Time Machine Poll

So, um, yeah, I posted on Craigslist about historical figures you'd like to have sex with, but there was a heated debate going on about whether or not it's ok to pee in the shower (the general consensus among people on Seattle Rants & Raves is that, yes, this is perfectly normal).

At any rate, no one was interested in considering the sex possibilities of the long dead.

One woman emailed me directly to get the title and author of the book that prompted my question and one guy posted saying that at first he was going for Cleopatra, but then got distracted by all the probable personal hygiene concerns of screwing around with people from most periods of time. I have to admit to some concern about teeth myself.

So, here's some random pics of my dogs instead.

Chewy being adorable as a young puppy.

Pixie playing in the snow. Think it must have been the infamous East Coast "Blizzard of '98". We probably shouldn't have cut her hair so short that winter.

Peanut, being curious about the camera,

which is very unusual 'cause she'd mostly run away.

Lastly, Mattie, the only boy.

Later, folks.

Random Stuff

Well, it's been a really long time since I walked out of a job interview feeling as good as I did today. Let's all hope I'm not delusional and it really did go as well as I think it did. Won't hear anything until next week......

In the meantime, the book I read yesterday morning, The History of Lucy's Love Life in Ten and a Half Chapters was absolutely and totally hilarious. I highly recommend it!!!!!!!

So, of course, I have to ask the question: If you had a time machine and could go back and spend a day & night talking with and having sex with any three historical figures, who would you pick? I'm thinking of posting a poll on Craigslist as well and will share the results with you later if they are interesting.

Me? Man, I'm having a hard time picking!

• Albert Einstein is pretty up there.
• Mozart?
• King Henry V (not the VIII - yuck!),
• Casanova?
• Michaelangelo?
• I briefly considered Shakespeare, but he was pretty awful to Anne and what if you went back for Shakespeare and discovered he was just a front for Marlowe after all? He's also not the most attractive of men.....
• Shelley? Percy & Mary AT THE SAME TIME!!! I think at least one romantic poet should be in there.....
• Oh, Blake! Except for the whole insanity thing.....
• Peter the Great?
• Dante?
• Galileo?
• Julius Caesar?
• Plato?
• Aristotle?
• Jesus?

It's kinda hard not to consider some women as well..... Helen of Troy? Cleopatra? Catherine the Great?

So many choices, huh? It's a fun game to play.

New Look

Changed things up a bit, obviously. I mean, those of you that know me will understand -- how could it be my blog with no blue??? Clueless as to why I choose the brown one in the first place, but it was starting to depress me. This one is happier, I think. Why do people think red & orange are happy and blue is sad???? I've never understood that. Blue is clearly more happy. The header is almost exactly the same color blue as the fuzzy socks I'm wearing right this very second.

Another career possibility I have ruled out: food photographer

Think of me tomorrow at 11am Pacific Time when I'll be sitting around getting grilled by three PMs......

'Night

Food for the Body vs. Food for the Mind

Or is it Food for the Soul? hmmmmm.......

Anybody remember the movie Mermaids? One of the little touches that I loved in that movie was that the mother, played by Cher, only cooked hors d'oeuvres. Yum. This is an excellent diet, especially when you live by yourself! If only it wasn't so hard to spell...... I was tempted to type 'canapes' instead. And, yes, I did have to look it up and, no, I had not spelled it correctly on the first try.

So, earlier today, when foresting through my kitchen in search of breakfast, lunch, and dinner, I was inspired. I had a wheel of the smoothest, softest, yummiest Goat Cheese Brie. I had some delightful smoked salmon. I had about half a box of Roasted Garlic Triscuits. You can see where this is going, can't you? Sounds yummy, doesn't it? You are getting hungry, aren't you? The salmon makes it healthy, right? So it's pretty much the perfect food. But proper hors d'oeuvres always have one last layer, don't they? Think about it..... cracker, cheese, salmon..... something is missing, isn't it? Black olive tapenade or something like that would have been my first choice, but, alas, I am all out. Large green olives stuffed with garlic? Too strong! Aha, bacon!!!!!! Everything is better with bacon. And I mean everything, including chocolate donuts. I'll hear no arguments on this point.

So, I set the bacon out to thaw and then go on my merry way, visions of the culinary festival waiting for me at the end of the day.

My merry way takes me, of course, to the bookstore. I have a perfectly good stack of unread books, as I'm sure you all do as well, but nothing strikes my fancy and after my reading binge of the last couple of days, my "on deck" backlog is looking alarmingly thin. My personal theory seems to be screw the canned goods and bottled water, at least have enough unread books on hand to wait out the aftermath of the apocalypse.

I buy seven books, but the two that immediately catch my attention upon returning home and settling into my one uncomfortable chair (the one with poor lighting and no back or neck support) are:

• The History of Lucy's Love Life in Ten and Half Chapters (A comedy in which Lucy steals a time machine and tracks down the great lovers of the past - Casanova, Byron, that kind of thing. In other words, literary chick lit) by Deborah Wright and
• The Good Good Pig: The Extraordinary Life of Christopher Hogwood by Sy Montgomery.

