Alcalá and Madrid

There's something about going back to a familiar place and finding that everything you held dear is the same. Right where you left it. But, this is life, and to find that some things have changed is inevitable.

Alcalá de Henares is a little city right outside of Madrid where I lived the first two times I came to Spain (once for a month in 2002, and again for a semester in 2004). When I stepped off the train Friday afternoon, I saw a short, nervous little man sitting on a bench, reading the paper. Memories came flooding back when I realized that he was a professor of mine from 6 years ago, when I took Spanish Civilization for the first time in undergrad. Carlos de la Hoz. I took the shortcut out of the train station as I had years ago, and was delighted to find that I remembered it. I went to the convent of cloister nuns who make their living making candied almonds and bought several boxes, smiling as I put my money in the revolving door, watched it swing around, and got my almonds and change in return. I walked around the Plaza Cervantes (named after the famed author of Don Quixote de la Mancha, Miguel de Cervantes, who was born in Alcalá) and chatted with a toothless old man about the beautiful day. Everything's the same.

I got a call from a friend from those blissful days after texting him that I was in Alcalá, and he said it would be best to come to the hospital now to see the baby because they would be discharged soon. Six years ago, when I met my friend for the first time, I never imagined that I'd ever be back in Spain and that one day I'd meet his wife and hold his first child. This is life, and some things change.

I sat down to lunch made by a wonderful lady I'd lived with the last two times I was in Spain. One of the first questions she asked me: ¿Tienes novio? Do you have a boyfriend? (sigh.) Same old Blanca. I met the girls who are living with her now for a month-long summer program and went shopping with them and met some of their friends. Later on that night, we sat in the Plaza watching the guys kick around a soccer ball, laughing at children's antics, warding off curious stares due to our English conversation, and breathing in the magical night air.

Just like old times, I stayed up with Blanca watching and commenting on the gossip shows. That night, the grandson of the infamous Spanish dictator Francisco Franco was featured, telling all of his drug addiction struggle. "If his grandfather could see him now," clucked Blanca in Spanish, with a shake of her head.

Saturday morning, I was off to Madrid. But not before Blanca made sure that I ate breakfast and packed me a lunch. I was reminded of a time years ago that Blanca wanted to show me some curtains she'd bought for an apartment she was renting out in another city. As we crossed the street on the way to the curtain store, she warned me to be careful and held my hand. Even though I was 22 years old.

I met up with a classmate in Madrid, and after wandering around the heart of the city, Puerta del Sol, and eating at a nice Cuban restaurant, we visited the requisite art museums, the Prado and the Reina Sofía. He'd never been, so I relished my role as Metro navigator and art historian.

Later on Saturday night, I met up with a friend I met when going to church in Madrid. She's now married and has an adorable little boy. We had fun catching up, and her son fell in love with my camera. We went to church together the following morning. The beautiful thing is that although the service was completely in Spanish, I felt the same awesome power of God. I could feel the love of the people there. The church sells plates of food after Sunday morning service, and I was brought to tears when a young lady treated me. All of the church people are immigrants (most of them at this particular church are Colombian), and most of them don't have very much at all. But of the little that they have, they still give. How could a spoiled American girl (I don't care what you say, Americans are spoiled compared to the rest of the world) accept something from a probably not-so-well-off Columbian girl? I also met a gorgeous young Moroccan girl who was majoring in English Language and Literature. "But, aren't your parents Muslim?" I asked. She told me that it was a long and wonderful story, but all she could say was that Jesus brought her where she was today. Wow. We later compared mp3s and raved about Jane Austen over guayabana popsicles. I'd never tasted guayabana in my life, and it was divine. "If you were to taste the real thing in Colombia," one man added, "you'd love it even more."

I watched the Spanish countryside speed by the bus window on the way back to Salamanca, feeling that, no matter where I am, God is with me.

El Retablo de las Maravillas

That's the name of the play we put on today in my theatre class. Some other classmates of mine did another extremely famous play during Spain's Golden Age called La Vida Es Sueño. We had a lot of fun:

So . . . anyway. It's cool getting to know people who will be starting the program with me in August. It's all in preparation for suffering together, I guess. lol. I had a nice, long walk and talk with one of the guys tonight. He's the same age as my little brother (It's totally weird that I'm starting to be older than people), and there's this little maternal instinct in me to take care of him. There's another guy in the program who reminds me of my middle brother. He even uses the same lingo, i.e. "Oh, so that's what's up."

