Lucy's Spleen

Things Worth Doing

Maggie started this and I haven't been able to stop thinking about it. So, without further ado, here are some of the scenes I hope to relive as my life flashes before my eyes:

1. Camping in Southern Utah with friends and the dogs; no one else around for miles.

2. She-crab soup in Charleston, S.C.

3. Sunset on the beach on Hawaii, staring as I hard as I can at the horizon to try to catch the green flash.

4. Dancing as if my life depended on it.

5. Any of various caffeine rituals I have had over the years.

6. Watching the path of moonlight across my bed under the skylight; not being able to sleep because the light was so bright, but not minding because the full moon was so stunning.

7. Racing wagons fast down the steep hill of the sidewalk on our street.

8. That party we threw was a terrific success.

9. Riding bikes to the Saturday morning farmer's market, the breeze in my skirt.

10. Taking a standing-room-only train to Karlsruhe, Germany to sit on the ground outside the town zoo with hundreds of multinational strangers staring at the sky and sporting funny sunglasses. Feeling awed as the clouds parted just in time to reveal the total solar eclipse.

11. Making out with a stranger.

12. Dogs, mountains, me. 

13. Phoning my singingest friend from La Scala opera house.

14. Turning twenty-something (24, maybe?). First/only real birthday party I ever threw myself. Friends and family, little kids and pets and everybody all gathered in my own backyard. They like me, they really like me!

15. When I wake in the morning next to my new forever lover he opens his eyes, sees me, and sighs, "Yay!"

16. Christmastime evenings when the only light in the room comes from the tiny colordy ones on the tree.

17.  Walking Prancing out front door and down the steps of my high school right in the middle of 5th period while the rest of the class was in chemistry to be picked up by my older boyfriend in his car so we could go make out at his apartment.

18. Turning twenty-one in Paris on Bastille Day.

19. Bedecking the Girls' Hideout at the cabin with a literal carpet of moss.

20. Returning to The Hideout the next day to discover that deer had been by in the night to appreciate our decorating scheme- by sleeping in it.

21. My very own puppy!

22. Walking at sunrise over prairie hills; a tiny plane flies low overhead- it's a friend of ours! We can't see him in the tiny yellow plane in the giant outrageous pink-orange sky, but I know he sees us and is waving down hello.

23. Sunday afternoon naps.

24. Paddling across the lake, the water under the canoe is so blue that, peering over the side I can see clearly every fish, every stone in the white sand.

25. Sipping a cocktail in my pajamas on the balcony of my apartment downtown, recalling that as a kid I had a fantasy of what "adulthood" would be like and this is exactly it.

Flamly Reunion

Now my brother Jak is here! It's a flamly reunion!

Stan and mom and I spent the day walking around Cambridge in the new crisp cold. We toured campus like we do with guests (I learn a little bit more each time about the olde and hallowede Harvard grounds), visited the Cambridge Common, where you can learn about George Washington taking charge of the revolutionary troops, and Christ Church, where George & Martha used to attend services. Then we had a couple of beers at celebrated Charlie's Kitchen and did a little shopping on Harvard Square. My brother arrived in the early evening and since then the four of us have just been laughing non-stop. It's one wildly inappropriate joke after the next around here now, punctuated intermittently by song and dance. In other words: the usual. I've been notably more weepy since having family around, and more appreciative of Stan than ever, too. I'm basically just a big, sappy pile of joy basking in the presence of three of my most comforting and most hilarious loved ones. It's cathartic and delicious.

I am a participant in NaBloPoMo.

I am at work and ought to be concentrating, but all I can think about is our couch which is to be delivered within the next four hours and which Stan is sweetly awaiting at home. 

UPDATE: It's there! I can't wait to go home and put it together. Also I am a shopping second-guesser extraordinaire so I am nervous about the color. I wanted this shade:

but that cover was not available for the sofa we wanted, so we settled on this one:

Which means we will now have the same sofa in the same hue as approximately nine hundred and seventy three million other young urban people with small apartments, but oh well. After two months of taking turns in our single armchair I'm just excited to have a place where the two of us can read or watch a movie while both seated, comfortably, at the same time.

I am a participant in NaBloPoMo.

Spring

We've been having perfect spring weather around here lately; warm, but not too warm; sunny, with a little rain thrown in, gorgeously lit at every hour of the day and very romantic. Everywhere I look I see animals going about together in pairs- the Canada geese fly over in pairs instead of vees these days; there are two horses on each pasture at the stables to the north of our home; the birds at our feeder- doves, quail, house finches and goldfinches- arrive together in matched sets, the male goldfinches seeming to grow a brighter yellow each day as they wine and dine their lady friends on Black Oil sunflower seeds. There's one male and one lady sheep in each pen over at the farm (I wonder if we might see a couple of little lambs over there soon), and there are two new little piggies I've been admiring greatly as well. They happen to be twin brother piglets, but hey- to each his own in this romantic season, no? A couple of lucky male creatures keep harems. Our neighborhood pheasant, Kevin, is one, and there is a new male doing a lot of puffing up and strutting in the formerly ladies-only turkey hutch at the farm. I'll show you his picture- he's at once splendid and revolting, see there?