[As an aside, you'll note that I've removed the section about what I'm reading from my blog because, frankly, I can't keep up. There's every reason to believe, barring any unforeseen phone calls, that I'll finish all seven of the books I bought today by the time I go to bed tomorrow..... I'm a glutton, I know.]

The pig book is shorter so that's the one I chose, thinking I don't want to be in the middle of a Really, Really Good Book when 8 o'clock rolls around and it's time to flip back and forth between the Biggest Loser and American Idol. When your life is as full as mine, you really have to plan these things carefully, you know.

Well, I finished the pig book promptly at 5:15 to the sounds of my grumbling, rumbling tummy and my softly falling tears. This was such a sweet book about such a great pig. I'm a total sucker about animal books, you know. Yes, not to spoil the plot, but he does die at the end after 14 wonderful years with his wonderful people, and yes, I'm not kidding, it made me cry. Boo Hoo for Christopher Hogwood, a really good pig.

And what better way to top of a good read than with some delectable hors d'oeuvres?

Ack!!!!! Bacon!!!!!!! How, oh how, can I eat bacon after reading such a charming, wonderful pig book??????? I'm faced with an absolute dilemma, obviously. My tasty treat would be horribly incomplete without that final topping and I've been humming about it in the back of my head all day. Yes, yes, yes, I suppose I could get re-dressed, hop in the car, go to the store, and get some black olive tapenade after all. But what am I going to do with this package of thawed bacon? Honestly, I can't just throw it away - I love bacon! I adore bacon! I dream of bacon! I wish I could marry bacon! Other people fantasize about dripping chocolate on their lover's..... well, enough about that. The point is, throwing away bacon, really, would go against everything I hold dear.

So, of course, I make the hor d'oeuvres with the bacon and they are totally and completely fantastic in every way. But I feel the need to say a blessing to all the piggy brethren of Christopher Hogwood who have sacrificed so much so that I might have my complete and perfect hor d'oeuvres. I'm raising my water bottle in salute right now, I promise.

Thank you for my towers of tantalizing tastiness.

Don't want to jinx it.....

.... so I'm almost afraid to say anything, but I did get a call back late yesterday for a second interview to take place on Thursday morning. Yippee! That gives me some confidence that I badly needed, I think. The next interview will be with three PMs, which can be a much tougher crowd than the hiring manager, so wish me luck. Meanwhile, the search continues just in case.

On other fronts, I have been sorely lacking in both creativity and motivation the last couple of days. As a fairly benign form of escapism, went on a book binge - eight light fiction books in the last three days. Not one of them sparked anything that made me want to write or post anything interesting. Now my back really hurts from sitting in my one super uncomfortable chair. Sigh. If I get a job soon, a comfortable chair will be one of my very first purchases!

Later.

Improbabilities

My horoscope today on msn.com:

Today's Cancer Horoscope for Jan 26, 2008
A fascinating article that you read in the newspaper could inspire you to try to create a mystery story of your own, dear Cancer. Today your mind is perfectly suited to thinking up twists and turns of plot, and interesting but complex characters. You could tell the story to children, or you might even decide to actually turn it into a novel. Jot down your ideas, and look at them again tomorrow. Then if you want to continue, go for it!

I ADORE horoscopes that are this specific, not withstanding the fact that I

1. haven't read a newspaper on a Saturday since moving to Seattle;
2. don't like to read mysteries;
3. have no interest whatsoever in creating a mystery story, being instead all science fiction-y right now.

Still, I am trying to write, so obviously this horoscope must be true for me, right?.

What I really like is the idea that all the Cancers in the world will get the urge to write or tell (to children?) a mystery story today. According to GeoHive Global Statistics, the population of the world as of January 26, 2008 is 6,646,342,046. Leaping to the assumption that the zodiac signs for this population are equally distributed across the 12 signs, there would be 553,861,837.1666666667 people inspired by reading a newspaper to create a mystery story with lots of plot twists and complex characters. Wouldn't that be just excellent on so many levels?

Some of you may remember to my shame and horror that I share my July 6 birthday not only with Nancy Reagan, but also with our current president, George W. Bush. It's not something I like to brag about. On the plus side, I can also claim Sylvester Stallone, the rapper 50 cent, and the current Dalai Lama!

Oh, how truly excellent the world would be if all the famous, infamous, and obscure Cancers across the world were compelled to create a mystery story today, but specifically this small group! That's the mystery story I would like to write: The mystery of the day George Bush, Nancy Reagan, Sylvester Stallone, 50 cent, the Dalai Lama, and Susan Libby all sat down to a newspaper and were inspired to write a mystery story. The creative exercise of imagining what type of mystery each of these characters might create would be more fun than a human should be allowed to have! Shall we all be killed off in mysterious circumstances and finally the hero realizes at the end after much detective work, that the only thing that ties us all together is our July 6 birthday and our mystery writing? Fun, fun, fun!

Would you accept....