God is really cool. He can use anybody anywhere to do whatever He wants whenever He wants to. I just have to trust that He is in control. I just have to not worry about walking in a fog of uncertainty, put my life on autopilot, and chill. But Lord, is it hard to do.

Boo and Yay

Boo
Ugh, the front desk guy. I was a little intrigued by him at first, but he's sort of flaky. Boo.

It's hard to meet new Spanish people. All day I'm surrounded by my American classmates. Although our classes are totally given in Spanish, I don't have any daily social interaction for a significant amount of time with Spanish folks.

I have all of these papers to write. And I need to do research. And I haven't even picked a topic yet for any of them.

Speaking of topics, I am a completely blank slate about my Master's thesis. I have no idea what I'm going to write about, I haven't chosen any faculty mentors. I'm just in no-woman's-land.

Yay
I met this really cool Apostolic girl who's also in Salamanca and who has a crazy amount of things in common with me. We'll probably go to church sometime.

I'm going to Alcala and Madrid this weekend to see my peeps from back in the day (see Chantelliver's Travels for background info.)

My group is going to perform a play (well, a fragment of one) for my Spanish Theatre of the Golden Age class tomorrow. We bought props and everything. It's a comedy by Cervantes, and I get to play one of the tricksters. I should have pictures posted tomorrow.

I'm having a good time! More to come!

Segovia

I almost forgot today was Sunday. Yikes. I didn't go to church (gasp!), but I did drop in for a few minutes of mass at a church built in the 11th century in the city of Segovia. Segovia's main attraction is the Roman aqueduct. What's crazy is that the city didn't stop actually using the thing to transport water until the 20th century. Like in the 19-teens or something. Spain was conquered by a lot of people (before they conquered a lot of people), among them, the Romans.

If you know anything about me, you know how I am about the Romans . . . I began to wonder if Mark Antony was in Segovia or anywhere in Spain at some time. I mean, he was a member of the 2nd Triumvirate (that was before Octavian bumped my boy and Lepidus and became the famous Caesar Augustus), so didn't he have to kind of check up on the provinces or whatever at some time? Just so I could say I've been where Mark Antony's been. Actually, I have. But that was when we lived in Italy back in the day. And that was before I cared about Mark Antony.

The Alcázar in Segovia (Arabic name for castle--the Arabs, or "Moors" at the time, were another group that conquered Spain after the Roman Empire fell) contains a room were King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella sat on their thrones and heard the petitions of Christopher Columbus in before he discovered the New World. I tried to imagine him kneeling respectfully before them, trying his best to persuade them to sponsor his voyage. We went to the very top of one of the towers and got some spectacular views. Sidenote about the Alcázar in Segovia: it is the model for Cinderella's castle at Disney World.

We also took a small stop by the city of Ávila. We didn't have time to explore, but we stopped at a lookout point and took some awesome pictures--it's surrounded by this spectacular wall that goes all around the city.

Oh, and lastly, I included pictures of another outdoor jazz concert we went to last night. We had a blast. It hit me why we were the only ones getting excited about the music: Jazz originated in the United States. As Americans, we couldn't help but get into it because it is the music of our homeland! I could tell you a story about a creepy guy who came up to us afterward and told us some stuff that was overwhelmingly TMI, but that would not be expedient. Lawful, perhaps, but not expedient. lol. More to come!

Independence Day in Spain

Well, Spain doesn't exactly have an Independence Day. They were the ones other countries had to fight for independence from. Yep. The oppressors and colonizers of Latin America.

Anyway, even though we didn't have this huge 4th of July celebration, an adventurous group of us took a walking tour. Out of all the places we went, the coolest was the San Esteban monestary. Christopher Columbus was trying to convince people that he knew a short cut (and was also trying to get money). He'd been before Queen Isabel and King Ferdinand several times, but one of the groups he appeared before was a council of monks and scholars that met in the monestary of San Esteban in Salamanca, Spain.

