kerouac says

if you were listening to michael hirsch on the brian lehrer show last friday, that was me asking about seymour hersch's ACLU address, and the assertion that young people were raped at abu ghraib. i managed to be less than articulate, but it wasn't really about me, so i guess that's okay.

i spent the weekend in massachusetts, sort of wrapped (initial typo: warpped) in a quiet familial bliss. my friends who have a great marriage just had a great baby. he's five weeks old, so new he still sort of smells like a Greater Power and AD&E ointment. the marrieds were so good to each other in what must be one of the top ten trying circumstances ever: the no sleep, constant feed and fuss newborn. the guy plans his day around doing small nice things for her; she gratefully accepts the help and doles out kindness and praise at regular intervals. it was all so good.

that, and the fact that we had sort of a necessary talk vacation while i was in new england made me think the monkey and i would be back on our better, newer page when returned to the city and we could finally chat on the phone. no. it was perhaps too late and i was inordinately grumpy about how hot the apartment was (really, though, it was ninety seven degrees in here when i got back--absolutely disgusting). he burned through his niceness waiting for me to get over the heat, and then we couldn't make our ends meet. we ended up hanging up sort of helplessly. i'm really lost on this one. i would really like for it to get better soon.

too few years ago today, this country recognized women's right to vote.

you may want to celebrate by registering to do so.

and if you're in new york looking for a way to protest on sunday, these guys could use the help.

seriously, bob marley is dead?

i got caught on the phone at work the other day. my work involves finger puppets of great artists of all stripes, and someone called wanting to know if we'd ever thought of making a bob marley puppet. and i mentioned that we rarely do puppets of people who are still alive for licensing reasons, and she let me in on a little secret.

i cannot believe i am still this uncool after all my years of tortuous self-improvement. bob marley is dead?

it's interesting to me that sometimes i can't tell whether i'm getting happier, or my standards are slipping, or if there's a difference. for instance, i've only had one drink tonight, but i just told the world goodnight out loud and that i loved it, and it made me really happy. there was a time when it would have made me wash the puke out of my sweater.

did i sleep funny on my back, or wake up with kidney pain?

is this a reaction to a night of bad sleep caused by relationship discord, or a reaction to actual bacteria?

will i have to visit the emergency room with no health insurance? reader, stay tuned.

today i am that girl who brings a large salad from home for lunch, complete with a light and lemony homemade dressing. i am hardly ever this girl.

the monkey is worried about me because our phone conversations seem to end sort of dispairingly. and it's true; i am not a big fan of whatever is going on right now. the whatever is equal parts loneliness and general bad feeling coupled with a strange awareness that after over a year of permanent roommate, him being gone is just not quite right. the days are fine--even inspirational, what with projects! and cleaning! and cooking! and crafts! but the evenings are sucking butt.

today i am also the girl who cries on the stoop. perhaps she needs an ice cream bar to go with her salad.

god. when did jason bateman get so irresistably foxy?


i'm, um. lonely.

let me tell you about tonight. tonight i am going to dye my hair. and take a bath. i bought pedicure implements and a tube of mudde masque, which i think is french for mud mask. i am also going to eat a light soup and salad dinner and then watch a movie with a few glasses of bourbon. after tonight is over, i'm going to sleep in and then get out of bed and play with my birthday presents.

eat it, rest of the world.

yesterday was my birthday. it went about as well as a birthday goes when you're relatively new in town and by yourself. there was a giftie from my mother in the morning--which, while it isn't something i needed or would have thought to want, betrays a heart-warming amount of forethought and doting. the monkey called pretty early on. i had to spend the day at the gift show, but made up for it by buying myself a tutu from one of the exhibitors, who makes princess outfits for grown up big girls. if you're wondering, it's black net and has a large red flower on it. i'd stopped for non-convention center food before coming in, including cupcakes. the best one regaled me after work with martinis and appetizers, and a sweet gift so kind and so unspeakably perfect that i cried a little on the subway home. that part was pretty great. i've missed her, and we have a good time together. i forget that i'm hungry for it.

i called the monkey from the train. perhaps i should have waited.

we got into it. i guess, to be fair, i got us into it. i asked about his first day of rehearsal out in the far midwest--and i swear to dog, i really wanted to hear it. and actually, i liked hearing. it's just that i'd been feeling so alone, and so unsuccessful, and i know, cry me a hudson river, but . . .

he said this thing about his costume fitting, and about how his costumes were beautiful and fit so well, and i wondered how it was that they fit. did he send his measurements in ahead of time? no, he said. they called the costume shops at the last two big professional theatres he worked in and got the info. after all, he noted, it had only been a year or two and he was still roughly the same size.

without mucking about in all the self-pity that i was unable to control at the time: something rubbed me funny about it only taking a year or so for the dynamic of our respective careers, if i can use that word without upchucking, to return exactly to where they lay in seattle. same shit, different coast. i'm home eating lentil soup and answering phones; he's getting paid six hundred dollars a week to try on a fur cape.