.... as an excuse that I am honoring the Writers Guild of America strike in solidarity with my writerly brothers and sisters??????

okay, okay, okay

I have absolutely, positively nothing to talk about right now. I'm blank. But Meg just sent me a funny kick ass message that I needed to post RIGHT NOW, so here I am. Does this count as posting? Hell, yes, this counts!

Hey, I have an actual interview for an actual job tomorrow so send good thoughts my way.

'Night.

Even More Silliness

Just now - and by that I mean just 15 minutes ago - I was driving home from my walk and there was some construction that forced me to take a detour. Hurray for me, as I discovered not two blocks from my apartment this treasure:

WAH Long Sports Bar

-- Chinese --

I'm dying to know what goes on in a Chinese sports bar!

Heated Mah Jongg matches?

Large gatherings for the annual World Ping Pong Tournament?

Is it the not-so-secret headquarters for the Burien arm of the Chinese mafia?

If you were, say, Korean, would they let you in?

I'm so curious, I want to sit in my car late one night and stake the place out just to see who goes in there. Or I want to post an ad on Craigslist for a Chinese guy to take me there on a date.

Or is it just a regular sports bar with Chinese food? Is there are large market in Burien of people who just can't get enough beer, basketball, and sweet & sour pork? Enough to support a whole sports bar? Did they run out of money and couldn't afford to put "Food" in the subtitle?

You can't really see it from the picture, but on the window there's a large arrow pointing to the side that says "Beer Garden" which cracks me up because China is famous for its Beer Gardens.

Is the owner named "WAH Long"? If so, why is the "WAH" part all in caps? Does it mean something in Chinese, like "VERY Happy Sports Bar"? Because in English, of course, it sounds kind of sad, like the kind of place where there's bowling on TV in the background and Journey (Open Arms) playing on the jukebox and you can cry like a baby over your beer as long as you like. I'd like it very much if it did mean "VERY Happy Sports Bar" and even better if the owner's name was Mei Hat Phun. Of course, if it were named the "Mei Hat Phun Sports Bar" it would frequently be raided by the renowned Burien police force.

It's kind of kitty cornered across the street from "A New Beginning" which, from the gatherings in the parking lot, appears to be a place for Overweight, Blue Collar Bikers with Bad Skin in Recovery to hold 12-step meetings. When the 12-step meetings are over, maybe the Overweight, Blue Collar Bikers with Bad Skin go over to WAH Long Sports Bar to drink Chinese green tea (they really, really need the antioxidants, don't they?), play dominoes, listen to Journey, eat really greasy egg rolls, and cry like babies 'cause they can't drink a beer. Mei Hat Phun is really pissed 'cause they don't order any liquor so she's losing money. She says to them all the time, "Get out of here, you cheap big fat bikers with bad skin!" but she says it in Chinese, so they assume she is saying, "Welcome to my VERY happy sports bar, bikers in recovery. Please, drink more green tea."

The very existence of a

WAH Long Sports Bar

-- Chinese --

makes life worth living.

DISCLAIMER: No Chinese were offended by the making of this post. I emailed a draft to the Chinese Consulate in DC, the Seattle Chinese-American Friendship League, and to some random guy on Craigslist who looked kind of Chinese and asked if it was offensive in a racist kind of way. Only the random guy responded on behalf of all Chinese people. He didn't really say whether he thought this post is offensive, but asked for my bra size and whether I was opposed to a very specific and detailed sex act. But if it were offensive, they all surely would have responded and said so by now. So, I am entirely confident that this post is not offensive and that the Chinese have an excellent sense of humor.

More on Silliness

Here I am dancing like Elaine from Seinfeld at Sulli's 5th birthday party this weekend. I look eight months pregnant in that shirt, don't I? It makes me wonder again if I should have had children. It's true that being around children (and dogs and cats and my sister and my brother) make me more apt to be a goof.

If I had had children, would I be more likely to laugh every day?

Well, that's just an impossible question, isn't it?

Meg is right, that I probably do laugh & play more than I think I do. But it's hard not to think of those very long stretches of time alone in my apartment doing whatever it is I do, when I'm almost never laughing or even smiling. Sewing my stupid monster has made me smile more than normal. Speaking of which, I haven't been waking up at 3am since I started sewing, hmmmmmm. In fact, I've been sleeping very deeply - so deeply that I wake up almost disoriented.

Last night, I watched a very funny romantic comedy on TV that turned out to be also very sexy. I sewed while I was watching and snacked on about a half a box of Cracklin' Oat Bran cereal. So, this morning I woke up vaguely disoriented, horny, constipated, and my fingertips hurt. The fast and full life of a single woman in the city, right?

I continue to find it hard to give myself permission to have fun and play when I don't have a job. As I'm sitting here typing, there's a pretty loud voice in my head telling me I should be working on finding a job right this very second. In fact, I should be working diligently at finding a job pretty much every second of every day and all these other activities, like writing and walking and whatnot, need to stop right now, missy! And the fact that I'm sitting here right now writing this and spent several minutes this weekend dancing with a bunch of little kids is just further proof that I lack focus and discipline.

