Category Archives: Weather, Seasons, & Celebrations

Book Browsing

So naturally now that I have a lovely big pile of books of and about Norse mythology, I’ve decided I’d rather be reading fiction.

This necessitated a spontaneous trip downtown to second-hand bookstores, where I found four (yes four) out-of-print fantasy titles, plus a Terry Pratchett book (who sells off their Pratchett?), and a nearly-new copy of a recently published book. Then as I wandered through Chapters with my notebook, taking down more titles to look for in second-hand shops, I came across a discounted hardcover edition of a title I’d noted down almost a year ago. Yay me.

What a gorgeous day; it was so nice to be strolling city streets. Everyone’s in a much better mood come the beginning of summer. It won’t last long, of course; soon everyone will moan about the humidity and the heat. Until then, however, I’ll enjoy the sun and the smiles.

On Birthdays

When I was a child, I was thankful to have a summer birthday. I was shy, and didn’t have very many friends; the thought of being chased and given birthday bumps, or having a parent come in with cake and juice, the way others did, terrified me.

Now that I’m an adult (and I think I can safely use that word, since I’m past thirty), I have about a dozen close friends, and having a summer birthday is a pain. Why? Because my friends, being adults with jobs and families, now go on vacation on and around my birthday. My big thirtieth birthday picnic was cancelled because of this; last year fell apart and ended up being a smattering of people at the pub; and now, this year, the same problem is cropping up. Even though I deliberately decided to plan for an earlier date to avoid the problem, it doesn’t matter; over half the people I wanted to ask will be unavailable or elsewhere.

I give up.

We made Skippy choose another birthday, because his fell too close to a major holiday and was inevitably swallowed up or forgotten. I’m beginning to think I ought to do the same thing.

Bitter? No. I’m honestly pleased that I have so many close friends who mean this much to me. Frustrated? You’re damned right. I finally get to the point where I want to host a party for myself, and I’m thwarted.

I give up.

Be Nice

Grumble grumble grumble.

I’m working on being social again, I truly am.

For example, I might venture out of my home to the bank today. I hear there’s this thing called Sun outside.

Woe betide anyone who actually tries to talk to me on the way, though.

The crazy thing is I’m in a good mood – so long as I’m by myself. Introduce another human being into the mix and I’m snarly again. Thank whatever deity you currently subscribe to that I have an on-line journal, so at least you all know I’m alive, because e-mail and phone calls are right out. I appear to have no patience with the human race, and it’s nothing personal, honest.

If you are an alien disguised as a human, accept my apologies for judging you by your cover, so to speak, and no, I still won’t be able to play nicely.

Grumble grumble grumble.

On Coincidence

I had the joy of spending Victoria Day outside with a few good friends at a spontaneous picnic. Simple pleasures: roast chicken, a few different kinds of fresh bread, warm strawberries, grapes, cool drinks, and total relaxation. All stresses were forgotten as we nibbled and laughed and played with my lovely goddaughter, who had more energy than the adults lazing about. Plus, I got a bit of sun, which, if you’ve seen my milky-pale skin, is a blessing. I no longer look like a creature of the night.

I happened to stop in at the secondhand bookstore around the corner and brought home quite the find: a copy of Connie Willis’ Lincoln’s Dreams. I’m a huge Connie Willis fan. I am not, however, a fan of charging $9.99 for a two hundred page book, and for some reason I never picked this one up when it was cheaper. (Actually, I know the reason: I’m not a Civil War fan.)

Well, apart from being immensely smug about scoring a Connie Willis book secondhand, I discovered that this book fits right in to my life at the moment. It’s not about the Civil War. (Well, sort of, but it’s a means to a different end.) It’s about dreams.

Now, I love how Connie Willis examines the whole what-is-real perception of reality, and time-travel, and life vs death. At this particular point in time, however, when part of my attempt to solve my sleep problems involves recording dreams, this particular book becomes even more fascinating. Especially since I’ve started noticing that every once in a while, I “dream true” – I’ll write something down in my notebook when I wake up, and a couple of days later something very much like it happens in the real world.

