I became an aunt on a recent drizzly October morning. Being an aunt is nothing like being a mother, which is rather obvious, but nonetheless profound, when you've spent the last nine months avoiding precisely this realization. You can love your sister wholeheartedly (I do), you can be there for her during labor (I was), you can rinse out her vomit bucket, and rub her back during contractions, and cry real tears of gratitude and love and joy when your tiny nephew slips into the world on a wave of sweat and blood and laughter, but you will still know that you are playing the supporting role, and not the lead, in this little drama. And I don't want to get all self-pitying and woe-is-me-ish, because honestly, that's just not very attractive, and it looks kind of petty, and probably no one really wants to hear me whine about how unfair it all is. But I will take the advice of a dear friend who said to me "be gentle with yourself right now." So I will be, and I'll admit that this is hard. Really hard.
And maybe it's okay to admit that.
Thursday, November 8, 2007
Tuesday, August 7, 2007
New Adventures in Drive-Thru
Last night I was curled up miserably on the couch with a terrible cold watching Dateline NBC, and thinking about food. I don't know if you are supposed to starve a fever or a cold or feed them or what, but I was very hungry, a state not a little abetted by the stack of food magazines (food porn as I like to call them) which I was absent-mindedly flipping through. Do not be fooled by the large piles of outdated Martha Stewart Living, Sunset, and Cook's Illustrated thrown haphazardly in my newspaper bin; they are not the least bit indicative of my housekeeping, cooking or decorating abilities, nor the proliferation of such activities in my house. I merely like to optimistically keep them around in case they might suddenly inspire me to great heights of housekeeping excellence.
So, back to the couch and the Dateline and the being hungry. As we are leaving for a short vacation tomorrow, there was nothing in my house to eat except things that I was far too lazy and stuffy-headed to make--you know, like bags of lentils, flour, frozen chicken breasts. I was looking for something more along the lines of Top Ramen. Or even better, Cup o'Noodles, which only involves the teakettle, and not an actual pan and/or other dishes. I considered going to Safeway, but the thought of wandering around aimlessly under bright fluorescent lights, and then coming home and actually preparing something was unappealing.
That's when I started thinking about french fries. French fries and a Sprite. It sounded so good and salty and greasy, and before long I couldn't stand it, I was obsessively thinking about french fries and every commercial seemed to be for, like, Carl's Jr. or something. It seemed so easy...I wouldn't even have to get dressed. Just pause the Dateline (I heart DVR), jump into the car, buzz through the drive-thru, and before I know it I'm back home on the couch with my grease-stained bag and frosty beverage. It's the American way, right?
In order to understand the even slight reluctance I had to actually follow this plan, you have to realize that I live in a family of hippie freaks. My sister has been a vegetarian since she was five, and my mother actually prepared a second meal just for her for thirteen years. We grew our own food growing up, our own eggs, even our own beef (the slaughter of which cows is directly related to my sister's vegetarianism). My mother gives me looks of horror when she sees half-drunk Starbuck's cups in my car, for cripe's sake. They don't approve of corporations. They have a subscription to AdBusters. I haven't actually eaten McDonald's in over ten years. The last time was once in my senior year of high school when my parents were out of town and I stopped at McDonald's for breakfast on the way to school. I know, I know, I was such a rebellious teenager.
Of course I've had some fast food from time to time since then. Just not McDonald's. There were a couple of late night stoney trips to Jack-in-the-Box during college, one of which memorably ended without the actual food. We just paid the money at the first window, happily bypassed the second picking-up-the-food window, and were on our way. Needless to say we were extremely disappointed once we got home, minus curly fries and plus one ravenous case of the munchies. And anyone who hasn't had an In-N-Out burger at some point in her life simply hasn't lived. But McDonald's? Oh, no.
