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There’s something about Sunday night
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Wednesday, May 31, 2006

Weddings

There's something terribly melancholy to me about weddings. It doesn't make sense, because it is a thoroughly joyous occasion, not only for the bride and groom but (hopefully) also for the guests who get to see old friends and family, raise many glasses of free liquor, and dance the night away.

But, sitting under the dark wedding pavilion this weekend with my family as most of the other guests danced and drank on the lighted clubhouse (it was just too hot there, though, and was delightful under the tent), I told that to my brother-in-law, and once I explained, he agreed with me.

It's such a public celebration of something that is inherently, intimately private. While everyone joins in the love and celebration, they are still essentially left on the outside.

What I didn't also tell him was that often (in my experience, and for some others I know) it also feels like loss. Inexplicably (for my sister had been a part of his family already for five or so years), I felt like I was losing her to him and them. No matter how wonderful they all are, they were still taking her away from me and my family. They can give her things I can't, my parents can't.

The day of her wedding, I felt useless and unnecessary. Everything went off without a hitch, without needing me. (I don't know if she ever really needs anything from me, but on a day like that, I wanted to feel indispensible.) Her new brother-in-law made a computer presentation of photos, and I looked through the stack my parents provided him before the ceremony. Flipping through the years of pictures, I felt acutely the loss of my darling baby sister with dimpled kness and pudgy cheeks, and I still cry every time I think about that morning.

A wedding is such a symbolic manifestation of all that, for in truth, I have not lost her at all, not really. It just feels like it sometimes.

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Tuesday, May 30, 2006

Goodbyes

Leaving family is always effably sad. I feel myself breaking up in pieces inside at the thought of not being with them. It's the worst with my sister.

I spent the weekend with them and old friends, and I forgot that we were ever apart--which made the goodbyes worse. And it gets harder the older I get. When I was younger, I don't think I needed anybody quite as badly. Now I have a hard time living far from my family. As much as Tim is now my family, they are still my family first.

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Friday, May 26, 2006

Fresh new hell

What fresh new hell is this?

I know the past two weeks have been evenly broken up by a camping trip and a day on the gulf beach, but I scarcely remember it. I don't even remember what happened the first week, or how I got through this week. Each day I barely had time to give more than a cursory glance to e-mail, then the day was filled with body-crunching stress, and my evenings melted into one drink after another to settle my nerves.

I had a moral quandry to relay from last week, yet all I remember now is that I was in one--not actually what it was. It has been replaced with a new one from this week.

My heart hurts a lot. I had the opportunity this week to receive a summons at a late hour (at which I should have been asleep) to deal with suicidal tendancies. Sometimes I revel in crises, because I am electrified by purpose. It feels like winning the Nobel prize to me, knowing how to handle a crisis.

And then sometimes crises don't have answers. They just exist. And nothing can be done. I try and I try and I try. I'm doing everything I can, and I can't fix it. I can't even moderately help it. Because nothing can be done. Nothing. Not even when you are holding someone's future in your hands, and they are pleading with you to not fuck it up.

And how does it always happen on the day that your boss says, "Leave early! It's a holiday!" that's the exact day you absolutely cannot leave anywhere near your regular quitting time?

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Friday, May 19, 2006

The measure of adulthood

Sometimes I think being an adult means when you sit down at a conference table, you sit up straight; you don't slide down in the seat and rest your feet on the chair across the table from you.

I guess I have a long way to go.

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Thursday, May 18, 2006

Advocating

Something happened at work recently that made me really uncomfortable. I may be hopeless when it comes to reading other people, but when it comes to myself, there's no question. My stomach tells me, with a tight fist of tension sinking to its bottom, when something's not right.

I second guess myself a lot, though. Sometimes I think my ability to look at a situation from 360 degrees is a strength--that seeing all perspectives is a positive, empathetic skill, but sometimes it renders me incapable of making a firm, swift decision.

Therefore, in the heat of the moment, I am never able to stand up and say, "No. I think this is wrong. I disagree." I think, "This feels wrong, but I can understand why it could be right. Moderately right." It takes me awhile to figure things out.

Last night, I went home and felt uneasy, and thought about it all night. I woke up the next morning certain of how I needed to address the situation with my boss.

