Facebook is killing my blog

My ability to post facebook status updates three times a day has totally killed my desire to blog.

But, I can't just leave that weepy post about Sugar sitting here at the top of the page. Sugar's doing alright for now. She had three tumors removed from her leg last Monday. Yes, in the week between me finding them and taking her in for surgery, another tumor appeared. Not good. The vet wasn't sure she was able to get all of the tumors during the surgery. One was deep, and one was undefined and looked like it might have infiltrated her lymphatic system. Not good. We're still waiting to get the pathology reports back, to find out exactly what kind of cancer we're dealing with. I've gotten the names of two vets in Boise that someone I trust, trusts. I'm not comfortable with my vet anymore, so depending on what the test results are, I might be taking Sugar down to the valley for treatment. Sugar's godmother has offered to underwrite her care, which is taking all kinds of stress away from the situation. I couldn't afford to do all of this for her myself.

I've set up Sugar in the guest room, which is driving Freckles insane. Freckles really needs a companion, but Sugar needs a quiet and safe place to recuperate. And they both need me. It's wrenching. But it makes me really glad I didn't get a dog this fall when I was feeling the fever to collect another pet. I think two animals per human is all a household should really hold.

Sugar

I just found two more tumors on her leg. The same leg where a tumor was removed last spring. I feel guilty and horrible for not finding them earlier. I knew when she started losing weight again that something was wrong. I kept meaning to check. I can't stop crying. My poor kitty.

Relief

Last night was pretty great, wasn't it? There are so many beautiful, tear-inducing things on the internet today about the election, I don't know that I can add much. I'm thrilled, I'm relieved, I can finally lift my 8 year ban on television news (not that I have the ability to watch TV news at the moment, so the ban has been essentially symbolic for over a year anyway, but still). I'm proud to be an American. And it doesn't feel embarrassing to say that, for the first time in a long time. As I told Zach yesterday, we can finally tell Europe with their snooty (and completely accurate but horrifically hypocritical) accusations of racism to shut up. I mean, can you imagine France, Great Britain, or Germany electing a racial minority as president? Heh. Non, no, nein. And, on a completely personal note, I think it is awfully cool that the next president of the United States is someone who once graded a paper of mine. I mean, honestly. No degrees of separation!

I'm also proud to be my mother's daughter today. Yesterday Zach sent me a frantic text from the beach where he'd found an abandoned, cold, shivering kitten. He brought it home, and the other abandoned cat that's basically taken up residence at his house freaked out. Being a 12 hour drive away I couldn't do much other than volunteer my mom to save the day, and she did. Zach brought the cat to my mom's gallery, she left work and installed it in the greenhouse at home, and there's one more kitten who won't be starving in the wilderness. I'm not sure this is a permanent solution, but it will work for now. My stepdad is allergic to cats and this kitten seems to want to be an inside cat. So if anyone lives in Oregon and wants a really sweet kitten, let me know!

Happy Election Day!

I woke up to the first snow of winter this morning, with an anxious feeling in the pit of my stomach. I plan to hide under the covers until the results are announced.

Sunny

I've been feeling that little blackness on the edge of my consciousness that means if I'm not careful, a period of depression might be just around the corner. Basically, I think I'm waking up to the reality of the irresponsible hash I've made of my life. 31 with a really expensive education but no saleable skills or experience. I'm really afraid that no one will ever hire me for anything. What I need is one of my more responsible and ambitious friends to get really powerful and hire me for something. Anything. Anyway. That's all I'm going to say about that. I'm trying really hard to avoid spinning out and for the most part I'm succeeding in the only way I know how, denial. It's my most potent coping mechanism and I'm employing it rather effectively so far. There's no crying. I'm not eating inordinate amounts of sugar. I've even been going to yoga and for walks on a regular basis. I'm fine. So. Lots of online games with Zach, lots of bread baking, lots of IMing rage and hate and fear at the election with Stephanie, tea and toast on a tray in bed every morning with the online newspapers while I wait for the house to warm up to 50 degrees.

And in really really excellent news, my mom will be here tonight! Falling gas prices and all sorts of rationalizations about things (I don't really need) that she would be saving postage costs on by bringing me herself have justified an extra trip this fall before the snow flies. I'm so excited! I know she was just here, but there were SO MANY other people here at the same time. This time I get to have her all to myself for a few days and I'm ridiculously excited. The weather is supposed to be fabulous most of the time she's here, into the 60s and everything! (Into the 20s at night, but still, 60s!)

EW

Remember how I was all proud of myself for putting up with mouse poop to install insulation in a crawl space, thinking it was the grossest thing I'd done? Oh the grossness just keeps going. Yesterday, on a whim, I decided to replace some nasty looking insulation above the dormer windows in my loft. It had obviously been there for 20+ years, and no one had gotten around to putting sheetrock over it, so it was pretty dusty and I just thought, you know, let's put some nice clean white stuff there. In addition to choking on dust and ancient insulation when I pulled it down, I screamed like a little girl and literally FELL OFF A LADDER when I saw at least thirty yellow jackets and half again as many flies CRAWLING on the wall where the insulation had been, daylight streaming from the seams between the siding. EW!!!! I'm still recovering from the grossness and horror of that moment.

On a much happier note, I've ascended one giant step up the ladder from trash to just plain poor with the removal of those junked cars. Someone came to take them away yesterday and it made me just plain giddy. There's still a trashy tarp-covered pen that needs to be pulled down, but I am moving on up as the Jeffersons might say.

Well, That Was Quick

Fall appears to be over for now, and winter has arrived. It hasn't gotten out of the 30s in the last couple of days, and there was even a skiff of snow on the ground when I woke up Thursday. The first few days I have to admit I was bitter. This is an unusually early cold snap, and I'm not really emotionally or physically prepared for it. Winter isn't that bad. It's just . . . I didn't think I'd still be here. I thought I would have found a real job by now, but that's not working out. (I know, I'm not exactly shocked either.) And I'm finally flat broke and busted. Remember how I was cold all last winter because I didn't get all the wood I ordered and had to be uber conscious of how much I used? Well, this winter, I didn't even order as much as I received last winter. So. I will be putting to good use all those wool socks I packed away in July. Which, you know, whatever. I still have my little spa job and that nets me enough to cover the essentials, like my Tivo and Netflix subscriptions and plenty of dried legumes and cat food. (The latter is for the cats, I promise!) This is all my own fault for being self indulgent and, let's be honest, lazy.

But before you think I'm feeling sorry for myself, I'm really not. Truth be told, it's all kind of exciting. The world economy is getting stripped down, and so is mine. I was talking to Zach about it the other day, about how I feel like I should be depressed, or anxious, but I'm not. He said he wasn't surprised, that my D.C. malaise made perfect sense, and this almost thrill in my currently reduced circumstances does as well. It's true. This is an opportunity to revel in my essential nordic-ness. To exercise frugality and simplicity and to make-do. I've got tea and books. I hand sewed a draft stopper using this fabulous and insanely cheap green houndstooth upholstery fabric I've had socked away forever. I'm embroidering gingham that I'll turn into an apron eventually. I'm poring over my expenditures, seeing where I can save. I'm looking forward to taking a thermos of tea and my snowshoes and spending hours wandering the hills around my house when winter really comes. I'm living like it's 1932. (Except for the Tivo and internet and Netflix - some of which should probably go away.) And it's all deeply pleasurable.

I've never really been able to accomplish anything until I was pushed to the wall and simply had to or the consequences would be too dire to live with. That is not an admirable trait by any means, and it's one I wish I didn't have. But, it's there. It's one of my strongest and least likely to be overcome personality traits. And it, along with my truly remarkable powers of denial and selective memory have gotten me this far in life relatively unscathed. I'm really, honestly, curious to see what happens next.

So Long Indian Summer

This weekend the reality of fall arrived. Cold, rainy, a low dark sky. For the most part my uncle and I hunkered in the living room watching DVDs. We watched the first season of Monarch of the Glen (which totally made me want to move to a castle in Scotland, until yesterday when I read this hilarious article about a family . . . who moved to a castle in Scotland), and when we ran out of that I introduced him to The West Wing. Can you believe he'd never even HEARD of The West Wing?!?! Well, I fixed that right quick.

But yesterday we did venture out for a short walk between rain storms. Isn't fall pretty?



[Sorry, for some reason blogger won't post my links, I'll try again later.]

In Which I Feel Like a Superhero for Braving a Little Mouse Poop

So remember when I said that my mom managed to get the insulation in half of the ceiling of the crawlspace beneath my dining room? You did all realize that meant that she'd left half of it for me to do, right?

A little background that I'm sure I've already mentioned, but it's easier to re-type then find a link. Originally there was a greenhouse attached to the cabin's kitchen. Due to harsh winters and complete neglect it sort of fell apart and a prior renter sort of turned it into a dining room on the cheap. I mean really cheap. The greenhouse had been dug into the ground a little bit, so to have the dining room floor match the kitchen floor, the renter left a fairly sizeable (though not sizeable enough to stand up in) storage space beneath the dining room. A storage space that is accessed by a door sawed in half. A storage space containing ZERO insulation. So, in our continuing effort to make this house more comfortable, we decided that a priority would be putting some insulation between the floor joists of the dining room. Which required spending time in the sort of storage space. Which is full of mouse poop and dust and spiders and ancient cobwebs and holy hell is it unpleasant down there. But I did it. Yesterday I donned full protective gear (including mask) and spent two hours squatting on mouse poop covered dirt floors and stapling insulation above my head.

