When we bought this house, I knew we’d be doing some remodeling. It’s not a surprise to me. And I am often reminded of this fact. I signed on for this; I knew what I was getting into; I was completely on board. Except as it turns out, I had no idea what I was getting into. And if someone had told me that I would be living in a construction zone for several years, with plywood floors, and huge holes in the walls through which the freezing air merrily blows through, and plastic sheeting draped everywhere, and no furniture, and all my stuff packed away in boxes, and construction work to look forward to every day for the foreseeable future, I may not have been so eager to sign.

When we were considering buying the house, P. brought up the idea of remodeling. He didn’t like the brick floor. I actually liked the brick. My grandparents’ house has a lot of brick and it reminded me a bit of that. (I have a soft spot in my heart for their house since it’s really the only constant in my life. It’s the first home I remember living in, and the one place from my childhood I can still go back to.) But OK, I was good with the idea of replacing the floor. And he wanted to paint the walls, and I was cool with that too. I used to be a paint manager at a hardware store, after all. I know how to paint. It’s slow but doable. And perhaps we should revamp the bathrooms. That also seemed reasonable, especially since in the version in my head, we wrote a check to a plumber and like magic, the bathrooms would be snazzy, modern marvels.

But then we moved in and actually started the remodeling. And somehow, the scope got a little bigger. It wasn’t enough to just paint the walls. Now we had to sand them all smooth first. And that turned into replacing almost all the drywall because the old drywall job wasn’t good enough and some of the seams showed through. I had this crazy notion that we’d be doing one room at a time, but apparently I know nothing about the right way to remodel, because before long, nearly the entire downstairs was gutted.

And replacing that brick turned out a little more complicated than I expected too. We couldn’t just replace it. We had to replace it with heavy stone. And P. decided, after much Internet reading, that we had to reinforce the foundation with lots of concrete and beams. I suggested that we have a professional come out and give us, oh I don’t know, a professional opinion. But who needs professional opinions when you have the Internet! So, we got to concrete pouring. Which meant we had to cut big holes in the floor. Obviously. What house is complete without big holes in the floor?

One of the many troubles of not doing one room at a time is that the rooms you’re working on remain in a state of mid-construction for a really long time. P. and I have this TV problem that I naively thought would be solved with this house. He likes the TV; me, not so much. When I have free time, I like to spend it somewhere quiet, reading a book or writing. This house was perfect for that. The big bonus room upstairs could have the TV and the living room downstairs with the cozy fireplace and nice view could have the quiet. Only the living room was the first room we started working on. And this multiple room approach to remodeling means that it’s been draped in plastic and full of construction supplies for a year and a half. With no end in sight.

And the scope just keeps expanding. A while back, P. decided that since we were tearing up all the walls anyway, we should put in structured wiring. This would give us coax and ethernet connections in every room. I wasn’t won over by the idea. We have wireless Internet. We don’t need a TV in every room. I don’t want a TV in every room. But I was overruled. Clearly, structured wiring was required. What was I thinking even questioning this? So now, even the rooms we haven’t started on have several huge holes in them.

Apparently, the kitchen is next, so it’s currently draped in plastic. And it joins the living room, hall, laundry room, bathroom, pantry, and dining room we’ve already destroyed.

Yesterday, it finally hit me. Yes, a year and a half is a long time for things to sink in, but hey, I can be slow sometimes. We were in the car and P. mentioned his plans with home automation. I quite logically asked him what the hell he was talking about. He explained about how your light switches can have Internet and you can talk to them from work. Because sometimes, when I’m at work, I just really miss my light switches. And I think to myself, if only I could talk to them right now, my day would go so much better! Then, he told me about how when we’re on vacation, we can program the lights to come on as though we were home. I mentioned those timers you can buy for five dollars. He looked at me like I had told him we could replace our bathrooms with an outhouse.

But the home automation plan was the moment I finally got it. What I want is for the house to be done. What he wants is to work on the house. It’s like how some people put together model airplanes as a hobby. He thinks of new projects for the house. I fully expect that soon, we will be living in a tent in the backyard, with a camp stove and sleeping bags, as the remodeling completely overtakes us. And the tent will have a TV, with a cord running from the outlet on the deck, likely with home automation so we can turn the TV on and off while at work. And P. will explain to me how what we really need to do next is put in recessed panels in every room for the plasma screens. And perhaps, once that’s done, we can consider turning the electrity back on. Heat and light being of course secondary to things like communicating with your appliances.

1. My current car is purple. Who the hell wants a purple car? I blame a complete lack of discernment when I bought it. How long do I have to pay for a momentary lapse in judgement? Surely three years is time enough.
2. The side mirrors don’t have defrosters. Which is clearly a safety hazard. This has been bothering me since the first week I bought the car and after researching online found that previous model years did have defrosters but for some inexplicable reason, my model year did not. Although apparently, all the wiring is still there, so some people replaced their side mirrors with ones found on totaled older models at junkyards, but that seemed really complicated so I have been driving with partial visibility this entire time.
3. The button for the heated seat is hidden way down between the seat and the door so that it’s impossible to see and since it’s a toggle, I’m always peering down there when I’m driving to see what side needs to be switched and again, that has got to be dangerous both to myself and to those on the road around me.
4. It gets terrible gas mileage. And it’s bad enough that it’s bad for the environment and my wallet, but it also means that I’m forever stopping at gas stations and it’s really cold out right now, so standing outside pumping gas sucks.
5. I think I’ve only ever had one car longer than three years and why should I keep a car I hate longer than many cars I’ve liked?
6. Did I mention my car’s purple?
7. I shouldn’t have gotten an automatic.
8. Life is too short to spend so much time driving around in an annoying car.
9. I’ve driven a lot of crappy cars in my life. First there was the green Chevy Nova. Then, the a Plymouth Duster. And a Ford Falcon. And some old Honda that I was driving some friends around in when the clutch went right out on me and wasn’t that great since I was only able to go about three miles an hour and that’s just not how to impress your friends when you’re in high school. And there was that Mazda with the cracked engine block that I tricked the dealer into taking back while the tow truck driver hid around the corner. The one that I had in the shop one time and afterwards the engine made a terrible noise so I took it somewhere else and the mechanic there found that the previous one had not only left a wrench in the engine (hence the noise) but had also left screws off an exhaust manifold or something so that if I had run the air conditioner I could have been poisoned by carbon monoxide. And then the CRX that I really liked but that kept breaking down on me like the time the timing chain broke when I was in the mountains above Paso Robles and that other time I was in the middle of nowhere and a spark plug came loose. Do you know what an engine sounds like when a spark plug comes unattached? It isn’t a pleasant sound, I tell you that. And I thought surely I would be killed but then the guy who stopped not only had a little boy with him but he also offered me a drink of his coke, which somehow made me feel like he wouldn’t murder me and leave my body in a ditch and it turned out that he had a tool in his truck that was designed for attaching spark plugs to engines and so that was lucky. And then I finally got a brand new car as soon as I had any money at all, although of course it was the very cheapest new car you could buy with barely a radio and certainly without power windows. And several subsequent car choices were influenced by the person I was dating and/or married to (I know; this was entirely my fault, but I have grown since then). And so you see that I have paid my dues with cars and can I please have one I like now?

I’ve discovered that playing sports is a little like eating vegetables. When I was a kid, it was awful. But as an adult, I’ve learned to like it. A little. I don’t know that I’ll ever really love sports or cauliflower, but I can appreciate them a bit better than I used to.