However, such was my mania for french fries at that precise moment, that I was willing to betray even the most sacred family tenet: Thou Shalt Not Eat Corporate French Fries. Off I went, in my sweats and sock feet. In all fairness I did try to at least go to Carl's Jr instead of the heretical Golden Arches. But after idling in front of the darkened menu board for a good two and a half minutes, I had to reluctantly admit that they were closed. Nothing for it but Mickey D's. I crossed the street and pulled into the parking lot. And here's where the fates, or the gods of the organic food movement, or maybe even, in some weird omnipotent way, my mother, began to conspire against me. I could not find the entrance to the drive-thru. I saw the exit, I knew it existed. I could see people inside ordering, and I saw the front doors, but I couldn't go inside to order because I had no shoes on. I circled around the parking lot, cursing under my breath, got back on the main boulevard and tried the driveway next door, a Super 8, thinking I could circle the back and cut into the drive-thru line that way. No luck. Instead, I ended up in a maze of parked big rigs which were separated from the neighboring McDonald's by a high chain-link fence. I started to panic. I should have already been back in front of Dateline. this was not working out as planned. But I refused to return home empty handed. After all, wasting gas driving around for no good reason is even worse than wasting it in getting fast food, right? Right? Finally, I found the entrance, a good quarter of a mile from the actual McDonald's building. And for good reason. Do you have any idea how many people are out getting french fries at eleven o'clock on a Monday? It's staggering. The line was at least eight cars deep. I cursed french fries and the commercials on prime time TV that prompted me to crave them. I cursed my own weakness. I worried obsessively about the CO2 emissions emanating unnecessarily from my idling car. Finally, I handed my five dollar bill through the window, and was handed back a gloriously delicious-smelling paper bag. As I pulled away, I grabbed some french fries out of the bag and took a ravenous bite. I wish I could say I should have listened to my mother. That they were a disappointment. That they weren't worth selling my good family name for a dollar-seventy-five. But it would be a lie. They were fan-freakin-tastic. And that, most of all, is what makes McDonald's so evil.
So, back to the couch and the Dateline and the being hungry. As we are leaving for a short vacation tomorrow, there was nothing in my house to eat except things that I was far too lazy and stuffy-headed to make--you know, like bags of lentils, flour, frozen chicken breasts. I was looking for something more along the lines of Top Ramen. Or even better, Cup o'Noodles, which only involves the teakettle, and not an actual pan and/or other dishes. I considered going to Safeway, but the thought of wandering around aimlessly under bright fluorescent lights, and then coming home and actually preparing something was unappealing.
That's when I started thinking about french fries. French fries and a Sprite. It sounded so good and salty and greasy, and before long I couldn't stand it, I was obsessively thinking about french fries and every commercial seemed to be for, like, Carl's Jr. or something. It seemed so easy...I wouldn't even have to get dressed. Just pause the Dateline (I heart DVR), jump into the car, buzz through the drive-thru, and before I know it I'm back home on the couch with my grease-stained bag and frosty beverage. It's the American way, right?
In order to understand the even slight reluctance I had to actually follow this plan, you have to realize that I live in a family of hippie freaks. My sister has been a vegetarian since she was five, and my mother actually prepared a second meal just for her for thirteen years. We grew our own food growing up, our own eggs, even our own beef (the slaughter of which cows is directly related to my sister's vegetarianism). My mother gives me looks of horror when she sees half-drunk Starbuck's cups in my car, for cripe's sake. They don't approve of corporations. They have a subscription to AdBusters. I haven't actually eaten McDonald's in over ten years. The last time was once in my senior year of high school when my parents were out of town and I stopped at McDonald's for breakfast on the way to school. I know, I know, I was such a rebellious teenager.
Of course I've had some fast food from time to time since then. Just not McDonald's. There were a couple of late night stoney trips to Jack-in-the-Box during college, one of which memorably ended without the actual food. We just paid the money at the first window, happily bypassed the second picking-up-the-food window, and were on our way. Needless to say we were extremely disappointed once we got home, minus curly fries and plus one ravenous case of the munchies. And anyone who hasn't had an In-N-Out burger at some point in her life simply hasn't lived. But McDonald's? Oh, no.