Well, fuck that! I think I can spare, say, two hours every day to do something fun that makes me happy. Ouch, but my two hours is up for today, so yeah, I'm going to stop this now and get on to the serious stuff 'cause I really, really, really need a job!

Later.

"I'm just laughing because I can."

That's what Sulli said to Jackson in the back seat of the car the other day. They were intentionally irritating each other, as siblings do, when Jackson accused Sulli of laughing on purpose just to annoy him!

I've been running this phrase around in my head the last couple of days because I like the way it sounds. And I think I need to just laugh more because I can. I don't think I've been laughing enough. Not just recently, but for a long, long time. I'd like to giggle more. I'd like to laugh so hard at some silly thing that I can't stop and my eyes tear and I pee my pants a little. I'd like to be more silly in general in a child-like way. I'd like to play more. From the outside maybe it looks like I've been playing for the last five years, but I soooooo have not been playing at all. Whatever it is I've been doing during this time has been very little fun and certainly not playful.

So, send me some stupid jokes people and I'll promise I'll laugh no matter what, just because I can!

If you look at it one way, I've sort of been playing this week. In the creative sense. No, I haven't posted in the last couple of days, but I have been writing for an hour every morning, and then job hunting stuff for an hour or more (which is totally not play). I've been walking, eating, and sleeping. I haven't given up any of my regular activities for my current project. Well, except for napping, which is a sacrifice, but anything in the name of art, right?

What I have been doing is sewing. Yes, you heard me, I said SEWING! I don't know why I get this bug up my ass to sew every couple of years, especially since I'm so bad at it. And don't particularly enjoy it. And it always gives me that going up the roller coaster feeling -- "Shit, shit shit. Why am I doing this again?"

Like that year around December 10 when I decided to make Christmas stockings for every member of my staff with their name sewn on with ribbon. Something like 12 stockings needed to be done in 8 days for the office party. Now that was a stupid idea!

What I've been working on this week is not stupid. But still, sewing????? It all stems from talking about and thinking about my inner monster. I tried to go to the store and buy something that worked for me, but nothing was right -- they were all too cute or associated with a specific character with traits of it's own. Or even if they weren't cute, they just weren't hideous enough. I tried to write about my monster, but there are some things that defy language. I tried to draw it, but it was too flat. So, me, I had to decide to sew it. And yes, I have created a truly hideous monstrosity, but I like it.

It has been an exercise in creativity and play. Well, the actual sewing has been pretty damn laborious, but the process of deciding how it should look, selecting the fabrics (I can't believe how many truly ugly fabrics you can buy!), what traits my monster has, how to portray a sense of sharpness with fabric - these are all interesting challenges. Several of the books on creativity I've been reading lately also talk about how bursts of creativity can come from routine, autopilot sorts of activities - driving, cooking, sewing, knitting, bathing, exercising. There's some evidence that you can trick your brain by routinely engaging in these kinds of activities to spur on the creative process. Particularly with activities that are sensory and tactile -- some sort of left brain/right brain thing -- you suddenly find yourself with a great story idea or some solution to that work problem you've been facing.

At any rate, I'm not laughing at my monster -- to me it's a very serious thing -- but still, it was fun and playful and creative to make it. It's not completely done yet.... It needs two more tails that look like scorpion stingers and an eye in back so it can see in all directions. But it's close enough. I have all sorts of complicated psychological reasons for wanting you to see it, I'm sure, but mostly I'm just proud I made it, which does make me giggle a little at the silliness of spending several days making a stuffed creature for myself as an adult. I guess I'm hoping that someday I'll be able to laugh at it.

You'll just have to trust me that even a photograph does not do justice to its repulsiveness - too many of the details don't show up properly. My nephews think it's FANTASTIC! I'm thinking of taking pictures of it all over town and making an alphabet book out of it.....

My monster rides an Alligator.

My monster plays with a Boat.

My monster does not eat the Cat.

PS - Start thinking about your next Halloween costume! I have just enough fabric left, I think, to make a truly awful cape or maybe a hat. A set of wings? I think I can say with all confidence that no one else will be wearing anything like it. The bad news is that something in the furry fabric makes me itchy and my eyes swell up. I'm allergic to my monster. My monster is toxic. Ha Ha.

Practical Stuff

Today has so far been all about real life. Yesterday, I met with a consultant named Beth Herrild that I met through my sister, who gave me a lot of insightful input on my resume and job search, so that's what I've been focusing on this morning. She also emailed me several contacts and I've been busily introducing myself to them. Keep your fingers crossed! I'll keep you posted.

If you eat....

..... chocolate pudding with a Nutter Butter instead of a spoon, you can almost put yourself into a small coma of bliss.

I can't think of a name for this one

This morning, I tried to do a specific writing exercise in longhand. It went badly. It was awkward, painful, and the results wholly dissatisfying. I have been focused on just writing for the sake of writing, to express myself and for the discipline of it, but this exercise made me try to write well and that stopped me. I was intimidated and self-conscious and angry about it. And the exercise was very specific about length (600 words, no matter what, then stop and walk away) and that just drove me crazy. I couldn't get to 600 words with a gun to my head on this exercise.

