This blog will be on hiatus until further notice.

Cheap therapy

Dirty Dancing (VHS) GBP 3.99.

Too bad they didn't have Thorn Birds!

Airhead

The reason I haven't posted much recently is that I haven't really experienced or thought anything humorous. In the absence of humor, some profound insight would be the second choice for a post, but that's been a non-event as well.

It's very strange. I've been having more bad days than good, and I've had two events that I'd call actual breakdowns, but the bad days are not profoundly bad, at least not most of the time. I really expected grief to be different...definitely more profound. Instead, strange bits of thoughts about my mother and her being dead flash into my head in irregular intervals, and sometimes they make me sad, and sometimes they don't, they just happen. Sometimes I think I should remember them, and tell someone about them, and sometimes I treat them like any other random thought, like I need to buy bread or Atze destroyed another tennis ball.

I don't know if the non-profundity of my grief is a good thing or a bad thing. I'm glad I'm not all-consumed all the time, but then there's also a kind of pressure (I don't know from where) to grieve 'right'. Today, in the NYTimes, grief was described as "sensations of somatic distress occurring in waves lasting from 20 minutes to an hour at a time" and I immediately thought "Well, I can't be grieving then, cause mine don't last for 20 minutes, not even close". Maybe it'll happen later. But honestly, the longer it takes, the more it concerns me, cause it seems like if I start grieving like it is described above in, say, 8 months or 8 years, it'll be like celebrating your birthday 4 months late. It seems like it'd be missing the boat, and it won't make sense to anyone else. Not that it does much now.

I think that's the worst part about it when it does happen. It's a very lonely experience. It's very basic, there's nothing profound about it.

A dress for Ness

I haven't really done anything blog-worthy since I posted last. I sure as hell haven't done anything worthy of the name fieldwork. Instead, I've been procrastinating by getting ready for Sarah's wedding in 3 weeks. Mind you, I'm not the one getting married, so I shouldn't claim too much time for wedding preparations, but any excuse is good for procrastination, as some of us know.

I've been working feverishly on the present, which probably still won't get done in time (sorry, Sas, you'll understand when you see it), but I can't post progress pix because then the surprise will be gone for the recipient.

I have, however, solved the clothing dilemma that inevitably presents itself when you need to buy anything other than a rain slicker and a pair of wellies on a remote Scottish island. I had my grandmother send me this dress of hers that I've adored for as long as I can remember. It is a bit over the top, but hell, it's vintage, so it can be a bit over the top, right?

Some minor alteration surgery is being performed on it as we speak, but here it is:



What do you think?

I am special

Hey Vassar peeps (if you're still reading this), did you get Fran's letter asking to contribute to the annual fund? I thought it was pretty funny, mainly this part:

"I feel a special bond to your class and all of those classes that graduated in the past two decades, [...]"

Hm, let's see, Fran, about 600 people per class, times 20, that makes about 12000 of us that you have a special bond to? Wow. That's a lot of special bonds. Your Friendster friends file must be huge!

I think I feel about as special as I did when we received our 'special' graduation gifts from Frannie. Remember? Those weird address book thingies?!

I mean, please, Professor Ferguson, couldn't we have been a little less trite in hitting me up for money?

Shades of White

The other day, I was filling out an application at the local college to join their Gaelic class, which included stating your ethnicity.

I knew identity politics were different in Britain, but I didn't know there were so many shades of white here:

12 White Irish
13 White Scottish
14 Irish Traveller
17 White English
18 White Welsh
11 White British (inc Wales and Northern Ireland)
19 Other White


Funnily enough, they have no code for black Scottish or Asian Welsh. They do have codes for 'mixed' but not for people who may be Black and Chinese or Pakistani and Irish Traveller.

I guess this was my chance to be the 'other'.

Summer holiday

Summer holiday
Originally uploaded by deepblue1975.

We had a gorgeous summer day today. Sun, 72 degrees. So we headed out to the beach.

Oh, and I take it back on those people being crazy. The water is really warm!

Approaching New York City

This is a poem by Franz Wright that appeared in the New Yorker a while back. I really liked it.

Gray wastescape
by midday
glare, a sort of
empty refrigerator light
everywhere-

Approach to New York through the South bronx, vast
hives of home to the world
of death and breath, just like anyplace else
but different: the White House of God, maybe; mother-
like mountains or statues...

On the night Greyhound:
once in loose-fitting hospital gown you approached
and pushing the I.V.-stand before you down the aisle
stopped at my seat without looking down, startling me awake.
(And white roses rapidly spreading like cold flames, over your
eyelids, the endlessly uttered white petals.)

Approaching New York City
signifies, primarily, approaching you -always
has, your face
like the sky it is everywhere, at every
turn, though you're a prisoner of Not today

and taken far from me.
But I am on my way,

one way or another I will
come knocking as so many times before,
I won't be long:
oh I will once again
belong, I know it.

CLASSIFIEDS

Happy Birthday to Katie!!!