Weekend Discoveries

Never a dull moment in California-land, right? Yeah sure. Nevertheless, every now and then I do something pleasant, or diverting, or discover something new. So here's what happened this weekend:

Yesterday Arash and I went to the LA Car Show. Okay, so it was more his gig than mine, but I'm a good girlfriend and went along for the ride. And as a result, I discovered my true love:

Yeah. Whoda thunk it? Me? In love with a bmw? Well, let's look on the bright side. It will remain an unrequited love. I will remain faithful to Corollas, if only because they are far more befitting a librarian of my status.

2. English Huntsman cheese: Thank you, Trader Joe's! It's a combination of Gloucester (I'm pretty sure it's pronounced "Gloster" but that's pretty irrelevant seeing as how it won't remain in my fridge long enough to matter) and Stilton. Now, normally Stilton's too strong, even for me. Its smell alone (back when I used to be able to smell) reminds me of some of very nasty things rotting in the fridge (and in my fridge, there's no shortage of that), but in this cheese, the Stilton was just perfect. Strong enough to announce that it IS a blue cheese, dammit, but not strong enough to remind me of dead things.

3. The movie Marie Antoinette. Now that I am a working woman, I am more able to catch up with many books and movies, and this is one of them that I have been meaning to watch for a while. It looked--and felt--a little anachronistic at first, but the movie managed to retain enough "vintage" feel to it to remain the kind of lush historical drama that I dig.

Well, the weekend is still going on...let' see what fun and exciting things I might come across tomorrow.

Over and out.

8 Things

Here are the rules of engagement: Each player lists 8 facts/habits about themselves. The rules of the game are posted at the beginning before those facts/habits are listed. At the end of the post, the player then tags 4 people and posts their blog names, then hopes they notice they have been tagged and continue this chain ad nauseum. I got tagged by one of my Library Ladies, SneakyPanda/Librarisaurus Rex, like, 4 freaking months ago, but because I am a half-hearted blogger, it took me this long to notice and respond. Dur.

1. I am completely and utterly careless when it comes to certain things: pencils and pens, lip balm, and nail files. I lose them all the time, and I have no idea why. I guess the only acceptable explanation is that it's the absent-minded facet of my genius character. Or something.

2. Several people have noted this: when I am talking on the phone, I pace, or (more disturbingly) if I am sitting on the bed, I rock back and forth. I'd love to say I am autistic, but god knows I've got very little genius-savant talent. And I am pretty sure I just pissed off a whole gaggle of autism-advocates with that ridculously ignorant generalization.

3. I talk in my sleep, a lot. I've held entire conversations, and can get very forceful if I think the person in my dreams is not listening. My personal favorite declaration: "We took the crooked staircase to Ankle Island!" Sure--just keep on walking, there.

4. I get really, really annoyed with people who park their vehicles in an askew manner.

5. I don't know how to ride a bike.

6. About 3-5 times a week, I dream about tornadoes. I am fairly certain this is how I am going to die.

7. One of my long-cherished dreams is to one day have a playroom filled with toys from my childhood. Thank god for ebay.
8. I keep a WRITTEN list of questions I am going to ask the Higher Power (if there is such a thing) when I die. So far, there's only a couple of questions:

-What happened to the Princes in the Tower?

-Who the HELL was Jack the Ripper?

Alright, I tag...Brittany, Laurie (not sure she still reads this), my sister Sarah, and Florida Jen. Get to it, ladies!

Back on the Air

"I've never really ever found a place that I called home,

I've never stuck around quite long enough to make it..."
Right now, I really don't have the energy to explain my absence. Anyway, there's not really that good of an explanation. Maybe I've just been lazy. I certainly have been avoiding my apartment, which has gone from Chez Ghetto to Chez Furnace in the presence of western exposure and in the absence of central air.

Maybe at some point I will reflect on my various doings of the past half year, but today isn't that day. Why? Because today is Sunday. And Sunday is the day for melancholic, rambling posts that don't really go anywhere but leave you, dear reader, plenty depressed.

Various circumstances (by and large GOOD circumstances) have led me to lately contemplate attempting to find an apartment in the desert. I'm not moving anywhere just yet, but I certainly am gathering information. And in this information-gathering process, I fell in love. I guess you could call it an unrequited love, as I am pretty damned sure I don't share a future with the object of my affection. But I am nonetheless completely, 100%, head-over-heels in love (okay, obsessed).