so, yeah, i'm exactly that shallow. if i were less sick of thinking about the fight we had last night, i'd write something about how i'm not envious of him per se, just sad about being reminded of my lack of satisfying work. it all came out last night, though. and the worst part of it was that when i got over my selfishness and told the monkey that it was okay, i was sorry i said something resentful, but i was feeling really lonely and could he please just say a paragraph or two about how he loved me?

no paragraph, not even after a few requests. spose it serves selfish, envious girls right, in a sense, but i was deep blue disappointed. it's not jake to hear what someone needs and leave them hanging, even if you're hurting for adjectives, or shy, or tired. not if the person is me, and you're you.

it's weird to be suffering the after-anti-glow of a big blowup, or a serious disappointment, and realize that you feel both justified and responsible. i probably shouldn't have poked the badness with a stick for so long if i didn't want it to bite me. but i don't think what i asked for was unreasonable, and it bugs me way deep down that the monkey gives up in the face of frustration when his best girl is still in need.

anyway. i still really like the tutu, but it looks less good when you feel like crapola.

i'm back.

it doesn't help that the path to our apartment from JFK takes you through some truly unattractive areas of queens, and that august is particularly gross smelling, and that two people shoved me on the train trip home, but i was not really happy to be back that day, no matter how joyfully my heart lept to see the monkey. it was so plain on my face that less than a block from our door, at the end of the hour long series of public transpo that gets us home from that airport, he blurted out i'm sorry you don't like it here.

well, i was sorry, too. but something magical has happened over the last two days. yeah, it's a rude awakening from the dream that is seattle, and yeah, i'm never going to like the weather or the garbage or the rudeness, but . . . i got sucked back in. in a good way. new york did its thing, and i drank the kool aid, or whatever happens when i'm here, and today i'm back to feeling like new york is a secret the west coast never gets to understand. i feel like an exchange student, a missionary, an ambassador--and not because i've got something good to preach, but because i'm living among so much difference. it's weird here, but it's home. and as much as i reminded myself every five minutes while back west that i can move home in five-to-seven years if i want to, i'm glad to be here now.

okay, already. here's just a few until i figure out how to do the rest.

me and my bridesman:



the vows:



with our madrina:

we had the grandmother over for dinner last night, from the nursing home. this visit marks my first time seeing her in eight years. everyone did such a good job preparing me for how far downhill she's skated that i was actually pleasantly suprised. she still gives a good hug, can crack a joke on occasion, and wants to hang out. that's about it for pleasant anything, though.

nursing homes are awful. this one isn't even so awful, it's just awful to share a glorified hospital room with someone you have nothing in common with. there are a few demented folks on the same ward, and there's a lot of television noise. jerry springer is the last thing you want to hear in that place, too. like the smell isn't depressing enough.

so we bring her home for a homecooked meatloaf, and of course she doesn't want to go. my dad gently gets her things together and brings her to the car. during the mutual-support dance required to get her hundred and thirty pounds into the passenger seat, her arms locked around my dad's neck, she turns and quips, "we'll be doing a two-step next. stick around."

we got to the home, got her laboriously changed and into bed and situated and goodbyed. and she throws up. poor lady; the one good thing that happens to her all week is coming home for home-time, and apparently the evenings nearly always end in vomit. richer food, more of it, later hour, the one quarter of a beer we poured for her--i don't know what it is, but my dad, who'd been a little short with her at times in the evening, patiently cleaned her up and patter her hand like she was . . . well, me. we drove home mostly quiet. i rubbed his neck a little. i wish he had someone to talk to.

the wedding. it all happened. the bride and groom were enormously relaxed--my mother, who was helping with the flowers, was amazed that everytime she asked the pretty princess to approve the boquets, she said, "oh, whatever you do is fine." she was also amazed that the bride didn't feel it necessary to wear containing undergarments under her very slight silk charmeuse dress, but that's my mom.

my father was the life of the reception. not only did he kick the groom's butt on the wedding morning bike ride, but he danced more than anyone else, and mostly better. i love my dad with my whole freaking heart.

i'm glad my parents come to these things with me. my friends have done me a service by getting married on successive years, in low-key woodsy ceremonies as full of teamwork and fun as a child's dream of kindergarten. i think my parents think of weddings as things that happen outside churches, now, and are perhaps ready to be ready for something less traditional.

i did get a few questions about the monkey. a few nudges. i gave my stock answer about how we're in it for the long haul, and have talked about how we'll get old side by side, but in retrospect i feel a little itchy about perhaps having said more than i meant to, or alluded to the Big Marrying Act without naming it per se. it's really a conversation i should have with him first, although i'm in no hurry. i'd hate to think i insinuated to a large group of friends that i'd be marrying the monkey when--as much as i know we're on the same page--i haven't actually said it to him.

it's not something i want the idea of to be old hat, if and when it finally comes around.