I can't decide which is more impressive- the angry neck warts or the flaccid nose flap. Here's one of him all floofed up for the hens:

I think it's awesome how even though he has a number of crumpled, broken tail feathers he's still proudly fanning those suckers out like there's no tomorrow. I picture him like an oblivious hiccupy drunk, relentlessly coming onto all the women trying to avoid him outside the bar, letting them know that, "This here turkey is one fiiine mother fucker."

Here are the piggies:

They were cute when I took this picture, but they've doubled, possibly tripled in size since they came to the farm and are growing more disgusting by the moment.

Lastly (and bestly), one of the mares over at the stables on the other side of our house has had a new little foal. He is gawky and gangly and lurches around with his long legs and pointy face and little beard and caterpillar tail. I can hardly get enough of him. Look:

In college tour news, Stan has visited three of our top picks in the Midwest and has two trips east coming up in the next week, then (yikes!) the official decision must be made. We've been leaning toward settling on a university in what I like to call a "major urban metropolis," so I'm trying to make the most of my farmy weekends while I can!

Awww...

Good morning. What are you doing? I'm drinking Lady Grey tea and eating Eggs Athwart Toast in the kitchen of our beautiful house while watching birds visit the feeder right outside the window (amateur birding being my new consuming passion with which I am boring everyone I know nearly half to death). The other thing I am doing, with deep and abiding pleasure, is typing here at my computer which (after many woes involving bad service and being in an unincorporated area and much other stupidity) is FINALLY, gladly, set up and running and connected to this new-fangled technology I hear they're calling "Internet." This brings us out of the stone ages and back into the world of modern conveniences  such as Listening to Music and Being in Touch with People. It's very novel and already I find myself wondering, "Whatever did we do before music and people became a part of our lives?* Good question.

This final convenience means all is just about perfect in my world, then. This, and the fact that tonight after work the two of us are hopping on a red-eye because Stan is taking me on my first ever trip to NYC. We're taking a quick weekend to explore the phylogenetic organization** of the top floor of the Natural History museum, eat, wander and spend a little time with a couple of very good friends who we don't see often enough. Most of all I am looking forward to being on vacation with my own loving cup.

Like this (only without the dog and in a major hugeantic urban metropolis rather than remote barren wilderness):

Hwre!

* Before= prior to yesterday

** Stan's current consuming passion with which he is politely NOT boring anyone nearly half to death

Yaaaaaay!

Go, Grace! GO!

Psst!
Hello, blog?
Are you there?
Hi! Today is Thursday and I feel like a million bucks. I'm drinking a really good Americano right now, I have been having rad ridiculous dreams almost every night, I like my job which keeps me busy as hell, I'm moving again soon (I know, I know- more moving! It's like a terrible joke only I can't stop telling it), it's the peak of crisp autumn climatological perfection here in the City of Salt, I have terrific friends and my relationship is satisfying and sound.
So... just wanted to let you know. It's been a while, eh? I hope all is super for you out there on the web. We really should try to keep in better touch, old friend. Anyway call me sometime, or something.
Love,
Emily

Q'aatorz bin Zhuliet Salaam!

It was my birthday last Friday. I decided to go ahead and turn thirty again. This is in accordance with The Plan, which was formulated last year on the occasion of the twenty-seventh anniversary of my birth. The Plan was to turn thirty a. last year, b. this year, and c. every year for the next nine years or however long I can get away with it. Due to advanced age, my memory's not what it used to be, and I figure it's easier to just pick a nice, round number and stick with it. This way there's one less thing I have to keep track of every day and, no matter how distracted or hungover I might be, or whether or not I've had my coffee yet, I can be confident that I'll have an answer at the ready anytime I'm asked what age I am. There may be many occasions when one might be asked to respond to this question unexpectedly, with no time to prepare in advance. In an instance of being put on the spot this way, sticking to The Plan averts the potential awkwardness of having to perform complicated mathematical calculations such as counting forward from 1978 or figuring out which year we're in currently.

I had a relaxed day at work, fancy dinner with the folks, and was greeted back at my apartment in the evening with a cake (illuminated by approximately 28-30 candles), surrounded by a crowd of my nearest and dearest holding hands and singing and swinging their arms for all they were worth. This love and friendship, this reason to celebrate and the pleasure and the joy of choosing to do so seemed particularly meaningful at this time, considering the other options. Celebrating my second thirtieth birthday has made me very aware of how very happy I am to be the person I am in the place where I am right now in my life. I'm a damn lucky girl, and a grateful one.

Springly Dogtime

This post about my Thursday with Grace D's dog will be mostly all pictures and almost no text, but click the little pictures to enbiggen them! Some are very pretty! Really!

