Today began badly. I woke up and went right back to bed. Too bad I couldn't stay there. It didn't seem so bad when I finally got up though. I made it into the shower and got dressed easily enough. I didn't even need to change outfits. I was happy enough with what I settled on. Looking out the window I could tell it was going to be foggy, but I wore my new blue wedges anyway, compensating by wearing a warm button up. I made myself breakfast, the last blueberry bagel was all mine. And I even remembered to pour my perfect French-pressed coffee into a carry cup so I could take it with me and stave off the brown mud at the office a little longer. I used the last of my filet mignon to make an excellent sandwich and was ready to face the day.
But somewhere between my house and the office the day turned on me. Traffic on Rt. 7 forced me to take a shortcut through Great Falls that I didn't know so well. Looking at the clock I groaned. It was 9:42am and I hadn't even made it to the George Washington Parkway yet. I was in trouble.
Getting into the office I'm greeted with the news that the 300 pamphlets I hand cut all day Friday were not up to par and we get to start over. We have 1500 due by the end of the week. We only have 250 completed.
Then I called GMU to check on my letter of recommendation. I had forgotten to get my professor to send one to GMU at the beginning and she was kind enough to print another copy and stick it in her mailbox so I could hand deliver it to the Admissions office. Taking out that extra step I thought would save some time. A week later and I get an email saying my application is incomplete. I call and they say it probably just hasn't been processed yet, everyone's on Spring Break. Call back next week they say. So I do. This morning. Apparently I didn't drop it off at the Graduate Admissions office like I should, even though that had never been mentioned and they said they would put it in that mailbox for the Graduate Admissions people to check. So I am told to call the General Admissions office to check. They tell me to try calling the Graduate Admissions, or the Graduate ENGLISH Dept. I call the Graduate English Department. Nothing. No one has heard of my application at all, because the Graduate Admissions people are still holding onto it, waiting for the letter that the General Admissions people have lost. I start to cry. I have already recieved 2 rejections out of the 4 schools I applied to, I'm expecting to hear a 3rd from the other school in London, but I hadn't really cared, because I want to go to Mason. I've been counting on going to Mason, and now, all of a sudden those hopes and expectations might be dashed, thwarted, deferred! Thanks to an idiotic underclassman working as a receptionist in Admissions, who wasn't quite awake enough at 9:00am to take my letter and actually read the name on the mailbox that she slipped it into. THANKS MASON.
I emailed my professor again, crossing my toes and fingers, hoping that this sort of thing happens all the time and my 3rd request for this letter isn't the one that sends her over the edge. She's a really nice professor, kind and humorous, but I don't want to give her the impression that I'm a foolish, thoughtless, unreliable person, who shouldn't be going to grad school at all, and certainly shouldn't be recommended by her. Because that's how I feel right now.
Monday, March 31, 2008
Friday, March 28, 2008
Speakeasies
Last night I met up with my friend in Old Town Alexandria to catch up, as he had been in Europe for the past month playing shows all over Germany, in Amsterdam and Paris. That asshole. Just kidding, it was nice to talk to someone about recent trips to Europe. Especially someone who feels the same way about travel etiquette as me.
We met on the corner of King St. as the evening got dusky and the lights in the trees lit up. I had just passed a Greek restaurant that smelled incredible so we went to check it out. I like it when those spontaneous meal decisions that are based on smell and feel alone turn out to be wise ones, because I have never been so entertained at a restaurant before in my life. Did you know that it is apparently a Greek tradition to throw plates on the ground while people are dancing around them? Yes.
We sat near the second level of the restaurant, which allowed us a perfect view of the two old musicians as they slowly set up their mics and guitars. Then, a chubby nine year old boy from a nearby table made his way onto the dance floor. I wish we had cameraphones for that moment so that I could show you his dance. It was unlike any other I've ever seen. It began by him hopping up and down on one leg, the other held up in the air as he sawed it, like it was a washboard instrument. Don't ask. I don't know why. But he seemed to be loving it, and the crowd was too. Then his mother came out on the dance floor too, taking his hands and twirling around with him, his tongue hanging out like an innocent, overeager Gene Simmons.
