grudges in go mode

There was a woodpecker pecking on the wall of my room just now, the room i grew up in. and, feeling defensive, i first asked him to leave and after no response I knocked back. I looked through the screen of the open window just as it looked up at me. It waited for a good 5 seconds before I stared it down and it flew away. I am laying on the bed, checking my email and the internet brings me yet another plea of help from an ex-friend.

I had been working on overcoming grudges, and thought this particular person would be a good place to start. i had recently been working to allow her back into my life, though she had even more recently re-earned her name on my shit list for the very same reasons I opted to take her off of my friend and acquaintance lists the first time.

And today, just now one of my mom's friends demonstrated the exact opposite qualities as shit-list-girl, loyalty and respect for other's time and energy and feelings. Yesterday my mom and two of her good friends were supposed to meet at the thai restaurant in town. And somehow they all ended up waiting with 2 large tables reserved at three separate restaurants. My mom's good friend called later so deeply distressed that she had stood my mom up that she was crying. She just dropped by the house to bring us a bucket of hand picked blueberries.

So Shit-List-Girl has hurt me in countless ways. It began in small ways by not returning phone calls or 'forgetting' to show up to a planned event and escalated to the scale of deciding not to fulfill a verbal contract that involved me loosing thousands of dollars. Each time she would hurt someone she would come back with flowers and letters and promises of bike rides and picnics and nights out at the local bar, but alas, these things did not happen.

Others learned that they could just not depend on her to show or to chip in for a group adventure. Others decided that it wasn't so bad as long as you didn't take it personally; she does it to everyone, after all.

But to me, this is not what it means to be a friend. And being let down over and over again is not worth my time even as an acquaintance. Especially when that acquaintance runs back to you yet again for support and forgiveness and more of your energy.

The details of her most recent re-earn of the shit list rank aren't important but the fact that she wrote an email to me today apologizing for the situation and NOT her mistake and asking for support is just part of the cycle. And an annoying one. Not quite as annoying as my dog disappearing for an evening without a note or a phone call, or as annoying as not making my mortgage payment because she just decided not to come home for the week or two before rent was due, but maybe just as annoying as promising me a birthday bike ride and never making it happen or offering me work when I desperately needed money and offering it to someone else at the last second.

I don't enjoy complaining or speaking poorly of others. It doesn't make me feel good. But I can offer no support to her now. I have no energy left for her. I am done. Grudge project on hold until next opportunity worth pursuing.

washworld

I'm in a Laundromat called washworld waiting for my industrial strength wash cycle to spin the ick out of my clothes. And today I'm sitting here with my computer sitting on a stool, listening to itunes and connected to a wireless internet connection. I like doing laundry. I like laundering as a public activity, I always have. I like the idea of water and people and community and soap and wash bins and rolly carts and the waiting that forces people to acknowledge one another. Or in previous days the hard work that created community between women and still does in certain places. I don't usually even care if my clothes are clean. But I like cleaning them.

As a kid laundromats were fun because my sister and I would roller skate around in circles to accordion tunes played by our kindergarten teacher Mr. Rothrock. In college I studied while my clothes rode round in circles before I pulled them out and stuck my face into the pile of warm goodness and took a deep breath. In Boulder I eavesdropped on Spanish conversations to keep up on my skills. I was unemployed during those days so I would spend the rest of the time making grocery lists or lists of things to do or books to get from the library.

In Colorado when I visit my aunt and uncle we make a ritual of hanging our clothes on the line behind the house in the tall grass. Sometimes we have to run outside as summer monsoons approach and threaten to un-dry our clothes, but sometimes we take down the clothes one by one and fold them into the baskets as we go. They smell of the mountains and grass and ozone, though they are still stiff and wet in the pockets.

In Japan we washed our shoes in special shoe washing machines and dried them in special shoe driers. We washed our clothes by trying to decipher the kanji and drank chu-hui (alcohol in a can) from vending machines while listening to Crosby Stills and Nash.

It is crazy to think how far the washworld has come. From washboards to space washers and wireless internet connections. I prefer the roller skates and accordions, the chu-hui and clotheslines but I like it all just the same.

lime popsicles

And there we were in the bathroom. Him on a stool eating a lime popsicle and me with a comb and a pair of scissors ready to cut his hair. I don't really know how we got here. Here getting ready to meet his family in a couple of weeks. Here looking for jobs and houses and bikes. Here playing in the river and having stick wars, playing on roller coasters and climbing trees and trusting in each other in a way most people never trust. Here cutting his hair in the bathroom.

In a couple of weeks we will be on our way par avion to Virginia. To put faces to the personalities and 'hello's' I get over the phone. And for some reason I'm not nervous but mostly excited to meet the people he cares so much about.

