Category: Sentiment

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Awesome Beginnings Being a girl Drew Friends Games Humor Memoir Nonfiction Sentiment

Throwback Thursday: Memoir

I pulled this gem off my old LiveJournal. I’m actually surprised (but very grateful) that I still remember the password.

This is from August 5, 2005. I’m really working hard to restrain from editing. (Oh, and as far as I can tell, the title means nothing but was probably the angstiest word in the song I was listening to at that exact moment.) Enjoy!

==

COLLAPSE

I have been at UC Davis for three years, and the number of things that I have exclaimed “Yes, let’s do that!” and then never done is astounding. Here is a brief list of examples:

1. Run through the maize maze (Woodland?) in the fall.
2. Gone, with any sort of regularity, to the Farmer’s Market. (And “But it’s SATURDAY MORNING” is no longer an excuse, as they have Wednesday evening FMs for which I know I am awake.)
3. Mini-golfing…Scandia…Sacramento…wherever.
4. The Davis Public Library: If I’m missin The Babysitters Club, they’re only a couple blocks away.
5. The MU Games Area.

Until tonight.

A bunch of us went to go bowling. It’s cheap, it’s accessible, it’s fun, it’s not too athletic (heaven forbid we do something cardio), and we all claimed to be bad at it. (Which was a huge lie, be careful of Drew, he will try to hustle you, but he’s bad at hustling.)

As far as I can see, bowling is bowling (*unless it’s $1.35/game and $.85/shoes*) and I thought it was all going to be very…familiar. Bowling. Ugly shoes and socks with shorts (what else could possibly be hotter?), and people watching your back, golf clapping for you whenever you turn back around but secretly chanting “gutter ball!” to themselves.

HOWEVER, UC Davis, well-known for several things, cows and a ginormous library being not the least of them, also features a “Rockin’ Bowl” to put all other “Rockin’ Bowl”s to shame.*

*Note: Writer has never actually been to any Rockin’ Bowls, nor does she know whether the term is “Rockin’ Bowl” or “Rock & Bowl,” but frankly, neither does she particularly care, and if you are still reading this, maybe you should just marry editing if you love it so much.*

So it seems to me that “Rockin’ Bowl” is made up of 4 main components. I will go through these for anyone who is unlucky enough to have never experienced the majesty.

#1. The music. Already loud when you walk in, and louder when you descend into the bowling pit, I mean area, it is turned up by a kid who can’t be older than 18 who tight-rope-walks down someone’s gutter to crank up the volume on the speakers sitting mid-lane. The number of times this exchange occurred is more than I want to remember:

*something unimportant*
“What?”
*repeat something unimportant*
“What?”
*repeat something unimportant, again, and louder, and also in a slightly embarrassed tone*
“What?”
“Never mind, it wasn’t that funny.”
“WHAT?”
“NEVER MIND!”

Then both parties would pretend to have heard the other, and that bit of conversation would be over.

Oh the glory.

#2. The music videos. Four large projection screens plummet from the heavens, and for the next…I don’t know how long it lasts. From then on, music videos are played on these screens. Music videos for songs whose names I only vaguely recognize. Music videos that are not nearly as clever as Britney Spears’ “Lucky” or Blues Traveler’s “Run-Around.” Music videos with angsty-looking men whose voices remind me sort of Phish, except I’m not thinking of these men as fondly as I think of Phish.

If I wanted to watch music videos, I would have been sitting at home whining about not having MTV. Or I would be going to Erin’s gym to “work out” and watch TV. It would not have occurred to me to go to Rockin’ Bowl at the UCDMU Games Area.

#3. The lights. Strobe and disco, namely. As soon as the fluorescents dimmed and the colored lights began to spin and I began to think about maybe getting a headache, I was also transferred immediately back in time to high school dances. (Probably more middle school, honestly, because in high school I went to 1 dance that was not a prom or formal (neither of which seemed to feature strobe lights to the degree of your everyday school dance), and I left that 1 dance pretty early.) So, middle school dances. So why was my impulse, on the strobe lights, to make out with someone? I was definitely not doing that in middle school.

Hold up, I wasn’t doing that in high school, either.

#4 and finally. The fog. I didn’t notice it for awhile (or maybe it didn’t get going until a little bit after the lights, etc., made their appearance on the scene), but once I did, I was transported to the backstage area of the Mondavi Center, kneeling on the ground, with my head in the Coke machine, filling it with fog so that the guy who played Eddie could trip over me to get in it before all the fog drifted out and we missed his entrance.

