs eternal.
I have been wearing the perfume Lys Mediterranée since one day about 3 years ago, after smelling it on the woman dining next to me at The Wolseley in London. As I dined on the so-so fare, the scent of what I imagined to be the most beautiful, vibrant lilies kept wafting my way. I looked around, trying to spot the floral arrangement, but there wasn’t one. Finally, I realized that it was the perfume of the young woman seated next to me, speaking French with her father (or let’s hope it was her father). When there was a pause in their conversation, I told her I loved her perfume and asked her what it was. Fortunately, she was forthcoming, since sometimes women get a little cagey about their scent. She told me what it was, and said that one could only buy it at a small store in Paris and one other in London. Handily, that store, Les Senteurs, was just down the street from my hotel, and so the next morning I trotted over and purchased this rather expensive perfume, and I’ve worn it ever since.
This morning, however, I checked the website to see what it costs these days, since it is nearing time to replenish, and with the current exchange rate it has become rather prohibitive: 95 euros for the smallest bottle! It seems crazy to spend almost $150 on a tiny bottle of perfume, but I do like wearing a perfume that I’ve never smelled on anyone else but me and that French girl.
On another subject altogether, I got an email from Barack Obama’s campaign this morning entitled “Tell us your caucus story.” I wonder if I told them my story, they might stop sending me emails.
Tuesday night I went to the caucus alone. Eeyore has had RSV this week (another chapter in our lives newly fraught with anxiety and exhaustion), and even though R. had won our coin toss, he volunteered to stay home with Eeyore so I could go vote. Since we were both voting for Obama, we thought one vote was better than none; it would be our family vote. Ten minutes before I was supposed to leave, I started to freak out. As I brushed my teeth, I judged myself in the mirror and for once it wasn’t about my looks. Could I live with myself if when offered the choice for the first, and perhaps only, time in my life to vote for a Democratic woman who I knew could effectively run this country, I didn’t take it? Even if Obama genuinely appeals to me more than she does?
The answer was no. And so I came out of the bathroom, teary-eyed and wondering how R. was going to take this last minute change-of-heart. He wasn’t surprised.
“I knew before you did this would happen,” R. said. “It’s your vote; use it how you want.”
I voted for Hillary Clinton, but we’re still putting the Obama sign up in the yard.
And finally, here's a recent picture of our little devil.
This morning, however, I checked the website to see what it costs these days, since it is nearing time to replenish, and with the current exchange rate it has become rather prohibitive: 95 euros for the smallest bottle! It seems crazy to spend almost $150 on a tiny bottle of perfume, but I do like wearing a perfume that I’ve never smelled on anyone else but me and that French girl.
On another subject altogether, I got an email from Barack Obama’s campaign this morning entitled “Tell us your caucus story.” I wonder if I told them my story, they might stop sending me emails.
Tuesday night I went to the caucus alone. Eeyore has had RSV this week (another chapter in our lives newly fraught with anxiety and exhaustion), and even though R. had won our coin toss, he volunteered to stay home with Eeyore so I could go vote. Since we were both voting for Obama, we thought one vote was better than none; it would be our family vote. Ten minutes before I was supposed to leave, I started to freak out. As I brushed my teeth, I judged myself in the mirror and for once it wasn’t about my looks. Could I live with myself if when offered the choice for the first, and perhaps only, time in my life to vote for a Democratic woman who I knew could effectively run this country, I didn’t take it? Even if Obama genuinely appeals to me more than she does?
The answer was no. And so I came out of the bathroom, teary-eyed and wondering how R. was going to take this last minute change-of-heart. He wasn’t surprised.
“I knew before you did this would happen,” R. said. “It’s your vote; use it how you want.”
I voted for Hillary Clinton, but we’re still putting the Obama sign up in the yard.
And finally, here's a recent picture of our little devil.
Friday, January 25, 2008
An open letter.