A big part is control. As a kid, you don’t have it. You eat the vegetables the way they are prepared and put onto your plate. You play the sports you get enrolled in. Not to your liking? Life’s rough. But as an adult, you can avoid certain vegetables altogether. You can make them yourself and discover the joys of fresh spinach that doesn’t come from a can. You don’t have to play a team sport, in which many other players are penalized for your complete lack of athletic skill.

But the real breakthrough for me was realizing that I don’t have to be good at sports. I have a bit of a perfection problem. I have this need to be the absolute best at everything I do. And as a kid playing sports, that was never going to happen. And kids always have to play team sports, so I felt the added pressure of fucking up everyone’s game and not just my own. In elementary school, my stepdad was helping me pratice softball for some school team I was on. He was pitching me balls and I was attempting (and failing) to bat. He finally told me, “you’re just not athletically inclined.” A mean thing to say to a small child who couldn’t do anything with the information other than get even more depressed at the forced participation in a sport that clearly, she would not improve at? Probably, but he had a tendency to say whatever was on his mind. (Hence my complete avoidance of salt, beginning in junior high and not ending until a few years ago, after he told me that my thighs were fat, likely because the salt was causing me to retain water. Possibly that’s why I’m so into salts now - to spite him.)

Anyway, when I was growing up, organized sports were stressful. I couldn’t opt-out; I sucked; I felt all this pressure to do well, because I felt pressure to do well at everything; I knew I would never do well (the “not athletically inclined” comment rang in my ears for years after); I was letting down my entire team by sucking.

I had to player soccer, basketball, the aforementioned softball. In junior high school, I warmed up to sports a little when I started running track. Non-team sports were infinitely better. No one was relying on you; you weren’t relying on anyone else. I was never much of a team player. Of course, I preferred math competition to any sport, and I was able to move away from anything athletic.

In high school, I returned to sports, but as a spectator, due mostly to boys. I wasn’t interested in watching, but my boyfriend was a wrestler. And wrestling was big at my school. I ended up as the sports editor of the school newspaper. I loved it because although I wasn’t into the actual sports, I got to do a bunch of researching and learning new things. Sure, they were sport-related things, but I never pass up a researching and learning opportunity.

My last year in high school, I dated an actor, so I got a reprieve from sports watching, but it was soon revived for later boyfriends. Years of watching mind-numbing basketball and hockey and football followed. Again, I made the most of it by learning all about full-court presses and icing and running backs. (These were the years during which I molded myself based on the interests of the person I was with, and thank God those days are mostly gone.)

P. doesn’t watch sports, so I don’t have to worry about running into that these days. But as I was snowboarding last night, going down the mountain by myself, at my own pace, I realized that I’ve made my peace with sports participation. I still don’t go for team sports, but I enjoy more individual sports on my own terms.

Since I absolutely know that I will never be good at sports, it’s the one time that I don’t put any pressure on myself to be the best. Maybe that’s giving up and probably it means that I’ll never be as good as I could be. But you know? I don’t care. I’m a crappy snowboarder and I’ll always be a crappy snowboarder, but I’d rather go at my own speed and enjoy myself than push myself harder and have a terrible time. For some people, the enjoyment in a sport like that is pushing to the limit, but I’m not one of those people. So, I board along and P. tries to explain how I should go faster or try this other thing, and maybe I should try harder to get better, but I’d rather go slow and enjoy the scenery.

It was the same when I used to play golf. I’m truly a terrible golfer. But it’s fun to drive the cart and enjoy being outside and who cares if my balls ends up in the water every so often?

There’s no other area of my life in which I feel this way. I’m generally not at all satisfied with mediocrity. But it’s fun to relax and not put so much pressure on myself. Should I take the lesson with me to the other areas of my life? Maybe. But while I can have fun being bad at things I can never be good at, I can’t see myself enjoying being mediocre at things I could be great at. So, outside of sports, I’ll likely keep striving to be great.

I mostly fail at being great at sports, but I don’t worry about it so much, so can still enjoy them. And I probably mostly fail at being great at other things, but I know I’m trying, so I enjoy all those other things too. Contradictory? Possibly. But it seems to work OK for me.

We stopped at a BBQ place on our way to the airport today, to get one last taste of Texas flavor. One thing I really appreciate about Texas is the iced tea. Texas is south enough that you can get it anywhere, but not so far south that it’s all sweetened. Many restaurants compromise and offer both types. I remember the sadness when I moved to Wisconsin and realized that my never-ending iced tea days were over. Many places don’t serve it all, and those that do offer it “seasonally”. I guess they figure that no one needs a cold drink when it’s 25 below zero before wind chill (unless that cold drink is beer). I went through a McDonald’s drive-through once, sorely in need of some iced tea, only to be told that was only available in summer. Such trauma I had to suffer.

Anyway, As we were walking back to the car after feasting on a variety of meats (accented by the many animal heads on the walls and the cow hide decorating our table), I realized we were in the quintessential Texas shopping center — truly the heart of texas.

Once you’re done fishing, you can stock up on ammunition and shoot an animal. When the vet can’t save it, just pop over and get it stuffed, then donate it to the wildlife exhibit. Truly, the circle of life.

Every city has has something about it that makes it special, some certain place you want to visit again and again. If you look hard enough, you can always find it. Maybe it’s a bluff with a perfect view for the sunrise, or an abandoned barn, alone in a golden field. A coffee shop where baristas design a perfect heart on the top of every latte.

Houston, like every town, has this special place, a place of desire and nostalgia and pleasure. I’m talking, of course, about Sonic Drive-In. Sonic has something that no other place has. Vanilla cherry limeades. Of course, Houston doesn’t have an exclusive claim on Sonic, but Seattle is Sonic-free, so I have to find my vanilla cherry limeades when I can.

When you order them in Houston, they correct you: a cherry limeade with vanilla? Um, sure. It’s like when you go to Starbucks and for a non-fat latte and they ask if you mean skim. They can call it what they want, just give me the vanilla-y, lime-y, cherry goodness.

When I was in high school, Sonic was the turn around point on the cruise route. It had the cool side and the not-cool side, and if you wanted to stop and hang out or get something to eat, but the cool side was full, you kept crusing until a spot opened up.

Of course, we weren’t always drinking vanilla cherry limeades. Sometimes we had big gulps full of 7-Up, spiked with Seagram’s 7. Or big gulp cups full of ice, with beer cans hidden inside (with handy straw access). The big gulp often came in handy during cruising.

But back to the vanilla cherry limeades. I realize they’re just Sprite with lots of sugary syrup and artificial sweeteners. But Sonic does thoughtfully add a lime slice to the top to perpetuate the illusion of fruity goodness. And Sonic has the added attraction of offering tator tots with chili and cheese. Potatoes and illusionary fruit. It really doesn’t get much better than that.

I suppose I’m inquisitive by nature. Even as a kid, I was always reading non-fiction or researching something. I loved the library. I could sit there at the card catalog or walk the stacks and learn about absolutely anything I wanted. And there was always something I wanted to learn. I suppose that’s why I always thought I’d be a journalist. Research and writing combined? Total dream job. It’s also probably why I love the internet so much now.

Completely unrelated (mostly), I also have this problem that I want to be the absolute best at anything I do.

So, of course, as you might imagine, when I started having sex, I immediately started researching how to be better at it. Despite lots of experimentation in high school, I didn’t actually lose my virginity in the technical sense until my freshman year of college (Good Friday, right after church). It didn’t take long before I started wondering how to be the absolute best at it and where were the orgasms, anyway?