It’s funny that I “hated” Rocky Horror so much while it was going on, but now I can totally look back fondly and think “Awwww. Backstage at Mondavi, dressed up with Katie and Tyler and Eric. How cute. And foggy.”

So while, for a minute or two, I was thinking to myself, “Man, I suck at bowling…good thing I’m good at mini-golf,” I spent some time post-our-game checking out the other people playing, and I realized that most people are not that good. Except for this one girl who got three strikes in a row, I saw on her screen. There was a little cartoon of bowling-pin Caesar in a chariot. But I digress. I don’t think that the UC Davis Memorial Union Games Area is the place to be super-concerned about your bowling skillz. (I am, frankly, more worried about my inability to write “skills” instead of “skillz.”)

So all in all, I guess I learned a good lesson tonight.

And that lesson is, remember to bring socks so I don’t have to wear socks that I find in the backseat of the car, socks that dump sand everywhere when I turn them right-side-out.

Oh, and I also learned not to stress about my bowling abilities.

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Beginnings Being a girl cars Friends Games Humor Memoir Sentiment Technology Travel

Back in my day

In high school, I sucked at sports but my friends didn’t. So in order to hang out with them, I kept stats for the softball and girls’ basketball teams. Kind of dorky, but it was fun, and I was good at it, and I have a lot of good memories of away games (and home games too, for that matter).

But things would be very different if I were doing this in 2013. For example, two vanfuls of girls used to drive back from an away game in Ukiah or Willits or Fort Bragg or Colusa or wherever. When we got back to the high school parking lot, the one coach (a father of one of the girls) who had a portable phone would unpack this briefcase so we could all call our parents to come get us. The reception was terrible (likely the fault of the isolated county, and not the briefcase phone).

GCScover

 

Oh, the good old days.

An even better example – but one that it’s possible I’m slightly misremembering – is the time we were headed up to Hoopa for a big annual softball tournament. (I think it was softball.)

hoopamap

This was a very exciting event for us, not least because it was so far away, and we would have to spend the night, and we could probably also fit in a trip to the big mall in Eureka. (No mall in our hometown!)

(I loved the Bayshore Mall growing up, but now Yelp gives it 2.5 stars and calls it a “small town mall.” Ouch.)

The way I remember it, we drove all night long, but now that I’m looking at the the driving time and everything…we probably just left early in the morning. I was in a car with our chemistry/physics teacher, beloved by everyone, his wife, and his daughter, who was on the team. Side note: I love everyone in their family. They were and still are awesome all around.

I remember sitting in the backseat in a pile of blanket and pillows, and driving through the dark. Marilyn was asleep in the far backseat. (Like I said, it was like 2am…right?) There was some weird station on the radio and they were playing Dr. Demento and some other similar song, and the only part of it I remember is an increasingly insane “Poppies poppies poppies poppies!”

When the internet first became the thing that it is today, I searched for that song a little bit, but now I think I prefer not to ever find it and know what it is.

It was pouring rain and I guess it eventually got light outside but I don’t really remember that part. I do remember arriving in Hoopa to find out that the fields had been completely flooded and the tournament was canceled.

I guess there was just someone hanging out at the school, telling everyone that it was canceled. And probably, they made some phone calls in the morning when they had to cancel the tourney. But if the only number they had was the school, and no one was at the school…and none of us had cell phones that the calls could have been relayed to anyway. So we made the entire probably 5-hour drive for no reason.

Well…not NO reason. We did go to the mall and go shopping and get lunch or whatever.

And then…we drove back home. I guess.

We were in Lakeport this weekend and so I’m being sweetly sentimental about a lot of late-90s/early-2000s things. But, I’m also very happy to have internet and a smartphone and all the improvements technology has brought into our lives. I’ll even take the complications.

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Baby Being a girl Drew Family Love Memoir Nonfiction Sentiment

Happy 1st Father’s Day!

When I was pregnant, Drew and I did not find out the sex of our baby – we wanted to wait. But for some reason, during those 9 months, we both had a strong intuition that it would be a girl. Which means no one was more surprised than we when B was born and Drew announced, more astonished than ebullient, “It’s a BOY.”

B was born just after midnight, which means that aside from being tired from the hours of labor, we were also dealing with it being the middle of the night. And B, like probably most newborns who have just been shoved unceremoniously into the world, would not stop crying. Since I was sort of stuck in bed, at least for a little while, Drew took up the task of walking ceaselessly around, shhhhing and soothing. This was the beginning of the rocking/swinging dance that, for awhile, was sometimes the only way to put B to sleep.