Our waiter, and three other waiters joined in, forming a line of dancers, who probably weren't greet at all, but had been taught the dances. They grabbed an older woman from the table in front, who looked as if she had seen a gypsy dance or two in her day. She didn't care that her husband was left dumbfounded when Greek waiters stole his wife away to wind through the tables. At last they came back to the dancefloor, where they formed a circle, and those plates I mentioned? They got tossed at their feet. Dollar bills got thrown in the air. We took sips of our licorice tasting ouzo and ate our anchovies.
After that, it was hard to find a place where the entertainment could compare, but we had made it our purpose to go to a speakeasy that night. It's this little place where--shhhh. I'm not supposed to be telling you this, so listen carefully--it's only open when the flag is in the window and the blue light is on. You have to be dressed properly, and ring the buzzer, having made reservations, or hoping to get a seat at the bar. You'd probably want to sit at the bar anyway, because that's where the action happens. No, I'm serious. This is a place that takes its cocktails very seriously. As in, they have dropper bottles of flavoring and jars of fresh herbs. The bartender cuts his garnishes to order, and if you get the Sherlock Holmes he burns a sliver of lemon peel then runs it along the rim of the glass for that extra smoky flavor. Then he finishes the drink off with a brisk rub and slap of mint leaf. I don't know what the slapping does, but he does it with panache. And he's quietly listening to everything you say as he moves around the bar doing a dance much more refined and elegant than that of the Greek dancers. We were talking about Hot Toddies because that's what he recommended I use some honey liquer for, brought back from a farmer's market in Germany. I couldn't remember what liquor was used with it and he corrected my guess of whiskey. Apparently it's brandy. And you don't use Earl Grey, they use a jasmine tea in theirs.
All in all, an elegant sort of night on the town with a friend. I wish I could make it my local bar.
We met on the corner of King St. as the evening got dusky and the lights in the trees lit up. I had just passed a Greek restaurant that smelled incredible so we went to check it out. I like it when those spontaneous meal decisions that are based on smell and feel alone turn out to be wise ones, because I have never been so entertained at a restaurant before in my life. Did you know that it is apparently a Greek tradition to throw plates on the ground while people are dancing around them? Yes.
We sat near the second level of the restaurant, which allowed us a perfect view of the two old musicians as they slowly set up their mics and guitars. Then, a chubby nine year old boy from a nearby table made his way onto the dance floor. I wish we had cameraphones for that moment so that I could show you his dance. It was unlike any other I've ever seen. It began by him hopping up and down on one leg, the other held up in the air as he sawed it, like it was a washboard instrument. Don't ask. I don't know why. But he seemed to be loving it, and the crowd was too. Then his mother came out on the dance floor too, taking his hands and twirling around with him, his tongue hanging out like an innocent, overeager Gene Simmons.
Our waiter, and three other waiters joined in, forming a line of dancers, who probably weren't greet at all, but had been taught the dances. They grabbed an older woman from the table in front, who looked as if she had seen a gypsy dance or two in her day. She didn't care that her husband was left dumbfounded when Greek waiters stole his wife away to wind through the tables. At last they came back to the dancefloor, where they formed a circle, and those plates I mentioned? They got tossed at their feet. Dollar bills got thrown in the air. We took sips of our licorice tasting ouzo and ate our anchovies.
After that, it was hard to find a place where the entertainment could compare, but we had made it our purpose to go to a speakeasy that night. It's this little place where--shhhh. I'm not supposed to be telling you this, so listen carefully--it's only open when the flag is in the window and the blue light is on. You have to be dressed properly, and ring the buzzer, having made reservations, or hoping to get a seat at the bar. You'd probably want to sit at the bar anyway, because that's where the action happens. No, I'm serious. This is a place that takes its cocktails very seriously. As in, they have dropper bottles of flavoring and jars of fresh herbs. The bartender cuts his garnishes to order, and if you get the Sherlock Holmes he burns a sliver of lemon peel then runs it along the rim of the glass for that extra smoky flavor. Then he finishes the drink off with a brisk rub and slap of mint leaf. I don't know what the slapping does, but he does it with panache. And he's quietly listening to everything you say as he moves around the bar doing a dance much more refined and elegant than that of the Greek dancers. We were talking about Hot Toddies because that's what he recommended I use some honey liquer for, brought back from a farmer's market in Germany. I couldn't remember what liquor was used with it and he corrected my guess of whiskey. Apparently it's brandy. And you don't use Earl Grey, they use a jasmine tea in theirs.