Aren't you impressed?

I mean, I know there are worse tasks. In fact, I seem too remember my dad, about this time last year, spending a week emptying a septic tank with a shovel and a bucket in the 90 degree heat of Belize. So yes, all ickiness is relative. But this is the ickiest thing I've done in quite a while.

Just Busy-ish

Here's the short version of the past month during which I apparently decided I no longer loved my blog enough to write. Which is stupid, because I've missed it:

The spa owners spent three weeks rafting the grand canyon, leaving me nominally "in charge", which meant at one point I worked 11 days straight. For me, that was brutal.

I then started applying for real jobs. Yes. Really. I sent out letters of interest and resumes and everything. There is a causal connection between this activity and being left "in charge" of the spa. While they were gone, something just clicked and I realized that "No. I will not be happy working a mindless customer service job for the rest of my life. I have very little ambition, but what I have is not going to be satisfied by this for much longer." I only applied for two real jobs, but was quickly rejected (one post had already been filled, the other I just never heard back from). So then I was a bit depressed/discouraged. I'm hoping to apply for a few more jobs this week. I'm serious about it now, so if anyone has any leads for jobs in Idaho, let me know. My pay requirements are minimal. (I actually found the perfect job (the one that was already filled, damn it) and determined that I could actually live, just barely, on the low low sum of $35,000/year. So now I at least have a floor of what I need to survive. Good to know I guess.)

And then, last week, I had a bit of a home invasion. On Monday my mom, stepdad, and their two large dogs showed up. On Wednesday, a dear old friend of the family (Howdy) arrived to remove about 500 pounds of horseshoes and a couple of forges that he'd been storing in the chicken coop for about twenty years. Also on Wednesday, fabulously skilled Uncle George arrived to finish a few more projects. These four people have done a HUGE amount of work. Totally makes me embarrassed for all the work I have not been doing. Stepdad and Howdy split and stacked two cords of wood between them. Stepdad bushwacked all the weeds I'd let take over the property and cut down two dead trees. Mom cleaned and planted the flower beds, killed about a million yellow jacket and wasp nests, put insulation in the scary space beneath my dining room floor, and buttressed the woodshed so it will survive another winter. George built a funny little deck off my dining room so he could take out these horrible old windows and install new french doors! (They're doors to nowhere for now since there's a five foot drop from them to the ground, but eventually, someday, there will be a real deck.) Oh, and the neighbors totally regraded my driveway. Yeah. It's been quite a week.

Howdy left on Friday, Mom, Stepdad and the dogs headed out this morning, so now it's just me, George, and the cats. The house seems really empty. As much as I'd kind of been dreading having such a full house, (have I mentioned lately what a hermit I am?) I miss them already.

Family

One of my college roommates, M, got married in Lake Tahoe on Saturday. To be honest, I had been dreading the trip. It was a long drive, and M and I are very very bad at keeping in touch. In fact, part of me was sure that somewhere along the way I had mortally offended her and she hated me now. Because we simply don't talk anymore. But at one time we were close. We lived together for four formative years, and for three of those years we shared a bedroom. Can you even imagine? Actually, it's even better. There were three of us in that bedroom. Our third roommate, C, is a master at keeping in touch, truly skilled. And I felt like I had to go to this wedding for her. So I went. And the three of us came together at the reception, laughing and chatting, and grinning like fools. Like no time had passed. Like no time ever would. Because no matter what happens now, for four years we shared everything. For four years we did almost nothing alone. None of us had a typical college experience. As C and I discussed, we sort of failed at college. We got excellent grades, but we didn't form the sort of memories most people share of those years. We were shy and we were insular, and the three of us just leaned on each other and kept our eyes forward and waited for it to end. Anyway, we're family now. And I no longer worry when M doesn't call me back. Because I just saw her get married on a beautiful day. And I know she's very happy. And I know, for sure, that we're family.

Magnet

That's the only thing I can come up with. Some joker at a Subaru plant thought it would be funny to embed a high-powered magnet in the rear driver's side wheel of my car. How else to possibly explain the fact that I've had three punctures, leading to three completely destroyed tires, in a little over a year? And every single one of them was the rear driver's side tire. I just don't get it!

In Which I Totally Succeed at Summer

Maybe you don't think of summer as something you can fail at, but a person can absolutely fail at a season by not taking advantage of it (for instance, ahem, a winter without skiing. Sigh.). If one's summer is distinguishable from winter only by the number of layers one wears: fail. And I have been determined not to fail this summer. I go hiking almost every day I have off and spend hours and hours basking in the sun (while wearing a hat and spf 30 of course). I've gone swimming in the river (quickly, it was very cold), and, most importantly, I've searched, high and low, for huckleberries.

Huckleberries had become my nemeisis this summer. The thing standing between me and a successful season. I could rationalize away not going rafting (too expensive), and not swimming in the lake (too cold) but not finding huckleberries? That was failure I could not live with. Yesterday I even climbed over a gate, prominently posted "NO TRESPASSING" and with three locks reinforcing the sign's intent, to look for a patch that my mom remembered as a gold mine 20+ years ago. A patch where we'd seen a black bear sharing our harvest. I didn't find it. I called my mom and she told me told me all I had to do to find them was drive over to West Mountain, slow down, open the windows, and stop when I smelled their unforgettable tart sweetness filling the air. So, I did. (But first I went home and baked a loaf of bread and made black cherry jam from a recipe in my Grandma Ann's ancient Boston Cooking School Cookbook. Another thing to tick off my checklist for summer. I made jam!) I crossed the valley, pointed my car up the mountain, followed a terrifying one-lane twisty dirt road with no guard rails, slowly, and stopped when I found a wide spot to park near the top of the mountain. I sniffed. Nothing. I was about to get back in the car to drive a little further, when I spotted it. A small bush about three feet away. Covered in those small purple berries that look so much like blueberries and taste so much better. I spent the next hour moving from bush to bush, slapping mosquitoes and eating about twice as many as I kept. I ended up with just a cup of berries. I may try and go back next week and see if any more have ripened, but for now. Summer: you did NOT beat me.

The Bats of August

I don't like it, but I have no problem understanding why and how mice get into my house. Crawlspaces, foundations, vents . . . there are ways. And while I do my best to keep my house clean there are crumbs. There are incentives. But bats? How the HELL do they find their way in? Certainly not through the crawlspace, and last summer we sealed up all the holes we thought they might fit through. But, more importantly, WHY? There is nothing for them here but panic and death and perhaps a little torture if Freckles catches them before their little hearts give out.

For whatever reason, bat season officially began yesterday when I came home from the spa to find two bats. One already dead, the other flitting, panicked through the loft. I've already shared too many horror stories here, so I'll spare you the details of what happened when Freckles caught the second bat. If last summer is any guide, this is only the first wave of a months-long invasion. I will be pulling my mosquito netting out of storage before bed tonight.

Intermission

I got a plea from a relative to post again, but I just don't feel like I have much to say.

My grocery budget has doubled as I gorge myself on cherries and nectarines and blueberries and any other fresh, reasonably local, fruit I can get my hands on. It's one of the greatest joys of summer. Although, sadly, it's not all good. Today I spent $13 on inferior cherries and I'm very bitter about it.

The weather has been fabulous, much cooler than last summer (in a good way), and significantly less smoky (in an even better way). I've gone for three hikes since Saturday, and one yoga class. I've seen twin spotted fauns and an enormous five point buck crashing through the underbrush. I've watched several really big birds (osprey? some kind of hawks?) circling above the pines, riding the drafts. I read half of Friday Night Lights sitting by the river on a particularly hot, Summer-2007-style day. I just kept dipping my feet in the icy water and splashing my arms and applying sunscreen because I didn't feel like being inside.

I think I might be a little depressed. I'm sleeping a lot. I still haven't looked for a job that pays more than $10/hour. I do have a complete cover letter, edited by a real lawyer and everything, but I can't bring myself to send it out. I just can't see an upside. The first option is that someone will want to hire me and I'll have to go back to real work, and work scares me. I don't want to go back to crying all the time. Alternatively, maybe no one will want to hire me and I will be destitute with no prospects. And . . . that doesn't sound so great either. So things are on pause right now. I'm reading books and eating strawberries and sitting on warm rocks. I'm listening to the wind in the trees and smelling the scents of an Idaho summer, old pine needles and newish mountains and the very faint sweetness of huckleberries. And I'm generally OK. Just not quite OK enough to think more than a day or two ahead. I've pushed pause, because this, right here, is good. Thanks for understanding. And not worrying.

I'm Turning Into Zach

I made pastry cream this afternoon to eat with some fresh strawberries that are cluttering up my refrigerator. All well and good right? (I mean, in case I haven't mentioned it, I've turned into a little bit of a home made foodie who bakes her own scones, and makes pudding from scratch, and generally lives the high life.) But while I was waiting for the custard to cool and set . . . I, well, I couldn't wait. So I just mixed a little heavy cream with a splash of vanilla and a pinch of sugar and poured it over strawberries and sliced almonds, and holy hell was it delish. But that is NOT something I do! I don't just EAT heavy cream! I NEVER have heavy cream in the house! This is a step too far! (In case you are wondering, I seriously feel that this deserves those four exclamation points. I am that horrified by my actions.) It's one thing to eat the fruits of my labors that just happen to be rich and decadent and slightly out of control. But you need to deserve those decadences. You need to have mixed and measured and applied heat and risked making something completely inedible. You can't just top something with heavy cream and be OK with it! This is a sign that my friendship with Zach, someone who drinks heavy cream straight from the carton, has gone too far. The next thing you know I'll be taking afternoon tea on every day off, ironing my pillow cases, developing an obsession with the Mitfords and stalking Edwardian strawberry forks on Ebay! Oh. Crap. Two out of four already.