There’s no such thing as coincidence, I’m fond of telling my students, since everything’s connected by energy of various sorts. I’m also a Jungian, which means that I subscribe to that whole collective unconscious idea. I also think that our human concept of time is a construct to make our lives easier, sort of like democracy. So, why can’t someone start picking up the dreams of a man involved in the Civil War? What’s to stop me from having the odd dream about something that (in our childlike perception of “linear time”) hasn’t happened yet? Why does man stubbornly insist that memory only stretches backwards, because he has experienced it? We know the future exists, because today was yesterday’s future. By extension, we’re living in someone’s past.

Mankind places a lot of weight on what is verifiable by sensory proof, and yet is incredibly subjective about other concepts that require faith. Some are inviolate – of course it’s true, even though it cannot be proven – and others are flatly dismissed without even a second thought – that’s impossible. It’s absolutely fascinating to see how uneven we are, and how strongly we’ll defend certain ideas, yet obstinately push away others. Man’s a hypocrite. A loveable, frustrating, contradictory, inconsistent hypocrite.

More Powerful Than You CAn Possibly Imagine

Never underestimate the power a single lightbulb can have. No, that’s not a pun; I’m serious. Yesterday I picked up two of those new-ish GE Reveal lightbulbs, the ones with a faint blue-violet tint to the glass. I put one in the light that hangs over my computer, and there’s a world of difference. It’s much more like natural light.

My next trip to the hardware store will involve the purchase of a club-pack of these things to put in every single socket in the apartment. I’m not kidding.

My husband made an official date with me to see Matrix Reloaded tomorrow after I teach. I anticipate much gleeful geeking out with colleagues next week, just as much geeking as X2 got. Well, maybe not; Matrix Reloaded doesn’t have Hugh Jackman, after all. Keanu’s just not in the same league, you know?

Puttering

I’ve had a busy couple of days: renewing my health insurance card and my driver’s license, doctor’s appointments, grocery shopping, lunches and barbeques, and a full-blown Beltaine ritual that was a bit late but wonderful nonetheless. (Kudos to my husband for solo-leading a ritual for over twenty people for the very first time, and for giving me shivers when he read the Charge of the God.)

In various waiting rooms, I began and finished Marion Zimmer Bradley’s The Forest House, which I hadn’t read since it came out. I remember being disappointed with it at the time, and I can’t understand why, now. Perhaps because I read it directly after I finished The Mists of Avalon, which is altogether a very different book.

We’ve finally constructed and arranged the various bits and pieces of furniture we picked up at Ikea this weekend (hot tip: if you have to go to Ikea, do it at 9 AM on a Saturday morning. There is no one there. No one. It’s spooky.). We now have a pantry, and a cabinet under the bathroom sink, and a cupboard to store our towels. The best of all: we have a hanging iron rack for our pots and pans. I’ve always wanted one of these.

I still feel restless, and I can’t sit at the computer for more than about fifteen minutes at a time, which rather limits the amount of work I can get done. If it were sunny out, I wonder if I would feel more focused, or just as unsettled.

Happy Birthday!

Today is my black and white cats’ birthday! Yes, Roman and Maggie are twelve years old today. And if you think I didn’t sing Happy Birthday to them, you’re mistaken.

This was a weekend of feasting, and I still feel stuffed. We had sushi on Saturday night, and last night we went over to the South Shore and my father-in-law made his famous barbequed ribs for Mother’s Day. There were suspiciously few bones among the ribs; there just seemed to be plenty of tender, juicy meat heaped on the platter. Not that I’m complaining.

My own mother, on the other hand, spent Mother’s Day in Rome. My parents have finally taken a two-week trip over to Italy, as they’ve been wanting to do for a while now. The last e-mail my dad sent me before they left included an attachment of a photo he’d taken, of my mother reading my blog. So of course, I just had to post it:

How self-referential is that?