Plus, I wasn't interested in the topic. I had promised myself I would start at the beginning of this book of writing exercises and just do each one, start to finish. But the first one wasn't particularly interesting to me today - it was a mistake to approach it so linearly - I should have randomly picked an exercise that would have let me tackle what was actually in my head this morning. It was an exercise ultimately about 1st person narrative voice.

What was in my head this morning was the outline of a science fiction story that I was semi-dreaming up in the middle of the night. I don't think I could actually write it right now - I think to do it well, it would take some research about stuff I don't know a lot about. And, of course, now that it's morning, all kinds of self-criticism is rushing in and I think the story has already been written in many ways and much better than I could. At any rate, much of the reading I've been doing lately has some underlying theme of Faith, so that's where I think it's coming from.

Here's the idea:

A brilliant Chinese mathematician or physicist working at a US university writes a formula proving theoretically that time travel is possible. That it is mathematically possible to travel faster than the speed of time and not against the laws of physics. I don't know yet why it's important that he's Chinese, except that he's Buddhist.

His work makes it's way to the internet, where it is happened upon by a very wealthy, very egotistical, very vain man who has been searching for a way to become famous. Not just famous, but immortally famous - a man who changes the world. He finances a team to build a vessel that can withstand the physical demands of the trip. Some how it is possible to pick not only the time, but the place where they will "land". He decides that he we go back with a group of select experts and try to prove or disprove the biblical accounts of the life of Christ. He himself doesn't care at all whether anything about the life of Christ is true - he has no faith - he just thinks that being the person who proves or disproves will make him the most famous. Because his motivation is fame, the expedition is highly public, not secret.

The team he assembles includes a biblical scholar, an historian specializing in the time period, a linguist who is "fluent" in ancient Aramaic. I put fluent in quotations because I think one of the problems of the expedition will be of language - that what we think we know of the spoken language of the time and region will be wrong. Also, I think they will bring a physician. I'm not sure who else - 6 seems a good number for an expedition back in time. Maybe 10. All of these people surely will have their own hidden agendas. The plan is to all wear hidden cameras all the time and film the life of Christ, so maybe there needs to be a videographer who is supposed to stay with the ship and receive / catalog all the camera feeds. I think they will try to land one year before the birth so as to find Mary or Joseph and get into the right position and then they intend to stay for five years after the crucifixion to follow the major disciples.

Most importantly, the expedition will include the six-year-old granddaughter of the financier. She will be the narrator telling the story from some distant point in the future. I think her parents are dead and the grandfather is her guardian and his decision to bring her is very controversial.

I think they will bring a bunch of goats, so that when they "land" they will be rich. Having a bunch of goats on a time-travel vessel will be funny. The granddaughter's job on the ship will be to tend the goats. None of the other travellers will really have much to do with her, since they are all big experts caught up in their own agendas and all.

I have a bunch of different endings or outcomes of the expedition, but the important thing is that none of them answers or implies an answer to the question, "Is the life of Christ as presented in the Bible true?"

Here are some of the possible endings:

• There's a technical problem and they come back to the wrong time and can't get to the right time. No one has the right equipment to view the films they have made or to make the equipment to view the films they have made. Everyone thinks they are crazy.
• They come back insane and entirely unable to articulate what they have seen.
• They come back never having been able to find Christ or anything related to what they had been looking for.
• The films are viewable, but somehow there is no audio, so they don't make any sense.
• Only the granddaughter returns, with no films, and she is completely mute. Or she can only speak a version of ancient language that no one can understand. Maybe she's killed off the rest of the expedition or abandoned them in the past to prevent the truth from coming out.
• They all return and have viewable films, but are immediately killed by the Chinese scientist on whose work the whole trip was based.
• They all return and have viewable films, but no one cares. What if, despite their best conscious efforts, they did change something in the past, so that when they return, the answers to the religious questions they went to answer are irrelevant.
• They all return and have viewable films, but they are all carrying an ancient virus - they themselves have built up some immunity by eating the food and drinking the water in the past, but no one that comes in any contact with them or their ship or their films and everyone starts dying - maybe they are eventually quarantined, but it's too late - the population of the modern world is wiped out. Maybe it's a metaphor -- that either disproving or proving the life of Christ will somehow kill faith and, therefore, literally kill all the people.

I think these last two may be my favorite endings. There's more possibilities and lots of questions, but I just got a phone call that interrupted my train of thought and I'm bored with the whole thing now.

Later.

The Life I Should be Leading

Well, the Life I Should be Leading certainly does not include 3am Nutter Butter binges, that's for sure!

Yesterday, I started Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortenson & David Oliver Relin. Mortenson is a hardcore mountain climber who fails on an ascent attempt at K2. He gets disoriented and lost in the mountains and wanders into a very remote Pakistani village, where he stays for a while to recover. He is inspired by the children of the village and vows to return and build a school for them. He raises money in the states, comes back, builds the first school, meets all kinds of great people, learns many important lessons along the way, starts a foundation, and now has built 55 schools -- especially schools for girls -- in very remote areas largely run by the Taliban. Up until this fateful trip when he discovers his life's work, he lives in his car and works part-time as an ER nurse just to finance climbing expeditions.