Cat(s) and Mouse

Apparently there's a regular Thursday night mouse convention at my place, because for the second week in a row we had mousetastic adventures on a Thursday night/Friday morning. Luckily, this has not (yet) ended in tragedy. When I came downstairs this morning, both cats were stalking and sniffing and generally behaving oddly in the vicinity of a certain leather club chair in my living room. I peeked beneath, and sure enough there was a scared (but fully alive and uninjured) little mouse taking refuge. The cats and I spent the rest of the morning trying (with completely different intentions) to catch the creature as it darted from chair to sofa to behind the TV. Eventually I had to give up and go into the spa. But I knew for sure Freckles would eventually eviscerate it, so I locked Freckles in the laundry room before I went, and left older, slower, and de-clawed Sugar circling the sofa. I haven't found a mouse carcase since I got home (and believe me, I looked everywhere), so I can only hope that it made its escape out of whatever little hole in the foundation it found its way in through. I'm too soft for my own good. I'd rather the mouse took up permanent residence under my kitchen cabinets than know one of my cats killed it. Of course, I'm not looking forward to any sleep tonight. I'll be bolting awake at each scuffle and thump of Sugar and Freckles on their nightly rounds.

Ooooh. In real wildlife news there are six bucks grazing not 30 feet from my living room windows! How pretty.

Wildflowers

Aren't they pretty? I picked all of them within 50 feet of my front door.

Tidy

I spent yesterday getting over my grumpiness. After sleeping for 11 hours, I spent the day cleaning, tidying, organizing, and generally reclaiming my space and my self. I feel better. Peonies, my favorite flower, help.

Grumpy

I am in a foul mood today. Practically poisonous. The day started really crummy, when at 1 am I was woken by little claws scratching my arm as a tortured mouse ran across my body trying to escape from Freckles. I found the poor creature, critically injured, trapped between my mattress and the wall. There was nothing I could do. I wrapped it in a paper towel, struggling the whole time. When I tried to open the door it escaped, flopped out of my hands, performed these horrifying death spirals on the floor until I was able to get it outside, on the porch, where I left it to its fate. Then I cried. And tried to go back to sleep. Every time one of the cats jumped up to the bed I freaked out, turned on the light, and made sure she was alone this time. It was not a restful night, but the mouse had it much much worse. Oh god, I'm tearing up again just thinking about it. Now I know, worse than finding a dead mouse on your bed, is finding a dying one.

The day has gotten significantly less tragic, but not necessarily better. I'm bitter about being stuck at the spa when other people are relaxing (which, given my schedule as described in my last post, I know is completely ridiculous.) I'm annoyed and angry with one of the therapists, a friend, who was horribly unprofessional today and stuck me in an awkward position as a result. I just wrote a sentence saying that I was probably being unfair, and excusing her, but I deleted it. Because I'm not being unfair, and today, being tired, and grumpy, and sad I'm not in the mood to be accommodating. And did I mention that it's cloudy?

Sunshine = Happiness

Not to rub it in or anything, but I've had the last five days in a row off, and it's been grand. I had all sorts of projects on my plate (lawn maintenance, painting, cover letters etc.) and I've made a little progress on all of them, but completed none. I've also read three books, watched two movies, had lunch with my grandparents, had lunch with friends, and stared off into space the exact amount that is good for me. There's something about summer. I know it says it there off in the sidebar, but can I just repeat myself, I LOVE SUMMER. It makes me unreasonably happy just to be warm. To put on sunscreen and wear hats and read novels in the grass and, despite my precautions, get a pretty tan anyway. Even doing laundry ceases being a chore when I can hang clothes to dry on the line and bring them in smelling of sunshine. I have to stay up late until the heat has dissipated enough from my bedroom to make sleep possible, and even a decrease in my nightly rest isn't enough to defeat my summer energy. I actually WANT to do home repair projects. I want to paint and scrub and weed and tidy. Would summer feel this great if winter hadn't been so hard? Probably not. So I'm just going to say it this once. Thanks for being so difficult Winter. I haven't enjoyed a summer this much since I was a child.

Oh Crap

I think I just agreed to go trekking with llamas tomorrow. How do I get out of this gracefully? On second thought, to hell with graceful, how do I get out of this? I am lazy and out of shape. It will KILL ME.

Pen Pals

I have a thing for pen pals. I love them. Like, literally, I have a weird tendency to fall in love with them. I have an uncanny and undoubtedly destructive ability to write my way into emotions. Since I was 21, I've had a string of male pen pals, with some of them I've exchanged long hand-written letters, with others long emails. And they have been, without question, my most satisfying romantic relationships. None of these relationships has worked out in real life. I have a long history of that too.

Some of them, most of them I destroyed. Without wanting to, helplessly watching from a distance as these men dared try to find a way to connect with me in some way that didn't involve the written word. I have snubbed my pen pals by phone and cold-shouldered them in person. Crushed the connection beneath my heel as soon as one of my pen pals ruined a perfectly satisfying and emotionally fulfilling relationship by wanting, like Pinocchio, to be a real boy. I think I've gotten over that. In fact, the last pen pal turned real person I actually gave a chance. It didn't work out either, but it failed in a healthy (um, maybe I should say healthier) way. In a real way. The real, non-written relationship didn't work, not because I wouldn't give it a chance, but because it didn't. And the real failure didn't hurt nearly as much as I thought it would all those times I was deliberately crushing budding romances. (I think, at 31, I'm finally getting over some of my heaviest romantic hang ups even as I've become enthralled with the idea of spinsterhood. What a . . . coincidence?)

Anyway, this is all to say that the original pen pal/love, the one to whom no other ever lived up, has gotten back in touch. And it's fabulous! He's hilarious and crass and he loves writing letters as much as I do. We could not be more different apart from our shared love of words. But after 10 years, we can still write pages and pages about nothing. And best of all, he's in love with a woman who desperately loves him back, so I can write my crazy, long, wackadoo letters to someone who actually WANTS to read them without fear of falling into that trap I've set myself time and time again. I hadn't even realized how much I missed having a person, as opposed to the internet, to write to, someone who will write me back.

Jinx!

Yesterday was awful. I got bad news about a family friend from my mother, and about three elderly relatives from my grandmother, and the final horrible thing that could happen to L, happened. Inexplicably I was already exhausted, and each successive wave of bad news made me cry and left me less able to cope with the next. By five o'clock I couldn't deal with one more human drama.

That sounds so horrible. My mom, my grandmother, and L had far worse days than I did, but I'm the one who couldn't deal with any more. It made me realize how fragile my current mental peace really is. Sure I can be calm and reasonably competent so long as I am well rested and facing only a mild, manageable form of stress. But throw me into a highly emotional situation when I'm a little tired? I become a basket case.

So I mowed my lawn. And I apologized, and said I just couldn't go out to dinner even though L needed the support. And I felt like a bad friend, but I sat on my newly mown lawn drinking iced tea and reading a mystery until I couldn't even do that any more and I went to bed at 8:45. I've been finding myself in the position of advice giver a lot lately, and I keep telling people it's OK to be selfish, necessary even. And now I know I'm right. Because this morning I'm well rested, and I feel capable of providing support if anybody I love needs it. Last night, I couldn't. Last night was awful.

Mercury Is No Longer in Retrograde. . . I hope.

I've got my fingers crossed that I didn't just jinx myself by writing that. The new battery charger/grass hog appears to be working so far. I've managed to plant a little herb garden for myself before the plants died in their pots. Which is huge because usually? I get excited and buy plants, get distracted, forget to water them, and they die before they're even in the ground. I also bought an old-fashioned rotary lawn mower, which I'm not sure will even work on my lawn/prairie what with all the weeds, but I hate relying on my neighbors so . . . worth a try. Despite my broke-ass brokeness. I've got to start looking for a real job. I started a cover letter to the law firm I worked for in Boise after my 1L year. And by started I mean I saved a file, found their address and the name of their hiring partner, and wrote a single sentence. A week ago. It's a start. But summer is so fun! I'm actually enjoying working outside, planting, watering, and grasshogging. I love drinking iced tea in my new vintage lawn chair while birds I can't identify dive bomb for bugs on my prairie/lawn. And walking down by the river is just fabulous.

Broken

So the brand new sewing machine my mother bought me randomly decides it will only sew in reverse and then just as randomly changes its mind. Oh, and it also changes stitch sizes every two inches. Which is clearly fucked. And now, the battery charger for my brand new weed eating grasshog decided to stop working after charging a single battery once. What the hell is going on in Chinese factories? I mean, I knew about the toothpaste, the tainted clams, and the lead paint, but those were just poisoned products, not non-functioning ones. This impacts ME and it sucks. Royally. I just discovered that I actually kind of LIKE this particular form of yard work and now it's barred to me until I drive 200 miles to exchange this broken machine.

I guess, if I felt like putting a positive spin on things, I'd say yay, I have an excuse to go down to Boise next week. But it's now summer, and really really pretty, and I don't WANT to spend the $40+ in gas and one of my days off to exchange a grasshog. Even if I do throw in a trip to Anthropologie and a movie theater. Damn.

Happy Days are Here Again, the Skies are Blue and Clear Again!