It's an apartment, a ridiculously undersized, overpriced apartment. The appeal? Hardwood floors, a fireplace, french doors, casement windows, central air, washer and dryer, a huge back porch, cats are allowed. It's got more character than me after I've pounded five shots of goldschlagger. But it's just too much, and I know it. But still I pine.

All weekend, I've been thinking about it. And when I came home on this lonely Sunday, as I began to clean my slum home, I was still thinking about it. And to cheer myself up, I decided that the proper medicine lay in the archives of Crazy Aunt Purl. If anyone could cheer me up, it would be her. And then I started thinking about her, in her cozy little valley home that she has hated for a while...and how she finally decided that now was the right time--in fact the only time--to start living her life and making her rented space into a home. And that got me thinking about my own circumstances--how it seems like I have never stayed in once place for more than a year for a very long time, and why the hell do I keep picking up sticks and going elsewhere? I am never satisfied, I am always looking for a better place. Always picturing myself being happier, more creative and productive, at the next place, not the current abode.
And that got me to the point where I had a Purl-esque revelation. I'm never going to find the one perfect place with lots of character that will inspire me to lead that ideal life. All the hardwood floors and french doors just won't do it. It's going to have to come from me, I am going to have to have the balls and initiative and energy and discipline enough to do it, regardless of where I live. So I need to just latch on to whatever common sense is lurking right now and make sure I don't go completely stupid and lock myself into a place that I can't afford, just to chase the rainbow of the perfect life that is waiting with the perfect place.

There is no perfect. There is just now, and good enough with improvements always being made. I'm going to still look for a place, and eventually move there. I will settle for the basis--central air, and please god a w/d hookup. Maybe a balcony. But I won't pay out the nose for a perfection that just won't come.

Sunday Sighs

When I was little, I didn't like Sundays. I would spend all weekend with my beloved grandparents, and then on Sunday evenings, they would drive me back home to my mother's. My during-the-week home. There was nothing wrong with it, really, I just didn't fit in there. And I was miserable every Sunday night. My poor mother must have been very hurt, every time mopey me would come home, hug my grandmother good-bye, and slump off to my room.

Now, years later, I am not sure all that much has changed. I like Sundays because they are my days off. But one of two things invariably ends up happening: I end up spending the day with one of my girlfriends or the boyfriend, or else I am at home all day, doing various chores. And there's nothing wrong with either of those scenarios, it's just...there's no happy medium. Either I am out having a nice time, and not getting anything done, or I am at home, getting stuff done and feeling a little lonely.

This Sunday, it's me, at home, cleaning, working on my "Vision Board", trying to dodge the cats. And I am feeling a little empty, a little lonely. I think it's because, back in Indiana with Michael and Florida with John, I got in the habit of viewing Sunday as "Couple's Day." One of the few times I would have to spend with my significant other, and yeah, we'd have to do pain-in-the-ass chores--laundry, cleaning, grocery shopping--but it was still fun and pleasant because I would be doing with the partner, and it would feel like there was a point to it.

And now...big adjustment. No laundry facilities. And just me. And yes, I know there is still a point to it--I am not a completely useless female that cannot stand to be alone--but it's just not the same.

Introducing Melissa, Librarian to the Stars

I am back in the game! I have been annoying a lot of people with my complete and total neglect of this here website. So, here goes. I will try to throw in some relevant stuff, and not make it one complete "here's what's going on in my life" kinda deals.

The setting: my living room at Chez Ghetto, late afternoon. It's a cloudy, warm spring day outside. There's a lot of birds tweeting, and the neighborhood rooster is crowing. (It's surreal). Sunnydale gets seasons, more than I expected of SoCal, and as a result, there's a lot of trees and bushes and flowers blooming. My cat Austen is asleep on top of the couch, and judging by his twitching paws and occasional grunts, he is dreaming.

What do cats dream about? And do they understand what is happening? I mean, do they know to distinguish their sleeping dreams from their waking realities? Humans understand the concept of sleep, and its necessity, and that the images we see in our brains while we are asleep, we understand as dreams. But do cats grasp that concept? I'm not articulating this very well.

Recently, some of the folks in my life have started talking about The Secret. Now, all of my librarian friends out there, you may have gotten some requests for this book/DVD. There haven't been any reviews for it in the publications we read, but it's getting hugely popular, and it's been pictured in PW a couple of times on the bestseller list.