This is a big step for me. Before this job, I never had the courage to confront things. I don't know if I necessarily have it completely together now, but I try. I can't figure out if this is a change within myself, or a result of being comfortable with my job and co-workers. I'm not a new and improved individual, though. On a scale of 1-10 of being as assertive as I need to be, I'm probably still at a 4.

In the end, though, I spoke my mind, and advocated for a client, and I succeeded. I'm learning I am capable of fighting tooth and nail when it comes to sticking up for my clients, and maybe this will teach me how to do it for myself, too.

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Wednesday, May 17, 2006

Leather



I strode into work this week with a black tee shirt, low riding jeans, and my new black leather cuff. I felt like a badass. Oh, I felt tough. And I waited for someone to comment.

When no one noticed (at least the cuff! C'mon! The cuff is awesome!), it made me wonder why I dress the way I do.

To be conscious of my outfit in terms of other people reminds me of being in junior high, high school, even college. First I dressed because I wanted to fit in, then defiantly because I wanted to make sure I stood out. It feels like a step back to wonder what people are thinking of my outfit. Which then made me realize how I've settled into my own groove, and no matter how much I might daydream about having a little rebel biker chick inside of me, I really don't. I might not be as radical, or hippy-chick, or graceful sophisticate that I’d like to be, but I think it’s too late to change my habit and nature.

I've long outgrown my leather pants; I've thrown away (with good reason) the Harley Davidson tee-shirt I turned into a slutty halter top; and to tell you the honest truth, I didn't wear low-rise jeans with my cuff this week. I wore Easter yellow Gap corduroys.

As much as I love my new cuff, the idea behind it was to hide my future wrist tattoo. I'm responsibly approaching it knowing there will be a good deal of time I'll want to (or need to) keep it covered. That the cover is slightly subversive just makes me all the more happy.

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Sunday, May 14, 2006

78

Today I cleared the closet of my winter shirts, and used them to pad some dishes I started packing. I also went through the bookshelves and selected some books and videos to give away (though, unfortunately, not enough to really make a dent in the huge amount of stuff we'll be moving.) It feels odd to be packing this soon, but it eases my stress. Last time I moved, people were carrying boxes down to the truck as quickly as I could pack them up, and that's an experience I never want to repeat again.

I added up the days left here, and it's 78. Which seems kind of high until I remember it's equal to two and a half months. At work, I have forms clients complete when they want to give me permission to talk to people/agencies on their behalf, releases of information, which last for 90 days after they are signed. Lately I've noticed the expiration date I'm writing is after I'll be gone. It's a strange thing to think about.

I'm terrified beyond belief about how I'm going to find an apartment. An affordable one in a decent location, one that's not too run down or tiny or depressing. All I can picture in my mind is my last apartment, which was blissful in many ways for me, but not great for two people. And with absolutely no closets or kitchen counter space.

I think I've been putting Chicago in the back of my mind for so long (first because I missed it so badly, then because I started to like it here and didn't know if we were going to return, then I didn't want to jinx my school acceptance, and finally I got busy organizing and planning for the beginning of school that I forgot where I was moving to go to school) that I've just woken up and realized it's real, that I'm moving back to the place that makes me happiest ever.

I can bike to school and work and to the Middle Eastern bakery for olives and spinach pies, then Little Vietnam for black sesame balls, dirt-cheap fresh basil, and rice noodles. I can spend the evening at a punk rock bar drinking Maker's Mark without breaking the bank, then get home without worrying about leaving a car somewhere. I can take a blanket to the park and hear the jazz fest, or blues fest, or Celtic fest . . . And I can see my sister and my nephew whenever I want to.

Only 78 more days!

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Thursday, May 11, 2006

I still feel hopelessly naive, or guillably hopeful. I'm the only one who still believes a woman when she says something about her life. I work so hard for my clients that I like to at least pretend that what we've accomplished together, they'll take on and continue long after I'm gone.

I guess I can accept that I am only able to do so much, and then wash my hands of it, and let the woman do whatever she was always planning on doing regardless of me. If someone decides to go back to the person who beats the crap out of her because she believes that this time when he says, "I've changed," it's true, there's nothing I can do about it, so my feelings are not going to be hurt. I'm not going to cry about it.