That last photo of snow on the june grass was just the beginning. The next morning we woke up to three inches. It was . . . disheartening. Every time I tried to exclaim over its awfulness, L would give me a disgusted look and say, with more bitterness than I have ever heard anyone but Zach express, "I don't want to talk about it." Thankfully it all melted during the course of the day, and by Saturday, summer was really and truly here. L and I went into town this morning for yoga, and by the time we got home that june grass, no longer covered in snow, was shorn. One of my truly exceptional neighbors had driven his riding mower down the hill, without warning, and cut my front lawn/prairie while we were gone. I couldn't speak. I have got to find a way to pay him. I'm thinking a check would be best.

Today has been a perfect alpine day. Sunny and in the upper 60s with a slight breeze I woke up with one goal. By the end of the day I wanted to sit on my lawn, content that I had made good use of the perfect weather, and sip a gin and tonic in the endless evening. After spending as much time as my poor arms could take raking the cut grass, after drying laundry on the line, and watering the peonies, I met my goal. Here's to small victories and days that last forever. (Of course, I've only managed to clear a small portion of what was cut. I'll still be raking when it needs to be cut again.)

June in the Mountains

Snow Advisory

Jesus. I just checked weather.com and there is a SNOW ADVISORY for tonight. Three to five inches of snow possible by daybreak. This is not right. Not right at all.

31, Now With Roommate!

Because a friend of mine was scheduled to show up at 4:30 with her clothes and her dog to stay with me for a bit while she sorts out her life, yesterday turned out to be one long cleaning binge. Now she's here, and until we make the guest room habitable with primer and paint and maybe some actual furniture (soon I'll have a guest room with a door and a bed and everything, NOW will someone visit me?!?!) she's sleeping on the couch, and her dog is snoring and of course I woke up too early and have been sitting in the living room drinking my tea, and trying to type quietly and not wake her. (Have I mentioned that my wireless router hasn't mysteriously started working as mysteriously as it stopped? I am beyond annoyed.)

So what with the cleaning, and the nerves over temporarily losing some of my privacy, my birthday was not quite as peaceful as I was anticipating. But it was lovely nonetheless. My roomie and I (let's call her L) met another friend for dinner and life change debriefing. They didn't know it was my birthday until I mentioned it late in the dinner, and they were a bit pissed. But . . . all sentimentalizing aside, my birthday really isn't an occasion I like to have become a thing. It's nice when people remember and call or write (thanks to all who did!), but I don't mind when friends don't remember. I actually think a completely normal dinner out, with no one the wiser, was a great celebration. I honestly don't LIKE being the center of attention. Anyway, birthday nonsense over with, it's time to move on to just being 31. And the first order of the day is to wake up L, meet our friend Nadine, and start out the new year with another muscle destroying yoga class. YAY!

(Oh, and because I know at least one person will be curious: The cats are reacting surprisingly to this invasion. Sugar seems fine with the dog. Wary, but not scared. Freckles on the other hand, once a bold invader herself, has been hiding upstairs since this giant gentle Akita showed up in her living room.)

Happy Birthday to Me!

There might be more than one post today, or maybe not, who knows. Maybe I'll be too busy to write about all the things I have to say. I have lots of fun things going on that I want to write about, but this post isn't going to be about them. I drove down to Boise yesterday and on the two hour trip I indulged in long internal monologues about turning 31 and doing it here, of all places, and, this is totally me exposing how ridiculous I am, but I may just have made myself cry once or twice. (I'm not depressed, just sentimental!) Is it self-centered to be sentimental about one's own birth? Indulge me.

When I was getting ready to be born, three+ decades ago today, my mom and dad were in Boise. I'm not actually sure what they were doing there. Visiting my grandparents? Shopping? But they were in a donut shop when my mother's water broke. Typical. My love of the sugar/fat combination was sealed. They took their donuts, got in the car, and with my mother in labor, started driving back up the very canyon I traveled yesterday. And it was June, and green, and the banks of the river, and the hills, were covered with syringas in bloom. Do you know about syringas? They're a leggy shrub, nothing special aside from a few weeks in late May/early June. But when they bloom they're lovely. Long boughs covered in tiny five petaled white flowers with the the strongest, sweetest scent. So it was sunny and beautiful and the syringas were in full flower and they drove the narrow winding road beside the river and up the mountain. And I imagine that the water was high and if it was warm they rolled down the windows, and mist from the river and the scent of the syringas was in the car where I was waiting to be born.

And they made it to the tiny hospital in McCall and there I was, and they named me Corina Syringa. They named me after a Bob Dylan song that my parents loved. And after the sweet smelling Idaho state flower that filled the air while my mother was in labor. Have you heard the song? How could one not grow up in the comfort that she was wanted and loved when named after a song like that? How could one not want to spend her birthday where syringas bloom? And I am loved, and I am spending my birthday where syringas line the banks of the river, and as freaked out as I am about turning 31, I'm oh so grateful to have been born to those two people, in this place.

Pretty Pretty Spring

Oh my. I . . . hurt. A lot. But lets not talk about that. Today we're having a break in the rain, so I grabbed my camera and went out to get a few spring photos. It's not an ideal photo-taking day, given the threatening clouds filling the sky, but the blog has gotten a little text heavy. Aren't those flowers on the right sweet? They're tiny, about the size of a wild strawberry. (I bring up because I saw some wild strawberry flowers too. So promising for a real summer.)

And here's a view of the river (the Gold Fork River to be precise) taken from that lovely boulder by the waterfall I found Monday. I didn't take the time for a picnic today. What with the clouds and the mist and the 49 degree temperature, it was a little cold to just hang out on a rock. I admit I put up with the cold for as long as I could while I summoned the strength to walk back to my car but . . . it wasn't very long. And this last photo below I actually took a few weeks ago on one of my too frequent drives down to Boise. I wish the photo could really capture how amazingly colorful the hills were with wildflowers. Waves and waves of purple and yellow. But the scene was beyond both my skills and my camera.

Grey

No river rambling for me today. It's cold (high of 45!), damp, and unremittingly grey. I have a hard time getting out of bed on mornings like this, but today I forced myself awake after my 9+ hours of sleep and finally made it to a yoga class. The free yoga was one of the more enticing perks of working at the spa, but this is the first time I've actually made myself go. I'm so ridiculous. I was nervous about sweating in front of people I know, and I felt guilty about using gas to get into town just to exercise. But it was fabulous! The meditation alone was worth the trip, but the stretching and taxing of muscles I haven't used since I gave up private pilates sessions (at the same time I gave up a real income) was the real treat. Although, my current practically immobile state is sort of a painful reminder of just how lazy I've let myself be. But, oh well. It's a perfect excuse to light a fire, drink pot and pots of tea, curl up with the cats, and watch every romantic British movie I have on DVD while still feeling that I accomplished something real and healthy today. (You know what I love most about yoga? It makes me feel at least two inches taller.)

Discovery

Why do I never have my camera when I could really use it? I took the long route home from the post office this morning because I wanted to see just how short my usual walk is (just under 3 miles, longer than I expected) and on the way I decided to park my car and explore on foot a mysterious dirt road that had been tantalizing me since last summer. An hour and a half later I had a blister and thought I was going to die of thirst, but I've definitely found my new favorite rambling spot. The road winds along the other side of the river and it's beautiful. But that's not what's so special. I mean, you can say the same thing about the road I usually walk along. But unlike on MY side of the river, this road is not bordered by barbed wire fences strung with ominous no trespassing signs. So I can hop off the road any time I like and perch on a rock by the water, or climb up the hills into the forest, without fear of prosecution. I'm so excited! Especially about one spacious sunny rock out of sight of the road at the head of a waterfall. I'm already imagining all the picnics I'll have there this summer.

(Private note to Mom: Can I PLEASE borrow Jackson for the summer? We'd have so much fun on this road together! And with a 130 pound fiercely protective dog at my side I might not get that little needling unease that shows up when I find myself alone in the middle of nowhere surrounded by shotgun shells and faded cans of Keystone Light. I hate that fear. It makes me mad. But I can't seem to get past it. I just have to feel it and keep walking. I've read too many damn thrillers in my life.)

Overwrought

So . . . that last post was just a touch overwrought don't you think? Sorry, I get that way sometimes when I'm writing letters, emails, blog posts . . . I just sort of get carried away with the words. Not that I don't mean them, but . . . yeah, just a little over the top. What's worse is that post was a re-worked version of an email I'd sent. I mean, can you imagine getting that out of the blue in your inbox? (If you're my friend or relative, chances are you don't have to imagine because at some point or points you've received something equally ridiculous.)

Of course I don't REALLY think I won't make new old friends. I'm just impatient. It takes forever for acquaintances to turn into old friends and I'll be in my mid-30s at least by the time anybody I know in Idaho reaches that stage. And, well, my birthday is coming up very soon, and I'm turning 31, and while I'm mostly very content with my slow transformation into the 75 year-old woman I was always meant to be, it's still a weird age to be hitting me with my life so up in the air so you'll have to excuse me if I mildly freak out a few times over the next week. And . . . none of the people I'm meeting now will ever know what I looked like without grey hair and crows feet! Although, given that I started going grey when I was 21, there are only a handful of people who will remember that me. So I'm just going to have to get over that.

Speaking of new people, I had dinner with a group of the "spa girls" last night. The "spa girls" are sort of whispered about at the resort. They're fun and loud and beautiful and they're tight and protective and take care of each other. And it was great and fun and we talked about relationships and babies and haircuts and there was no pettiness or competition or one-upsmanship. Just unconditional support and love and a lot of laughter. And it was very very different from the dinner that sent me spiraling last Saturday.

