Boxed-Up

My friend, Ms. Mo, packs up her apartment this week. With Ojibwa summer ceremonies, Mo gave thirty day notice on her apartment. Her lease is up at the end of this month so sometimes I stop by to help her pack. Started this effort last week. I stopped over, like I might on any given Saturday, with Thai food and some music to listen to. The contents of her cupboards and bookshelves filled. Moving was more of a theoretical exercise rather than a practicality. The boxes, like our conversation, had no particular destination.

I’ve stopped by on a couple of nightly occasions since to help sort her CD collection or fold clothes or whatnot. And what started as a small silence between us slowly swelled to fill up the emptying space.

Last night we were boxing things up when she pressed her thumb into that fleshy part of my palm. A habit we formed, years ago, which always means: Listen. Listen here. She says these boxes will probably move her back to Minneapolis. Next fall, maybe. Maybe sooner. There’s a dot on the map but not a route, yet, from here to there.

I can’t be surprised, really. Since she’s gone to the trouble of packing up her life into boxes it makes logical sense she’d unpack herself in Minneapolis. Past our high-school graduation Mo has only ever considered Lincoln her mail-stop in short spurts. A handful of unemployed summer months. Recovering from a winter break-up.

We’ve refined the habit of saying good-bye. One of us boarding a plane or packing up in a U-haul. I’m less likely, anymore, to be the moving object. I spend more time staying put. But this is still familiar territory.

Proximity doesn’t make a huge dent in the conversation between us. It only makes for a longer pause between each iteration.


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Currently Reading: The Terror Dream by Susan Faludi
Goodness: With all the rain this Spring, my garden is flower-freaking-tastic!
Lesson Learned: Should McK offer to refine your palate for mixed-drinks, don't preface every concoction with question: "So, is this one fruity?". Eventually, he'll renig on his offer.

Fight or Flight

So I have this new assignment at work. A cool little project which lands me with something to say in a series of neighborhood discussions. So I'm excited and I think I could be good at this.

I hope to be good at this, anyway. Which makes me nervous. And being nervous or stressed some people have the fight or flight response. I've refined the puke or cry response. Either way, the prep work for these community conversations can get pretty messy.

Once I'm faced with the conversation or meeting I've worried over: I'm fine, actually. Completely fine. Which is great. A smidgen annoying since I was all worked up. But great. In hindsight I'll even swell with a little fondness for the occasion.

Until that rear-view mirror moment, however, my pockets are stuffed with Pepto Bismol tablets and Aloe Vera Kleenex.

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Personal Soundtrack: Not Ready to Make Nice (Dixie Chicks)
Reading with Naomi: Hate That Cat by Sharon Creech

G'night

With final exams finally done, I have resumed my long-standing love affair with sleep.

I realize there hasn’t been a true coronation, or anything, because I would hate for anyone to make a fuss…but… I secretly consider myself the queen of bedtime routines. I read about sleep. I read myself to sleep. More than once I’ve tried to finagle a life that I could manage entirely from my bedside. These efforts have reached varyingly high-degrees of success, actually. You’d be surprised.

Then there is the sleep maintenance part of the whole deal. Fluff the pillows. Flip the mattress, well, naturally. Change the sheets often.

Ah, now consider accessories. Let’s just say: I’m flush with sleep accessories. OK, ok, let’s say more than that. Sleepy music mix tapes. Pajamas for every season. Slippers and sock-slippers. Several varieties of over-night facial cream. Scented pillow spray. Oh, and if you ever need a sleeping mask, seriously, call me! I’m pretty sure I have a spare.

Last night I flopped down between the covers at what, to anyone else, would be an embarrassingly early hour. Scrunched up my toes with glee, and considered the coming months without coursework. Whew.
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Reading with Naomi: Heartbeat by Sharon Creech
Recent Goodness: Monique's proliferation of text messages to get me through finals.
Personal Soundtrack: Horses by Rickie Lee Jones
Dinner Line-Up: Spaghetti Squash with Pesto, Tomato & Mozzarella Salad
Recent Revelation: I'm not exactly a positive thinker.

The Women Who Bookend Me

Happy Mother's Day.

The Pill

I was twenty-something and at lunch with a group of clients. We were at some nice restaurant in Denver with clean windows, fancy water glasses and linen napkins. I was trying not to fidget at a circular table with middle managers.

The beginnings of my professional life were marked by a painfully awkward, knobby-kneed feeling that followed me everywhere I went. I remember this lunch, though, with particular clarity. Trying to be both impressive and casual.

It must have been 1999 because how every polite conversation was a “Best of…” commemorative. Best Short Stories of the Twentieth Century, for example, or Most Memorable Kisses on Screen, Most Influential Historic Moments …you get the idea. And our group spontaneously fell into a polite banter which asked what the "Most Groundbreaking Invention of the Twentieth Century" might have been.

I sat, smiled, and listened to compelling arguments for inventions such as: the polio vaccine, the microchip, the atomic bomb, the air conditioner, radio and television broadcasting. Somebody posed the question directly to me. My answer came out loud and clear without an iota of doubt or hesitation: The Pill.

And the beach-ball bounce feeling that accompanies any lively conversation sort of fell (ka-thunk) on the floor. Somebody coughed. It never even dawned on me that saying so might have been wildly inappropriate in a business setting.

My mention of The Pill could be taken more as a statement of my sexual prowess rather than how I intended it. What I meant was this: having the power to determine if, when, and how many children you have was a seismic shift. Women suddenly lived out their career goals and educational aspirations. Our lives looked fundamentally different. Our marriages functioned differently thereafter. Our consumption of resources, the cultural awareness of child psychology were irrevocably altered.

Somebody must have changed the subject after my Pill proclamation, or the food arrived to break the silence. I remember unwrapping my flatware from the napkin and thinking, clearly, I had won the Most Groundbreaking Invention of the Twentieth Century debate.

It's a moment that came to me as I read on CNN that this weekend, Sunday actually, marks the 50th Anniversary of the FDA approving use of birth control pills. I wished I could grab the sweaty hand of that twenty-something girl at the lunch table. Squeeze her fingers in mine and say, "I know exactly what you mean!"

May Day

"the earth laughs in flowers"
- e. e. cummings