I got to walk into a room where Columbus presented his case, which eventually led to the "discovery" of the place I call home. How's that for 4th of July patriotism?

We also went to a convent with beautiful gardens, went to the very top of the Salamanca cathedral and took some awesome shots and ended the night at a jazz concert. I've also included some pictures from Thursday night--the plaza is absolutely dazzling at night, and we learned how to salsa. Ay, ay, ay!

Create Your Own

Create Your Own

Livin' la Vida Española

Schedules are different in Spain. We eat breakfast at the normal time, but we don't eat lunch until 2 p.m. (Most Spaniards get a little midday snack to tide them over.) It's the biggest meal of the day. There's a siesta, which is the most awesome power nap ever, and businesses close during that time . . . from about 2 to 4:30 or 5. Dinner doesn't come until 9 p.m., and it's lighter than the lunch meal.

The great thing is that it doesn't even start getting dark until about 10:30, so places in the Plaza Mayor (main plaza) stay open until as late as 2 a.m. The plaza is great . . . you'll see old couples walking along arm in arm, little kids playing and running around, younger couples . . . well, this is Europe . . . and there are bunches of stores and little cafes with places to sit outside. Ideal for people watching and just soaking it in. Anyway, last night a few classmates and I decided to have a midnight "study session" in a cafe at the plaza. Yeah, we got loads done.

Here's a gem right here--an automatic bathroom thing on the street that you have to pay 20 euro cents to use:

Additionally, no trip to Europe would be complete without a pseudo-crush. My crush of choice this time around? The front desk guy. Well, there are 3 front desk guys, but my guy is the one who's there in the morning. This morning he was telling a couple of us over breakfast about the music he likes, and he mentioned a reggae-ish singer named Shaggy. Except he pronounced it "Soggy." We were like, who? Finally he said, "You know Scooby Doo? The same name as Scooby Doo's friend." Oh, Shaggy! Awww.

More to come!

Cool Buildings and Stuff

Me at the Plaza Mayor


The Cathedral


Me and Katie in front of the Cathedral


If you click on this pic to enlarge it, you may be able to better see the faint red writing on the wall. They are words written with the blood of bulls from bullfights long ago.

Frutería

A frutería is a store that sells fruit and vegetables. Here's a grammar lesson. Adding "-ería" (more or less) onto a noun in Spanish turns it into a word meaning a store that sells that noun. For example:

zapato = shoe, zapatería = shoe store

papel = paper, papelería = paper (stationery) store

pan = bread, panadería = bakery

joya = jewel, joyería = jewelry store

Anyway, this morning, I was telling the front desk guy that I wanted to meet more Spanish people so that I'd have more opportunities to practice my Spanish. Then he was like, "Okay, here's an opportunity to practice your Spanish. I have a list of things that I'm going to order from the frutería. I'm going to call them and let you order." (We also eat at our residence, and I guess one of the front desk guy's duties is to keep the kitchen stocked with whatever they need.) He re-wrote out his little list in neater handwriting for me and called the place and gave the phone to me. Cinco kilos de patatas, diez lechugas, tres sacos de limones . . . it gave me flashbacks of when we lived in Italy across the street from a grocery store and my mom would send me over to order from the deli.

Anyway, there's my Spanish experience of the day. More to come!

¡Hola!

From Atlanta, to Paris, to Madrid we went. Air France hospitality was notable as far as airplane service goes, but there were periods of time I thought I was at Six Flags. Seriously. I mean, I love Six Flags, and I'm a rollercoaster fiend, but not thousands of feet up in the air. Naw.

Anyway, on the Paris to Madrid, I sat next to a friendly-looking Spaniard and wanted to get some practice in before touchdown, so I struck up a conversation asking him if he liked cookies. Only because he hadn't eaten his. But I guess he thought I was asking because I wanted them and he gave them to me. Okay, okay . . . deep down inside I wanted them. Anyway, I learned that he was fluent in 5 languages (that makes me SO jealous) and we discussed things from Spanish grammar to American politics. He even carried my carry-on off the plane for me. Aww. Here's a bit of cultural info: When greeting one another and before leaving, Spanish people kiss each other on both cheeks. (Men to women and women to women only. No male bonding stuff going on.) It means absolutely nothing other than 'hi' and 'bye,' but when we cheek kissed goodbye after getting off the plane, I felt like I'd been baptized in Spanishness. Welcome back!