However, such was my mania for french fries at that precise moment, that I was willing to betray even the most sacred family tenet: Thou Shalt Not Eat Corporate French Fries. Off I went, in my sweats and sock feet. In all fairness I did try to at least go to Carl's Jr instead of the heretical Golden Arches. But after idling in front of the darkened menu board for a good two and a half minutes, I had to reluctantly admit that they were closed. Nothing for it but Mickey D's. I crossed the street and pulled into the parking lot. And here's where the fates, or the gods of the organic food movement, or maybe even, in some weird omnipotent way, my mother, began to conspire against me. I could not find the entrance to the drive-thru. I saw the exit, I knew it existed. I could see people inside ordering, and I saw the front doors, but I couldn't go inside to order because I had no shoes on. I circled around the parking lot, cursing under my breath, got back on the main boulevard and tried the driveway next door, a Super 8, thinking I could circle the back and cut into the drive-thru line that way. No luck. Instead, I ended up in a maze of parked big rigs which were separated from the neighboring McDonald's by a high chain-link fence. I started to panic. I should have already been back in front of Dateline. this was not working out as planned. But I refused to return home empty handed. After all, wasting gas driving around for no good reason is even worse than wasting it in getting fast food, right? Right? Finally, I found the entrance, a good quarter of a mile from the actual McDonald's building. And for good reason. Do you have any idea how many people are out getting french fries at eleven o'clock on a Monday? It's staggering. The line was at least eight cars deep. I cursed french fries and the commercials on prime time TV that prompted me to crave them. I cursed my own weakness. I worried obsessively about the CO2 emissions emanating unnecessarily from my idling car. Finally, I handed my five dollar bill through the window, and was handed back a gloriously delicious-smelling paper bag. As I pulled away, I grabbed some french fries out of the bag and took a ravenous bite. I wish I could say I should have listened to my mother. That they were a disappointment. That they weren't worth selling my good family name for a dollar-seventy-five. But it would be a lie. They were fan-freakin-tastic. And that, most of all, is what makes McDonald's so evil.
Friday, August 3, 2007
Living a Still Life
I've been wanting to write a post about the title of this blog for a while. Still Life With Roses. The truth is, the meaning behind the title is a little cheesy, in an inspirational-poster-with-a-soaring-eagle sort of way. Or a monkey hanging on to a fraying rope. "Hang in there" and all that. The thing is, I feel like I've been living sort of a still life. Stagnant would really be a better word, but then it doesn't have the cute double entendre that "still life" does, and thus the title of the blog wouldn't really work. Although it could be "Stagnant Pond with Lilies" or something. Anyway.
I live a perfectly adequate, somewhat respectable, existence. I'm married to someone I truly love, and that's nothing to scoff at. We own a fairly successful business, we live in a cute little house with a big front deck, my sister and brother-in-law come over on Sundays for barbecues, my brother and I go kayaking together on weekends. Really, I have nothing to complain about...except that I feel like I'm living someone else's life. Or rather, my own life, but a life that should have expired, or grown or transformed or something a long time ago. Nothing happens for me. I've been trying to continue with my post-graduate education (I won't go into the specifics of it just yet) for years, literally years, but something--starting a business, completing surprise prerequisites, bureaucratic red tape--always comes up to postpone it. From the outside I'm a well-educated, world-at-my-doorstep young business owner. From the inside I'm someone unqualified for anything relating to what I really want to do, helping with a business that was my husband's dream. I feel like I have no more of a career than I did when I was a twenty-year-old waitress who slept in until noon and rolled into work at six o'clock in the evening. This isn't me.
Of course, the biggest roadblock in my life, the one that hurts so much that I have to pretend like it doesn't exist in order think about my life a year from now, five years from now, twenty years from now. I have no children, and it becomes increasingly clear to me each passing month that babies are not anywhere in my near---or maybe even distant--future. This was bearable when only a few people we knew had children, but now, when even my six-years-younger and unmarried (at the time) sister is surprise! expecting, and when meeting your friend at the farmers market, or a couple you've known for years at a baseball game, now involves spending hours with the object of your most secret desires, it has become a dominant factor in my life. I pretend not to hear when people ask me when our little one will be coming. I try not to act insanely jealous when my mom talks about my sister's baby, everything she has saved for her first grandchild, the room at her house that she's fixing for it. I try not to think That baby should be mine. I wanted it first, I wanted it so much. But each month slips away, taking with it the likelihood that my sister's baby will have a cousin its own age. So I smile, and knit my niece or nephew all the baby things from patterns I've been saving for my own child, and go overboard planning the baby shower so that no one will suspect how resentful I am inside.