I love to torture myself with books like this. I've got some deluded sense of self-importance going on that says I should have been doing something meaningful and heroic during all these wasted years. I should have been serving with dignity and grace in some horrible, remote, desperately poor place, preferably some place very, very dangerous.... maybe some place with terrible factions led by evil warlords that I have to outwit and enormous mosquitos and lots of dirt. But, even sweaty and dirty and probably starving, I will be beautiful, of course, because of the purity of my mission. On the cover of the best-selling book I write about this mission is a breathtakingly beautiful picture of me wearing a head scarf. I have very luminous and pure eyes.

The very dangerous thing about this fantasy for me is that it leads to an insidious dissatisfaction with the possibilities available to me that aren't Grand and Meaningful and Important. I'll have to ask my siblings, but I suspect that we each have a small voice in the back of our heads telling us we should be living Big lives.

Hmmmm, live in a one bedroom in Burien and be a manager somewhere or Sacrifice Myself to Save Needy People in some God-Forsaken Place. It contributes a great deal to this paralysis and it's got to stop. I've got to let go of the Life I Should be Living and live the life I am living. Well, I am, of course, living the life I am living, but I'm not living it very well, am I? Right this very second, though, I think I am living it the only way it can be lived.

Hey, by the way, I didn't eat any more Nutter Butters today!

Uh Oh!

I don't want to write this morning. Yes, I woke up at 3am for no apparent reason again. But I didn't write.

This is my nephews' new favorite phrase, "For no apparent reason." They say it all the time and it invariably cracks me up. My dad was in town for the holidays and we took the boys to the Pacific Science Center one day. There was supposed to be a holiday train in one of the other buildings that we were trying to find, so I had the four-year-old on my shoulders when he exclaimed, "We're just wandering around in the frickin' rain for no apparent reason." He's sometimes a very world-weary boy that makes me laugh so hard. I like to watch them both discover a new word or phrase and test it out over & over. Their joy at language and discovery is inspiring.

So, at 3am, I was starving and craving some really bad food. And since I've been very careful about my eating, I had no really bad food in the apartment. I didn't roll over and force myself to try to sleep some more. I didn't get up and force myself to try to write something. I didn't get on Craigslist. I didn't pick up the book I started last night. I absolutely, positively did not try to analyze whether I was really hungry or whether I was empty in some other way. I didn't try to find some not really bad food instead. No, I slipped on some jeans and a sweatshirt over my pj top and went to the 24-hour Walgreens two blocks from my house. It was surprisingly full of people for 3am. Or maybe not so surprisingly. Maybe there's a whole host of lonely, empty people wandering around 24-hour markets at 3am all over the place, every night. And, I learned, I didn't even need to put on jeans -- I would have fit in perfectly in my pjs. Maybe I'll have to go back again tomorrow to see if the same people are there or if it's a whole new group.

I got some Nutter Butters and some chocolates. Oh, and some chocolate milk to wash it all down with. You can make a pretty damn fine sandwich with Nutter Butters and Ghirardelli Intense Dark Espresso Escape squares. I ate some sandwiches and then crawled back into bed and tried to force myself to sleep some more. You'd think I would have gotten on the internet then, all fortified with really bad food, but, no I just wanted to crawl back under the covers and pretty much just stop thinking.

Here I am now, on a post-binge come down, not wanting to write, trying to tell myself it's just premenstrual cravings and not something deeply meaningful. Which brings me back to the phrase, "For no apparent reason". I think I'm trying to convince myself that I can say, "I went to the store and gorged on really bad food at 3am for no apparent reason." Are you buying it? I feel the need to point out that I did not eat all the Nutter Butters nor all the chocolates. Which means, of course, they are sitting right in front of me right now, but I'm not eating them right now. Although, since they are here, there's virtually no chance I'll go the rest of the day without eating some more. Maybe a whole bunch more. I don't know yet. But I can a least recognize that I won't be eating them for no apparent reason. That's good, right?

I can't begin to tell you how much I don't want to think about it any more right now, much less write about it. There's a pretty good chance I'm going to read a book now, but not a good, demanding book, eat some Nutter Butters later, and some time later fall into a really bad food stupor that I will call a nap. Great day. Oh, and it's raining.

Cresting the Hill

At one time, I really, really loved going to amusement parks and riding roller coasters. My all-time favorite is the Giant Dipper at the Santa Cruz boardwalk in California. It's one of those older, rickety, noisy, terrifying wooden coasters that used to be on every top 10 list. It's been around since the 1920s, but every time you ride it, you are just sure it's going collapse. It shakes, especially on really windy days. The summer I was 13, I rode that coaster ALL DAY one Saturday with my hands up in the air. I was so proud of myself and I still count this feat of daring as one of my major life accomplishments.