He immediately started calling B “Buddy,” which at the time, I found baffling. Where did this “buddy” thing come from? Who actually says that, outside of old TV shows? When did we decide that was going to be a nickname? But then it just stuck. And while I say it occasionally, I still think of it as a father’s nickname for his son – something he’ll call B when they’re out fishing or playing catch or camping in the backyard or something. You know, guy stuff.

For the record, I’m sure that Drew would be an amazing dad even if our first baby was a girl. But I’ve become obsessed with watching this father-son relationship develop. I love watching my two boys together. I hope that B realizes how lucky he is to have such a great dad, and I hope he grows up to be an equally incredible friend and partner. He’s got some big shoes to fill, but he’s got the right role model to help him grow into them.

Happy Father’s Day!

husband

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Awesome Family Humor Love Memoir Nonfiction Parents Sentiment

Happy Father’s Day, Dad!

In 5th grade, we had to do periodic book reports. For some people, that might have meant just standing up in front of the class and saying, “I liked the part when.” I don’t recall whether we were required to make our book reports more interesting, or just encouraged, or maybe I was just overeager and had too much time on my hands. But I remember book reports being A Thing.

When I read Black Beauty, my “report” took the form of a board game based on the book. The playing pieces were horses because I had many toy horses lying around. Inexplicably, I incorporated a bottle of “horse perfume” which was really just a giant green bottle with a stopper, and the stopper was sprayed with Lysol so it smelled like a vet’s office. I think it was called Eau de Horse, and there were flies drawn on the label. I have no recollection of how this was a part of the game.

The only other thing I remember is that part of my high-pressure performance was to roll the dice, count one-two-three, and land on a square saying, “You broke your leg. Game over,” and then I pulled out a cap gun and shot the horse figurine.

WHAT WAS THIS GAME ABOUT.

Confession #1: I never finished Black Beauty.

Confession #2: My dad was the mastermind behind this twisted board game. If you know him, then this probably doesn’t seem weird to you. In fact, this might sound strangely familiar to you. Maybe he helped you with a weird board game for a book you secretly never finished reading.

My dad is a quirky guy, who is willing to put himself out there, whether it’s in a skit or a performance or clowning or entertaining or just hamming it up behind the scenes. I admire that self-confidence and commitment.

I might not have inherited that same level of enthusiasm (unfortunately), but I think I did get a little bit of his artistic quirk. While making Black Beauty the Board Game, I showed my mom the label for the Eau de Horse, and her response was, “You can’t let Dad do the whole report for you.” I remember this very clearly because I was pretty much bursting with pride that she thought that Dad had created the label that I had written and illustrated all by myself! Clearly, if she mistook it for his work, it was amazing.

I learned two things from this experience:

1. Book reports are not always about the books; and

2. If I’m lucky, people will compare me to my dad and see the ways that I am like him.

Happy Father’s Day, Dad! Thanks for setting me on the right path early. I hope I am making you proud!

dad

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Awesome Family Holidays Love Parents Sentiment

Happy birthday, Mom!

Happy birthday to my wonderful, inspiring, awesome mom!

Mom Collage

You’re the best mom a girl could ask for! Hope today is wonderful!

(We need to take some new pictures together!)

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Awesome Drew Love Religion Sentiment

Showing off love

The other night at the theatre, it was about 6pm and it was all warm and sunny and beautiful, and this 20-ish-year-old couple came walking through the courtyard, holding hands. He let go and vaulted over this low railing, and then turned around and looked at her, needing approval. I thought that was so cute, that he was showing off for her. Then he tried to help her jump over the railing, which of course she pretended like she couldn’t do. Then she got up on this planter box and he stood about 20 feet away and took pictures of her. And I was watching them and thinking, Isn’t love great?

Then an hour or so later, this 60s-ish couple came in and they were waiting for the box office to open. When I looked back at them again, she had gone up to the first landing of the stairs, and he was standing at the bottom taking pictures of her. And I just melted, because love and showing off love doesn’t just apply to 20-year-olds.

It’s springtime and people are twitterpated. I don’t know what it is but I know that I’ve felt a little giddy the past few days – the warmer weather? The extra vitamin D? The opportunity for more exercise outdoors? In the fall, my favorite season is the fall, but at this time of year, spring is definitely it.

So show off some love!

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Baby Dreams Drew Family Love Memoir Nonfiction Sentiment

Anniversaries

Today’s a special day in our family:

  • It’s Drew’s and my 8-year dating anniversary.
  • It’s the 1-year anniversary of the day we found out I was pregnant.
  • And it’s B’s 4-month birthday!