What's the secret? That's not for me to tell. I am deeply ambivalent about the whole thing--it's completely new-agey self-help--but with an essentially positive message. In a word, it's the New Age variation of "God helps those who help themselves" or "with faith you can move mountains"...and the implication being, if that damned mountain doesn't budge, you must not have believed hard enough.

Hrmph.

But I am all about positive thinking, and projecting what I want "out there". So slowly, I am implementing the Secret, we will see what comes of this in the days, weeks, and months ahead.

And what else? I have to write a couple of rejection letters at work. Hurrah for administrative experience!

Monday Musings

1. Most fitting--I've got the Pretenders' "Back on the Chain Gang" going through my head.
2. When I was studying European history, many moons ago, I read of a concept known as "lebensraum." It's German for living space, and that was one of Hitler's kooky motivations for being...well, a crazy asshole. He thought Germans needed more living space. Demented, no? Unfortunately, my ass is staying true to its German origins, and has decided that it, too, needs more living space. And has started to expand. If it invades Russia or tries to torment some historical scapegoats, I'm going to be very concerned.
3. It might rain or snow or something this evening. Yay!
4. For the first time yesterday, I did some of my shopping at Trader Joe's. I fear I might be addicted to their veggie chips. Whether or not this has anything to do with my ass's expansionist tendencies remains to be seen.
5. Last night, I watched A Scanner Darkly. All's I have to say is...Dude. I need to watch that movie about ten more times to really take it all in.

Okay, kids. Another day, another dollar. Back on the chain gang...

The Price We Pay To Survive

One of the more quaint (NOT antiquated) characteristics about me is that I like to write letters. Wordy, sturdy letters, written on nice stationery, sent through snail-mail. I like to light a candle in the evening, turn on my New-Agey music, and scribble away. Fortunately for me, I do have someone to whom I write, that also enjoys writing, and for the past three years, we have been sending letters to each other, back and forth. Not always in a timely manner, but dammit, we write. My penpal's name is Kim; he and I attended college together (I was getting my bachelor's in history, he his master's) and eventually I helped him prep for his comps.
In Kim's most recent letter to me, he told me about moving to Austin, Texas, and the life he is striving to attain for himself and his partner out there. Right now, it's just a dream, but he's working hard to make it a reality. He described this dream to me in detail in his letter--evocative, sensory-rich details, and the descriptions were so vivid, I found it hard to believe that this was not actually already reality.

I envy him that dream. Because, as much as I want to, I can't do it, can't cook up dreams like that. I want to be able to do that, and I used to be able to do that--oh, god, I used to dream of a townhouse in Broad Ripple, with copper pots and pans and a study with walls painted a lovely cornflower blue, and a little back patio where Michael and I grew flowers, and a kitty and maybe a doggy, and a library job appearing miraculously, and quiet years spent in a quiet city, with friends, and a lovely home, and fulfilling jobs, and in the fullness of time, some children.

I used to be able to dream like that, you see. And god, those dreams were lovely. It's been almost a year since my dreams bitch-smacked me back down into reality, and while I have pretty much come to terms with it, one thing hasn't gone back to "normal." I'm no longer able (or maybe only no longer willing) to have dreams like that. It hurts too much when you lose those dreams. And I am afraid to dream, or at least I don't know how to. The only plans I make are short term, like over the next year or two, and all of them are related to things in my immediate sphere--my career and my apartment, for example, or a trip I plan to take in a few months. Nothing, no dreams with Arash. I want to be able to do that--regardless of whether or not he's a willing part of them--but I am too tired still, too scared, too worried that I will look like a fool. And so, I don't dream about our future. I am plain too scared. Or cautious? Or wise, even? I just quietly go through each day, and I'm happy for each day I have with him.

Someday I will learn how to dream again.

2007: The Year Ahead

Yes, yes, I know. We are more than halfway through the month, and I am just now starting to work on the whole 2007 Resolutions/To Do/To Don't List...but hey, I was sick at the beginning of the month, and for the past week I have been juggling various crises.

Maybe "don't procrastinate and make lame excuses" should be at the top of the list.

