Thursday, March 29, 2007

miss helpful.



"I don't think this is working."
"Did you try pushing the on button?"
"Of course I tried pushing the on button. Thanks, Miss Helpful."
"I like to think of myself more as 'Miss Moral Support.'"

life with E.

I think I'm going to start a new series here, which I am going to call "Life with E."

E lives a secret life fraught with danger and inexplicable disaster, whereby her hair is dyed orange and set on fire, her bike is stolen by mongolian midgets, and she inadvertently smushes a little-known but endangered bug on a forest conservation fund-raising hike. Within the span of a week. (Okay, those examples are a bit of an exaggeration. But close.)

This is not to say that life with E is one of hapless mis-adventure. E is in no way hapless. She has an uncanny ability to sniff out bargains, beat out inhuman bureaucracies, and has been known to orchestrate small-scale corporate take-downs in her free time. No, it's not that E is incapable of managing the ordinary day-to-day of the universe. It's that the universe, in often extraordinary ways, is simply out to get her.

My life with E has been one of many emergency room visits. Punctuated by review of the occasional police report. For all of that, I love her with all my heart.

So, internet. Installment one of Life with E:

Last week, on a short ski trip and in the middle of my first ride up the lift, I pick up my cell phone to hear E's voice: "I hate to bother you, but if you were trapped on the hotel balcony in your underwear, would you call housekeeping, or the front desk?"

Ah, life with E.

Saturday, March 17, 2007

when god closes a door...

Okay, I admit to this tiny, painful--but small--internal zit of guilt that has developed over my neglect of this space.

I think it's that so much has changed in the last couple of months--changes that I haven't been able to piece into any sort of coherent narrative that makes much sense to me. I suppose a different sort of person than me would be bothered by this less. Life, after all, isn't much of a coherent narrative, and there is often little that's very personal that really makes sense. It bothers me, nonetheless.

The only cure, I think, is to just lay it all out. So here it is:

After much discussion about the way our lives appear to be heading, P and I decided to part ways. It was an ending much more like a terminal illness than a car wreck. Slow, steady, sad--but also full of an awareness of the impermanence of things and the way in which good things--like love--should never be taken for granted. Though we are arranging our lives in a different way now--and that is significant--he and Bird remain in my heart.

Somewhere in the middle of all this, I decided to take a new job--which in practice is very much like my old job. But it makes life a little more compact and is different in a dozen very small ways that seem to balance out to something better than what was before.

I am living in Los Angeles now--in a house with two large dogs--closer to my new job (a bike ride away!), and down the street from a lady who hangs brightly glazed pottery from trees, and across from a large reservoir. For the first time in my life, I have a garage opener.



An old friend who lives just up the road made a list of things in the neighborhood she thought we might enjoy doing together, which turned out to be composed entirely of local restaurants. We have jointly pledged to expand our field of interests beyond, er, eating.

In short: where a few months ago, I was living on a boat and mastering the art of packing school lunches, I am now single, in a house, walking dogs, and eating out. Life is funny that way.

I'm not sure what there is to observe about these developments except to refer loosely to the singing nun in the very popular musical movie about Hitler and gazebos and favorite things. Yeah, you know the one--where she says something in the beginning about God, and doors closing and windows opening. As strange as it is to be here, what I can say? The windows are wide, wide open.

Monday, March 05, 2007

not mutually exclusive.

We pass a woman talking loudly to herself on the street.

Me: "I think that woman is suffering from schizophrenia, or something. Mental illness can be so sad."
Mom: "I don't think she's crazy--I think she's talking into one of those cell phone earbud things."
Me: "I don't see a headset. I really think she's mentally ill."
Mom: "No, no. She's just on the phone."
Dad (interjects): "She could be BOTH, you know."

Crazy woman shares crazy via cell phone? Yes. Totally possible.