Now if only we weren’t both sick…

And, as long as I’m wishing for things, maybe we could win the lottery?

jump

Oh that’s right! We already did win the lottery! (Awwwwww)

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Awesome Beauty Drew Humor Memoir Nonfiction Sentiment

Make your own tumbler

Last weekend, Drew and I went down to Half Moon Bay to try our hands at glassblowing. It was a “bucket list” type of thing, and Drew’s idea to celebrate this kind of big birthday he was having.

The class was in this little studio next to a winery. Half Moon Bay is so charming. It’s easy to have a good time when you’re in the most beautiful part of the world.

Right after we arrived, this other (older) couple came in and the woman started making all this annoying comments and asking too many questions. None of us – Drew, I, Doug (the teacher), or the woman’s husband – seemed interested in what she had to say. When he asked them what they were there to make (pumpkins or tumblers) she said they weren’t there for the class, that they “came in off the street.” But wait…hadn’t she just told us that they had to make a U-turn on 92 because they drove past it? So what’s the truth? She was crazy. Luckily they left right after that.

While we were waiting for the other two people in the class to arrive, Doug told us he would do some work on a project and we could watch. He was creating a decanter, because apparently some guy on the east coast is doing all this work with infused vodkas and ordered a bunch of “hand-made vessels.” He shaped this gorgeous decanter, it was so time-consuming, and then it cracked and he dumped the whole thing into this discard bucket. Yikes.

When the class started, Drew went first (thank goodness). Doug took him through the whole process, from start to finish. It’s harder than it looks – keeping the whole pole turning the entire time might be the hardest part, especially with gloves on. At one point I thought that we weren’t going to do any of the actual blowing, but we got to do that part too. Doug must have been teaching this class for a long time, because he’s got the system down pat – how much to let the student do, and how much to take over. I probably only did 30% of the work creating my tumbler, but I was so involved in the whole thing, and I did a little of everything.

There were some questionable safety issues – like when we were supposed to just leave the propane torch on, but it rocked on the base so you couldn’t set it down stable and walk away. But all’s well that ends well! We left our tumblers in the freezy box, and went back on Monday afternoon to pick them up.

Both our tumblers are a little lopsided, and we don’t have any immediate plans to actually drink out of them, but we love them both and they look so friendly together. And taking a glassblowing class was super fun and something that I would never have dreamed up on my own. I definitely recommend Doug’s class if you’re interested in stuff like that, or even if you’re not. You never know!

glassblowing

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Awesome Baby Being a girl Fashion Humor Memoir Nonfiction Sentiment Travel

Ode to a purple purse

Carrying a diaper bag suits me.

I’ve always been the kind of person to have too much stuff on me. Occasionally it pays off – like when I’m stuck in line somewhere  and need something to read, or when someone says, “Does anyone have contact solution?” or when someone needs to borrow a pen and I can offer them a choice between 7 different pens and 1 mechanical pencil.

(I like mechanical pencils way more than regular pencils: you don’t have to sharpen them and I just feel like they write really nicely. One of my favorite things in high school used to be sitting down to do math homework on a nice piece of fresh graph paper with a nice 0.7 mechanical pencil…NOT a 0.5!)

Often, of course, I’m just the person with a way-too-full purse, and people with good intentions will tell me that it’s too heavy and that it’s bad for me or something. I remember, right when we moved back to California in 2009, I finally decided to stop carrying around a messenger bag, and I went to Macy’s and bought my purse, the same one I’ve carried since then. It was purple and hobo style, not super huge, but big enough to fit a book and my planner and a granola bar and a bunch of papers I don’t need and of course, up to 10 writing implements.

I carried that purse for over 3 years, probably never matching it to my “outfits,” and I loved it no matter how worn out it got and how dirty it was. But then at church on Christmas Eve, I tried to zip it shut and I guess it was just too full, and the zipper broke clean off. A couple days after Christmas, I remembered about the zipper busting, and so I sat down, ceremoniously emptied everything out, threw away all the old gum wrappers and receipts, sorted the papers into three piles (“shred,” “do something,” “file”), and then, without further ado, stuffed the purse into our kitchen trash can. Not the most illustrious send-off for an accessory that has served me well, but rest assured, purple Nine West purse, I will never forget you.

So now I’ve busted out my cross-body bag that has the NY Public Library lions on the front. Drew’s mom gave it to me for Christmas in 2008. I love it, and it’s got more room, so now I can have all my regular stuff, plus my Nalgene and even an extra granola bar. But probably my favorite thing about it is, since it’s a cross-body, it doesn’t require extra work to keep it on my shoulder, and it doesn’t fall down my arm when I lean over to pick up the carseat, grocery bags, baby toys, etc. (Women will probably understand what I mean.)