But when I work to help someone, and my coworkers say, "she's not going to do it; she's going to lose her apartment/go back to him/fail in all ways," and they say this because they can "read a person," it makes me lose hope, and it makes me feel like I'm shit at reading people. Something I think a social worker actually has to be halfway decent at.

Which makes me rethink my career completely and totally. Why am I going into this if I am terribly naive and hopeless at really understanding and knowing people? And what's wrong with me that I can't pick up on people's nonverbals--that I take everyone at face value, that I let them present to me the person they want me to know?

But I also think it's dangerous to start evaluating people. A part of me feels like, no matter whether I believe it truly or not, I have to at least pretend like everyone I work with is going to make big changes in her life, protect herself from violence, and become an independent woman. Because otherwise, I just don't know if I could continue my work. And I don't think it would be fair to, say, bend over backwards to help one woman find a job or an apartment just because I think she'll really stick with the job, stick with the lease, but give lukewarm effort to another because I believe she'll drop everything once her boyfriend finds her again and says, "baby, I miss you."

But of course I always focus on the negatives, and I wonder what is wrong with me that I am so naive and hopeful?

The woman who says all this is actually one of my favorite people at work. This week, she saw my countdown on my bulletin board--thick black Xs marking out the months until I leave. And she laughed, and said, "I bet you're ready to go!" I moaned to her how burnt out I am, and she said, "but you can't let that show in your work. You gotta keep doing your job . . ."

Part of me feels like I am very realistic, and divorced, in some ways, from feeling much for the job. I know not everyone I touch is not going to become golden. I only have one or two people that I could still brag about, in a year and a half, and an uncountable number who went back to or on to someone new who hits them. That's life, and I don't cry about it at home. I'm not a miracle worker. But I still have to act like miracles will happen, and I continuously wonder if that makes me a weaker social worker.

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Basketball

Tim still tells the story about the day he realized I was the one for him. We were at his best friend's childhood home, helping his parents move back in after the house had been destroyed by fire then rebuilt. In between loads, or perhaps to stay out of the way of the real movers, we cut the bottom out of an old plastic bucket and nailed it to the garage. Andrew or Tim produced a basketball, and we started playing. I don't know why I was the only other one playing--probably I was feeling shy and didn't want to stay in the kitchen with everyone else that I didn't know too well yet. But I also love basketball.

Tim had the ball and was heading towards the basket. It will forever remain an argument between us because I contend that I was firmly planted and he charged me, while he thinks I wasn't, and his move was a perfectly legal offensive attack. Regardless of who is right (I protest publicly that it's me, though don't tell him I might concede not both of my feet were on solid ground when he hit), I ended up on the ground, and then in the kitchen, washing the blood away; I still have a scar on my elbow to showcase whenever this story is told.

He realized he wanted someone who could take what he dished out, and I realized I wanted someone who would go the basket ruthlessly, then argue the technicalities later, not treat me delicately just because I wasn't as good a player, or because I was a girl.

At our wedding, we passed around cards for everyone to write on. Most people gave their best wishes. My favorite one comes from a boy who was 8 or 10, and was at the house that day we played basketball. His says, "I remember when I first 'met' you as a couple. We were at the house soon after they moved back in after the fire. I heard people commenting about Tim, 'she's the one.' I must say they could not have been more right."

Amazing insight for such a young boy. Reading it always reminds me of that day, and the joy of a basketball under, and leaving, my hands, and happily loving someone with all my heart, and sharing simple, easy joy with him.

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Coffee

One of my coworkers won a gift card to Starbucks in a monthly birthday giveaway, and since her preference is sweet tea to coffee, she gave it to me.

I'm not a coffee drinker, though I'd like to be. As a former Starbucks employee, Tim knows his way around a bean, though, so I let him use the card to purchase a half pound. His choice was Yukon blend. The name means nothing to me, but when he opened the bag and poured in a few tablespoons into our French Press, I stuck my nose into the glass and breathed in heaven. Just the smell itself sloughed off the stress and strain of the day, and evaporated whatever tears of frustration (of "Oh my god. I still have 8.5 more weeks at work." Yes, my countdown is down to weeks, and soon, days.) were still lurking behind my lids.

I was transported back to Unicorn Cafe, age 22, and everything that time encompassed. All the newness of Chicago and a new cafe where I worked to make friends. It reminds me of smokey coffeehouses with open mic poetry readings and intense conversations.