One of the most terrifying and exhilarating parts of this ride is that it starts by immediately going down a steep hill in a very dark tunnel. And I mean dark. You have no idea if a turn is coming or (my own secret fear) some sort of support beam is going to smash you in the head. No one to my knowledge has ever been smashed in the head, but this is what I'm afraid of. I always duck during this part, which reminds me of a car game we played as children, where we ducked when we went through a tunnel (or was it that when we held our breath? No, I think you hold your breath when you pass a cemetery and lift your feet when you go over a bridge.)

Then you finally emerge into the blinding California sun after what seems like forever to start that long, slow climb up the first big hill. On this and every other coaster I've ever ridden, I find myself on this first big climb all hunkered down with my eyes screwed shut praying, "Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit, oh shit. I'm such a moron. I'm such an idiot. This is stupid, stupid, stupid, shit. Why did I do this? What was I thinking? This is the stupidest, scariest thing I've ever done. Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit..." And then you crest the hill and Wheeeeeeeee!

Yeah, so of course this is a major metaphor for where I am right now as I'm sitting here after waking up at 3am again covered in sweat. Maybe it's just menopause, but I wish I could remember what I'm dreaming about.....

I have come out of the terrifying, cold, dark tunnel (I hope!), but I'm stuck slowly climbing that first big hill and all I can think is "Oh shit". I keep hoping to crest and get to the fun part and let go, but this is just the longest hill ever. I think I have actually forgotten what that absolute exhilaration of the crest feels like and have just spent some time checking out how much it would cost to fly from Seattle to San Francisco or Monterey or San Jose, rent a car, drive to the boardwalk, ride the Giant Dipper over and over and over again until I don't need to anymore. As if joy is a physical memory that I have forgotten and desperately need to remember. I want to go today! But the park is closed for the winter. Sigh.

I have this idea that I used to be brave -- fearless even -- but I'm not any more. I'm not sure either statement is entirely true, but that's the idea I have. The last time I rode any kind of roller coaster must have been between 10-15 years ago. A bunch of old friends in their late 20s/early 30s all called in sick one day to our various jobs, drove from Washington, DC to Hershey Park, PA and spent the day riding rides, bitching about the crowds & lines & annoying teenagers (which is fairly ironic 'cause I'm pretty sure we may have been just as obnoxious that day), drinking too much and what not. (And by "what not" I'm pretty sure that I mean there was some pot smoking going on.) I mostly remember that I didn't ride some rides I wanted to ride because the man who would become my husband didn't want to. He'd had lower back surgery for some ruptured disks and it would hurt his back to whip around the turns and I didn't want him to be standing there all alone watching everyone else have fun.

That night we saw Aerosmith play at the park and got home around 2am. I think we all made it to work the next day, which I'm very sure I couldn't manage today. It was a very conscious regression back to the carefree days of some other time that we all remembered so vividly but that never really existed quite as beautifully as we remembered. Weird 'cause I don't think any of us had been to an amusement park together, but this day of playing hooky represented some sort of freedom and lack of responsibility to all of us. Pretty soon, this particular group stopped hanging out as a big gang so much, started focusing on work more, started getting married and having babies and generally growing up. Pretty standard stuff. At any rate, the crowds, lines, costs of the amusement park no longer seemed worth the fun. I don't know about the rest of the group, but I think I became too afraid, too risk-averse, to really enjoy it any more.

Not to totally change the subject, because somehow I think it's related in the sense of What do I need to do to crest the hill?..... Yesterday I posted that "Yeah, but" exercise about writing and my sister posted a comment with a point-by-point counter argument. And then she called me to poke holes in my irrational thinking some more (Hey, I never claimed these fears weren't totally insane and stupid!). I love my sister, by the way, and think that she is one of the few people in our wider family who is emotionally brave. I don't know where she got it from 'cause neither of our parents are particularly brave in that sense.

So anyway, when I think about that list I made, a lot of those things I don't hear in my own voice. I hear them in my mother's voice, her father's voice, my father's voice, his mother's voice, the voices of various teachers or other authoritative figures. I've been carrying these voices around for a long time and can't wait to let go.

Here's what I hear in my own voice and it's so scary it couldn't even make the list: That by writing I will reveal or make visible this awful, hideous, deformed, misshapen, ugly, monstrous, terrifying Thing inside of me that I've managed to keep successfully hidden all these years and all the people I need to love me will suddenly coil in disgust and hate me and I'll be shunned and isolated and destroyed. Ack! Where the hell is that coming from? I mean really, I've thought some forbidden thoughts, but nothing bad enough to warrant THAT. Talk about irrational! And then I think, "Well, DUH STUPID! Isn't that what everyone is afraid of?"

So this thing, writing, that I've very carefully NOT been doing for so very long, I have somehow come to believe will destroy me when in fact it may be the thing most likely to save my life. OK. So destroy me. Bring it on. It's not like I have a whole bunch of really fantastic stuff in my life to hang on to! Wheeeeeeeee........

Yeah, but....