So, off to the university library I went. I spent hours with the microfilm and microfiche, reading up on the scientific details about why guys have the advantage when it comes to orgasms. I used up all my dimes, printing out the pages. (Kids these days have it so easy. They’ve never had to cross-reference and pull out drawers and load up the old dusty machines. All they have to do is type a few words.)

I also hit the bookstore. I was looking for some real how-to advice. I found this book — I probably still even have it somewhere — all about how to be great in bed.

It was about that time that I started a summer internship with a repertory theatre company. I worked in set construction and we worked just about every hour of every day until our bones hurt and we fantasized about getting into some terrible set construction accident so we could go to the hospital and rest for just a little while. The “repertory” part involved two theatres, about a half hour apart. Once we got all the sets built and the shows were in production, we spent every night tearing down a set at one theatre, loading it up on a trailer, and driving it over to the other theatre. We rotated six shows between them, and the sets involved lots and lots of heavy steel and plywood. No one had warned me about the steel and plywood.

My only downtime came during the drive between theatres. So, that’s when I read. Hey, I had to read sometime. I became known among the interns for my reading choices. And my ability to make gaffer’s tape work like a weld, but we didn’t mention that part to the actors. Of course, all you can really get from reading is theory. Theory needs practical application to really work. So, I set out to practice.

I think I read up on sex advice all throughout the next year. I was never really sure how well I was doing at it. How can you know, really? Eventually, I put aside the research and concentrated on practicing, although even now, I still hit the internet every so often to see if there’s anything new I should know. (And there’s always something new, although possibly I shouldn’t know all of it.)

You can never do too much research, really. And probably the same is true for practicing.

As is evident from the title, I’ve been listening to a lot of Billy Joel lately. Which always brings me back to high school, driving down to Northridge, singing all the way over the grapevine.

High school sucks for everyone, obviously. You live at home with your parents, who are crazy (or maybe that was just my parents), and you don’t have any money and your car breaks down all the time and you’re socially awkward and you have to work and study and worry about college and your future and your friends always have drama and you always have drama, so it’s like a never-ending drama loop. And then you like a boy and then he doesn’t like you and then you make out with someone else at a party anyway, but once you sober up, you don’t really like him, and then you try smoking and it’s just too hot outside to keep it up.

But high school is also wonderful. Your whole life is ahead of you so you can still do anything you want — life full of promise and all that. And you’re not bogged down with the baggage of a million years and you don’t really have all that much responsibility since your job is frying chicken, and you don’t even have a mortgage payment and you’re experiencing everything for the first time and you can hang out and party every night and still keep your 4.0 grade point average.

If not for all the teenage angst, life would be pretty sweet.

Life now, of course, is mostly much better than high school, although the angst never goes away entirely. But at least I know a lot more. I now know that I’ll never have all the answers and I’ll never be perfect or even mostly perfect, or, let’s face it, anywhere in the general perfection ballpark.

And when you’re young, you think you’ll live forever. But the older you get, the more the sense of your own mortality is always lingering there in the background, taunting you, mocking your wasted youth and the quickly passing days (or again, maybe that’s just me). We only get this one life.

But mortality issues not withstanding, getting older isn’t all that bad. I’m a lot more honest with myself, mostly. And I’ve mostly gotten rid of all that insecurity. I mostly know what I’m doing. Adulthood is just full of mostlys, I guess. And more grays than black and whilte.

Some days I choose reality and madness. And sometimes madness does me just fine.

I hate It’s a Wonderful Life.

It’s not the bell ringing and the angel wings. I sort of expect things like that in Christmas movies. And you can’t help but like Clarence a little anyway. Who would begrudge him wings?

And it’s not even that the movie makes no sense. Although it doesn’t, since George wants to kill himself, so telling him what would happen if he hadn’t been born doesn’t really tell him anything about what might happen if he dies now (sure, he whines about wishing he’d never been born and all that, but it’s not like that’s a Christmas wish Clarence was going to magically grant or something). What George really needs is the spirit of Christmas future, but I guess he was busy in that other movie.

It’s really the whole beginning of the movie, before the missing money and the drunken uncle and the jumping off bridges that bothers me. And by bothers me, I mean it makes me irrationally angry to the point where I want to throw things at the screen. Is this really the message of the season, that we should give up all hopes and dreams and do only what everyone else wants? That we’re obligated to pick up the pieces when other people fuck up? And now that I think of it, maybe it’s not just the beginning. All that stuff about how everyone’s lives were better because of George? Way to absolve every single person in Bedford Falls of responsibility for their own lives and put all that weight on George. No wonder he wanted to kill himself. It’s one thing to make a difference in the lives of others, but is it really his fault is Mary becomes an old maid without him? Was George the only man in the entire town?

The idea of the ending is nice — you sometimes end up where you don’t expect, but don’t overlook the joy in the new destination. (Or something.) But I just can’t get over how he never really even tried doing what he wanted. Or, maybe he did do what he wanted, but it was the expense of something else he wanted and so he was a big mopey baby about it.

I realize I’m projecting onto George. I spent way too much time feeling responsible for everyone else and now I’m trying to figure out the delicate balancing act of being the right amount of selfish. It’s exhausting enough just to carry around the weight of your own life, after all. But when I think of It’s a Wonderful Life, I want to yell at young George to go see the world, already. Hire someone else to run the bank and get on the damn train. And I want to tell the rest of the town to get off their lazy asses and save themselves. Stop being such an albatross around George’s neck.

I’m tired right now just thinking about it. And apparently, I’ve somehow managed to take on the burden of the lives of fictional characters in a fictional movie that was filmed before the invention of technicolor. Maybe the first person I should yell at is myself.

(The continuing saga of publishing old drafts… I started this in March 2005.)

I love cookbooks. I love food and I love books, so I suppose it’s not surprising. Two of my earliest happy memories are of figuring out how to read and of standing on a chair near the stove, watching my grandmother cook. When I looked at one of my favorite books, Richard Scarry’s What Do People Do All Day, I always said I wanted to be the chef, who was wearing a really tall white hat. It was probably so easy for me to choose because the book didn’t have a writer, with a big quill pen. That would have made the choice harder. One of the amazon reviews for the book talks about the overt sexist roles, and how only three jobs are available for women (homemaker, nurse, and secretary). But when I was little, I didn’t in any way get the message that I couldn’t do the jobs in the book that were being done by men. The chef was a man, but I didn’t think only men could do it.

I’m sure I have more than a hundred cookbooks: shiny new ones with healthy recipes, old tattered ones from days when all recipes called for lard. I just ordered two new cookbooks from amazon, and I like them, but I have one complaint. They’re hardcover and just so big. I realize this is a good thing in the kitchen. They’re sturdy. But the size makes them difficult to read. And I like to read my cookbooks.

If I’m judging my cookboks purely on reading enjoyment, the old ones definitely win out. Take, for instance, The American Woman’s Cook Book. How can you go wrong with a title like that? This book, edited by Ruth Berolzheimer, was originally published in 1938. My hardcover was printed in 1942. I see that amazon.com lists an out-of-print paperbacka version printed in 1974. I don’t know how much it changed between 1942 and 1974, but one would hope a lot, judging from the reader’s comments. “This book is my cooking bible.”

The first great thing about this cookbook is how it is organized. It has separate sections for: cookies/candies, cakes, ice cream, pies, and of course, the completely different, desserts. Cheese also has its own section. I am all for devotion to cheese, so you won’t get any arguments from me about that.