Here’s the thing, Hillary: I don’t like you these days. And if you’ve lost me, a core Democratic supporter who had actually planned on voting for you, then you are losing other people, too. At least, I hope you are, because this bullshit of the last week or so has really pissed me off. What do you think you’re doing, trying to rip up another Democrat; one of the brightest lights of our party? Are you truly so blind to the needs of this country that you would sacrifice our future for your own, immediate grab for power? I don’t know, maybe this is your revenge against Bill for all the shit he put you through when he was in office; certainly he is making a big, fat fool of himself now to further your goals.
The more I watch this spectacle you’re creating, the more I think you might as well be George Bush for all the good you’re doing for American politics. Most of us are longing to move past this kind of old school, Tammany Hall shit and get on with a more optimistic future, and you don’t want to let it go. Look, I’m not quibbling with you on the issues – at least you are more or less still a Democrat. I’m just tired of watching you act like a puppet on a string, changing your tack every 5 minutes to try to capture whatever your advisers tell you is the way the wind is blowing this week. Last week you were laughing like a hyena; this week you’re “finding your voice.” Sorry, but that is so disingenuous and you know it. Why can’t you just play nice? You started this, so it’s not like you were on the defensive.
Sister, we NEED to win this election. The fate of this country is on the line. The next president is going to determine whether we will ever regain a position of respect in the world or maybe even if we’ll all die at the hands of people who really, really dislike us. Do you think Mitt Romney is going to garner us that respect? The answer is NO. John McCain? I don’t ever want to have to find out. So stop acting like a goddamned fool and be nice to your fellow Democrat, because I don’t want a bitter taste in my mouth if I have to vote for you next November. This election is an opportunity for America; don’t fucking blow it.
The more I watch this spectacle you’re creating, the more I think you might as well be George Bush for all the good you’re doing for American politics. Most of us are longing to move past this kind of old school, Tammany Hall shit and get on with a more optimistic future, and you don’t want to let it go. Look, I’m not quibbling with you on the issues – at least you are more or less still a Democrat. I’m just tired of watching you act like a puppet on a string, changing your tack every 5 minutes to try to capture whatever your advisers tell you is the way the wind is blowing this week. Last week you were laughing like a hyena; this week you’re “finding your voice.” Sorry, but that is so disingenuous and you know it. Why can’t you just play nice? You started this, so it’s not like you were on the defensive.
Sister, we NEED to win this election. The fate of this country is on the line. The next president is going to determine whether we will ever regain a position of respect in the world or maybe even if we’ll all die at the hands of people who really, really dislike us. Do you think Mitt Romney is going to garner us that respect? The answer is NO. John McCain? I don’t ever want to have to find out. So stop acting like a goddamned fool and be nice to your fellow Democrat, because I don’t want a bitter taste in my mouth if I have to vote for you next November. This election is an opportunity for America; don’t fucking blow it.
Monday, January 21, 2008
And then dousing them.
Lest you think that my husband is a jerk or that we have serious problems with our marriage, I should probably have pointed out before writing my last post that both he and I have an occasional habit of “catastrophizing” to a remarkable degree. What I mean by that is that he or I, in this case he, will take the germ of a valid idea and blow it so out of proportion as to become almost ridiculous. The bad part of this is obvious, as it can cause ruffled feathers and result in some unnecessarily hurt feelings and unwarranted fears. The upside, however, is that nobody can ever accuse us of complacency, and so we end up getting issues out on the table before they ever really become issues at all. (The other downside: talking shit into the ground.)
Of course I made my husband reassure me several times that he only fears we could embark on a path of parallel lives; not that we have already done so. He told me, “I’m worried it will just happen when we’re not paying attention.” I said, “Are you kidding me? You, not paying attention?” So that was pretty much the end of the discussion, although it remains true that the constant needs of a baby do result, necessarily, in not enough time for us to focus only on each other. There’s really no getting around that. And so, thank CHRIST, we are not canceling our trip to Paris just yet.