Last night was a bit of orientation and finding our way around. The main plaza was dazzling . . . we had the requisite tapas, I splurged on a bit of decadent Spanish ice cream, and as the night wore on, a few of us decided to head back. Unfortunately, a person in the trio of us who headed back to the residence knew that she knew a quicker way back. It turned out to be a bad idea to trust and follow her. Homegirl got us so lost . . . it was ridiculous. I ended up asking a Spanish lady where a landmark I remembered was located. I figured if we could get to what I remembered, we could find our way back. Channy saves the day! And yes, it was technically day. It must've been 1 a.m. by the time we got back. Homegirl sheepishly said, "I guess you won't follow me anywhere again." T'yeah.

Today was the first day of class, and it was great. The professors are animated and really into their stuff. That always makes it less boring. I'm taking Spanish Theatre of the Golden Age, Introduction to Latin American Literature, and The Spanish Post-War Novel. Exciting stuff.

Spain recently won the Euro Cup (soccer, or the real football is a gargantuan deal here) and so I thought I'd get in the spirit and wear my España shirt today. Upon seeing my shirt, random people on the street yelled out "España!" with raised fist, and I did the same in turn. It made me feel authentic. Like, the shirt gave me street cred.

Anyway, here are some pics of my first full day:

On our way to class!

At the Colegio de Maestro Ávila between classes

The Colegio de Maestro Ávila (where morning classes are held)

The group (along with professor) in the Spanish Theatre of the Golden Age class


Some cool looking Salamancan buildings

Washing handfuls of delicious cherries our gregarious program director lavished on us

Me right before Introduction to Latin American Lit

Here's my home away from home:

Messy bed accompanied by bookbag and George

Nice desk scattered with a bunch of stuff overlooking a window. (With my zoning habit, I'm never going to get any work done.)

My oh, so European bathroom, featuring a bidet. (I'll let you look up what it's used for.)

More to come!

Familiarity Breeds Contempt

Someone mentioned that familiar saying in reference to this blog.

At first, I was a little defensive and annoyed because blogging is a fun little creative outlet that I enjoy, and implying that my blogging would cause others to view me in a contemptuous light elicted nothing but a huge mental 'whatever' from me. At first. Then, I listened to what they were saying (a genius idea when someone is trying to make a point) and seriously considered the merit of the point they were trying to make.

What do people mean when they say "Familiarity breeds contempt"? Basically, that the more you know about someone, the less respect you have for them because you are overexposed to them; more specifically, you are more likely to find fault with them and more likely to notice their flaws.

Though I try to not to reveal identifying details about my life and that of others who wind their way into my life's narrative, I must admit that I do reveal a lot about myself emotionally—my feelings, my thoughts, my likes and dislikes, my hopes, my fears, my experiences, my views. One could learn about me quickly and easily via my blog what would take time and effort for one to learn about me the old fashioned way. And that makes me wonder if the ease of access to personal details that characterize some blogs combined with the ubiquity of the Internet that allows them to exist allow not only an effortlessly gained hyper-familiarity, but also produce a contempt and lack of respect (or rather, less respect than would be otherwise had) due to that hyper-familiarity.

We call people who physically expose themselves to strangers exhibitionists. (We also consider them sickos and would never hope to be unwitting witnesses.) But what about people who emotionally expose themselves to strangers? Would we call them emotional exhibitionists? No? Oh . . . bloggers. At least the Where-You-Can-Find-Me-ish type.

The allure of blogging comes from having a built-in, overwhelmingly (most of the time) sympathetic audience. Having a bad day? There are people out there who feel your pain. Relationship woes? There are people out there who experienced the same thing. Wondering what would be best? There are people out there willing to lend you $0.02. Embarking on an adventure? There are people out there who want to virtually experience it with you.