There is a chart of “alkaline and acid-forming foods”, although it doesn’t go on to say what the importance of knowing this might be. Beware though, that “cheese, cream” is alkaline and “cheese, all but cream” is acid-forming. The cookbook goes on to explain how to buy food. “It is desirable to include fruit twice a day.” “Women and little children will eat about two average potatoes and 1/4 lb. other vegetables daily. Adolescents and men at hard work can eat two to three times that amount.”

And then, we learn about food values. “The modern woman will learn to distinguish between vitamins and calories.” Indeed.

Alton Brown, my TV boyfriend, writes great cookbooks for reading. He probably would have a little to say about the whole vitamin vs. calorie debate.

Mostly, I just like to have the cookbooks around — just in case I want to read them. Or cook with them. 90% of the time, I use the internet when I’m searching for recipes, so you might think I don’t need all these cookbooks around. But you would be very wrong. As great as the internet is, it can never fill the need I have for books. They’re as different as vitamins and calories.

(I have made it a Christmas vow to publish all of the old bits and pieces of drafts that I have hanging around. Some of them are a couple of years old, so who the hell knows what I may have even meant by them. This one is from August, so I can even sort of remember writing it. And I still like the quote.)

I was at BlogHer last month [edit from the present: back in July now] and Arianna Huffington said something that rang true for me, and I’ve been thinking about it ever since: “we owe it to ourselves to change our minds.” She mentioned how difficult it was for her to change her political affiliation — that people who were her friends asked her why she was betraying them and everything they believed in. Change it hard, not only for us, but for those around us. Actually, when I think of Arianna Huffington, I still think of her as the wife of the rich Republican candidate. I lived in California when those ads were on TV every time you looked. That was years ago, but it’s still the first thing I think of when I hear her name, so I can imagine it was a difficult shift for her.

I think sometimes we forget that we can change our minds — entirely if we want to. That we can turn around, choose a different path, go a completely different direction. But we can. My divorce was hard for many reasons, but the idea of complely changing my life was a big one. I felt like I wasn’t allowed to change. That life itself wouldn’t let me.

When I was a kid, my stepdad valued his word above all else. He wouldn’t go back on it, no matter what. Sticking to his word was more important than reviewing the facts, doing the right thing, admitting he was wrong. If he made a rash decision in the heat of the moment, that decision stood no matter how ridiculous he later realized he was. That led to us as children being grounded for a year, moving halfway across the country, owning a girl cat named Butch.

I wanted to name the cat Cinderella. I was going through a time during which I desperately wished fairy godmothers were real and that mine would come and rescue me. The cat was a tiny calico kitten, born to a stray cat under the neighbor’s trailer. My stepdad didn’t want the cat but gave us an ultimatum. We could keep her, but her name would be Butch. What could we do? We loved that kitten. So, Butch it was.

In high school, I was scraping together every last penny for college applications and SAT tests and I needed another hundred dollars for something. My stepdad said I could sell my stamp collection to him for $100. I started collecting stamps in around the first grade and had carefully moved them from house to house to house. What did he need with it, honestly? But much like the cat naming problem, I was backed into a corner. I really needed the money, so I handed over the stamps. He kept them. I guess he did acquiesce on the stamps eventually. When he and my mom got divorced, he left the stamps with her to give back to me.

When I was growing up, my secret revenge on my stepdad was the quote about how “a foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds”. That Emerson would think my stepdad had a little mind only helped a little those nights that I was grounded for no reason, but a little was better than nothing.

I know that it’s important to be responsible and reliable and stick things out, stay the course, all of that. But there’s just no reason to name a girl cat Butch.

I’ve loved booked ever since I can remember. I love reading them, being around them, owning them. I can get completely lost in a book to the point that I entirely tune out the world around me. (Really. Try talking to me sometime when I’m reading. I won’t even know you’re there.) When I was growing up, I was never without a book. If I needed to walk from one part of the house to the other, I did it while reading. I was pretty good at navigating around things while keeping one eye on the words.

Just being around books makes me happy — even books I would never read. I could spend an entire day in a bookstore, just looking at books.

The trouble comes in when I start looking at everything, and I see all my favorites and they make me happy and I want to buy them and take them home, even if I already own them. And I have to remind myself that my copy at home is just fine. I really don’t need another one.

I went through this period a few years ago where I would haul in boxes of books to Half-Price books in a misguided attempt to reduce clutter in my life. It was difficult because I want to keep every book I ever read. And now, I feel book naked. I look at my bookshelves and think, but I’ve read way more books than this! I’ve bought so many more books than this! I know, I’m a little unbalanced when it comes to books.

I have a particular weakness for old books. I’m not really sure why. The older they are, the more they pull me in. I was at this used bookstore on Saturday and it was great with a loft and a windy staircase to the basement and cats.

I was very tempted by Shakespeare. Shakespeare always does me in, even though I rarely read him anymore. I think he brings me back to my college days, when I got to spend all of my spare time entrenched in reading things and writing things — a literary heaven.

So, there I was, standing there, looking longingly at the shelf, even though I already have several different copies of the complete works of Shakespeare. Really. Plenty of copies. But this one was from 1866 and it was so pretty. I do already have a copy from the late 1800s that I picked up in London, but it’s in pretty bad shape, so I could use another one. On the other hand, this book was $100. It seemed a little crazy to spend $100 on a book I already have several copies of. But I really wanted it.

In the end, I resisted, but did pick up a fairly old collection of Poe. Sure, I have Poe too, but not in this collected form. I don’t think.

I used to read Poe as a kid and he scared the hell out of me. I didn’t even know he was this old, classic author. I devoured any book I could get my hands on, so it would be like Little House on the Prairie, Nancy Drew, The Tell-Tale Heart. I was so surprised when I found out he wrote poems! And was dead!

I don’t have as much time to read anymore. Too many others things to do, and reading seems like an unattainable luxury sometimes. I sneak in my reading time at the gym. I’d like to make it a point to read more, but it seems like a frivolous goal when there are so many others things I should be doing.

I’m really tempted to go back and get that Shakespeare though.

I was avoiding calling my mom. Yes, she had called three times. Is there a special section of hell reserved for daughters who refuse to call their mothers? If there is, I suppose I have a reserved table, because I don’t even feel guilty about not returning her calls.

Her last message even mentioned Christmas and I imagine that avoiding moms who want to talk about the wonderment of the holiday is cause for having your name of the VIP list for that special hell section — they lift that velvet rope right up when they see you.

Anyway, I did call her back. Eventually.

At some point, she asked how I was, so I mentioned about how my house didn’t have power and I was freezing and how there was a hole in the roof. You know, what the hell, share my life a little.

Her response? Concern and caring for her eldest child? Heartfelt emotion and and outpouring of love and sympathy? Well, kind of.

I believe her exact words were “your sister is mad at me right now and you know I love my granddaughter and I don’t like going a day without seeing her, but your sister’s not coming by today, but it’s not my fault and…”

I drifted off at that point, so I’m not sure why exactly it wasn’t my mom’s fault, but since I had already heard the story from my sister earlier in the morning, I figured I could fill in the gaps for whatever I missed.

After hearing a bit more about her woes, I finally got to the point of the many calls - she wanted to let me know that she sent me a Christmas present. It probably sounds sweet, but with my mom, everything has a motive. Of course, she would deny it. She truly believes that her every move is selfless — a complete sacrifice of her own life for others. Even the act of sending me a present is cause for great fanfare.