Epiphany

I was driving home tonight, and everything was incredibly beautiful. There were grey thunderheads breaking up the blue of the sky so that the fields and mountains were alternately the bright green of spring and deep green of summer in the resulting patches of sun and shadow. It was so grand and stunning and I don't know why, but that picture postcard of why I love it here made me think about what "here" lacks. And that in turn made me realize why I felt so off, and, just a little bit, lonely after last weekend's wedding. And it had nothing to do with feeling judged, or feeling inadequate, or missing anyone in particular.

So here is the epiphany, and it's a pretty basic one really: What I miss, and what I got a taste of last weekend, is simply being around people I know, who know me. I don't particularly like new people, I don't like new friends. I love being around people with whom I share a past, any kind of past, and I don't have that any more. I've given that up to be closer to my family, to live in the most beautiful place I've ever seen. I'm socializing, I'm meeting people, but I can't picture what they were like 4 or 8 or 16 years ago. They have no history. I see them as they are now. Their image is crisp and unblurred by my memories of them as they used to be. They don't know that I once inappropriately reminded someone of his ex-wife, and I don't know what any of their old crushes look like. I've never seen them nearly comatose with overwork or commiserated when they got a bad grade or review. They don't know or care that I used to be near the top of my class, that there was a brief moment in time I could actually keep up with the drinkiest of them in alcohol consumption, that I once simultaneously dated two horrifically nerdy men on law review. We don't know the same stories about the same people. We haven't choked with laughter and powdered sugar, spent hours and hours together in dark theaters or too-bright libraries, eaten hungover brunches with our sunglasses on. And chances are, we never will. Because I don't particularly like new people, which makes creating new old friends difficult.

I miss an assortment of individuals very much. Some of them read this blog. But I'm not afraid of never seeing them again. I know I will. One at a time, or in small groups. Certainly it won't be as often as I'd like, but I can get on a plane and make it happen. So what nearly broke me. What made it impossible for me to just close my eyes and go to sleep after the wedding reception was over. What made me call and text old friends in the middle of the night begging them to keep me company: this wedding was probably the last chance I'll have, for a very long time, to be with a critical mass of very familiar people. I gave that up when I moved to the middle of Idaho. And I miss that more than I miss any one of my friends.

Stupid Colds, Wireless, and Meth Addicts

The wedding was really lovely. (Wait, did I even tell you I was going to a wedding? Well, I did, last weekend, in Denver. Now you're all caught up.) The bride and groom glowed, the sun shone, and I got to hug and chat with people I really care for. But it left me a little wobbly. Not the wedding, I think I'm beyond being discombobulated by people getting married, but being around the people I used to have so much in common with. Not my dear friends, seeing them was grand, but those others. The ones on the periphery of my old life, who measure their own success in pay checks and status. Not that I feel judged by them. Perhaps they do judge, but I jumped out of their race long before I left law school, and I don't feel it. But for some reason seeing them still left me feeling off my game. A little unhinged, maybe even depressed. And I'd planned to write a long post all about how wobbly I felt, and why the very fact that they could throw me off even a little freaked me out to an insane degree, but first I had to recover from a weekend of no sleep. And then my wireless stopped working. And then I got a bruiser of a cold. So now I can just make myself sit upright in a not so comfortable chair tethered to my ethernet cable long enough to say: fuck you, meth addicts. CoAdvil used to be a right, not a privilege. I used to be able to pick it up at any old convenience store. But now, to get a little relief, I have to drive all the way into town, and even at the grocery store I have to stand in line at the customer service counter, which is never adequately staffed, behind all the people waiting to cash checks and send money by Western Union, and then show picture ID and sign my name and address in a little book like I'm trying to get into Sing Sing to see some no-good named Bobby-Ray. And who has the energy to do that while fighting a cold? You've ruined a good thing you selfish jerks.

I'm going back to the couch and a Jeeves and Wooster DVD.

Real Life Intrudes

Life has gotten a little vicariously soap-operatic lately. Not to be annoyingly cryptic, but my best stories right now aren't entirely mine so I'm having a bit of blog-block as I try to figure out how to tell them without, well, screwing a friend in case someone accidentally stumbles on this blog.

Everything in my life is completely lovely, in case anyone was worried, including the weather (the snow is TOTALLY GONE!) and I'm looking forward to spending Memorial Day weekend in Denver celebrating a wedding with friends. There's no progress on the job front, recent cryptic events have made me even more thrilled to be embracing spinsterhood (Zach and I keep describing our lovely days to each other (walks in the woods! a new recipe! entire books read while sitting in the sunshine! and ending with "and I didn't get divorced OR have an affair today!"), and the cats are driving me insane with their spring energy. Tulips are blooming, the aspens are leafing, fields are this amazing neon green following yesterday's rain . . . and I have new anecdotes to share as soon as I feel the urge to write again. The only truly unpleasant thing that's happened recently was discovering three rotting cow carcases on yesterday's walk. And you didn't really need/want to know that did you?

I'll try to get back to posting on a semi-regular basis next week. I miss it. Even when I don't know what the hell to say because it seems like nothing changes. (Which at this point is NOT a complaint. When life is this good, a lack of variety in my life is boring only to the poor people who have to hear me say "Yeah, no, nothing new! Sorry!")

Foxes, elk and hummingbirds oh my!

What a great day. This morning when I looked out my window as I waited for the kettle to boil, I saw three long-legged foxes hunting voles. This evening, as I was checking out the sunset, I noticed a small group of elk calmly snacking on the ever-greening grass.

In between? I saw my first hummingbird of the season. I put out the feeders so hopefully I'll see many more. Feeling the spring sunshine on my bare toes I was inspired. I spent the afternoon watering and weeding flower beds, picking up little pieces of trash that had been covered by the snow, sitting in a canvas chair outside reading a book as half a dozen different birdsongs filled my ears. It's finally, FINALLY spring in the mountains and it is truly glorious.

Is it just me, or does it feel like all is wrong with the world?

This global food crisis is freaking me the hell out. I just read part two of the Washington Post's excellent series on the subject, and then, sobbing, headed immediately to a website to make what feels like a paltry contribution to the UN World Food Program. Did I mention I'm sobbing at the spa? It's really slow today, so there are no customers here to watch me turn red-eyed over a man trying, in vain, to sell his family's last goat. Stories like this make me feel like my whole life, everything I do, is one big self-indulgent waste of resources. In other words, do not read the Washington Post series without your wallet handy, or you too will be reduced to feeling like the world is in the process of ending and there's nothing whatsoever you can do about it.

Snow=Scones

It's been snowing since dawn. We're three weeks into April, and there is snow predicted every day as far into the future as weather.com dares to predict. But, in my continuing effort to master the art of not giving a fuck about whatever little unpleasantries life throws my way (A destroyed tire? Eh, they're still under warranty. A TWO HOUR swearing in ceremony for the Idaho bar? I haven't had to listen to a judge or a lawyer talk at me for a year and a half, I think I can handle it. More snow covering my green grass? Whatever dude.) I decided that the continuation of winter gives me permission to ACT like it's still winter. Forget spring cleaning. Forget eating like I might have to wear something skimpier than jeans and a wool sweater . . . ever. I'm spending the day on the couch with a good book, I'm not going to stint on the firewood, and I'm putting chocolate chips in the scones for my afternoon tea. To hell with spring. I never liked spring anyway.

The snow is in retreat.

I repeat. The snow, it is in full retreat! These last two weeks have seen an amazing amount of snow melt and it is embarassingly thrilling. I mean, don't get me wrong, you could still go blind looking at the landscape on a cloudless day without sunglasses, but the cover is . . . thinner, and the edges of the snow fields are gettting farther and farther from roads and foundations and tree trunks. And, I can hardly believe this myself, and I check on it every day to make sure it's still there (in fact, I just went to the window to make sure it didn't disappear overnight), but there is GREEN GRASS growing against one corner of my house, the one that gets the most sunshine. Green grass, inches from the snow field. It's so promising! (Of course, the retreating snow is revealing all kinds of trash and detritus and general uglyness that had been beautifully covered for the last few months. Like these cars. Believe me, they looked much more . . . picturesque surrounded by green grass than they do by rotten snow and mud. But lets focus on the positive, hmmm?)

On Saturday I drove down to Boise because the weather report was promising temperatures approaching 70 degrees, and lo it was wondrous. As I wound through the canyon, following the snow-melt swollen river down from the mountains, I honestly started grinning like a fool, alone in my car, when green growing things replaced black and rotten snow on the side of the highway. I might just have let out a little squeal when I saw buttercups (!!!) flowering between the boulders. And then . . . in Boise . . . I wore FLIP FLOPS! All day long! And I wasn't cold at all! In fact, I was a little warm! And then yesterday? When I left the spa? FOURTY SEVEN DEGREES. I drove home with the windows down. I may have almost cried a little. Living here has definitely given me an appreciation for the little things, like grass, and unconfined toes.

Thanks for all your congratulations on passing the bar. I really appreciate it. It's strangely comforting to know there are people out there (even people I've never met!) thinking positive thoughts for me. Not to be all gooey or anything.

I'm really not sure how it's possible.

But somehow I passed the bar. It's not like I want to be a lawyer or anything, but . . . I really don't like failing. And as much as I was totally prepared to re-take it in July, I'm soooo glad I don't have to.

Ok, so it's still not spring but . . .