All in all, an elegant sort of night on the town with a friend. I wish I could make it my local bar.
Freedom From Work
I was reading one of my favorite blogs today- Girl's Gone Child and her post about her great grandmother's life made me want to immediately quit my bland office job in favor of sunny writing rooms in the Frank Lloyd Wright homes of Southern California. Yes, I know that that's not a very realistic version of what would happen if I quit this job, but it does harden my resolve to not remain in this gray office forever. Occasionally I look around me and am forcibly reminded of the Theodore Roethke poem, Dolor which only depresses me further. I think this desire to work in an environment that is more open, and creative is one of the very strong reasons I want to go back to grad school and become a professor. It is a way for me to have the creative and intellectual freedom that I want so much. Staying in this world is deadening. You lose too much of your spirit here. I cannot condone this career path. I want something else. Even if I have to be a wandering nomad to seek it.
Wednesday, March 26, 2008
Freedom of Speech
Sometimes I write posts on here and forget they aren't in my own private world, or my notebook journal (which I really should start keeping again, much less trouble). That people might read them and disagree! I have a hard time with knowing what I should and shouldn't put out there. I know this cyberspace sometimes seems like an anynomous realm, but I learn all too often that it's a very small neighborhood.
So please, comment, criticize, take me to town on things, but know that when I post on here it is often out of frustration, passion or simple musings. They are opinions that I try on like clothes to see which ones fit me, which ones will stick. It is very common for me to feel like a retraction should be made, maybe I need an omsbudman to edit me. I don't disagree with what I write, but I often change perspectives. I think it over a little more and realize, with a flush of horror, that I wrote something for everyone to see that I don't want anyone to see. Or that I might have said something off the cuff that might have hurt someone I care about (a fact that was made all too clearly to me on Friday night). I'm slow, people! I spend so much time in my own head that I forget what it's like in other's heads, and it takes a while for that process to filter out things that I should restrain myself from saying.
Sometimes I say things and forget how they might be viewed, or how I might be viewed by them. I forget that you're not all in my head, that you have your own thoughts and opinions. And I know this sounds juvenile, like I'm a two year old that hasn't realized that other people still exist when they leave the room. I still want you to like me! Really like me!
I'm not saying this as an excuse, that you should ignore what I say because I don't really mean it, like some dumb ingenue that shouldn't be allowed to speak to the public. Or that I immediately disagree with everything I've ever said and flip flop like a politician. I guess what I'm trying to say is that I'm still trying to figure out where I stand on issues, where I belong, and how to censure myself enough that my friends don't hate me, but speak my mind enough that I have something to say creatively. Read this blog if you will, but don't hold it against me if you disagree. And I will try to leave the philosophical discussions that go on in my head out, but the amusing anecdotes of twentysomething life will remain. The only problem is NOTHING'S HAPPENING!
So please, comment, criticize, take me to town on things, but know that when I post on here it is often out of frustration, passion or simple musings. They are opinions that I try on like clothes to see which ones fit me, which ones will stick. It is very common for me to feel like a retraction should be made, maybe I need an omsbudman to edit me. I don't disagree with what I write, but I often change perspectives. I think it over a little more and realize, with a flush of horror, that I wrote something for everyone to see that I don't want anyone to see. Or that I might have said something off the cuff that might have hurt someone I care about (a fact that was made all too clearly to me on Friday night). I'm slow, people! I spend so much time in my own head that I forget what it's like in other's heads, and it takes a while for that process to filter out things that I should restrain myself from saying.
Sometimes I say things and forget how they might be viewed, or how I might be viewed by them. I forget that you're not all in my head, that you have your own thoughts and opinions. And I know this sounds juvenile, like I'm a two year old that hasn't realized that other people still exist when they leave the room. I still want you to like me! Really like me!
I'm not saying this as an excuse, that you should ignore what I say because I don't really mean it, like some dumb ingenue that shouldn't be allowed to speak to the public. Or that I immediately disagree with everything I've ever said and flip flop like a politician. I guess what I'm trying to say is that I'm still trying to figure out where I stand on issues, where I belong, and how to censure myself enough that my friends don't hate me, but speak my mind enough that I have something to say creatively. Read this blog if you will, but don't hold it against me if you disagree. And I will try to leave the philosophical discussions that go on in my head out, but the amusing anecdotes of twentysomething life will remain. The only problem is NOTHING'S HAPPENING!