Two nights ago I was at a friends party making pizza with apples and tomatoes and cheese. We had crutches contests with the crutches we found in the broom closet, to see how far we could walk without legs.

In the broom closet hiding from the rest of the people at the party Andrew and I tried to squish the door closed. Well, if we could have fit in the closet, but it was only wide enough for our bodies and deep enough for the two of us, but not tall enough to put our heads inside and close the door. This spurred a series of explorations of the hidden cubbies of the house. We gathered a group of people and off we went. We managed to pack 5 people into the living room closet in a way that if someone were to open the door they wouldn't know we were there. I felt like we were in Mary Poppins.

And what's NOT perfect about someone willing to squish themselves into a tiny broom closet or explore old house cubbies or other boring shit of the like? Hmm... nope, can't think of a thing. Oh wait. He doesn't like cheese.

Up kite, up!

Working on my thesis is like playing a never-ending game of red light green light. Only usually I'm stuck at the red. Especially on Mondays. By Friday I manage to work up some momentum and I know where to start in the morning. After a weekend of roller coasters and bike rides and Harry Potter movies and wine tasting and barbeques and swimming in the Russian River, I've lost all momentum. And now it is Monday and I've forgotten what my project is about and what I need to accomplish and why I'm still in school and what degree I'm working towards.

When I get stuck I start by making myself lists: goals for the end of summer, goals for the end of the week, goals for the end of the day. But for some reason, getting past the list seems impossible and the urge to work on my portfolio instead of my project is overwhelming. I really wish there was a GO button I could just push that would jump-start this process.

I imagine this process is a lot like frog (from Frog and Toad Stories) trying to will his kite into the sky saying over and over again 'up kite, up' while pulling on the kite string and grunting. The scary part is that I'm pretty sure frog's method didn't work.

all i ever need to know I learned in grad school

Last night in a conversation with a new friend I remembered the main thing I have learned in grad school. I have learned about circulation patterns seating heights, lighting, site-scale and planning scale design, transportation planning, graphic design. I have learned many computer programs and become a decent teacher of basic biological concepts. I have gathered some very useful presentation skills and communication skills I desperately needed. But the lesson I find most valuable is the one that came up again last night, one that I use every day of my life.

Bernie and I were discussing academia and specifically his favorite professor in graduate school. On the first day of class she announced, " I will not teach you anything new. In undergrad you spent your time learning about and struggling to remember concepts and specific details. In graduate school you spend your time learning that a full understanding of these concepts is not possible." The most important lesson for me from grad school? Humility. The ability to stand up in front of a group of students and try to teach what I know about biology, and to admit when I don't know and to feel comfortable with that. To be able to ask the class if anyone else knows the answer. And to recognize that I can learn something from every single person in the room. To admit to everyone I meet that they know many things I do not, they have experienced things in a way I will never experience them.

dirty jenga

last night I learned of dirty jenga.

Jenga is my favorite game in the whole world, with the exception of 50 questions. It requires deliberate movements, grace and ingenuity and a touch of occasional sabotage. What could be better than a tower of blocks shattering the silence unexpectedly? Add in ambiguous questions and commands that require you to make up stupid shit on the spot if you pull out a block and place it successfully.

The problem is this: i'm not full of ambiguous questions or commands. I only have a few. So my request: send me stupid shit to write on a Jenga game, and we'll play it next time around. :) mwa hah hahahah...

Resolve

My birthday last year was officially the Worst Birthday Ever.

When we were young my mom would go out of her way to build us cakes shaped like Cabbage Patch Kids from scratch. She would surprise us with little fun gifts and my parents would decide on an appropriate piece of outdoor equipment (usually) for my sister and I on our respective birthdays.

As my sister and I got older, my parents would ask us what we wanted as our interests became more and more specific, but the joke gifts like clam sauce or terrible glittery shoes that used to be my grandmother's would still accompany our 'real' present. We would often pick up the boxed cake mix on the way home and gifts were rarely wrapped. And this was all fine by me. I do remember two birthdays (13 and 16) for which my friends banded together for small gifts and a special cake and quality play time. These were two of my favorite birthdays because though it was not extravagant, it was thoughtful and it made everyone feel good.

I think it was because of my family's laid-back view of how to deal with birthdays and Christmas and any other holiday or event that usually involves surprises or gifts, that I had become a very inconsiderate friend. Birthdays were backburner and usually involved many thoughts about what to make or do for others but I never carried through with my plans, not even for my parents or my sister. A phone call? yes, maybe. A card?, less likely. A box cake? Probably, if you live in the same house or are already planning an event. A present? Usually late and only if you are in my immediate family. Thoughtful? No, not at all.

And it didn't feel good. Though I recognized this, I didn't know what to do about it or how to be better at birthdays.