What does this have to do with the roses? After all, the name of this blog is Still Life With Roses, not Still Life with Whiny Barren Bitter Lady. Well, here comes the aforementioned cheesy part. I needed a project for this year. This yet another year where school has been postponed, where no baby is expected, where no fulfilling and high-paying career is being offered to me. Really, I need something to make me...well, get over myself. I mean who out there is living their dream life? (Please don't answer if you are.) So this blog is my project. Something to make me realize than even in a still life, there are roses. (Hey, I warned you about the cheesiness.) So I want to write about the roses in my own life: my husband, my family, my knitting and books and garden. Okay, not my garden, because I don't have one, but if I make one, I'd like to write about it.
I live a perfectly adequate, somewhat respectable, existence. I'm married to someone I truly love, and that's nothing to scoff at. We own a fairly successful business, we live in a cute little house with a big front deck, my sister and brother-in-law come over on Sundays for barbecues, my brother and I go kayaking together on weekends. Really, I have nothing to complain about...except that I feel like I'm living someone else's life. Or rather, my own life, but a life that should have expired, or grown or transformed or something a long time ago. Nothing happens for me. I've been trying to continue with my post-graduate education (I won't go into the specifics of it just yet) for years, literally years, but something--starting a business, completing surprise prerequisites, bureaucratic red tape--always comes up to postpone it. From the outside I'm a well-educated, world-at-my-doorstep young business owner. From the inside I'm someone unqualified for anything relating to what I really want to do, helping with a business that was my husband's dream. I feel like I have no more of a career than I did when I was a twenty-year-old waitress who slept in until noon and rolled into work at six o'clock in the evening. This isn't me.
Of course, the biggest roadblock in my life, the one that hurts so much that I have to pretend like it doesn't exist in order think about my life a year from now, five years from now, twenty years from now. I have no children, and it becomes increasingly clear to me each passing month that babies are not anywhere in my near---or maybe even distant--future. This was bearable when only a few people we knew had children, but now, when even my six-years-younger and unmarried (at the time) sister is surprise! expecting, and when meeting your friend at the farmers market, or a couple you've known for years at a baseball game, now involves spending hours with the object of your most secret desires, it has become a dominant factor in my life. I pretend not to hear when people ask me when our little one will be coming. I try not to act insanely jealous when my mom talks about my sister's baby, everything she has saved for her first grandchild, the room at her house that she's fixing for it. I try not to think That baby should be mine. I wanted it first, I wanted it so much. But each month slips away, taking with it the likelihood that my sister's baby will have a cousin its own age. So I smile, and knit my niece or nephew all the baby things from patterns I've been saving for my own child, and go overboard planning the baby shower so that no one will suspect how resentful I am inside.
What does this have to do with the roses? After all, the name of this blog is Still Life With Roses, not Still Life with Whiny Barren Bitter Lady. Well, here comes the aforementioned cheesy part. I needed a project for this year. This yet another year where school has been postponed, where no baby is expected, where no fulfilling and high-paying career is being offered to me. Really, I need something to make me...well, get over myself. I mean who out there is living their dream life? (Please don't answer if you are.) So this blog is my project. Something to make me realize than even in a still life, there are roses. (Hey, I warned you about the cheesiness.) So I want to write about the roses in my own life: my husband, my family, my knitting and books and garden. Okay, not my garden, because I don't have one, but if I make one, I'd like to write about it.
Saturday, July 28, 2007
In a Moment
Today, somewhere, a young girl had her first glorious, awkward kiss. A mother held her baby in her arms and wondered at the softness and the curve of his tiny head. A sixteen-year-old came home waving his temporary license triumphantly in his hand. A man gave his silken and beveiled daughter away to the man of her dreams. Somewhere today, the last word of a first novel was typed with a flourish, someone signed the papers to buy her first home, and someone played the guitar on stage to a roomful of ardent fans. And somewhere today, someone was having the worst day of her life.
I spent this day in near-halcyon summer bliss: at a water park on a hot day with my husband and friends of ours. We ran around like children, screaming as we slid down the knee-shakingly steep slope of "The Avalanche" ride, laughing and chatting as we floated lazily under the hot sun in the slow-moving lagoon. We ate soft-serve ice cream, and got slightly sunburned, and afterward we went out to dinner and ate crab legs and shrimp and clam chowder with cheddary biscuits. And while we were doing all of this; while we were living a day as carefree as one almost never has after one enters adulthood, a little boy lost his battle with cancer.