Thursday, March 20, 2008
Love Is The Answer, But Sex Raises Some Interesting Questions.
You go down to the pick up station
Craving warmth and beauty
You settle for less than fascination
A few drinks later you're not so choosy
When the closing lights strip off the shadows
On this strange new flesh you've found
Clutching the night to you like a fig leaf
You hurry
To the blackness
And the blankets
To lay down an impression
And your loneliness
-Down To You, Joni Mitchell
In the vein of Carrie Bradshaw I present a love & sex question. I hope you don't mind.
"Is it wrong to sleep with someone you don't love? Someone you care for, but don't 'like like that' as the kids say?"
I wonder about this as I think about all the cruel, hurtful things we do to one another, out of our own selfish desires. I'm not talking about getting my feelings hurt because of misplaced affections, I'm talking about the moral toll my actions take, not only on myself but on another. Granted, sex between two consenting adults who are not in relationships with others isn't genocide, terrorism, theft or anything like it. But I also think that the little things in life count too. Just as opening the door for a mother with a stroller is a small kindness, there are small hurts too. Is this situtation one of them? Can you be a good person and still allow yourself to indulge in selfish desires? Because sex for sex's sake alone is a selfish desire--wanting to be desired for your physical attraction, using someone else's attraction to you to make yourself feel better, that's selfishness. Is this just a small example of the world's obsession with instant gratification, living only for one's self, and tossing aside anything that acts as a barrier to stop us from what we feel like doing?
Perhaps it is because I have been re-reading Jane Austen, and thinking about how different the acceptable social behaviors of those times are, compared to today's. It almost feels like fiction from another planet, not from a culture that existed 200 years ago and influenced our own. Today it is perfectly acceptable, indeed even expected, for people to sleep together who are not married, have no intentions of marrying, or barely even know each other. Jane Austen's heroines are so very proper and concerned with moralistic behavior, caring for others and concerned with what is good, proper and kind. In comparison my own behavior, which I consider pretty good normaly, seems out of sync with what is good and kind.
How can sleeping with someone that you care about, but not love be good or kind? It isn't. Sex is, I was always taught, something that expresses love and increases the intimacy of two people who want to be closer. The fact that it is fun is just an added benefit. When I had sex for the first time I wanted it to be with someone I cared about, and did love, even if I wasn't planning on loving him forever. I was fortunate enough to have that, and I felt no guilt. I didn't feel guilty that I had 'pre-marital sex', as I thought I might. I felt fine. I wondered what the big deal was.
And now that I have a little more time and experience I see that even if it isn't the deadly sin I was led to believe, engaging in sex without those commitments (be it marriage or other ties that bind) does let other problems slip in. I'm not even talking about the obvious ones, pregnancy scares, STD concerns, etc. I'm talking about the ways that sleeping with another person can make you vulnerable, something that is never comfortable unless that saftey net of love is there to stop your fall. Sex opens up possibilities I hadn't considered before. The possibility that I could get hurt, get dumped, get rejected, get lonely and do something unwise in order to feel less lonely, get drunk and it gets easier.
I have no answers to this moral situation. I agree with that Woody Allen quote above, Love is the Answer, and while I'm waiting for it Sex does raise interesting questions. I don't want to give up these selfish impulses, but I also want to be a person who cares for others. I want to be free to love who I want, like the intellectual bohemian I pretend to be, but is that just an illusion? Do we call it 'free love' because we don't want to own up to the posibilities that love is not free, that sex is not as easily forgotten as we seem to think?
Thursday, March 13, 2008
It's Only 11 a.m.
You ever have those days when you wake up and realize your alarm didn't go off and the only reason why you woke up was the warm sun on your face and a yarling cat trying to get some love? Yeah.
And then you crawl out, worrying about the fact that you're going to be late again to work, and just as you're about to dash into the bathroom for the fastest shower known to man you hear your sister shutting the bathroom door. Twenty minutes later you figure you should probably change up your morning routine and have breakfast before showering because it's like waiting for a pot to boil with her.
After your shower, where you decide you like your hair dirty and tussled today, even though everytime you decide to leave it unwashed you begin to regret it around 2pm, you get dressed in about three variations of what you will eventually wear, ignoring the fact that you are seriously late.