So, great, sent me a present. Can’t wait. Tell her if I don’t get it by Tuesday at 3, because she’ll get her money back for the postage. Alrighty then.

Later that day, my sister called. “Mom said that a tree crashed into your house and now you don’t have any electricity.” Well, kind of. You see, it’s not that my mom wasn’t listening to me. It’s just that she was collecting the information to use in another conversation where she could be dramatic. I’m sure she’s told the story several more times by now, and at this point, my house has been washed away in a mudslide and I’m living under a bridge.

Then my sister went on about how my aunt is sending all the relatives notes, telling them not to stop by my grandparents’ house for Christmas, because they aren’t up to it, but my grandparents are sad, because they are lonely and want people to stop by for Christmas and my God it all makes my heart hurt and I feel like the worst person in the world because my first thought was that I’m glad I’m not there.

This afternoon, I got the note myself, tucked into a Christmas card. The holiday spirit leapt right from the page. I felt like flying down on Christmas day out of spite. Which isn’t very Christmasy, but then, apparently that’s not what my family is going for this year. I probably would if I wasn’t already planning to be at P.’s family’s house. As it is, I don’t know when I can get down there. I’d like to get in a trip after Christmas, but that isn’t looking likely. It would difficult anyway — how do you visit your grandparents and not your mom when everyone lives in the same house? How about sneaking in some time with your niece while avoiding your sister? I guess this is what they mean when they say you don’t pick your family. You would like to pick some of them, but the others keep hanging around.

My middle name is Jean. When I was really little, this made me very upset because I didn’t understand why my mom named me after a pair of pants. She actually named me after my grandma — my biological father’s mom. Despite having spotty contact with him over the years, I had a much closer relationship with her when I was growing up.

We’d visit and call and she’d send us birthday presents. I remember writing letters to her in crayon. My grandparents on my mom’s side have seemingly thousands of grandchildren, so for some reason, as a kid, I was always proud of being her oldest grandchild. It made me feel special. She and my biological father came to my high school graduation and I was sure, even then, that she dragged him along. She was always trying to compensate for his lack of parenting.

I remember in college, she was living in Paso Robles and my boyfriend was going to scool at Cal State San Luis Obispo, so I would drop by and see her. She was living in a retirement home then.

I don’t know when it was that I gave up on my biological father — when I decided that his relationship to me was simply that we were both people living on the same planet. But I do know when I knew for sure that he’d have no second chance with me, when my apathy turned into something else and my heart turned cold.

I was living in Dallas. My grandma had moved to be near him in Oklahoma. Unlike now, he knew where I was, and exactly like now, it was fine that he didn’t seek me out, until one day. He called my mom to tell her that my grandma had died. She had been in the hospital for a week. I had been a two hour drive away. And he never even thought to contact me so I could see her one last time. So she would know I cared. I was devastated. I really don’t think about my biological father anymore, but when I think about that day, I’m still mad at him.

With all that history, you’d think I’d like my middle name a little more, but I think I always felt a little odd, having my name associated with the side of the family that wasn’t really part of our family, that I was always a little confused about. I didn’t go by my biological father’s last name growing up, so having this middle name bond was awkward. Those awkward years are long passed now (although I still don’t use that last name). And although I don’t use my middle name much, I do sneak in the initial every so often.

Apparently my decision to leave work last night was a wise one. The six inches of water I waded through in the garage turned into four feet soon after. We lost power sometime in the night but while large branches now cover the house, deck, and yard, none of them actually made it through the house, so it’s cold inside, but not windy.

This morning, I foolishly tried to keep my appointment with my personal trainer. During winter in Seattle, 7am may as well be the middle of the night. I felt around in the dark bathroom for my toothbrush. I grabbed my gym bag. I figured I could shower at the gym.

As I drove down my street, I understood the lack of power. Huge trees had fallen over power lines, and the street was an obstacle course of wires and poles and dislodged trees still sporting full root systems. I slowly drove around them. My gym is directly across the street from my office, about 10 miles from my house. The route is a combination of streets and freeway. I didn’t see signs of electricity the entire drive.

I wasn’t hopeful about the gym. Or, for that matter, my office. I pulled up to the very dark and very closed building. And drove over to the equally dark, equally closed office. A group of people were standing around in the parking lot. I noticed that much of the water had been pumped from the parking lot. But while the water situation had improved, the power situation had not. A small group of my coworkers were huddled around a car, eating pastries. I am apparently not the only crazy person in my office, trying to work at 7:30 in the morning, despite the lack of power and connectivity. You would think we might decide to go home and go back to bed. But if you would think that, you don’t know us very well.

Our company has another office in Seattle. All we had to do was figure out a way to get over the one bridge that remained open and we could work! (Have I mentioned that we are insane? But look, no power at home — so no heat, no coffee, no Internet. We have all of those things and more at work!) A few of us carpooled over. We heard on the radio that the carpool lane that is normally open to westbound traffic in the morning was instead open to eastbound traffic, because there was no power to turn on the other side. We soldiered on.

We eventually made it to the office — land of power! and warmth! and coffee! The best part was by far the coffee. And we even had Internet access. Oh Internet, how I’ve missed you. You were only gone from me for a few short hours, but the loss was a stabbing pain to my wounded heart. And while my blackberry had forsaken my instant messaging and web browsing needs, it mostly made up for it by continuing to provide email. Oh blackberry, please never leave me.

Our main office is closed until they can get the power back on and pump out all the water and I’m not sure what’s going to happen at home. I think we’re in for several days of non-power. And the news doesn’t look hopeful: “We’re just now getting a grasp on how bad the damage is,” a spokeswoman said. “We’re cautioning customers to prepare for multiple days without electricity.”

Which means coffee could be a problem. Lack of coffee is just about as bad as lack of Internet. Can I survive the weekend? Can’t I just spend the weekend in this office?

When I woke up this morning [actually, yesterday, since I didn’t get this posted last night], I did not think to myself, “self, perhaps you’ll be wading through a flooded garage of rain, mud, and raw sewage later.” I mean, it just didn’t cross my mind at all, not even a little bit. Apparently, I should have been thinking ahead. And maybe packed galoshes.

I have this bad habit of not paying attention to anything at work if it doesn’t concern me directly. I never read the all-office mailing list and I don’t go to any of the all-employee gatherings. It generally works out OK. If I really need to know something, I figure it out eventually.

For instance, this week, an admin sent me an email, telling me that she had to move one of my meetings to a conference room in the new building across the street. What? We have a building across the street? When did that happen? (Apparently last week.) Then I ran into someone who asked me if I got my bus pass yet. I seriously have no idea what he was asking me.

This afternoon, I was in one of many meetings, and people were talking about the office closing early and about high winds and network outages. Perhaps that should have been my first clue.

Later, I was doing some work and some instant messaging and was on the phone (I’m nothing if not a multi-tasker) and out of nowhere, a hurricane appeared outside. The trees were bent completely sideways from the wind and an entire ocean was pouring down from the sky. I should explain that I sit in a corner, so both walls around me are windows. And I started to feel like they could collapse in on me at any time.

And the power went out. Everything went black. I may have yelped a little. Which probably was not very professional, considering I was talking on the phone with a coworker in an office in another state, who had no context for my crazy outburst. I tried to explain about the storm and the darkness and my office full of coworkers who were vocaling expressing their feelings about losing all of their work in a single moment of computer shut down. Did I mention I could see nothing except the headlights outside? “Do you want to talk later?” She asked this as though I were perfectly sane.