Speaking of catastrophizing, if I was going to have to cancel our trip to Paris I was thinking I might as well just hang it up as a person. Retaining some sense that there remains an individual behind the wife-and-mother façade is imperative to me, and keeping up my annual trips to Europe is part of that. I realize it’s unlikely I will be able to keep up the annual aspect too religiously, but I really, really, REALLY don’t want to just sit here in Denver forever watching my child grow up with no exposure to the world. Oh, good, I’m glad a marginally unselfish thought just flowed out of me for a change – it’s not just about what I want (annual shopping sprees, basically) but also about retaining a link to the larger world, and instilling that value in our child. The single best thing my mother ever did for me in terms of shaping my adult life was moving us to Paris when I was 12. That exposure made a difference to the way I have coaxed my life to evolve; from moving back to Europe again and again to not saving enough money because I blow too much on trips back there when I am living here. And you know, other things – like being really open to other cultures.
That was a joke. I’m open to European culture, but I don’t put my money where my mouth is when my tolerance for other cultures is put to the test. For example, I’m going to go out on a limb and say that from what I can see, I wouldn’t be feeling particularly diplomatic if I were called upon to visit, say… the Middle East. I’m just not that open to the “culture” I see flowing out of there. Call me old-fashioned, but not so old-fashioned I’m still living in the 13th century.
Of course I made my husband reassure me several times that he only fears we could embark on a path of parallel lives; not that we have already done so. He told me, “I’m worried it will just happen when we’re not paying attention.” I said, “Are you kidding me? You, not paying attention?” So that was pretty much the end of the discussion, although it remains true that the constant needs of a baby do result, necessarily, in not enough time for us to focus only on each other. There’s really no getting around that. And so, thank CHRIST, we are not canceling our trip to Paris just yet.
Speaking of catastrophizing, if I was going to have to cancel our trip to Paris I was thinking I might as well just hang it up as a person. Retaining some sense that there remains an individual behind the wife-and-mother façade is imperative to me, and keeping up my annual trips to Europe is part of that. I realize it’s unlikely I will be able to keep up the annual aspect too religiously, but I really, really, REALLY don’t want to just sit here in Denver forever watching my child grow up with no exposure to the world. Oh, good, I’m glad a marginally unselfish thought just flowed out of me for a change – it’s not just about what I want (annual shopping sprees, basically) but also about retaining a link to the larger world, and instilling that value in our child. The single best thing my mother ever did for me in terms of shaping my adult life was moving us to Paris when I was 12. That exposure made a difference to the way I have coaxed my life to evolve; from moving back to Europe again and again to not saving enough money because I blow too much on trips back there when I am living here. And you know, other things – like being really open to other cultures.
That was a joke. I’m open to European culture, but I don’t put my money where my mouth is when my tolerance for other cultures is put to the test. For example, I’m going to go out on a limb and say that from what I can see, I wouldn’t be feeling particularly diplomatic if I were called upon to visit, say… the Middle East. I’m just not that open to the “culture” I see flowing out of there. Call me old-fashioned, but not so old-fashioned I’m still living in the 13th century.
Saturday, January 19, 2008
Fanning the flames.
Did a whole week just go by? I suppose it did; in a blur of sleepless nights, calculating Weight Watchers points and endless news analysis of the presidential candidates.
And then there was last night, when after feeding and tending to the baby from 2 until 3 in the morning my husband returned to bed and said, “I don’t think we should go to Paris in May.” Even as disappointment welled up in me, I wasn’t surprised to hear him say it and so I said, “Okay.” I thought I knew where this was coming from; could we really leave our baby with his grandmother when he still wasn’t sleeping through the night? Would we travel thousands of miles only to sit around and cry about missing our baby?
Over coffee this morning, he admitted there was more. Last night a friend had come over for dinner and after a couple of bottles of wine had said “No offense, but you two seem in love with Eeyore.” Even though she had started five other sentences with “no offense,” in each case where there was nothing offensive being said, my husband interpreted her words to mean that while we seemed in love with our child, we didn’t seem in love with each other. In the dark of the night, he had decided that he didn’t want to go to Paris because what if her words were borne out? What if we could find nothing to talk about except Eeyore and whether he was surviving at home without us? Never mind that we find interesting things to talk about every day of our lives together; clearly she had seen something that was there, apparent to all but us.