For the last week or so, every time I've passed over the bridge across the reservoir, I've seen trumpeter swans gliding through the black water between blocks of ice and snow. I mentioned them to my mom, and she asked if I remembered the spring storm when I was a child that brought an entire flock of migrating swans to rest and regroup in a neighbor's field. I do remember, but in seeing the swans over and over this week I had forgotten that they don't come every year. One more unusual, wonderful event to add to my tally for this (first?) adult winter in the mountains.

And last night, as I was driving home, a pair of long-legged foxes kept pace with my car for awhile, yellow and orange darting between dark trees, brightening an otherwise monochrome landscape.

Today it snowed from daybreak until 3 pm. Small, dry flakes, that fell quickly and didn't last long.

I'm trying to focus on what I have, what I see, and not what I'm missing.

Tea Time

I'm afraid I might finally have read too many golden age English mysteries. Zach sent me an excellent scone recipe last week, and I've taken to making them every few days and then serving myself afternoon tea when I'm at home. With home-made jam, and tea in Great Aunt Thelma's china. Three o'clock rolls around and I break out the flour and butter and by 3:45 I'm sipping tea and dropping crumbs on the sofa as I read . . . yet another golden age English mystery. I haven't yet started putting the milk and sugar on the tea tray, but I'm this close. When combined with my recent obsession with learning how to embroider properly (my first cross-stitch project is almost finished) and the fact that I live alone with two cats . . . be honest: don't I remind you of your Great Aunt Thelma? (I haven't even mentioned my new obsession with toile!) I'm pretty sure if I lived in a neighborhood with children, I'd be yelling at them to get off my lawn.

Spring Morning

The sun is shining, there are at least thirty fluffy birds chirping away in the bare branches of a tree, it's 3 degrees above 0, and 4 inches of fresh snow fell in the night. The resorts are all crowing about "mid-winter ski conditions!" April is 3 days away.

I miss . . .

inexpensive fresh flowers. It would be really nice to be able to pick up a $5 bunch of daffodils or tulips at the grocery store. A little something to counteract the black/white/gray gloom outside.

A great friend I'd made here moved to Texas at the beginning of March and is back in town for a few days to finish packing up her house. I spent a long time with her yesterday, and as unideal as her current Texas living situation is, she couldn't stop mentioning how much she didn't miss the snow. And it just fed into my current dissatisfaction with the mountains. Everyone hates this time of year here. I'm not alone. But I need to find a way to enjoy it anyway. Either that, or get a job so I can not feel guilty about spending some of my last nickels to fly someplace warm for a week.

The things we do to ourselves

Two weeks ago I started on a series of microdermabrasion treatments designed to make my skin as dewy soft and glowy as it's possible for it to look. I didn't get a chance to go last week, so today was only my second appointment. And my aesthetician is just so generally horrified by the state of my skin and eager to see results that she didn't confine herself to the sandblast machine. She decided to whip out the fucking laser and BURN OFF a layer of skin on my chin. I mean, she asked first, this wasn't a non consensual attack. After all, what kind of fool would say "no" to a free laser treatment? That shit is expensive! But . . . oh my god. The smell. Of burning flesh. And though this was a super light laser treatment on a small area of skin . . . I can still smell it. An hour later.

Not Blonde But . . .

Everyone remember the movie Legally Blonde? While the movie didn't exactly mirror my law school experience, I do remember having a little moment of character identification. The first case they talked about in her first law school class was also the first case we talked about in my first law school class.

Well, this morning I had another, very different, Legally Blonde character convergance moment when I realized the following: Holy hell, I'm working in a salon/spa and I think I might just have a crush on a cute UPS delivery guy.

Whoah. I'm not so sure my life is going in the right direction . . .

Happy First Day of Spring

It's not even 2:00 and already I've seen: cloudless sunny skies, black thunderclouds spitting rain, and currently the wind is howling and big flat snowflakes are blizzarding.

Oh Loathesome March

Monday I decided it was time to get out of the mountains again. I mean, it had been a WHOLE WEEK since I'd gone anywhere . . . antsyness, thy name is Corina. So I drove down to the Valley and did all those little things I can't do here. Like go to Anthropologie, browse used book and antique stores, see a movie in the middle of the day, find cross stitch fabric, eat Vietnamese food, and walk on snow/ice/slush-free sidewalks. The weather in Boise wasn't the spring-time idyll I was hoping for, but for March it wasn't bad. And when I got home yesterday it was RAINING. The temperature hovered in the mid 30's, and it was raining and the air was damp and cold and the wind was creaking in the eves. This is a horrid time of year. I tried going for a walk last week, and between the squelchy mud and slick ice and bitter wind, I lasted 20 minutes and then returned home with dirty hems and a headache.

And . . . I'm sounding awfully negative. I've just always hated the long tease that is the end of winter. And I have to go into the resort spa this aftenoon for more training. And work makes me cranky, because I don't wanna! I want to sit by the fire and find the perfect font for the fist cross stitch project I've done since I was 8 instead of showing people to the steam room and asking if I can get them another glass of water and "your therapist will be with you in just a minute" and "would you like to put a gratuity on the card?" But this afternoon will pay for the new jeans I bought at Anthropologie (they were on sale). And that's good.

Depressed or DST?

I've been having a hell of a time getting out of bed this last week. It makes me nervous. This lingering drag when the alarm goes off, the desire to fall back into dreams and darkness, is usually the first sign of a bout with depression. But this time I really think that it's just the switch to DST last weekend. Am I the only person who loathes DST not because it steals an hour of my life (which it does, and yes, I hate it for that reason too) but because it steals an hour of daylight from my already dark mornings? Evening sunshine is fine, I don't object to it, if given a choice I would choose more of it . . . but not in exchange for going backwards. I would not choose to undo the earlier and earlier sunrises that were telling my body, naturally, that spring is on its way. Because that is a message my body desperately needs this year. It's been such a long dark winter. There will be snow on the ground for months more. DAMN YOU FOR MAKING MY MORNINGS DARKER!

I Can't Believe It's Been This Long

How does a year go by so quickly? I'm having trouble, as I sit in my cabin reading golden age mysteries and watching snow melt, believing that just a little over a year ago I was in Cambodia. Melting in the heat. Climbing crumbling temples to watch the sun set over a country that seemed to be made in equal parts of dust, smoke, and beautifully carved rock. When Lara and I left Cambodia, we agreed that neither of us really felt the need to go back. I still don't, even with the smoothing effects of time on memory. But I'm so glad I went.

Energy

I've been feeling so energetic and cheerful ever since the bar ended. That doesn't mean I haven't spent plenty of the time sitting on my ass, but, I've been spending significantly less time in that position. This morning, for example, I'm cleaning my living room, which had more or less turned into a trash heap during those long dark pre-bar months. My mom managed to fix the "broken" vacuum cleaner by figuring out in about 5 seconds that "the hose is clogged dumbass!" [The "dumbass" was implied.] But before I can apply the vaccuum to that hideous victorian green carpet (which was not made less hideous by a month's accretion of . . . stuff that would ordinarily be removed by a vaccuum) I wanted to make the non-floor portions of my living room more pleasing to the eye. Progress is slowly being made, but, to give you an idea of just how bad it had gotten, this one room might take me all day.

Part of my new-found energy is the sudden release from the downward pressure the dreaded bar was exerting.. But another source of cheer and energy is definitely the lift I got from my trip to Oregon. The beauty of Zach's luncheon table setting, the happiness of being around my mom, the sight of ground uncovered by snow, the cheerful bumptiousness of two friendly slobbering dogs . . . all make me want to not waste this uptick in my spirits. I want to make my own life a little more lovely. I've already taken steps to make myself more comely, which always helps everything else, a new haircut, tamed brows, and this afternoon microdermabrasion and a facial. But this morning it's about my surroundings. Starting with the living room.

Back in the Cold

My trip to Oregon was lovely lovely lovely! I really wish I'd stayed an extra day. It was sunny, and beautiful, and I had a fabulous time with my mom. She taught me how to knit! (We couldn't find any cross-stitch fabric in Newport. In response to the anon commenter on my last post, I want to do both cross-stitch and embroidery, but I have a cross-stitch project in mind first.) I promptly ruined all the work I'd done on my "scarf" as soon as I got home, and after a couple of frantic calls to my mother where I tried to articulate what I was doing, and she tried to explain what I was doing wrong, I finally got the appeal of webcams. Because with visual aids we might have been able to figure it out. As it was, I finally worked it out for myself using a simple knitting guide she'd sent me home with. I'm really enjoying the knitting, but . . . I'm having a hard time imagining myself ever being good enough to make anything I'd want to keep.

Oh, and did I mention that while in Newport Zach made a three course luncheon? (It wasn't lunch. When it's three courses, served on an insane mix of colorful antique pottery and wildly patterned china with silver demitasse spoons from Mexico and complete with both jam tarts and lemon cake for dessert? It's luncheon.) Photos of the crazy quilt luncheon later.

Things I'm Preoccupied By Before Dawn Today

(1) It rained last night. It's still dark so I can't yet see what the rain has wrought. Yesterday was warm, in the upper 40's, and I came home to a largish pond in the low spot in my driveway. I think spring is going to be harder than winter. The snow is getting black and rotten, and I can already see glimpses of the sour sucking mud to come. I told my mother about the pond, and about the feel of my tires ripping up the road as I drove through it . . . and she told me to go dig a tunnel into the snow bank on the side of the driveway to give it a chance to seep away. I looked blankly at the phone and started wishing myself . . . somewhere else. I'm too lazy for this. I might just have to start parking in the cemetery and avoid the worst of the driveway until either everything freezes and I can drive on lovely solid ice (Seriously, other than bare pavement, and fresh packed snow, ice is the best possible surface for driving right now. Can you believe it?) or . . . June and nice sold dirt returns. In the meantime, I think I might actually need a pair of galoshes.