But a diaper bag opens up even more possibilities than just a medium-sized purse. I love having an excuse to take an even bigger bag with me. I love that I can just pack up everything I could possibly need: extra clothes (and they’re so tiny, you can fit so many!), bib(s), diapers, almost empty package of wipes, brand new package of wipes, burp cloths, disposable burp cloths, toys, nursing pads, travel lotion, more toys, extra pacifier, pacifier leash(es), other nursing pads, extra plastic fork (just in case?), large hook (for the stroller push bar to hang your plastic shopping bags on), pacifier wipes, diaper disposal bags (scented in case you have throw away a dirty diaper in your office)… and I might be forgetting something.

All this stuff fits in one regular-sized diaper bag…and means that we’re prepared for almost any occasion. I just love that. I love being prepared. I think that’s one of the things I really liked about stage managing – having a kit full of office supplies. (Well, being prepared, and, I just love office supplies.)

The funny thing is, we don’t really need this stuff that often. We do leave the diaper bag at home, or in the car, and go out without it. I’m sure a day will come when we’ll regret that.

In the meantime, we’ll make sure the diaper bag is well stocked for all contingencies. I’ll continue my quest to fit more and more things in my NY Library lions bag. And maybe one day, when all this baby stuff has calmed down, I’ll get myself a new, ladylike purse. One that would make the ladies of Sex and the City proud. Maybe.

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Awesome Beginnings Dreams Endings Holidays Humor Nonfiction Self improvement Sentiment Writing

How To Make New Year’s Resolutions

To no one’s surprise, the world did not end this year – meaning 2013 is nearly upon us. That means it’s time to start making all kinds of promises that are meant to make ourselves “better” people: thinner, smarter, cleaner, neater, richer, more interesting, more well-rounded people.

I have made New Year’s resolutions every year for the past 5 years, to varying success. Sometimes they have taken different forms, depending on how ambitious I am. Also how tired I am of failing at my standard resolutions: save money. Go the gym. Write more. Eat better.

In 2009, when I was still living in New York City, I made a list of 100 things I wanted to accomplish during the year. Some things were easy: watch a sunrise. Send valentines to my family. Go on rollercoasters. Some things were more of a challenge (and thus, didn’t happen): Buy a MacBook. See a Cirque du Soleil show. Some things were private, some things were silly. Some things were foresightful: Move back to California (by driving). At the end of December 2008, how could I have known for sure we’d move back? I guess some things work out. Ultimately I crossed 59 things off that list. In terms of grading, I believe that’s an F. But in terms of New Year’s resolutions I’d say it’s pretty darn good.

In 2010 and 2011, I just made categories of promises to myself: some resolutions about my health, some about writing, some about money, some about relationships. There are usually two or three things under each category, and I try to be as specific as possible. So not just “save money” but specific amounts. Not just “write more” but certain monthly goals to meet. It doesn’t always work but it makes it a lot easier to say how it went at the end of the year.

I’m coming to the time that I review how I did in 2012. I will say that my two biggest goals – “Get pregnant” and “Have a baby” – will make up for any goals on which I fell short this year. (And yes, I made those two resolutions separately as my way of making it clear to the universe what I wanted. Like I said, I believe in clarity.)

I’m also coming to the time that I will form my new resolutions for 2013. I predict they will be much the same at my 2012 resolutions. But as always, I have high hopes for the new year.

Here are my tips for writing successful New Year’s resolutions:

1. Be specific. Don’t say “be healthier,” say “Drink 32 oz of water a day.” Instead of “Be a better person,” try “Volunteer at a soup kitchen once a month.” Specificity keeps you on track and gives you a way to assess how it’s going.

2. Categorize. I find it really helpful to group things together. Then I can have one from each category that I’m working on at once. I like the categories of “health,” “finances,” “relationship,” and “writing.” But that’s just me.

3. Don’t go overboard. I usually have around 12 resolutions, but they are all baby steps and lots of them are season-specific. Many of them are monthly goals. So it’s not like I’m ever actually juggling 12 things. It’s just things to think about throughout the year.

4. Keep them somewhere you’ll see them occasionally, so you remember that they exist. I’m not a print-them-out-and-stick-them-on-the-fridge kind of girl, but I keep them somewhere that I can glance at them now and again, and see how far behind I am.

Happy New Year and happy resolving! May you accomplish enough in 2013 to feel proud…but still leave plenty of room for improvement in 2014!