Last year I spent my birthday feeling overweight and alone and depressed at my sisters house. I was there to help her out of a particularly bad slump, though I was pretty depressed myself. I spent the day paying bills with money I didn't have, waiting for any of my friends to even send an easy email card. Nope... That night, one of my best friends bailed on my birthday dinner with my sister, which I had to plan. but the shitty part? The really shitty part? No one remembered my birthday except my parents, I spent it alone, or so I thought.

A month or two later I received a package from Jenn that was sent from New Orleans a while before my birthday. It felt good just to be remembered, just a few words on a map of new orleans and an aardvark and some cock flavored soup.

Since my official Worst Birthday Ever I've been slowly working towards being a better friend in this category. Admittedly I've failed a few times already and this is frustrating and embarrassing.

But today is Andrew's birthday. And this time I hope I do it right.

housemate issues

our housemate has taken to a childish sort of revenge against us. I can sympathize with him to a certain degree but right now I'm not feeling sympathetic.

He hasn't been in a relationship for a LONG time or had any prospects and he is now having to deal with us in a relationship everyday in his face. Also he doesn't like indoor pets. I have Jerry. But the flip side is that Andrew and I are usually playing elsewhere on the weekends and having dinner with housemate on weeknights and not being exclusive or disrespectful. We include him in hiking and climbing and sea kayaking adventures and nights out on the town which he never turns down. He always wants to tag along.

As far as Jerry is concerned: I clean up after Jerry constantly. He doesn't bark. He isn't allowed on the couches or the beds. And really, who doesn't love Jerry?

But housemate has obviously taken issue with the situation. On Saturday morning we woke to blaring horrible irish music because he apparently wanted to listen to music while he sat outside talking on the phone. The speakers are literally about 2 feet from our bedroom door and it was obvious that we were home. No apology from him, no comment about the music or the volume or pretending like he thought we were gone. He seemed very pleased, in fact.

Last night he pretty much told Andrew that he could do Andrew's job and he would never hire an architect. He knows AutoCAD; he would just design his house himself (read it with an appropriate amount of bitter sarcasm, please)

It seems as though housemate knows how to piss us off so he is taking advantage of that. But I would like to know what his issue is with us. I would like to know how to fix it. But his approach makes me want to respond in an equally childish manner and pour a can of tuna fish into his bed. but maybe he likes tuna fish, we'll have to have a talk.

crags

This weekend was a whirlwind adventure testing bikes, hiking and climbing. On Saturday I woke up groggy in the early morning and decided to stay in bed... until about noon. The afternoon was filled with more test bike rides. As i am not in the market for a new bike, I tested out a sweet single speed Specialized and a $3,000 Orbea carbon-frame bike. I decided on the way back to the bike shop that if I ever need a quick form of transportation I should just "test ride" a super fast bike.

We headed out to the coast after bike testing to hike and climb. We hiked down through toasted grassy fields to a rocky point. Fractures in the stone had created perfect niches for blooming sedums. Trodden paths followed the terraced fractures to the top of the rock face. We explored the surface of the rock with our fingers and rubber-clad toes searching for holds. The only other creatures around us were of the non-human kind. Cormorants and gulls... and flies and ticks. Beer break just before sundown. We started back as the sun was squished by the line of fog on the horizon, first into a square then into a 'V' shape, then into 2 slivers.

Hike to Sea Crag

On Sunday we woke early and packed up our gear for a day of climbing the crags near Calistoga. I'm not a big fan of ropes, however i surrendered to the idea for the day, trusting in my climbing partners who were not the typical ego-freak climbers.

I've always wanted to get into climbing but was fairly repulsed by the skilled ego-freak climbers who were intimidating, and the unskilled ego-freak climbers who were not intimidating but rather annoying and surely wouldn't care about my safety. I'm also not into climbing with unadventurous types that discourage 'unwise' behavior (see pic below). I looked for a while in undergrad for the perfect climbing community but there seemed to be no middle ground. So, I feel pretty lucky to have finally run across a group of non-gear-heads who are both skilled and fun.

The day was blistering hot but we climbed until our fingers were raw, our bodies were weak and knees bruised with blue polka dots from a free chimney climb.

The Far Side Crags @ St. Helena

Mission Post-Comment complete

I've fixed my settings. anyone can post comments without being a registered user, thanks to chamise for pointing this out. oops!! I also found my title bar. I'm really up on this technology thing. :)

to all 3 of you who read my blog:

Post comments, damnit! I want to know when you are spying! at least say hi.
I write because it helps organize thoughts, but I also write because I'm not good at it. Any critique about subject, format, grammar, etc would be welcome as well.