My life has not been so very great in the last couple of years, so about six months ago, I decided I needed some help and started therapy. [Shout out to my therapist, Peter, who has been great and very helpful].

Peter gives me homework some times, which I almost always hate. I'm very resentful in a petulant, immature way, because the homework makes me think about things I don't necessarily want to think about. Sigh. But I make myself do it anyway because I'm invariably a good little student and don't want to disappoint him.

At any rate, I had 4 assignments this week. Yes, I know! What a demanding ass. 'Cause I'm so busy job hunting (or avoiding job hunting) and reading Craigslist and taking long walks in the woods and everything else that fills my very, very full days...

My Assignments

1. Write my intentions for 2008
2. Do a "Yeah, but" exercise about writing
3. Interview the fear (of writing)
4. List things I want to / can write about

I got totally stopped by the second one and cannot do the 3rd & 4th right now. Instead of "releasing" me in some way, the second one just stopped me cold. So, for some reason, I feel compelled to share the results here for the record. Maybe so I don't lose it?

In this exercise, you are supposed to write some strong, simple declarative sentence about yourself or something you want to do and then write "yeah, but" and try to identify all the ways in which you are resistant or blocking yourself. Here's mine:

I want to write

Yeah, but......

• I can't make a living as a writer
• I'm not good enough - I don't have any talent
• All of my writing is trite and cliched
• No one will want to read my writing
• It's just too hard and exhausting
• I'm boring
• I have nothing of interest to say
• I can never finish anything
• Some things I write may hurt people I care about
• I'm not disciplined enough
• If I were truly a writer, I should be more compelled to write and should have been writing all these years
• If I get a job to support myself (which I really, really need to do), I won't have the time or the energy to write
• I'm too private and don't want to expose myself emotionally so I can't write anything GOOD
• Writers (and other artists and creative people) are essentially selfish people, which I don't want to be
• I am not brave enough
• Only award-winning "high" literature will do. If I can't win the Pulitzer or the Booker or the National Book Award, what's the point? Travel writing, romance novels, science fiction, erotica, essays, blogs, etc. are all not good enough.

That's all for now. Maybe I'll add more later. But for what it's worth, here it is for the record.

Fear and Resistance

My parents told the story throughout my life that when I was two years old and asked the inevitable, "What do you want to be when you grow up?" I invariably answered, "I'd like to be an author." No princess fairy queen ballerina for me!

I'm 43 now and have had no clear vision, purpose, meaning for my life for as long as I can remember. Somewhere after leaving the precocious toddler stage, my life became ruled by other things. Fear, resistance, excuses, the need for money and security all joined forces to squelch that early clarity. I rarely write, except in a work context, and when I do write for pleasure, I never finish what I start.

I have been reading Callings: Finding and Following an Authentic Life by Gregg Levoy and at about 3am this morning, waded through the section on Synchronicity - meaningful coincidences - before finally drifting off to sleep. I awake (late & lazy), get on the computer to begin my daily job search and to skim the entertainment on various parts of Craigslist (my preferred method of procrastination and distraction from what I SHOULD be doing these days). The first headline that catches my eye: Lose Weight by Writing. Have you noticed the date? January 9. I am a woman, ergo, I have a New Year's resolution to lose weight. Hmmmmm, lose weight by writing......

I finish my morning perusal of Rants & Raves and take off for my regular "I'm unemployed and killing time" errands: Cheap gas & cigarettes at Costco and a visit to the bookstore. An acquaintance has recommended a novel by an author whose last name begins with 'Y' so I'm way at the end of the fiction area and sitting on the shelf directly in front of the book I am seeking are two books stacked. Someone apparently picked them up from the next section (all the books on getting published, becoming a writer, releasing your creativity - a section where I studiously never go) and this unknown person has changed their mind and set them right here in front of the book I am seeking.

You Know You're a Writer When.... by Adair Lara

The 3am Epiphany: Uncommon Writing Exercises that Transform your Fiction by Brian Kiteley

Synchronicity. It's all a little woo woo for me, but..... OK, yes, I'm a smart woman, but sometimes I do need to be hit over the head.

So here I am. You can consider this a New Year's resolution as well, I guess. That I will do my best to write something -- ANYTHING -- every day. Maybe some days I'll do specific writing exercises, maybe some days I'll write about my life, maybe some days I'll only manage a sentence (something along the lines of "Fuck, I don't want to write today" I imagine).

Why a blog and not a secret writing journal? Well, it's just too easy to cheat and be lazy if it's secret. I'm approaching it like other resolutions, like losing weight or quitting smoking. I'm doing it for myself, because I need to do it, but I need a support system to keep me honest. So, I will tell a few key friends and they will come visit this site - it doesn't really matter if they read the postings or if they like the postings (or dare I say, think my postings are small droplets of absolute brilliance). The point is they will bug the shit out of me if I'm getting lazy or fearful or resistant and not posting.

Is it my calling to be a writer? Who the hell knows? All I know is that it can't possibly be a bigger waste of time then reading Rants & Raves compulsively for two hours every morning.