The power came back. I was grateful that I was working from a laptop chock fully of battery. I didn’t gloat though. I figured my cursing officemates would turn on me in a pack. Instead, they went to the bar. I tried to work out what I really needed to get done before I left and what could wait until tomorrow. The last of the team headed out. “I know you’re going to be here until the bitter end. Maybe you should go find a flashlight before the lights go out again.” I figured I could type a little faster and beat the next power outage.

A few minutes later, my cell phone rang. “Um, is your car parked in the garage?” My coworker again. “Maybe you should move it. The garage is sort of flooding a little.” How bad could it be, right?

I looked outside. The traffic looked really bad. Maybe I should just wait it out until things died down a little. I looked at the trees. They were even more sideways than before. Maybe I shouldn’t wait it out. I packed up and walked down the stairs. I started getting suspicous as I walked down. I could hear lively conversations about water and flooding. I walked by a few people who asked if I was parked in the garage. They asked it in a tone that seemed half amused, half pitying. And then I passed a guy who was wearing trash bags like boots.

The stairs go down to the garage, and there’s this little landing area with a door. And you open the door and go into the garage to your car. Normally. Today, we (this group of random strangers and I) peered around the corner and found the landing area completely flooded. With rain. And mud. And sewage. Yes, the sewers overflowed or broke or did the opposite of whatever sewers are supposed to do. The guy with the trash bags looked unsure. He tested the water with one trash-bag covered shoe. It was a little deeper than he expected. Then he ran back up the stairs. I followed him. Now what?

Once I go back up to my floor I ran into coworkers who I didn’t know. (This happens a lot with me. Did I mention I don’t pay attention a lot at work?)

“Is your car parked in the garage? Mine’s outside. I’ll drive you.” Thank you random coworker who I’ve never seen before! We all went back down the stairs and out the front. The rain had definitely broken something. Half of the parking lot was completely underwater. We went around a large pond and piled into random coworker’s car. He drove us down towards the garage. Which was underwater. And buckets of water were continuing to pour in.

He headed in. We saw a few people wearing those fashionable trash bag boots, wading towards their cars. We got to my car first. I looked at my car. And the water. Everyone in the car could emphathize. They were next.

I put one foot into the water. It was cold. And gross. I knew how countless disaster movie heroines must have felt. I hopped towards my car. Why get both feet wet? The water was at mid-calf. I hopped a little more. Of course, I’ve never seen movie heroines hopping through a flooded garage, but I’m sure it made for quite a dramatic scene. And then I was in. Now to drive out of the lake of sewage. I could hear the water splashing against the sides of my car. I plowed on. I finally made it out and onto the street. Water was pouring out of the storm drains. The intersections were completely flooded. And 30 minutes later, I hadn’t even made it to the next light.

I figured I may as well use the time to return some e-mail. You think I’m kidding. If only the instant messaging had been working on my blackberry, but I couldn’t even get the cell network to stay online. I got to the freeway and inched by all the downed branches and pockets of flooding. I took off my drenched sock. My foot started to burn. What was in that water anyway?

I did eventually make it home and now I’m writing by the flickering lights and the sound of the trees threatening to topple over and smash our house. Maybe when the Internet is back, I can even upload this entry.

I miss music.

Sometimes, I just need quiet (although my ability to get that ended when I started working at company with one of those nifty “open office” arrangments, aka “rooms of chaos and noise”). And I get into weird talk radio moods, although there’s only so much NPR one person can take.

I mostly can’t listen to music while I’m writing. The words get all tangled together like sheets. But when I’ve been writing a lot, I like to listen to music between the writing. Which makes me want to write more. Books are the same. If I’m reading something really good, it motivates me to go try and write something that halfway measures up.

But I don’t listen to music anymore and I really miss it. I suppose it’s my own fault and my weakness for technology. Once I got an iPod, I forgot how to carry CDs in my car or bring them to work. And then my iPod broke. And now I have to listen to morning talk radio in the car, the crappy overhead music at the gym, and my noisy coworkers at the office.

You might think the answer is to go over to my CD cabinet and get some CDs, but you would be wrong. The answer is to get a new iPod. Although then I’ll also need time to organize all my music and upload it. I don’t even think I still have the computer where I installed iTunes, so I’ll probably have to start burning my music all over again. I may have a bunch of mp3s on my old laptop, but you can see that clearly, I need my assistant to make this all work.

I did buy the latest Dixie Chicks CD over the weekend (the source of the title of this post), and I’ve been listening to it in the car on the drive to and from work. It’s reminding me of just how much I really do miss music. It’s ridiculous, right, that I don’t even make time for that? If the world can’t stop to give me time to organize my life, can it at least stop long enough for me to organize my music?

It is no secret that organization is my arch nemesis. The organizational dream and I have a love/hate relationship that has overshadowed my entire life. The trouble is that I want so much to be perfect and then I do too much and it falls apart and it’s not so bad that things turn to chaos except that it bothers me so much.

I’ve tried every trick I can find: I’ve hired an organizational consultant, bought expensive dayplanners, read possibly every book on organization that exists, made schedules and lists, set priorities — but none of those help with the real problem. I just don’t have enough time. Which sounds like a cop out, I know, and maybe I’m just not prioritizing the organization thing, but I sort of just wake up in the morning and start working on stuff and then suddenly it’s 11 at night and the organization thing didn’t happen.

Anyway, a friend of mine caught a glimpse of my e-mail inbox the other day and was shocked and apalled. As though that weren’t bad enough, he saw my desktop today, and anyone who’s ever seen that has gasped in absolute horror. Inwardly, I said, “I know, I know! I’m horrified too! It’s the bane of my existence! The albatross around my neck. The weight that drags me…” Oh, you get the idea.

So when I saw my handy life coach today and she asked what I wanted to work on, I once again brought up the organization thing. She said that a full inbox does not mean I’m disorganized, it just means I get a lot of mail. To be fair, she didn’t actually see my inbox. Or my desktop. And she’s also much too nice for her profession. She said that I must be somewhat organized, since I get a lot of stuff done, and that’s true. But then I mentioned the black hole of undoneness — all of those things that I’m not accomplishing and that I’m not organized enough to even look at so I can make an action decision to ignore them, rather than ignore them by default due to forgetfulness, as with my current plan.

She said I needed a different term than “crazy disorganization”, but I don’t know that calling it “selective memory management” is going to help me all that much. She gave me some other ideas in addition to the name change thing, mostly things I know, things that just require a little of that time I seem to keep running out of.

What I really need is one of those machines that stop time. I could make everything halt and then spend a couple of weeks making everything perfect and tidy. And then I after that, I could surely keep up no problem. Right?

They don’t get me down. In fact, I love rainy days. They are comforting in a way I can’t really explain. And I’m a secret fan of Mondays, although I suppose that means I like my work just a little too much. But that particular insanity isn’t the point. The point is that what really gets me down are movies about animals. Those feel-good ones with the sweet dogs or tigers or penguins or whatever the hell that are supposed to tug at your heart strings and make you all warm and fuzzy inside.

But no. They don’t make me feel warm and fuzzy. They make me cry my eyes out. Movies where people get maimed or killed or left alone to wander aimlessly? Fine. Whatever. A movie where a little bear has lost his way and can’t find his family? I totally lose it.

I was reminded of this when I walked upstairs last night and glanced at the TV. Eight Below was on, and while I have never seen it, I recognized it instantly. Here’s what happened in my brain. “That’s the dog movie I don’t want to see ever! Some of them die. And the rest are cold and hungry and alone and why would anyone make a movie like that?!” I somehow managed to walk in at a part of the movie I least wanted to see, where one dog is down for good in the snow and another is sad and… forget it. I’m not describing it. I couldn’t even if I wanted to, because even though I hadn’t seen the rest of the movie, had no emotional build up to the scene at all, I immediately started tearing up and had to look away.