I don't see anything harmful about any of that. At best, it's therapeutic, at worst, it's self-important. But my misgivings have to do not simply with people knowing about me, but because of that knowledge, in the long run, affecting people's esteem of me. And not only that, but also making it too easy to know about me without truly getting to know me.

I'm not saying I want to stop blogging altogether. But I've really been challenged to reevaluate the effects and consequences of it.

"Self-knowledge," a Poem

by C. K. Williams

Because he was always the good-hearted one, the ingenuous one, the one who knew no cunning,

who, if "innocent" didn't quite apply, still merited some similar connotation of naïveté, simplicity,

the sense that an essential awareness of the coarseness of other people's motives was lacking

so that he was constantly blundering upon situations in which he would take on good faith

what the other rapaciously, ruthlessly, duplicitously and nearly always successfully offered as truth. . .

All of that he understood about himself but he was also aware that he couldn't alter at all

his basic affable faith in the benevolence of everyone's intentions and

that

because of this the world

would not as in romance annihilate him but would toy unmercifully with

him until he was mad.

(P.S. For whatever reason, Blogger won't allow me to maintain the integrity of the line breaks in this poem, but there it is.)

Things That Probably Only I Notice/Care/Think About

Paint ain't
I was going to WalMart and saw a sign on a paint store that I'm sure was printed "PAINT SALE," but a little flap of the sign was blown over, so instead it said "AINT SALE." I don't know why that was so amusing to me. "Sorry, son, you cain't buy no paint here. You saw the sign. Ain't no sale."

Butterfly cards
Upon arriving at Wally World, I was elated to find a package of blank cards that were just imprinted with me-ness. Lavender-rimmed with a lone butterfly in the middle. I almost believe God knew I wanted to buy some blank cards, and He knew what kind of cards I wanted in my heart of hearts, so he aligned a series of events so that I would walk in to Wal Mart and see those cards and buy them with a sense of destiny.

Blowdryer
I have a dilemma. I keep breaking my blowdryer attachment combs, so I constantly buy replacement attachments. I used to have a Vidal Sassoon but I don't anymore. But the only replacement attachments I can find in town that come close to fitting are Vidal Sassoon. But the attachments don't fit exactly right on my blowdryer because they're not the right brand, so they break even more often. So I resolved to give in and just buy a new Vidal Sassoon blowdryer of the right model so that the attachments would fit. But WalMart didn't have any, the brutes. So I went to one of those special stores that has an array of "ethnic hair care" products along with a better variety of blowdryers. The store is run by a polite, efficient Korean lady who usually gives me the hookup with the attachment replacements. But today I walked in and was shocked to see an old, starkly white man manning the register. Seeing him juxtaposed with the entire wall of hair weave packages behind him was mildly amusing. Meanwhile, I eavesdropped on the Spanish conversation of two Hispanic women at the register ahead of me. I thought of the events in World History that allowed my existence, the man's existence, the Korean lady's existence and the Hispanic women's existences to converge in that beauty supply store.

Pimp to punk
Listening to the banal Christian radio station on the way to Panera Bread, I noticed that the word "pimp" is replaced with "punk" in what I guess is the radio version of tobyMac's song "Lose My Soul." (This comes after Mr. Franklin steps up to the mic.) Like, it's a Christian song, but they had to Christianize it even more in order to make it acceptable to a mainstream Christian audience. But, how is a punk more Christian than a pimp?

Panera vs. Starbucks
Upon arriving at Panera, I was excited at the prospect of getting to use my fully stamped card to get a free drink. Each time you buy a drink, you get a stamp on your little card (if you present it, which I always promptly do.) You have to get that puppy stamped eight times before you reach the status of free drinkdom. Then you get a new card and it begins anew. Then I wondered why Panera doesn't seem to have the prestige of Starbucks. It has so many more advantages: the free drink card, free Wi-Fi, and they offer actual food in addition to good coffee. Maybe because the more accessible something is, the less prestige it has. Or rather, the more prohibitive elements surrounding something, the more prestige it has. At Starbucks, you have to pay for Wi-Fi, for example.

(Sigh.) I know that I must enjoy these last few days of wandering musings and enjoy them well. For the day approaches where my brain will once again be held hostage to work.