First we did lying in the sun. Malcolm likes this part and he is very good at it.

See how he likes to coordinate his toys with his outfit? Stylish!

Next, we went out for a walk, following my usual route through Arana Gulch, past the upper and lower harbors, and down to the beach. Most of the Gulch is actually a field,

 

and while we were walking through it a hawk began doing slow, deliberate circles above us.

I didn't want Malcolm to worry that the hawk might be looking for an adorable stub-tailed lunch, so we hid out for a minute beneath my favorite tree in all of Santa Cruz which is this one.

Along the path to the harbor I asked Malcolm to pose among the poppies.

Seems it is truly finally spring now because flowers were going all over the place.

Malcolm likes 'em!

Ever since I started walking to the harbor I have become obsessed with seabirds. My camera isn't equipped to photograph them properly but anyway here are two with their reflections.

 
As far as I can tell Malcolm is indifferent to birds, but he does always stop to give big lovesome hugs to every single dog/person who notices and will pet/play with him.

At the exit/entrance to the harbor is a lighthouse. The lighthouse is on a jetty, and the jetty is supported by these four-pointed Things:

What ARE they? The jetty is made up of regular big boulders on one side and, on the other, these four-pointed things, looking haphazardly dropped about like a bunch of mammoth concrete jumpin' jacks. Hooligans paint on them, lots of flowers and peace signs and other tacky hippie shit. Also they're all mysteriously stamped with numbers on one "end," as you can see in this closer-up.

I've been wanting to tell about this dredge and why it's in the middle of the harbor, but loading all these pictures has taken FOREVER and in the meantime I've become rather tipsy. So, there it is; maybe I'll write about it some other time.

Malcolm doesn't know wut the jumpin' jacks things are about, either.

Here's me with the lighthouse with my sunglasses coming off and Malcolm with a boatnabarge (get it? boat 'n' a barge? you guessed it- i am drunk now! this is some Class A blogging, buddies! you can tell cause it's makin' up words time!)

 

Okay, let's see. Finishing up, then.

I, Emily Elizabeth, took the following exceptional photograph of Malcolm the Valiant at the lighthouse which I effing love more than life itself.

Then we saw more flowers, then we got a burger at Foster's "Old Fashion" Freeze Ice Milk Dinners Burgers, which has my favorite sign in all of Santa Cruz,

because getting burgers is what we do on our dates (but I'm lying a little bit because actually I got a fish sandwich this time!) Then we went home and played with toys and had rubs,

and I began to have a chill because I had gotten sunburned like an idiot.

Then it became night so we snuggled. The End!

(P.S. Also it was a beautiful spring day and I miss having a dog. Okay.)

Good Day, Sunshine

You can't believe it, the sun is out! I'm thrilled; the whole city is thrilled! You can tell because of our one neighbor, Wilma, who does obsessive arrhythmic tribal drumming at all hours of the day; which I can only assume must be part of some type of meditation ritual. Or not. Wilma drums, and does laundry. In fact I'm convinced that, apart from laundry, drumming is the only thing Wilma does. She drums in the morning, she drums at night; if you are home in the afternoon you can hear her drumming through the closed windows even from the very depths of your apartment, sometimes for many hours at a time and never, ever with even the remotest implication of a beat. And if, say, it has been raining torrents nonstop for weeks at a time, it is possible that one may find this drumming to be a wee bit annoying, an irritation that, if one admitted to it, one would categorize as very minor, yet one cannot stop praying for the next laundry break. But, it turns out, laundry can be stressful, and stress must be ameliorated- with drumming! The sound of the drumming reflects the level of that stress, and the intensity of the rain. The harder it rains, the more stressed-out Wilma's drumming sounds, and the more it influences one to also be (even more) stressed-out, through the closed windows in the depths of one's apartment. Must we really have all this intense and stressed-out drumming? Wilma! Gaaahh!

But that's only in the instance of rain, and today it is sunny! Today is a blessed 70 degrees and the sun is shining sweetly. Today the air is fresh and faintly perfumed and I have all the windows open, there are little birds and bugs flitting around and Wilma is pounding away exuberantly! Even less rhythmically than usual! With claps! And a dull "thock" of the drumsticks knocking together, so that I imagine her doing a slick little spin, like a dance move, and then, "thock" with a flourish at the end of the spin. I imagine she's inventing a routine; I've been studying it and I think I've pretty much got it down, it goes:

Drum. Drum. CLAP! Drum. Drum. (Spin!) THOCK. Drum.

It's a beautiful routine. I should get my own drum and join her. We can take our act downtown, drumming and thocking our way down Pacific Avenue! We can have top hats, or bowlers maybe, and we'll be like a two-woman carnival! In bowler hats and- clown shoes, let's say, doing our claps and our slick little spins...

We can, because have you heard? The sun is out! At last!