Lightning Crashes~

Right now in a hospital a couple hundred miles away a new baby boy is about to come into this world. He is about to meet his mother and his grandmother and his aunt and his great aunt and his great cousin who have all rallied around to be there for this moment. For his moment, for that first cry, for that first glimpse of the person who has just captured their hearts forever. It's magical. To me, when a baby is born it's just like magic. The instant you meet this baby who you realize will turn into a child, a teenager (yikes!) and someday a grown-up. But along the way he'll become his own person, with his own dreams and his own future. And for that first moment there's nothing else. It swallows you up and you aren't sure how you ever survived without this feeling, without this person, without this love, without this new life.

I'm not there for a lot of reasons. Truthfully I didn't want to impose. Truthfully it's not something I'm sure I could handle. Truthfully I'm a little jealous. I want a baby. Sure, not today...but someday and I guess I'm tired of watching all these people have babies. I'm just feeling crabby and irritated. I'm just left wondering if that magic is ever going to happen for me. It's Friday night and I'm home, drinking and smoking away the thoughts that I can't face yet. I'm tired of being sad, I'm tired of hoping and being let down.

That life is just out of my reach. And for tonight, while it's pouring down rain outside, and inside it's just as gloomy I'm going to revel in. I'm going to take a bubble bath and throw a pity party for myself...

"Much unhappiness has come into this world because of things left unsaid." ~Fyodor Dostoevsky

Bouquets of Sharpened Pencils~

Ladies and gentleman, we can all breathe a sigh of relief! Whew!!!

Somewhere around mid-January I get the wintertime grays. Literally--I can't see past the sun going down at 4 pm and the layers of ice and snow covering every imaginable surface. Somehow I convince myself that summer is just a hop skip and a jump away. Naively I psych myself up to spend countless hours with mediocre literature and the alternating sounds of the lake crashing into the shore or the rhythm and bass pulsing through the buds of my iPod shutting out everything else. I imagine myself working on my (safe! SPF 45 baby) tan with the backdrop of peace and tranquility and whatever drama happens to be unfolding on the pages of my current book.

The fiction! The audacity! That shit doesn't happen. Summertime has a whole new meaning in the real world. I long for the days of summer I so recklessly wasted before I knew how to truly revel in three months off. Summertime just means you get to trade ice and snow for blue skies and 99 degrees. It just means that you get to do your work while the lucky few are out enjoying "summer". It means that although you've uttered "I love the outdoors..." what you really meant was "...when I'm camping with my fam, partaking in my share of alcoholic beverages on the coast of somewhere beautiful." Otherwise, really, nature is just a big old pain in the ass!!

Now that I've lived a full summer, and almost a full year as a working girl away from the nanny gig (and the full size swimming pool) I feel I've finally seen the error of my misguided ways. Summer is crap. Summer sucks. (Except for folks like my sissy who was smart enough to choose a job that lets you take advantage of your fully- capable-adult- decision- making- skills and revel in three months off).

I heart September. I heart fall. Forget long hours and endless to-do lists. We've got bedtimes and school nights, we've got routine! I heart routine! We've got dinner times and schedules. We've (almost!) got new TV to dive into with cups of hot tea and extra blankets around for those moments it gets a little chilly. I'm a routine girl. I get up earlier and start my day the right way. I'm reading and writing because now suddenly I have all this time! While summer so greedily sucked away every precious minute I had, fall gives it back in spades! I'm speaking almost entirely in exclamations, and I give credit where credit is due; to FALL! To new sweaters and corduroy skirts! To pumpkin spice lattes and apples right off the tree! To not having to keep up my pedicure and swimsuit season coming to a close!! To spending weekends with my sister crafting, talking, and cracking each other up!

I feel like skipping in the crisp morning air. I feel like dancing through college campuses. I feel like sharpening bouquets of pencils and just passing them around. Instead, I'll just do all that in my imagination; save the public from my autumn--induced euphoria.

On second thought, that pencil thing might just get me through the afternoon!

Some people hear their own inner voices with great clearness and they live by what they hear. Such people become crazy, but they become legends. ~~~~~Legends of the Fall