Finances:

1. Pay off my credit card debt left over from the move (already about halfway there! Wooo!)
2. Pay off one of my private loan from Sallie Mae (assholes)
3. Save receipts, record all purchases

Professional Development:

1. Update my resume every 6 weeks
2. Update my work blog very regularly
3. Attend ALA in Washington this summer
4. Set deadlines, and stick with them
5. Remember this: Every taxpayer is my boss
6. Read all the Caldecott and Newbery Award-winners
7. Do monthly genre studies

Friendships/Relationships/Community:

1. Remember everyone's birthday, and send their cards on time
2. Be prompt in returning emails and letters
3. Become a Big Sister

Physical Care:

1. Drink lots and lots of water
2. Start using gym pass
3. Take vitamins and medications on time
4. Get teeth cleaned
5. Moisturize and use sunblock, copiously
6. Strive to take good care of possessions: hang up clothes, iron items, polish shoes, don't get things so dirty!
7. Learn how to apply eyeshadow with some degree of skill
8. Floss
9. Cut back on junk food. I do pretty well with the no fast food, and have sworn off beef. Now, must do this...

Homemaking:

1. Start cooking, dammit.
2. Learn how to mend
3. Spend 15 minutes each day, cleaning up after myself
4. Get a couple of (non-poisonous) houseplants

Travel:

1. Take a road trip to San Francisco
2. Fly back to Daytona at Thanksgiving
3. Visit Palm Springs
4. Visit San Diego

Creative Ventures/Hobbies:

1. Learn to knit
2. Learn to make jewelry
3. Write more--writing prompts, letters, journal entries, short stories, poetry, haikus, lists, freewrites, research, ideas for novels
4. Try to go on a hike at least once a month
5. Learn Dreamweaver, and how to design my own blog

Spiritual Development:

1. Read Desiderata every day
2. Meditate

Purchases, Little Indulgences:

1. George Foreman Grill, water filter, vegetable steamer, and electric wok
2. Papasan chair
3. End table
4. Bedside table lamp
5. Featherbed mattress
6. "Taste of Home Cookbook"
7. Replace hubcap on car
8. Get car door handles fixed
9. Get car detailed

To Don't

Don't get dumped in a student union! In fact, don't go to any student unions, for any reason!

Don't cry like a bitch with a skinned knee for an entire month if I get dumped. Moping occasionally is okay. Lying on the floor of friends' apartments, sobbing and hyperventilating? Not so much.

Don't sabotage the relationship with the boyfriend. Sure, I've got a lot of issues and hangups left from the last relationship that carries over into this one. Sure, I have my fears. But DON'T SABOTAGE.

Don't spend a lot of time thinking about small-minded Italian women who hate me. If I don't forgive, I am allowing them to live in my head, rent-free. And we all know how expensive rent is here in SoCal.

Don't swear so much.

Don't lost all my nail-files, lip balms, and pens.

Don't procrastinate

Don't think negatively, or anticipate. I don't know what the future holds, so it's unfair to project...

You'd Have to Know Us To Get How Not Serious This Is...

Funniest conversation ever:

M: I think you need to move back to Bloomington and become a librarian at the Kinsey Library.

Me: I think I am underqualified. I think they would want me to get a PhD in sex.

M: Oooh! I'll help you study!

Thoughts Before Sleep

Hot damn, it's cold. Bitterly cold. Colder-than-a-stepmother's-breast cold. And it's windy, too--there's a wind roaring through the palm trees and through the eaves and down the heating vent. I didn't imagine that California would be like this--not that I am complaining. It's hard to be disappointed in a place when it's cold and windy outside but cozy inside, and one is tucked up in bed, with a kitty curled up beside them, and a laptop for company. It's a good life.

Today I had to drive out to Redlands for a couple of errands, and on the way out, I passed by a HUGE tumbleweed by the side of the freeway. Not just any tumbleweed, mind you, but a weird-ass tumbleweed that was all big and poofy like a bad 80s hair-do, and that had all sorts of trash and debris and tire-tread caught up in it. It was a bizarre, yet perfectly fitting, natural collage that represented California quite beautifully.
I didn't expect to like it out here as much as I do. How much of that has to do with my friends and Arash, my super cheap rent and ideal living situation, I don't know--but I do know that I am one lucky girl.

Something to Ponder...

I was going to blog about inane little things, empty vapid commentary that's one step away from insipid Victorian social chatter. But then I got to thinking...

...which is always dangerous.

I will be 27 in less than 6 months. I'm single, in the unmarried sense. I guess I am in a relationship; my twenties seem to be defined by that. I've never been married. Never had a kid. Never been divorced.