(2) I'm worried about Sugar. She has a nasty spot on one of her back legs. She was at the vet recently being treated for a UTI, and they wanted me to bring her back when she was through with her antibiotics to take a closer look. I'd thought it was just some wound, possibly inflicted by Freckles, that was taking a while to heal. They thought it was a growth. Which could be cancerous. And last night I noticed that she was limping. She's finished the antibiotics, but I won't be able to get her into the vet for another week. And, this is horrible, but my savings is really running low, and I can't afford cancer.

(3) Speaking of not being able to afford cancer. I need to be able to afford cancer. It's time for me to stop living in lalalalalaiamgoingtowinthelotteryanydaynow land and find a way to take care of myself and my kitties. The last few days? I've felt really tired of being poor. Which is RIDICULOUS and slightly embarassing because I have not exactly lived the life of a poor person this past year. I've traveled a lot, I've eaten fancy cheeses, I bought a brand new car for heaven's sake! But still . . . I wandered into Anthropologie a few times this week between sessions of the bar exam, and I coveted things. Cute spring jackets and absurd camel-shaped creamers and over-priced kicky little flats. New things. Things. And my covetousnous was visceral and made me feel ashamed. But it's not this urge for new things that is causing me to worry about my bank balance. I can make-do without new things. I have lots of pretty, cool old things. But . . . as my savings shrink, so do my options. I need money for necessities. I need money to pay for Sugar's biopsy, and if she has cancer I need to be able to pay for whatever treatments the vet recommends. I need to stop fantasizing about living this life of luxury and ease forever. I need to pull out that old excel spreadsheet and figure out just what income level will make me feel safe, and I need to find a way to earn it. In the meantime, I've agreed to work another day a week. This third work day will be at the owners' other spa, the one at the fancy new ski resort across the valley.

(4) Should I take up embroidery like I kind of feel like I want to?

(5) Sugar and Freckles might just kill each other tonight. Tomorrow I'm driving over to the Oregon coast and I'm taking both cats with me. Tonight, all three of us will be spending the night in a bedroom at my grandparents' house in Caldwell. I will be drugging them with kitty valium, but still. I'm not expecting much sleep.

Moving On

The bar is over. I won't know for sure that I failed until sometime in April. I finished about an hour early yesterday (I don't spend much time dithering in an exam - if I don't know the answer right away, staring at it won't magically make me remember the proper rule) and walked out of that convention center positively giddy. I'm free! I can do whatever I want without feeling guilty because I'm not studying! It feels like it's been ages since that has been true. Probably because it has. Of course, now I get to feel guilty about not doing more to find an income stream . . . but that's not quite as bad.

Honestly

The first question on the Idaho Essay section was about potatoes. Way to live up to the cliche state of mine. There was also a question that involved watering cattle. I've finished up the essay sections, and the verdict is: atrocious. Like really really bad. The question about potatoes? I was able to vaguely say that the contract was governed by the UCC, but apart from that? No clue. The question about cattle was all about water rights and I basically answered the whole thing with "first in time is first in right". Over and over. Que sera.

Yesterday, before the exam began I was so filled with nerves and adrenaline it was scary. I was hyped up and shaking, but luckily I had internet access during the TWO HOUR wait between the obligatory check-in and the actual beginning of the exam and so while crazy people reviewed foot-high stacks of home-made flash cards I IM'd with Red Fraggle about the Oscars and played literati with Zach. I'm really grateful for my friends.

And thanks to everyone wishing me luck. I really appreciate it. I might be asking for those positive vibes again come July.

Logging Out

I'm about to head down the mountain until this blasted bar exam is over. I'll spend tonight holed up in my grandparents' basement, watching the Oscars and "studying." Tomorrow afternoon I'll begin two and a half days of hell as I try to remember what the hell a "security" is and how it can be "perfected"; the specific intent required for arson; what makes a marriage void vs. voidable; the difference between a vested interest subject to total divestment, and a contingent remainder; and the defenses to contract formation.

The good news is that on Wednesday at 5:00 p.m. M.S.T. or thereabouts this will all be over . . . for now.

Waiting

At this point I'm just waiting for the fucking bar exam to be OVER already. I'm sick of not studying for it, and I'm sure you're all sick of me writing about how panicked/bored I am because of it, and it's just time to move on already.

If I were a little more self-aware, or felt up for a long introspective post, I could turn this into a deep examination of how for 30 years I've been waiting for something to start/end so my "real" life could begin. But I've had that epiphany before, and other than various vows to "seize the day already!" that peter out the next time I get antsy with the status quo or have a grand idea that can't be implemented immediately . . . let's just all take that as written/read.

One example of why I love my mother

We were chatting last night, and when she asked what I was doing, I was honest and told her "Well, I'm watching Law & Order. It's sort of like a refresher course in [inaccurate] criminal procedure. I should be studying, but at this point? How much can I really learn? I'm so going to fail." Her response: "[Laughter] Well, it shows a certain panache to pass one of the hardest bars in the country and then fail in Idaho."

Word. This is where I get my skill at spin. I'm lazy, but I'm lazy with panache.

Chicago (Some More)

I'm hanging out in a friend's apartment, sitting on her couch with her dog, not studying, getting nervous for this afternoon's interview. Actually being in Chicago is panicking me a little. Driving in from the airport last night, through the gritty streets, with the traffic and the cold and the urban-ness of it all . . . is this what I want? I feel lonely already. It feels different sitting alone in an apartment in the city than it does alone in a cabin in the mountains. I shouldn't feel this way. One of my best friends in the world picked me up at the airport yesterday. We ordered take-out and chatted into the night and she'll be interviewing me this afternoon and I know if I move back here we'll do this a lot. Sit together eating Thai and watching bad TV. And that sounds good. It sounds great. Walking out my front door and ending up in a coffee shop or an antique store, access to public transportation, and places and reasons to wear high heels all sound great.

But . . . I think I need to make an effort to find a job in Idaho. I need to at least try. Because I already miss the mountains.

Chicago!

I'm off to that frigid city today for an interview tomorrow. They have me going the long way, through Portland. Bright side: I guess I should look at it as an extra three hours with nothing to do but study.

I'm feeling much more positive. I deep-cleaned my kithen yesterday, and having one room in my house not be a slovenly mess cheered me up enormously. It's really odd how that works, one little patch of order and cleanliness and my faith in my ability to, you know, not self-destruct, is restored. Now if only I could get my vacuum working again . . .

Another Mini Breakdown

Last night, as I was driving home after my second straight 9.5 hour day, I slammed on my brakes to narrowly avoid running down a beautiful red fox who'd decided to dart in front of my car and I was barely able to hold back the tears. It's not like there's anything horrible happening, and the good news is I did NOT kill a fox last night, but I'm tired and a little overwhelmed. And more than the feelings of exhaustion and stress, what really made feel that panicky flutter in the depths of my chest was this fear: If two long(ish) days of work, an upcoming bar exam, one sick cat, two cats who hate each other, and the prospect of a job interview are enough to make me feel like throwing both cats into a snow bank and crawling under the comforter for a few (many) days, how the HELL am I going to go back to working 50+ hour weeks? Can I really do that and not lose my mind? In stronger moments, I think of course I can. People do it all the time. Most of my friends do it and sure, they complain, but they're still mentally intact. They enjoy their lives if not their jobs. But last night I wasn't so sure I could. Or more accurately, if I can do it without chemical support. Not that there's anything wrong with that of course. It's been so nice to be happy without them, but I'm not clever enough to come up with an alternative that doesn't involve defaulting on my student loans.

Uh oh

The bar exam will be OVER two weeks from today. Um. Can you guess how the studying is going given the content of my last post?

Is there a rehab for literati addicts?

Zach and I spent 7 hours playing literati today. We weren't even having fun after the first couple of games. To the contrary, the words "hell" "nightmare" and "disaster" were used repeatedly to describe the experience. But we just couldn't stop. We'd break away for lunch and then mysteriously find ourselves drawn back to Social Lounge 23. We kept telling each other that we really needed to get on with our lives. I put on boots and brought in wood . . . and then went back to Social Lounge 23. It was always "just one more game." We were out of control. During this horrid descent into torpor I drank about 10 cups of tea. By hour 6 I felt like a jittery slug, but we still played two more "one more" games. I can't even imagine how long we would have gone on if Zach hadn't finally had to go to work.

I need to find something new to talk about

But for the first time, I'm beginning to think spring might actually happen. It's 34 degrees outside. That is two whole degrees ABOVE freezing! I can't remember the last time it was this warm. It's practically balmy. I'm even lounging around the house in regular pants (rather than two layers of pants) and NO SOCKS (rather than two pairs of socks). It feels strange. I can actually see the snow bank in front of my living room windows shrinking a bit. I'll really know spring is on the way when the snow is below the window sill again.

Not So Fast

My interview has been postponed. Both my interviewer and I were going to be flying into Chicago today and there's some sort of winter storm warning there too? Maybe? I don't know. I'm too obsessed with my own weather to bother looking up anyone else's. It's still too dark outside to see if we got the 6-10 inches they were predicting for last night. Anyway, the interviewer thought there was a good chance that one or both of us wouldn't actually make it, so we're going to re-schedule for next week. Or the week after. I hope.