And then your sister gives you a ride, but first she has to google map it, and sit there and wonder about the best route to get to her location after she drops you off at the metro. And makes you listen to Carrie Underwood and deep voiced country boys make awkward jokes about pop culture while she's too busy talking to bother slowing down, so that she can then slam on the brakes and make you wonder if maybe you would have been safer just staying in bed today.
And then the train closes its doors just as you're coming down the escalator trying not to look like an idiot as you run along in heels. The next one doesn't come for 12 minutes, making you even later.
And then the bus decides its going to sit around hoping for last minute stragglers while you impatiently huff and try to ignore the time, that was so easily forgotten earlier.
But at least what you're wearing is colorful, warm, comfortable and stylish enough to make you hope The Sartorialist is in town early for his opening and maybe possibly, hanging out in Rosslyn metro to take your picture.
And then you crawl out, worrying about the fact that you're going to be late again to work, and just as you're about to dash into the bathroom for the fastest shower known to man you hear your sister shutting the bathroom door. Twenty minutes later you figure you should probably change up your morning routine and have breakfast before showering because it's like waiting for a pot to boil with her.
After your shower, where you decide you like your hair dirty and tussled today, even though everytime you decide to leave it unwashed you begin to regret it around 2pm, you get dressed in about three variations of what you will eventually wear, ignoring the fact that you are seriously late.
And then your sister gives you a ride, but first she has to google map it, and sit there and wonder about the best route to get to her location after she drops you off at the metro. And makes you listen to Carrie Underwood and deep voiced country boys make awkward jokes about pop culture while she's too busy talking to bother slowing down, so that she can then slam on the brakes and make you wonder if maybe you would have been safer just staying in bed today.
And then the train closes its doors just as you're coming down the escalator trying not to look like an idiot as you run along in heels. The next one doesn't come for 12 minutes, making you even later.
And then the bus decides its going to sit around hoping for last minute stragglers while you impatiently huff and try to ignore the time, that was so easily forgotten earlier.
But at least what you're wearing is colorful, warm, comfortable and stylish enough to make you hope The Sartorialist is in town early for his opening and maybe possibly, hanging out in Rosslyn metro to take your picture.
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Six to Ten
And now we are six...Oh Winnie the Pooh.
1989- Six years old We move back to Charlotte, NC. Another house at the end of a cul-de-sac. When we move in Wendy and I get my aunt's old bedroom furniture, complete with a canopy bed that my friend eventually breaks by swinging on it. It is white, and princess-y. Our pillows are lacy and peach colored. We have a peach colored canopy and dust ruffle too. We have white ruffled curtains at the windows. This beauty is almost too much for my sister and I to bear. But, we have to share the bed. Wendy rolls around in the bed until she is pressed up against me and I can't sleep with her hot little limbs and rhythmic breathing on my neck. I start wondering if a chainsaw could cut through a bed, giving us each our own.
My mother comes upstairs one afternoon to find Wendy and I playing tea with a makeshift tea set. Books are used as plates, batteries from various toys are teacups. She buys us a real set.
On my side of the bed I set up a 'nursery' for my babydoll Megan. Every night I put her to bed and every morning I wake her up to feed her plastic bottles that make the milk magically disappear. I can still smell that distinctive powdery smell of plastic Megan. Wendy has a doll baby named Rachel that is similar to Megan, but instead of having lifelike eyes that open and close Wendy's doll has eyes that are scrunched close. To make her mad I constantly refer to her baby as 'Blind Rachel'. As in, 'Wendy, did you leave Blind Rachel on the floor again! I'd never do that with Megan. You must be a bad mother!'
The next door neighbors have two children, a girl, Jennifer, a year older than me, and a boy, Christopher, who is Wendy's age. We spend all of our time in the playhouse my dad put together in the backyard, or making up clubs in our room. When a hurricane hits we spend all of the next morning prancing around the neighborhood in Jennifer's dance tutus while the adults clean up broken branches and shingles.
Jennifer is in second grade at the local elementary school. My mom home schools me. I am so jealous of Jennifer's obvious coolness, and the fact that she gets to ride the school bus, that I decide I want to go too. One morning I wake up early, put all of the books I know how to read into a little purse that will be my backpack and go into the bathroom to take a shower, like I've seen my parents do in the morning. My parents wake up when they hear the water running and find me trying to figure out how to make it hot. They decide it is time for me to go to public school and I start soon after. The second day I discover I hate public school and want to be back safely home.