One of my friends is separated from her husband. Another friend's divorce was finalized a few months ago. A close family member is coming up on her divorce, I think. I recently got back in touch with a friend who's been divorced for five years. The divorce rate in this country is really high, and I am beginning to believe it, when it's beginning to show in the lives of my people.

It's inevitable to ask this question: what's the point in getting married? It seems like most of us are doomed. Or are we giving in too easily? Or getting married too early? I am willing to bet all of these folks didn't get married thinking, "Hey, we'll have a few good years of it, and then go our separate ways." I'm sure it was something more like "till death do us part" and then...something changed? and they parted. I'm pretty damned sure that most of us go into marriages thinking, "It's not going to happen to us. No divorce here."

So what is it? What changes? What makes us give up?

I'm trying very hard not to be jaded about the marriage thing. Don't get me wrong--I want to get married, preferably in the next five years, give or take a year or two. I believe in marriage, and making things work. I believe in faithfulness and perseverance and compromise and working hard at a lasting relationship.

But I am pretty sure all of those other people did, too.

So, what is it? What changes?

And I don't care that this is all strictly academic, and that I am about as far from the altar as I have ever been in my entire dating life. It's a good question to ask. It's a good thing to ponder.

Not Quite A Valley Girl...But Still...

Back in college, during my neurotic undergraduate years, I majored in History. I loved--still love--history, because I love stories and different places and people. But I would make a BAD historian, because I'm not an analytical, abstract kind of thinker. I'm more of an emotional, sentimental type. I don't romanticize history (mmmm, anyone want some distended ovaries with their whalebone corsets? How 'bout a nice case of the Inquisitions?), but I do tend to look at history with more of an emotional eye.

Another example of this would be my boyfriends. I like to learn about where they grew up, and imagine what they were like, and what their lives were like, when they were there in their hometowns. With the Crap Weasel, who was...well. WAY too old for me, I drove around St. Petersburg and tried to imagine what his life was like, growing up there in the post-WWII, Golden Age of America years. (See! TOLD YOU he was too old for me.) With John the Saint, I tried to imagine what life was like for him, growing up in Daytona Beach before it got really...Daytona-y. With M, I tried to imagine what life was like, growing up in normal, anonymous Middle America, in a place with seasons, and a normal nuclear family. With Arash, I try to contextualize the Valley with him in it. Example: I visited the Valley last week, met up with an old Indiana friend and her family who live there. We went exploring, shopped at Ardvaark's Odd Ark and ate some delicious French pastries, and later, when I told Arash about it, he knew exactly where I was talking about, as I has been in his old stomping grounds.

Boyfriends past and present aside, the trip to the Valley was really, really fun. It was the first time I had been there in the daylight, the first time I got to rove through a Valley mall. And it was wonderful to see Jeana, wonderful, funky, original Jeana again. She always is so driven, put-together, organized, and creative. She makes me want to be better, do more, challenge myself. Even though I don't end up doing these things usually, she lights a fire in me. And her family is wonderful, too, her little sister, Sam, is this sweet-natured girl who agrees enthusiastically "Uh-huh!" with an unspeakably cute inflection, and her parents, whom I have met all of twice in my life, are incredibly warm and hospitable and made a wonderful dinner and basically gave me a standing invitation to their place.

AND I got to go hiking through a canyon!

So, a few pics:

The canyon!

View of the San Fernando Valley

Me. Southern California has been treating me well...

Oh Mr. Sandman...

At almost three in the morning, when you are still awake and sleep does not seem to be anywhere in your vicinity, life takes on a different shape. It morphs into something a little more abstract, something that one can keep, and examine, at a distance, in a detached sort of way. You can contemplate your daylife, your work, your interactions, your plans and hopes and to-do lists and worries, and somehow, the emotions involved seem muted. Almost as if the life you are leading is completely separate from your nightlife, as if they carried on independently of one another, never touching. And, considering the dreams I have, that's not such a stretch.

But here I am, at almost three in the morning, wide awake because I stayed up too late last night and the neighbors below me are assholes that play their television or stereo too loud. I am propped up on a bank of pillows, tapping away at a laptop, swaddled in my down comforter. It's been a long time since I have had insomnia, and I don't know quite what to make of it. Why is it that our heads become so much more jumbled full of mental clutter when we are waiting for sleep to come?