Just to Say

I have agreed
to buy tickets
to Wilco
off Craigslist

even though
we hadn't discussed
spending
the money

Forgive me
they were face value
in the orchestra
and it's almost my birthday


Song-writing contest below

Song Contest # 4

Holy pregnancy brain, Batman! I keep forgetting to post this. We have another song writing contest, courtesy of the previous winner, as follows . . .

This is my idea for another Song Writing Competition. Maybe it's not a good idea, but whatever, I won so I can do whatever I want right? This is it: you must write a song whose main emphasis/thematic motivation is either (1) an animal [as in a specific, individual animal like Tony the Tiger] or (2) animals [as in tigers in general].

Freakin' animals! I mean WHY NOT? Just--I don't know if it can be wolves. Never mind, it's not my contest. Let's regroup in a month, okay? Send your (basic and lo-fi) song to rocktastica at gmail dot com. Stop being a wuss about it. Just be like Nike. You know, feel the "Instant Karma." Do It.

What kind?

So, I'm starting to show this week. It looks slightly more likely that I could be pregnant than that I had a few too many beers in college. When I look back I realize that this whole pregnancy thing is going pretty quickly, even though l am counting down the weeks until the break in the clouds known as the end of my current full-time employment happens: 22 weeks until Thanksgiving day! Not that my job is bad--it's just FINE (and I am lucky to HAVE a job), yes that's the word. But I'm about ready for a ch-ch-change.

Now people keep asking when we will find out what "kind" of baby we are having. What kind I think is a freaking genius rockstar. A drummer if we get lucky. Or maybe an accountant. Who hates the outdoors. There's nothing wrong with accountants at all. My brother is an accountant. Sort of. I mean he was and then he found something related that was more interesting. But my sister-in-law is an accountant. Sometimes. Really she's a mom, but whatever.

So far most people are guessing "girl" as the "kind" of baby we will have. Really I'm hoping "healthy, happy, non-sociopath." But (though I would love a girl kind), due to the fact that people keep telling me what they think, un-prompted of course, based on whatever brand of voo doo they may subscribe to, I am secretly kind of pulling for the "boy kind." Oops, secret is out. Though I will go back and edit this particular blog entry in a couple weeks to say the opposite for the sake of my future child's self-esteem if necessary.

Huh?

This morning I ran out of my house to drive my car to the train station, late as always, but noticed there were at least ten emergency vehicles on the road in front of my townhouse complex. Then I noticed that there were several non-emergency vehicles also clogging up the road and that my little service road/parking lot was blocked off with cones and orange tape just a few houses down. On the other side of the cones was an armored truck (I think--it looked like one). Various uniformed officials were all over the street. We spied for a while and saw some camoflauged dudes (National Guard, maybe?). El Esposo swears one of them was carrying an assault rifle. My neighbor had been outside for a while watching and his guess was bomb threat. Seriously, bomb threat in a residential neighborhood in the suburbs?

Clearly I missed my train, so I decided to take the next one. Since I had plenty of time and the road was clogged up I thought I might walk to the station, but the uniformed dudes would not let me. They wouldn't give me any info but I wasn't allowed to go that way. Now I realize I should have been more demanding as I have found no info on the incident via google. I did see a channel 4 helicopter flying around but I have not seen any info on the incident (whatever it was) on their site. I'm guessing whatever it was was a false alarm.

Meantime the news is all about the seriously scary metro incident. The Red Line has always sucked--they seem to have the most delays and problems--but this is REALLY bad. Last I heard there were nine casualties. I read a bit of Metroman's play-by-play - so terrible and bizarre.

STUCK

SO yesterday after reading Sherpa's blog entry I got really excited about working on my novel, which, I wonder if that even could have been the original writer's intent. I mean probably not, but I find all the time these days I am choosing to think of the opposite of the cynical thing, which makes me happy. So it can't be that bad, right? Even jokes referring to Sheryl Crow songs are not so bad. They aren't!

[Oh right, if you just happened upon by my blog you might have no idea that I am supposed to be A WRITER. I even went to three years of grad school for it. I certainly don't show it on this blog as I think I am usually embarassed about my recent lack of efforts in this area. I also do very little editing on this blog b/c I am SOOO sick of it. It is the main thing I do at work, where I have sold my soul to the man. I justify the job by saying it helps support El Esposo to save souls.]

Anyway I have written many a short story and I have tried to write a novel before but it just ended up being eighty pages of ruminations on "what if I were a twelve year old again?" Then at the end of last year I got a good idea. Something I really, really want to explore in fiction. Most of the fiction I write tends to answer the question "why does a person act like X or do Y?" and this one is a really interesting question to me. The gist is "How can a person possibly forgive something THAT bad? PLUS, how can a person change into something so forgiveable?" I'm not going to get into the specifics so you don't steal my idea, but anyway I've been writing many scenes with the main character and watching her morph and be funny and obnoxious and sweet and vindictive and cunning and clueless and just ALL HER and I LOVE IT.

However, I am STUCK. I have BEEN stuck, actually. This is because I am horrible at plotting. Seriously, if I could just steal an ounce of John Irving's plotting skills or maybe even J.K. Rowling's (the lady can write a compelling plot), I think I would probably be unstoppable.

Okay, enough self-congratulation plus self-pity. What I need is to figure out a couple of key things: 1) How does the betrayal go down? and 2) What does character X do for a living when he grows up?

I learned something in grad school. I learned a lot of somethings, but I learned something about myself. I learned that it is out of my weakness that I will find the pieces to build the grandest stories. It is only after much pain and defeat that I can do anything really. It's possible that this is true for lots of people.

Yet here I am waiting for brilliance to descend upon me . . .

The thing I already know is if I care enough to write a good novel I will have to slog through my own suckiness for many miles. It's called "get to work."

Sights from/on the train

...The trees are absolutely choked by Kudzu. I see it all passing in my window. The concrete canal. A woman sitting in the grass with a dog tail wagging behind her. Two men walking around in jumpsuits and hardhats. Piles of gravel. Huge satellite dishes. The VRE train official dude comes to announce that the LAW is gonna come down on us. The LAWuh! Fare evasion is now a $500 fine. The cute little lake with the dam. Trees and trees upon trees with trees standing on their heads. Trees hiding behind the backs of other trees. Poison ivy. Tennis courts and condos. Condo fees. Now approaching my stop...Approaching...

The other day I was sitting on the train next to a dude who was talking on his cell phone about someone's username and password to a government system of some kind. Just absorb that for a minute. Um ... seriously?

Update 6/16: Today the train was packed and there were NO SEATS. How does it happen that there are no available seats for anyone at my stop when normally every single one of us gets a seat? Was today "everyone new ride the VRE" day? Anyway I sure TRIED to look as pregnant as possible in the hopes that someone would gallantly offer me their seat, but the bump just is not big enough to garner any sympathy at this point. I just look a little bit chubby. Anyway I was totally fine, but sometimes I do feel light-headed so I hope today was a fluke. Today is the first day I have WANTED special treatment. I am so glad it never happened on all the days I felt like I was about to puke.

Check back in six months

So predicts Madame Zaritska:

The day you deliver, outside will be overcast. Your baby will arrive in the evening. After a labor lasting approximately 18 hours, your child, a boy, will be born. Your baby will weigh about 8 pounds, 11 ounces, and will be 22-1/2 inches long. This child will have light gray eyes and curly red hair.