50 questions

I felt like I knew the essence of who he was the first time I met him at the Gillian Welch show in the fall of 2005. But I know very little about his past or his family, his goals and fears. As Jenn would say, we've been making it up as we go, discovering the details one by one. After having to admit to a friend that he also knew very little about me, he invented 50 questions.

50 questions is just what it sounds like plus a bottle of wine and a few rules. Drink every time you ask a question until the bottle is gone. Accidental questions count i.e. 'how do you spell Steven? There is no winning and no need to ask questions in order, just ask if they come to mind.

He set us up with cheat sheets and pens to record our questions and answers and we questioned away every last drop of wine. The questions started out very basic: names of family members?, how many cousins do you have?, what are your favorite foods and least favorite foods?. As the bottle drained our questions became less tangible, no one-word answer was possible or permitted. And by the end we were giving each other questions to ask just so we could answer them, keeping track of answers to all the questions, even the accidental ones.

We were left with papers filled with numbers and answers and paraphrases of responses to heavy questions as well as an exhaustion that only comes from having shared just the right amount of yourself with someone else, someone whom you know will keep those parts safe now that you have shared them.

Melting

It is so hot here I'm sure my brain is melting. I tried to go for a bike ride today but unfortunately picked a straight-up route. I felt my heartbeat pounding throughout my body. It was pounding so hard I was sure it would jump out of my chest. I couldn't tell if my vision was blurred by the heat waves rising up from the pavement or the only warning I would get if I was about to pass out.

I realized on the way back down how steep the road actually was when my forearms and fingers froze in place from grasping the breaks so hard. It was even too hot on the downhill with the wind to dry the sweat from my arms and face.

I'm a bit of a wimp when it comes to the heat. Anything above 70 degrees causes my body to shut down and my brain to melt. The ride brought back memories of burning myself on the seatbelts of my grandma's car on trips to Santa Rosa. It reminded me of riding in the backseat of our touring truck in Africa when I had to roll up my window because the wind was quite literally burning me it was so hot. But mostly it reminded me of the familiar feeling of severe heat-induced apathy. ICK! I hope the heat wave ends soon.

the works

The town of Sebastopol decided a long time ago that they would never be able to compete with the Santa Rosa fireworks, so they decided to celebrate the 4th of July on the 3rd instead. This means that for two nights in a row the sky lit up with explosions of green and blue and red and purple and gold light. This meant that on Tuesday night we sat on the cool grass of Devon's front yard listening to friends play the guitar and sing loudly until it was time for the works. We set up a ladder to the roof and tested our plan. The ladder cracked as I climbed up, and so it was thrown over the deck and replaced with an aluminum ladder( I wasn't involved of the throwing of the ladder, only a witness of the ladder breaking the clothes line below). Ladder #2 worked like a champ and in a few minutes the party moved to the roof, watching the fireworks through the trees.

After the show we found our way down via ladders and trees and fences back to the lawn where I had the best wrestling match i've had in a long time.

The fourth was a lazy day full of sun and bikes and burgers. We watched the fireworks from the back of Andrew's truck with Jerry-dog who is apparently more tolerant of the earth-rattling cracks and booms than of being left alone for an hour in his new house. Two nights of glittering sky made me happy, though my disgust with the current state of the US might have hindered my enjoyment just a smidge.

home again

In Eugene again, back home for a few thesis meetings and various chores. It is good to be home, if only for a few days. If only to check on the roses and the squash and tomatoes, to watch them grow and prop them back up when they fall. I carefully pull the weeds away from volunteers from the fallen tomatoes and squash of the year before.

It is good to be home to see my upstairs room transformed into Marylynn's new room and to watch Jerry bask in the sun in the backyard or curled up on my bed while I write. It is refreshing and warm and cozy.

I know somewhere inside it is refreshing because I know that tomorrow I'm going back to California with some perspective, more accomplished on my thesis, and a reminder of all my good friends who are not so far away. A reminder of how I met them, and renewed energy to meet new friends in my new home.

I've embraced every moment, having breakfast with friends in the light summer rain, lunch with others in the sun, and a late night dinner with Jenn on Skinner's Butte with a brilliant orange moon on the horizon. In the morning we snuck into Julie's backyard, kissed her kitty Oz through the window, and began to pick cherries, plucking them one by one or in bunches and dropping them into the basket we found waiting to be filled.

I climbed as high up as I could go, my bare feet feeling the curve of every step. I wrapped myself in the branches, looked up, and blinked at the sun peaking through the leaves, the burgundy sweet goodness glowing with afternoon light. I can't explain the feeling I get from pulling fruit from a tree, stretching as high as I can to pick the perfect cherry, the one just out of reach, but it is a perfect sort of feeling. One that settles me, and makes me feel at home wherever I might be.