This was upsetting to me. I don’t feel that way, and in fact I have been fantasizing for months about this trip as one extended romantic stroll along the Seine, complete with accordions playing in the background. I’ve pictured him taking me to see the buildings he’s studied, and my taking him to all my favorite restaurants. We’d end every evening with a last glass of wine at an outdoor café, snuggled up close to each other and talking about what we’d seen that day. Other than calling home to check on the baby, and acknowledging that we would of course miss him, my fantasies about our trip to Paris hadn’t included feeling estranged from my husband of a mere year and a half.
In the light of day, he claimed to realize that was extreme, but that he was concerned that we could go the way of many parents who become just that: parents, and no longer the couple who loved only each other enough to get all the rest of it, the family stuff, started. This is, of course, a valid concern for any two people who have had to shift their focus from solely each other to include a third, bottomless pit of a person. It’s hard to find time for each other when much of our time together requires constant attention to a squirming baby. Still, maybe I am naïve, but I had thought we’d been conscious of the pitfalls of parenthood and had been trying to stay ahead of them with things such as scheduling a babysitter most weekends so we could go out alone. We’ve even been back to see our couples therapist to make sure we keep working on our communication and, uh, stuff. Despite knowing we’d miss our child, we had planned a romantic week away, just the two of us. Doesn’t that active effort we put into our marriage put us ahead of most people?
What can new parents do to keep the central relationship, the one that makes everything else possible, thriving?
And then there was last night, when after feeding and tending to the baby from 2 until 3 in the morning my husband returned to bed and said, “I don’t think we should go to Paris in May.” Even as disappointment welled up in me, I wasn’t surprised to hear him say it and so I said, “Okay.” I thought I knew where this was coming from; could we really leave our baby with his grandmother when he still wasn’t sleeping through the night? Would we travel thousands of miles only to sit around and cry about missing our baby?
Over coffee this morning, he admitted there was more. Last night a friend had come over for dinner and after a couple of bottles of wine had said “No offense, but you two seem in love with Eeyore.” Even though she had started five other sentences with “no offense,” in each case where there was nothing offensive being said, my husband interpreted her words to mean that while we seemed in love with our child, we didn’t seem in love with each other. In the dark of the night, he had decided that he didn’t want to go to Paris because what if her words were borne out? What if we could find nothing to talk about except Eeyore and whether he was surviving at home without us? Never mind that we find interesting things to talk about every day of our lives together; clearly she had seen something that was there, apparent to all but us.
This was upsetting to me. I don’t feel that way, and in fact I have been fantasizing for months about this trip as one extended romantic stroll along the Seine, complete with accordions playing in the background. I’ve pictured him taking me to see the buildings he’s studied, and my taking him to all my favorite restaurants. We’d end every evening with a last glass of wine at an outdoor café, snuggled up close to each other and talking about what we’d seen that day. Other than calling home to check on the baby, and acknowledging that we would of course miss him, my fantasies about our trip to Paris hadn’t included feeling estranged from my husband of a mere year and a half.
In the light of day, he claimed to realize that was extreme, but that he was concerned that we could go the way of many parents who become just that: parents, and no longer the couple who loved only each other enough to get all the rest of it, the family stuff, started. This is, of course, a valid concern for any two people who have had to shift their focus from solely each other to include a third, bottomless pit of a person. It’s hard to find time for each other when much of our time together requires constant attention to a squirming baby. Still, maybe I am naïve, but I had thought we’d been conscious of the pitfalls of parenthood and had been trying to stay ahead of them with things such as scheduling a babysitter most weekends so we could go out alone. We’ve even been back to see our couples therapist to make sure we keep working on our communication and, uh, stuff. Despite knowing we’d miss our child, we had planned a romantic week away, just the two of us. Doesn’t that active effort we put into our marriage put us ahead of most people?
What can new parents do to keep the central relationship, the one that makes everything else possible, thriving?
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