Yes, because of a fictional dog in a fictional movie that I wasn’t even watching.

P. was watching it, so I couldn’t just change the channel. I tried not to watch any more of it as I worked on my laptop. I did, however, manage to cry twice more and curl up in a little ball with my hands over my eyes once. Why do people make movies like that?

Two Brothers was worse because I watched it in the theatre. And sobbed and sobbed like a teenage girl watching Titanic. So much death and pain and sadness and torn apartness (which isn’t a word but perhaps should be). And don’t even get me started on that March of the Penguins. What was so heartwarming about that? I don’t think I spent a minute of that movie not crying.

I’ve decided that I’m going to just avoid movies that feature animals or have animals in them or that claim to be “for the whole family” or “feel-good” or “miraculous.” It’s just not worth the pain.

Friends of mine often get confused when I mention my past. Where was I living when? What was I doing where? Was it the second time I lived there? Which state and which high school? Hell, even I get confused. Clearly, a diagram is the answer. A diagram can solve nearly any problem. OK, maybe a diagram can’t wash your car, but that’s what my assistant is for.

The drawback to presenting a diagram of my life is that it sort of screws up the whole anonymous nature of this journal, as anyone who’s heard me ramble on about my childhood, confusing or not, might find the diagram familiar. On the other hand:

• Everyone who reads this journal knows me in person.
• Nearly every email I’ve gotten from someone who’s stumbled upon it accidentally has started the email with something like, “hey, is that you,” so I’m not exactly fooling anyone anyway.

So, I figure a diagram isn’t going to make much difference at this point. So without further ado, the diagram.

This diagram makes my life seem so much simpler than it has actually been. The speed round follows.

The early California years

I was born in Long Beach, at home, which should tell you just how much my parents were hippies. They soon moved to Bell Gardens, but I don’t remember any of it, and by the time I was two, my parents had split up and my mom had moved in with her parents in Bellflower. I still think of that as my home, really. It’s the only house I’ve really known my whole life. By the time I was four, my mom had remarried and we moved to Downey. Where I went to kindergarten. But I never graduated, because we moved.

The Oklahoma years: part one

This interlude actually began in Fort Smith, Arkansas. Things I remember: fucking loud thunderstorms, fishing. This began the moves of “my stepdad kept thinking that if we moved somewhere else, life would be totally different and happy”. I guess no one ever gave him that whole “whereever you go, there you are” Hallmark card.

After only a few short, storm-filled months, we moved to Broken Arrow, OK, where I went to first and half of second grade. Things I remember: walking to school in the snow (uphill! both ways!), discovering there is no Santa Claus, having my first crush, then dumping him because I brought flash cards to his house and he said he didn’t want to learn to read (not want to learn to read?!), wanting to get to the red book in reading class. Only we moved before I got to it.

Where did we move? Jennings, OK. A town that at the time had 200 people in it. A quick Google search shows that they now have 382. They’ve nearly doubled in size! Current average house price? $36,000. I spent the latter part of second grade at Jennings elementary school. A school so small that each class had two grades in it. I was in the first/second grade room. I mostly remember helping the teacher. And being cold. And that the lunchroom served beets. In third grade, we went to a Christian school in nearby Manford. My parents headed up the children’s program at the church and my mom helped out at the school, so I think we must have gotten our tuition for free.

We had a brief interlude within an interlude when we spent a summer in Kennewick, WA, but I’m not sure if that counts as a move. I recall that it was hot. And that I found $5 in a grocery store parking lot and bought a Buck Rogers toy. That was the highlight.

The middle of fourth grade, we moved to Perry, OK. Where we were homeschooled through the end of fifth grade. This period is also known as the ridiculous travel trailer years, during which my “moving makes us happy!” stepdad thought that if we sold our house and bought a travel trailer, we could move any time we wanted and not worry about pesky things like finding housing.

But at that point, reeled in by the crazy housing prices in Perry ($14,000 for a four bedroom!), he quit his oil well-style job and began a life of home remodeling. Which only lasted for three houses, one of which we had to live in. But my fifth and six grade self became well acquainted with the world of remodeling. A world I hoped I would never enter again. My hope, of course, has since been dashed. I went to regular public school in Perry for the first half of sixth grade, and as I’ve mentioned elsewhere, didn’t learn much in the actual class, having already learned it, but this is the school where I started playing flute and getting sent to speech therapy.

The wonder days of remodeling were cut short when my stepdad likely was offered some cash to get back into the oil fields. Which takes us to:

The California years: part two

We ended up in Bakersfield, CA. Where I spent the second half of sixth grade. This period is also known as the years of three junior high schools. Yes, three. I would explain it but it’s tiring to write and boring to read. My parents were crazy. Just accept it. Things I remember: learning algebra in the school library for state competition, since there was no actual class on it at the school, getting involved in journalism for the first time, being band major with the whistle and the huge mace. More speech therapists.

I then followed my friends from the third junior high school to high school, where I had a lovely half year. Half year? Well, sure, we had to move back to Oklahoma.

Oklahoma: part two

As with every good Oklahoma move, it must start in Arkansas. I may have left this out of the diagram. We moved to Fayetteville, but of course, it being Arkansas, we only stayed a few months and then went onward to Oklahoma.

This time we moved to Tahlequah. Where 9th grade was back in junior high school. That’s right. My fourth junior high school. Fourth. Seriously. I was able to get back to high school for 10th and 11th grade, where I learned the fine arts of ditching school while maintaining a 4.0 gpa, drinking, and working crappy fast food jobs. I also learned about boys. Near the end of my junior year, my parents moved — you will not believe this, but it’s true — back to Bakersfield. However, I stayed in Tahlequah through the summer because I was taking college classes. I am amazed they let me stay, especially since they completely reversed course about letting me live away from home the summer after high school. But then I remember that they’re crazy and it all makes sense. I drank a lot that summer.

California: take three

Incredibly, I went to the same high school my senior year that I had gone to as a freshman. Built-in friends! First time that had ever happened. This is the year I partied with KORN in a crack house in Riverside.

I then moved up to Lodi, where my parents had moved yet again, and went to college in Stockton. I blew through college in three years (anything to be free of the crazy rule) and moved to… Downey (see above, re: kindergarten years). I was working in Fullerton and my company soon moved to Irvine. I then moved in with my boyfriend in Newport Beach. We moved to Costa Mesa, then broke up, and I moved elsewhere in Costa Mesa. I still miss Orange County. I could have lived there forever.

But no, I had to enter…

The become an adult to get control, then give up control years

I really didn’t want to leave Orange County, or my job, but my boyfriend moved to Dallas. And I told him I didn’t want to move, but he was all insistent, and I figured, what the hell, I was used to moving. Of course, then we got married and moved to Madison, WI. Another place I didn’t want to move. And then we briefly, sort of moved to Atlanta, but not exactly, and ended up back in Madison. And then we moved to Seattle. And got divorced.

And I still live here, so maybe I’ve gotten some control back. It’s hard to know. But Seattle is the city I’ve now lived in longer than anywhere else in my entire life by far (five whole years!), although I’ve lived in 4 places during that time.

And at this point, I can honestly say I have no idea what’s going to happen next. Life is a journey. Some people just travel a bit more than others.