1990-Seven I might be wrong about this, but from what I can remember it was around the time of the Gulf War. I remember being afraid my dad would be drafted. Somehow I knew that had happened in previous wars, but I didn't understand that it wouldn't happen in this one. I was seven and I understood what a draft was! How did I know that?
I had a birthday party, the only home video my family owns, since we never had a camcorder. My friend's father videotaped it and this video has gone down in Byrd history. To this day my friend the Pea occasionally breaks out into a Southern accent and quotes me.
Let me explain the awesomeness of this video. I am turning seven, sitting in the middle of the living room with presents and friends all around me. I open a present and get very excited. My mother sticks her head into the the room: 'What did you get, Meredith?' she asks. I hold it up proudly and say...'It's saidwaulk chaulk!'
Later on we have an obstacle course designed by my parents, consisting of filling up an aquarium with water at the bottom of a little hill, while wearing my dad's giant sneakers, and crawling through things until eventually reaching the slip 'n slide at the bottom. Julia, who is two, doesn't understand the taking turns concept, so she decides she's going to fill it up whenever she damn well pleases. I have to wrestle the cup away from her to take my turn. Wendy, ever the supportive cheerleader, is jumping up and down like she's desperate to pee, squealing 'Go Meredith! Go Meredith!'
1991-Eight years We move to Montreat, NC, near Asheville. I begin the third grade. There is an apple orchard across the street from us and we make apple pies as the leaves change. I still remember the crisp sweet smell of those apples in the cool dusky mountain air.
We play in creeks in the spring, imagining the dust swirling around our ankles to be dust angels, and pick raspberries and blackberries from the tangled thickets along the streams. We slide down the sides of mountains getting black dirt and leaf mulch down our pants. There is a baseball field down the hill and across the street where we meet up with friends to play baseball after school in the fall. I think I knew, even at the time that this must be the most idyllic place to grow up as a child.
1992-Nine years We are on the way home from swim practice one evening when we look up to the mountain we live on and see black plumes of smoke. There is a forest fire and they aren't letting anyone into the cove. My mother manages to get us through because my grandmother, who is 80 is still at the house. Once we arrive home my mother realizes there is no danger because the fire is a few streets up the mountain from us. We children don't understand this and in a mad panic we run into the house to gather our most precious posessions. Coming out of the house we drag giant suitcases behind us filled with our stuffed animals. We are desperate to escape the fire but my parents see no reason to leave. After dinner we drive up to the opposite side of the cove and look across the valley to see the fire burning on the mountain above our house. This sight does not comfort my siblings and I. My mother has to lie with me until I fall asleep.
1993- Ten years A couple of days before I turn ten I tell my mom I'm really relieved to be leaving nine behind me. 'It feels like a great weight off my shoulders' I tell her. We are driving in the car and she starts laughing uncontrollably.
I have my first girl-boy party, inviting all the guy friends I have, including my crush. All but one have to cancel, for various reasons. Ben, the only one not to get sick, have a Boy Scout camping trip, or something else going on, is stuck playing charades with six girls.
1989- Six years old We move back to Charlotte, NC. Another house at the end of a cul-de-sac. When we move in Wendy and I get my aunt's old bedroom furniture, complete with a canopy bed that my friend eventually breaks by swinging on it. It is white, and princess-y. Our pillows are lacy and peach colored. We have a peach colored canopy and dust ruffle too. We have white ruffled curtains at the windows. This beauty is almost too much for my sister and I to bear. But, we have to share the bed. Wendy rolls around in the bed until she is pressed up against me and I can't sleep with her hot little limbs and rhythmic breathing on my neck. I start wondering if a chainsaw could cut through a bed, giving us each our own.
My mother comes upstairs one afternoon to find Wendy and I playing tea with a makeshift tea set. Books are used as plates, batteries from various toys are teacups. She buys us a real set.
On my side of the bed I set up a 'nursery' for my babydoll Megan. Every night I put her to bed and every morning I wake her up to feed her plastic bottles that make the milk magically disappear. I can still smell that distinctive powdery smell of plastic Megan. Wendy has a doll baby named Rachel that is similar to Megan, but instead of having lifelike eyes that open and close Wendy's doll has eyes that are scrunched close. To make her mad I constantly refer to her baby as 'Blind Rachel'. As in, 'Wendy, did you leave Blind Rachel on the floor again! I'd never do that with Megan. You must be a bad mother!'