With milk and vanilla honey, it was like silk on my tongue. I have always had fantasies about waking up in the morning, putting on the kettle for coffee, then lingering over breakfast with a mug. It doesn't quite fit into my view of life that I consistently wake up 9 minutes later than I should, and race around getting ready and hoping I'm not late to work. And somehow relaxing over breakfast/coffee/newspaper on the weekends isn't such a treat, because it doesn't feel like a special stolen moment the way it would during the week.

I think, though, that if I drank coffee every day, it wouldn't be such a special, ritualized treat for me. Maybe it should stay that way.

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Monday, May 08, 2006

Swim team

I practice tennis at the Y. The courts are next to an indoor pool. It's been so temperate lately that they leave the floor to ceiling windows open, and swim season just started. As I walked across the court each time after my turn in the hot seat, I'd see bodies lined up against the window. Adolescent boys, their new muscles pop out of their skin like novelty balloons, and the girls they talk to seem light years older than them. Light years older than I remember being at that age.

At that age, I was nearing my inglorious end to swim team. Not so much a loser as filler. I was just another body to put in an empty heat. I always worked just hard enough to get through it. (I never really understood the passion that drives athletes to put every ounce of themselves into competition.) It was, as sports have always been for me, a social outlet for the very shy.

No matter what happened during the school year or who I was then, during the summer, I had friends on the team. There was no one from my class to take the lead and ignore me like usual. My teammates were older or younger, and I was a part of the group.

During meets, we'd write our events on our arms in permanent marker, and draw hearts in zinc oxide on our backs, to tan in our own summer tattoos. Each poolhouse candy counter was reassuredly the same; we'd get Zotz and Chik-o-Stik and a particular kind of red liquorice I've never been able to find anywhere else, and we'd split up our spoils.

That's where I learned how to flirt, with two guys a year ahead of me, who would never have looked at me twice--and didn't--any other time of the year. And with inappropriately friendly college boys who were terrible coaches for teenage girls. Years later, I still have a crush on one of the former guys that I have never been able to shake.

Then one summer, I got a part-time job, and my parents never mentioned swim team again. As an inherently (where did I get this??) lazy person, no matter how much I enjoy a sport or exercise, I won't do it unless pushed into it. So I forgot about sun and swimming and boys in bathing suits, and started pushing cones at an ice cream shop in town.

The kids in the window reminded me, though, of what a good way to pass the summer.

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Saturday, May 06, 2006

Saturday night random

I think my hands feel lost without a keyboard underneath them. Folding the laundry tonight, I thought an undershirt was inside out, so I reversed it, only to discover it was then inside out. My left hand twitched for Control + V so it would go back to the way it was and I wouldn't have to turn it out yet again.

I added up expenses for next fall so I could figure out how much financial aid to accept. I don't know if anyone ever turns down portions of what they're offered. Being out-of-state first semester is going to keep us strapped for a while. But it occurred to me that I was basing all the estimates on the entirety of our expenses and financial aid, and not taking into account Tim making an income. Though there's no way to predict what he'll bring in, at least it will be something. I feel a little better.

But thinking about money freaks me out, period, and I'm starting to get really angry for purchasing three small red peppers for $6. That money could be put elsewhere. Like a gorgeous satchel I am coveting for my birthday but would really be horrified to actually own (it costs more than I think is necessary). I hate having money issues. I'm going to be second-guessing every single thing I purchase for the next three months, from groceries to clothing, to a dollar for a coke with lunch.

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Tuesday, May 02, 2006

I confess

that last night, I struggled into a black strapless top, then when I saw how awful I looked, got stuck on the way out. I took a moment to properly appreciate my history with the top (as my formerly svelte self) then I took industrial scissors to it so I could escape. Good-bye, cute black strapless.

And I spent the rest of the evening tugging down another short top. I don't mind my back tattoo showing--I like it--but it occurs to me (finally! Thank god I've seen the light!) that belly-baring tops only make me look even shorter in the torso, and that's absolutely not what I need to accentuate. Also, I've developing a bit of a gut, and I feel way past my prime in revealing clothing like that. Does that mean I'm old? Or just wise?

I wish I had appreciated my youthful physique when I had it, instead of taking for granted I always would have it.
 
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