It's Maddening

'Maddening' is a word I like to use in lieu of 'frustrating.' 'Frustrating' sounds so blah. Like a word only tightly wound, anal, obsessive-compulsive people use to describe situations that don't go their way. 'Maddening' has deep violet shades of meaning. 'Frustrating' only messes with your head. But 'maddening' perturbs your soul. Or maybe I'm just making that up.

Anyway, I'm really trying to see this state I'm in in a fun-loving light. Expect the unexpected! or Life is a highway/I'm gonna ride it all night long. Or, better yet, It's my life/It's now or never/I ain't gonna live forever/I just wanna live while I'm alive. Since I don't know what's going on, just kinda carpe diem my way through it. I'm even trying to look at it in a "Footprints" way. You know, I saw one pair of footprints in the sand and I got ticked at God for leaving me, but then He was like,"Cool it, my child, that was when I was carrying you."

Uncertainty is maddening. Facing decisions within that uncertainty is maddening. Trying to figure out what's best: Balancing the fact that you really care about what people you really love think with the fact that whatever decisions you make as a woman who is literally 4 years shy of 30 are your decisions alone and that you are the one who will have to live with them. It's humbling. It's daunting. It's maddening. It makes me cry.

A week from tomorrow, I board a Spain-bound plane. It doesn't even seem like it. But once I get there, WHAM! Just imagine a hefty pack of three intensive, month-long graduate courses in Spanish. Then, as soon as I get back, WHAM! An amalgamation of Meet the Parents, packing, moving, unpacking, and Graduate Teaching Assistant orientation. And what are you writing your thesis on? Durned if I know. Wonderful! And what are you doing once you graduate? See the aforementioned. Here's the kicker: I signed up for this. It's not like life has blindsided me with a rush and tumble of events. I knew what was coming. You can't whine about being unprepared when you were given ample notice, and not just notice, but you prompted this series of events of your own free will. But what could I do to prepare? Other than steeling myself? anesthetizing my heart? (Which is impossible.)

Wait-and-see is maddening. It seems that no matter how much I knock-knock-knock on Heaven's door, "wait and see" is the hollow reply. It's a new and uncomfortable sensation for me. Feeling at the mercy of factors beyond my control. And I suppose I always was at the mercy of those elusive factors, it's just that I haven't been dealt such a raw slice of that reality until now. And this from a girl who claims to relish her steak medium rare.

Born-Again Flosser Goes to Birmingham

I woke up this morning with remnants of swordfish and pork between my teeth. Had I known that I was going to spend the night away from home, I would have brought some dental floss. I need dental floss. I begin to suffer from withdrawal if I don't have it. I became addicted to it once, for the first time in my life at 19, my dentist discovered a cavity. I've been a born-again flosser ever since.

The swordfish got in there when I went out to lunch with one of my guls in Birmingham (more affectionately known as B'ham, or, simply, The Ham). It may have been the first time I've ever had swordfish. It just sounded exciting, so I got it. It was covered with creamy sauce, too. Then we skiddadled off to the Galleria, and my gul got me a shirt that made me feel like a Greek goddess when I put it on. If I had to choose, I'd choose Athena.


Later, the illustrious M made us a splendid dinner of stuffed pork tenderloin and asparagus. That's how the pork got in there.


A dessert of warm apple pie with vanilla ice cream topped with caramel and whipped cream did me in. It also caused me to have bizarre dreams: I had an argument with my mom because she didn't want to shake hands with one of my friends. I began to cry and yell at her saying, "Mom, how can you call yourself a Christian and treat people that way? It's not fair!" Then I ran away. She called after me saying, "Girl, don't you know I was just kidding?" LOL.

And look at the breakfast I ate this morning! That's what I'm talking about. I could subsist on breakfast food indefinitely.


So, maybe some bacon got in there, too.

Oh, but once I made it back to the Gump, I whipped out that dental floss before you could shake a stick. Glorious. Look, I've got some sizable chompers. I've gotta keep those things right.