I made Alaska MVP Gold last week. This is the honor bestowed upon you when you spend more time in airplanes and hotel rooms than at home. In return, you get rewarded with perks like boarding early. In order to take advantage of these perks, you have to continue to spend more time in airplanes and hotel rooms than at home.

I actually love to travel, except for the part where I have to climb into a huge metal tube and get flung through the air while up very, very high. Did I mention how high it is? And how I’m stuck in a tube? And can’t get out? No matter what? Yeah, that part isn’t so great, but the drugs help.

What is great is walking around in a whole new city, seeing all new things, eating different food, experiencing, well, life, I suppose. We only have this one lifetime; I want to see and do everything I can while I’m in it. And if I have to get into the tube of doom to do that, well then so be it.

I made MVP status around the middle of the year. MVP gives you B-list perks. You’re in the royal family, but you rule one of the lesser kingdoms that you can only get to by traveling on horseback through muddy fields. You have a crown, but it’s filled with cubic zirconia rather than diamonds. You can use the first class line at the ticket counter, but not the first class line at security.

Sometimes people get suspicious. Perhaps I don’t look even like a cubic zirconia person. I was standing in the first class ticket counter line at one of many airports the other day and a woman in the coach line leaned over to me: “That’s the first class line. Are you traveling first class?” I smiled and nodded (thinking I didn’t really owe her an explanation about the whole runner up crown). “Well, I just had to check.” Er, she did? She’s the line police? It’s required of her? At yet another airport, I got in line to get on the plane when they called for early boarding for MVPs and first class. A man stopped me. “They’re only boarding first class right now.” Um, thanks. I actually can hear and understand announcements myself.

I must really confuse people when I actually do fly first class. They must walk by me when boarding the plane, barely able to keep themselves from letting me know that I’m sitting in a first class seat, and actually, I need a first class ticket for that.

Of course, I do walk through the airport in a Xanax-induced haze, and these people are probably only trying to help me in my obviously confused and altered state. I’m lucky I make it onto the plane at all.

I have only one or two more trips this year and then I’m home for 10 whole days next year before heading to Europe. I’m not looking forward to getting on that plane, but I am looking forward to getting off the plane and being in an entirely new place.

I have turned into a crazy person. Quite possibly, I was always a crazy person, but I’ve now become someone who you slowly back away from, someone who wanders randomly and talks to herself in the streets. Yes, I’ve gotten a bluetooth headset. In fact, I’ve just gotten a newer, smaller one that is hidden under my hair, so if you happen to see me wandering the street, muttering to myself, and you peer over to my ear to see if I’m on the phone or simply bonkers, you’ll go with bonkers.

That’s the least of my craziness though. Worse still is how much I love the little bluetooth headset. It’s so small! I can talk without my hands!

Years ago, I had this obsession with buying shoes. I couldn’t pass a shoe store without buying another pair. It didn’t matter if I already had black boots; I didn’t have black boots with little laces up the side! Or with a buckle! I had hundreds of pairs.

That obsession has waned — replaced by an obsession with technology. I now have a blackberry and a cell phone and I almost don’t want to say how much I love them both. I could explain to you why I need both of them, but you’d only pat my head and call the straight jacket people. Today, I was instant messaging while at Home Depot! A blackberry may be the most brilliant invention ever. For crazy people.

I also recently purchased a Nintendo DS Lite. So I could have a pet dog, who I teach tricks. I think this is brilliant as well, because while I love dogs, this one won’t wake me up every day at 4am for walks. I don’t think, anyway. It’s like when you were in school and had to take care of an egg like it was a baby, except it’s in a cute little black case. Maybe schools today hand out Nintendo DS Lites instead of eggs. Someone should suggest that.

Earlier, I was in Fry’s, gazing longingly at the micro memory. It was just like those days in the shoe store. Except the memory was smaller and cuter and any shoe could ever be.

What makes you colder? Snowboarding or Scuba diving? I had a suspicion that diving in the Pacific Northwest in winter was crazy, in a freezing way, but whole magazines are devoted to it. Divers claim to love it. It’s the best diving anywhere! Better than Australia! All you need is the right gear to keep you warm.

Apparently I am extremely gullible, because it seemed reasonable to me. I’m pretty toasty warm when I’m snowboarding — in the snow and cold and sleet. Snowboarding clothes are pretty clever with their overlapping layers to keep out stray snow and their ability to keep you completely dry even in a torrential downpour. Surely scuba equipment is similar.

So, we scheduled a diving trip in the San Juans. It sounded peaceful and beautiful and adventurous. Beautiful islands! Giant octopus! Just us, the quiet water, and the sealife. How could we go wrong.

Our first clue that this may not be the idyllic scene (well, the first after the general idea of the freezing water) was the suggestion that we get an underwater flashlight. Even though our dive would be around 11 in the morning. And then we got loaded up with gear: boots, gloves, hood, super-thick wetsuit. Will this keep us warm? I was unsure. Our divemaster assured us we’d be fine.

Our second clue that we might be in for the absolute coldest time of our lives ever, including those years I lived in Wisconsin, where it often went weeks without going above 25 below zero and you couldn’t stay outside long for fear of your nostrils freezing together, was that when we got to the boat, we saw that everyone else, except one lone person (and, of course, us) had dry suits.

Now dry suits are quite a bit different from wet suits. Mostly in that when you’re in them, you stay dry. Unlike wet suits, in which you, well, are wet. We asked someone (a dry suit-clad someone, I might add) what the water temperature was. “I don’t know. I try not to think about it.” Alrighty then.

Have I mentioned just how freezing we were on the boat? It was in the low 40s outside, a little windy, and we were on a boat that was speeding across the open water. It was cold.

Finally, we got to the first dive site. We got all suited up and weighted up, strapped on our tanks and our fins and shuffled over to the side of the boat. And walking with frog shoes, pockets full of 30 lbs of lead, a steel tank of compressed air trying to tip you forward, while in a rubber suit and huge plastic goggles isn’t as easy as it sounds.

I stepped off the boat. As soon as I hit the water and started sinking, the icy cold water from the depths of a frozen hell started seeping through my wet suit into my skin. At no time during the dive did I feel warm. Or anything less than so cold I thought my bones were about to shatter. After descending about 15 feet, we were rewarded with views of dark murky water benefited absolutely not all from the flashlight. We could have been surrounded by multi-colored octopi doing interpretive dance for all I know. It just looked black to me.

The second dive would be better. Right? On the way over, P. couldn’t stop shivering and we plotted the deaths of our dry suited companions. We eyed them to see which suits would fit us best.

At the second site, we shuffled over yet again and took the big leap. Jumping into frigid water when already cold and wet makes for a cold experience that I can’t really describe. I couldn’t control my breathing. My chest hurt. My body hurt. My teeth were chattering. We descended. The water was much clearer than on the first dive, but I was too cold to enjoy it. It hurt my chest to breath. I signaled that I wanted to go back up. We were all crazy people.

I felt bad for P. though. You can’t dive alone, so if absolutely can’t take another second of freezing to death, then he has to head back to the boat too. We peeled off the suits and got back into our only slightly wet clothing. Later, when we were back at home in our heat-filled house, I told him I wanted to try again. I could do it this time. I know what to expect now.

He looked at me like I was insane. “It was freezing out there. Let’s never do that again.” I guess I didn’t need to feel so bad after all. So, warm water diving it is. Until the day that we get dry suits. Or steal some from smugly warm divers.

Last night, we went snowboarding. The warmth was refreshing.