When I heard the news from my dear friend, upon arriving home from our summery day at the waterslides, that her young friend had at last slipped into that last long night, the thing that kept running through my head was to wonder: what was I doing at the exact moment that he breathed his last breath? At the moment his mother realized that it was truly the end? At the moment the doctor pronounced those words "time of death", so irrevocably? Why was it me that got to savor those licks of butterscotch ice cream, those delicious cool dips into bright blue water? Why me, when this little child deserved it so much more?
I did not know this child personally, but I have a small small inkling of the massive enormity of the grief his loved ones are feeling, after having watched family members survive the accidental death of their toddler two years ago. I didn't then, and I don't now, know how to process this type of brutal unfairness in the world. The arbitrary decision that an innocent life be cut short before having that first kiss, that chance to accomplish something great, to fall in love and have children of one's own. The arbitrary decision that some parent must survive the unthinkable: the death of her child. If this is the sorrow necessary for the existence of its counterpart, joy, I sometimes wonder if it is not too high a price to pay. Can good ever justify its own existence, if evil is a necessary requisite?
I spent this day in near-halcyon summer bliss: at a water park on a hot day with my husband and friends of ours. We ran around like children, screaming as we slid down the knee-shakingly steep slope of "The Avalanche" ride, laughing and chatting as we floated lazily under the hot sun in the slow-moving lagoon. We ate soft-serve ice cream, and got slightly sunburned, and afterward we went out to dinner and ate crab legs and shrimp and clam chowder with cheddary biscuits. And while we were doing all of this; while we were living a day as carefree as one almost never has after one enters adulthood, a little boy lost his battle with cancer.
When I heard the news from my dear friend, upon arriving home from our summery day at the waterslides, that her young friend had at last slipped into that last long night, the thing that kept running through my head was to wonder: what was I doing at the exact moment that he breathed his last breath? At the moment his mother realized that it was truly the end? At the moment the doctor pronounced those words "time of death", so irrevocably? Why was it me that got to savor those licks of butterscotch ice cream, those delicious cool dips into bright blue water? Why me, when this little child deserved it so much more?
I did not know this child personally, but I have a small small inkling of the massive enormity of the grief his loved ones are feeling, after having watched family members survive the accidental death of their toddler two years ago. I didn't then, and I don't now, know how to process this type of brutal unfairness in the world. The arbitrary decision that an innocent life be cut short before having that first kiss, that chance to accomplish something great, to fall in love and have children of one's own. The arbitrary decision that some parent must survive the unthinkable: the death of her child. If this is the sorrow necessary for the existence of its counterpart, joy, I sometimes wonder if it is not too high a price to pay. Can good ever justify its own existence, if evil is a necessary requisite?
Sunday, July 15, 2007
Obligatory First Post
Here it is, my obligatory introducing-my-blog post. Of course, knowing exactly what aim I myself have in writing this blog would help in introducing it, but the fact is, I'm not really sure what that aim is. I love to knit and will probably talk about it and share pictures, but I don't think this will really be a knitting blog. I love books, reading them and writing about them, but this won't really be a book blog. I read endless mom blogs and probably identify with them more than any other type of blog, but as I don't have any children, this definitely isn't a mommy blog. I guess what I want, and what really appeals to me about blogging, is the intimacy of it, the glimpse into someone else's life, that spark that makes you feel less alone. The form of communication, while quintessentially modern, is so timeless in it's slowness, it's attention to detail. The blogs I love to read are like letters from a good friend. In fact, I think blogging fills a void that the Victorian art of letter-writing, or the childhood idea of a pen pal left empty. And as a hopelessly nostalgic person, this appeals to me greatly. And so, having read many lovely or funny or thought-provoking letters from so many of you, I thought that it was time I sent some letters back. As none of you have any idea that I exist, I certainly don't expect you to read them. But they'll be out there. Posts (or letters) about my knitting, books I love, my yearning to be a mother, simple ruminations about my day--I'm opening myself up here. And as soon as I figure out how to make some of these blog friends people speak of (how does one go about that, please?), it can feel like a real correspondence. Until then, you can find me here.
On the bedside table: The Road by Cormac McCarthy
On the Sticks: "Climbing Lattice" dishcloth (Leisure Arts Pattern by Patty Kowaleski)
On the bedside table: The Road by Cormac McCarthy
On the Sticks: "Climbing Lattice" dishcloth (Leisure Arts Pattern by Patty Kowaleski)
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