I remember

taking a walk throught the neighborhood with my mom and asking her what "S-T-O-P" spelled.

seeing a homeless person for the first time.

crying during Tracy Chapman's "Fast Car" video.

being elated that Santa Claus had come, not realizing that I had actually caught my parents redhanded.

not wanting to get on the school bus, but being happy once I was shown the Cheetos and M&Ms in my lunch box.

my Minnie Mouse backpack.

not liking Grouchy Smurf and getting offended if I were accused of being like him.

loving Piglet.

tennis shoes with no shoelaces but two velcro straps across the front.

watching an old Italian woman at the beach cut a sea urchin in half and slurp out the insides.

Parmalat milk.

feeding raw hotdogs to a stray neighborhood dog.

throwing rose petals on a float of a patron saint and a Virgin.

fighting a boy over a swing.

having a crush on the pizza delivery boy.

swishing my mouth out with fluoride once a week at school because there was no fluoride in the water.

jumping off the high dive into the deep end.

wishing I could paint "Waterlilies" by Monet.

playing the flute in Beginning Band and walking home with a boy who played the sax.

feeling more out of place in the United States than in a foreign country.

punching in a lunch number at the cafeteria register.

the ecstatic catharsis of speaking in tongues for the first time.

being a candy striper over the summer.

the dread of my first kiss.

the smell of Bath and Body Works Pearberry body spray.

the complete darkness, booming, dramatic drum beat and piercing, heartwrenching bagpipe which began the version of the play Macbeth that I saw in high school.

a boy who wrote "We Did It!" on his torso in body paint and lifting his robe to show the audience after he got his diploma.

sorrowfully crying after my parents dropped me and my belongings off in a dorm room.

the feeling of getting a new life every semester.

feeling the impact of my car hitting a telephone pole and gritting my teeth against crushed glass.

watching alternating stretches of graffitied urban sprawl and countryside speed by a train window.

observing a butterfly with a torn wing flutter on the curb.

. . . and Hillary is an honorable man

Mark Antony's funeral oration in the Shakespearean play Julius Caesar has been a long time obsession of mine. Basically, Mark Antony acts as if he's being all complimentary of Brutus & Co. when he's actually inciting the mob's anger against them. (If you have a nerdy streak, I'd click the above link and read the whole scene to get the full impact. But if not, just scroll down to where Mark Antony begins with "Friends, Romans, countrymen.")

Okay, now read this article, and tell me that it doesn't remind you of Mark Antony's funeral oration! I don't think Obama is trying to deceptively incite the plebians' anger against Hillary at all, but the whole combination of an orator, booing "plebians" in the audience, and the orator's appeal to an "offender's" noble character just channels that scene in Julius Caesar for me.

The Wedding

It was yesterday, and it went over wonderfully. Thankfully, I was feeling 100% myself, no more, er, resurgences, I was able to do my little duet and keep the hyperactive flower girl focused. Surprisingly, I didn't cry. Like, usually I'm a softie, but I guess I was just so excited and happy that no tears came to my eyes. Instead of feeling this bittersweet oh-my-friend feeling, I felt like Yay! And I couldn't stop smiling. A few pics:

Oh, and here are a few pics from our fiesta themed wedding shower. Caliente!

Anyway, tomorrow I fly away from the boonies and back to the Gump. Then I have to repack for España in about a week and a half, and then I'll eventually have to pack up my entire apartment to move to Auburn . . . and there will be other mini-adventures in-between (sigh), but we'll cross those bridges when we get there. Well, NoDak, ta-ta for now!

Why Me, Why Now?

Ugh. All day yesterday, as of 5:30 a.m., I was wretchedly sick. The details would be, in short, tmi, but suffice it to say that it was not pretty at all. Even today I feel a little fuzzy, but at least things that I take in are staying down, youknaaimsayin? And the weird thing is that I never get sick. Seriously, I very rarely get sick. And when I do get sick, it's a little head cold, or at worst, a fever. Never an extravaganza of grossness.

But, holy buckets, now is not the time to get sick! I'm the maid of honor, and the rehearsal, replete with keeping the flower girl in check and singing a duet, is tonight. Meaning that the wedding, the real deal, the thing that I've come to the boonies two weeks early for, is tomorrow!

Fuzziness, fuzziness, go away, come again some other day . . . Or better yet, go away and never come back. This is not the business.