The next door neighbors have two children, a girl, Jennifer, a year older than me, and a boy, Christopher, who is Wendy's age. We spend all of our time in the playhouse my dad put together in the backyard, or making up clubs in our room. When a hurricane hits we spend all of the next morning prancing around the neighborhood in Jennifer's dance tutus while the adults clean up broken branches and shingles.
Jennifer is in second grade at the local elementary school. My mom home schools me. I am so jealous of Jennifer's obvious coolness, and the fact that she gets to ride the school bus, that I decide I want to go too. One morning I wake up early, put all of the books I know how to read into a little purse that will be my backpack and go into the bathroom to take a shower, like I've seen my parents do in the morning. My parents wake up when they hear the water running and find me trying to figure out how to make it hot. They decide it is time for me to go to public school and I start soon after. The second day I discover I hate public school and want to be back safely home.
1990-Seven I might be wrong about this, but from what I can remember it was around the time of the Gulf War. I remember being afraid my dad would be drafted. Somehow I knew that had happened in previous wars, but I didn't understand that it wouldn't happen in this one. I was seven and I understood what a draft was! How did I know that?
I had a birthday party, the only home video my family owns, since we never had a camcorder. My friend's father videotaped it and this video has gone down in Byrd history. To this day my friend the Pea occasionally breaks out into a Southern accent and quotes me.
Let me explain the awesomeness of this video. I am turning seven, sitting in the middle of the living room with presents and friends all around me. I open a present and get very excited. My mother sticks her head into the the room: 'What did you get, Meredith?' she asks. I hold it up proudly and say...'It's saidwaulk chaulk!'
Later on we have an obstacle course designed by my parents, consisting of filling up an aquarium with water at the bottom of a little hill, while wearing my dad's giant sneakers, and crawling through things until eventually reaching the slip 'n slide at the bottom. Julia, who is two, doesn't understand the taking turns concept, so she decides she's going to fill it up whenever she damn well pleases. I have to wrestle the cup away from her to take my turn. Wendy, ever the supportive cheerleader, is jumping up and down like she's desperate to pee, squealing 'Go Meredith! Go Meredith!'
1991-Eight years We move to Montreat, NC, near Asheville. I begin the third grade. There is an apple orchard across the street from us and we make apple pies as the leaves change. I still remember the crisp sweet smell of those apples in the cool dusky mountain air.
We play in creeks in the spring, imagining the dust swirling around our ankles to be dust angels, and pick raspberries and blackberries from the tangled thickets along the streams. We slide down the sides of mountains getting black dirt and leaf mulch down our pants. There is a baseball field down the hill and across the street where we meet up with friends to play baseball after school in the fall. I think I knew, even at the time that this must be the most idyllic place to grow up as a child.
1992-Nine years We are on the way home from swim practice one evening when we look up to the mountain we live on and see black plumes of smoke. There is a forest fire and they aren't letting anyone into the cove. My mother manages to get us through because my grandmother, who is 80 is still at the house. Once we arrive home my mother realizes there is no danger because the fire is a few streets up the mountain from us. We children don't understand this and in a mad panic we run into the house to gather our most precious posessions. Coming out of the house we drag giant suitcases behind us filled with our stuffed animals. We are desperate to escape the fire but my parents see no reason to leave. After dinner we drive up to the opposite side of the cove and look across the valley to see the fire burning on the mountain above our house. This sight does not comfort my siblings and I. My mother has to lie with me until I fall asleep.
1993- Ten years A couple of days before I turn ten I tell my mom I'm really relieved to be leaving nine behind me. 'It feels like a great weight off my shoulders' I tell her. We are driving in the car and she starts laughing uncontrollably.
I have my first girl-boy party, inviting all the guy friends I have, including my crush. All but one have to cancel, for various reasons. Ben, the only one not to get sick, have a Boy Scout camping trip, or something else going on, is stuck playing charades with six girls.
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
Hail to the Thief
I just watched the President's helicopters land from my office window. Weird to see an obvious symbol of what goes on in this city go right past me. I'm not used to thinking of Washington as anything other than my home. You can tell it's the President's helicopter because there's three of them, all in a row, equidistant from the other, and they all circle around and land right where I estimate the White House to be.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