I suppose with this unexpected free time I should be studying for the bar, huh?

By the way, snow shoes are just as fun as I'd anticipated. And I haven't fallen down once yet. Maybe this afternoon I'll go farther than the woodshed on them.

Also by the way: Go Obama!

Big City Adventures

So, after the rude awakening with the mouse, the rest of the weekend was really lovely. I drove (slowly, it was icy) down to Boise and then flew to Seattle for a very short visit with my mom. We stayed at a hotel downtown and I got to satisfy my only four goals for Seattle: (1) I bought snowshoes (I'm sure there will be an update soon on how that turned out) at the flagship REI store; (2) I ate sushi . . . twice in two days (omg do I miss sushi); (3) I bought far too many 1930s mystery novels at Seattle's awesome bookshops and antique stores; and, most importantly, (4) I ate crumpets and drank mugs of strong tea at The Crumpet Shop . . . also twice. Because really, does Seattle mean anything other than books, crumpets, fancy sporting goods, and sushi? I mean sure, there is, allegedly, an amazing art museum, and some people rave about all the excellent coffee, and there are those glorious flower and fruit selllers in Pike Place, and there's something about a needle reaching toward space, but give me a soft and crunchy ricotta and nutella crumpet, a vat of strong tea, and a novel with an opening paragraph like this:

I had dark forebodings. I had evil premonitions. Naturally, Adam Oakman being the high type of man he was, and his visitors being his relatives, mannerly and well educated, I didn't predict anything so uncouth as murders and dead boties disappearing like the morning dew all over the place. But I had forebodings, just the same.

And that adds up to an excellent weekend in Seattle to me.

But now that I'm home, I have to try on my suits and hope that one still fits, re-pack my bag, and head back to the airport tomorrow for an even shorter trip to Chicago for my job interview. There's another winter storm warning tonight, so even though I've been home less than 24 hours, I might head down to the valley this afternoon just in case. Wish me luck. I think I'd really like to get this job. I think. Maybe.

Eeek!

Around 5:30 on Saturday morning, Freckles began an odd little routine. She ran upstairs, jumped up on my bed, batted her paws at my legs, jumped back off the bed, ran downstairs. She did this four or five times before I decided to give up on sleep. I turned the light on during an on-the-bed stage of the procedure and found that she wasn't batting at my legs, she was batting at a DEAD MOUSE. A DEAD MOUSE. ON MY BED. Sadly for Freckles, she didn't get the praise that I'm sure she was expecting this feat to bring. I shreaked, she took her prize back downstairs, I followed her (having carefully checked my slippers before putting them on), stole her precioussssss, and chucked what was once a really adorable little creature (the mouse, not Freckles, although on second thought Freckles didn't seem quite as adorable at 5:45 on Saturday morning as she had when I went to bed on Friday night) unceremoniously into the garbage bin on the porch. I'm not sure which bit of knowledge is more discomfiting, that there was a DEAD MOUSE on my bed, or that, before it was dead, there was a mouse LIVING somewhere in my cabin. I'm not so hardened by my 7 months in the mountains that I don't find both thoughts upsetting.

Home Again

I did spend the night in town yesterday. I didn't get out of work until dark, and it just seemed like tempting fate to try the reverse of my morning adventure at night. But I unexpectedly had the morning off today so I ventured home to find what the storm had wrought . . . three feet of snow that had drifted into my carport and neck-deep drifts between my house and the woodshed. An hour and a half of digging took care of the first issue, but those drifts between me and the woodshed . . . they look damn near insurmountable. Seriously. Some effort and a lot of stumbling could get me through them, but how the hell could I carry wood enough to raise the temperature of the house even a degree? I just don't see how it's possible. And there's no point in digging a path, because the wind is still blowing, and that's just where the snow settles. The only thing I've been able to come up with is a sled to carry the wood, and snowshoes to carry me. Doesn't that sound like fun? I actually think that sounds like fun! I have a real, practical need for snowshoes! They're not toys, they're equipment. Maybe you think I'm a nutjob, but extreme weather leaves me so happy (as long as no one gets hurt and I don't have to drive in it obvs).

I'm heading to Seattle tomorrow, the home of REI, and I think I might come home with snowshoes. But before that, I have to make my way back into McCall (and then home again). Wish me luck!

Update

For the two people who read this blog: I made it to work. It was harrowing, to say the least. Have you ever driven in a whiteout? I had only the vaguest notion of where the small snow drifts that made up the road ended and the bigger snow drifts that made up the rest of the world began. I don't recommend it. And an hour later, they've closed the highway I drove in on. Really glad I have that overnight bag now.

Stupid Snow

The Valley County schools are closed. They don't close schools here for a little snow, they're only closed if the roads are REALLY bad. I guess 6 inches of snow overnight and 40 mph wind gusts qualifies. And I have to go to work today. Stupid work. I like work, really I do, but I like it a lot more when the roads aren't death traps. I'm actually considering bringing a change of clothes with me today so that I can get a hotel room and not drive home tonight if the roads make me too nervous (the forecast calls for another 5-8 inches today, and 2-4 inches tonight.) That's insane right? I mean, a hotel room costs more than I make in two days of work. But . . . I have to make it in (the owners are out of town) and . . . tonight Lost comes back, and if I had a hotel room I could watch it . . . Hmmm. That is sounding like a better and better idea. Assuming, of course, I make it into McCall at all this morning and don't get stuck in a snow drift. Fingers crossed for me y'all.

Not Much to Say

I've been in hibernation mode this last week. My mom sent me a full Tivo and it's now almost empty as I've been bingeing. (Let's not talk about BarBri, shall we?)

The cats are driving me insane. Right now they're having a stareoff: Sugar is sitting in a cardboard box full of wood scraps, and Freckles has wrapped herself in the living room rug, and it's the quietest they've been since I woke up. They've been chasing each other and growling, which wouldn't be such a big deal if their well-established chasing route didn't run right over my body, wherever my body happens to be relaxing at that moment.

I'm tentatively scheduled to go to Chicago next week for a job interview. Part of me is really excited and can't stop obsessively looking at apartments on Craigslist. Part of me is very disappointed in myself and feels that at 30 years-old, I should really just settle in somewhere and not keep moving every 1-3 years. That's what this move to Idaho was supposed to be. But I'm already getting antsy.

Small Town Late Night

I went out on Friday night, and it was awesome. I was out until 3 in the morning, which I haven't done in ages, and it was fascinating and, even though it's possible no one else noticed, I had fun. It was the birthday of one of the massage therapists I work with, and the evening started with dinner at a pub at a nearby resort. Which, whatever, it was fine, but then the birthday girl wanted to spend the evening at Vigilantes, which is a bar/restaurant (one of two) in Donnelly, ID, pop. 198. The bar features a video game called Extreme Hunting (I think I've mentioned that before, but really, doesn't it deserve to be mentioned twice?) and on Friday night there was a D.J. in the corner playing techno music. In a bar with cowboy boots nailed to the wall. And most of the people were in sweaters and jeans, but there was one girl, as there always is, spilling out of a halter-top. In January. It was unfortunate on many levels.

The place was fairly crowded and most of the people seemed to know each other (hardly surprising in a town this small) and it was fun. I couldn't really drink because, well, there really aren't cabs (god I miss cabs), and because I couldn't drink, I couldn't really pull myself out of my shell enough to mingle or dance or well ... do anything but sit at a table and talk to whomoever decided to sit next to me. And because I actually know a fair number of people now, and met some more people that night, it wasn't lame, it was interesting. (Well, I'm sure it looked lame, but I was having a good time so fuck it.)

At midnight, I decided that I'd had enough fun, and got ready to take my friend L home. But as we were waiting for the car to warm up, I surprised myself. I suggested we go into McCall and see what was happening at a new bar that had opened that night. A bar that some of the birthday party attendees had defected to earlier in the evening. L called ahead to make sure there were still people out, and we learned that everyone had given up on the new place (too many kinks to be worked out) and had ended up at the Yacht Club. Yes folks, there is a Yacht Club in McCall, ID. It sits on the lake, and I'm sure in the summer the view is beautiful, but in the middle of January the windows look out on snow and ice and it's just another smoky bar with pool tables and loud music and plastic cups.

And we sat in the crowded and smoky McCall Yacht Club until it closed, talking and laughing and making fun of girls in halter tops, and people danced and played pool, and I saw two scary looking girls get in a fight. The lights came on and the bouncers threw them out and I was entranced by the spectacle. And the crowd was a mixture of twenty-somethings and fifty-somethings and everyone (except the fighting girls) seemed to be happy. Including me. Because I was sober and watching people I think might actually become my friends have a good time. And that always sort of surprises me, you know? I put on a damn good front, but under the poise and apparant confidence, I'm shy and insecure and people really have to work to convince me they're not just tolerating my presence. Which I'm sure gets really boring for them. But somehow, eventually, I always manage to find people willing to make the effort. And that's really nice. Anyway, at last call, I was part of a group wading out into the snow and cold, and I think I laughed out loud at . . . something. And finally, at 2 am I drove L home, and by 3 I was tucked in my own bed.

I spent Saturday on the couch watching episodes of The West Wing (I'm obssessed) and that's how I spent Sunday too, and I haven't studied for the bar in over a week, but I'm not panicked. I'm feeling good. It's 4 degrees outside, and the sun is out. There's fresh snow on the ground and Freckles is hungrily watching beautiful fluffy birds at the feeder outside my window. Life is good. My chest isn't tight, not right now anyway.