little victories

this time, i'll be sailing
no more bailing boats for me
i'll be out there on the sea
just my confidence and me

and i'll be awful sometimes
weakened to my knees
but i'll learn to get by
on little victories

this time, i'll have no fear
i'll be standing strong and tall
turn my back towards them all

and i'll be awful sometimes
weakened to my knees
and i'll learn to get by
on the little victories
and if the world decides to catch up with me
it's a little victory

[matt nathanson]

i feel like this song could come across as such a passive-aggressive communication, but it's not meant to be. it is simply this - that i've had this song stuck in my head today so far and i think parts of it are fairly accurate regarding where i am in my life. and it's beautiful. as per the usual with matt nathanson.

in other news, bridgette's coming today! i am so ready.

g'day.

loaded questions, the board game

it was fun.

"how long does it take you to go to the bathroom, on average?"
(we all write down our answers and pass them in)
"ok. the first one says . . . it's flatulates. fajita day!"
"wait. ben. that says fluctuate."
"oh."

and then, aunt wendy burst into a fit of laughter that lasted for a good ten minutes, causing the rest of us to laugh until we cried because she was still bent over in the corner wiping her eyes after the next turn.

oh my.

anyway. my skin is all post-bath loveliness, i have one of my favorite old crumplysoft t-shirts on and i think it's time i attempted to describe what it feels like to be home. or rather what it feels like to be home at this particular moment, because it depends. but. it is two o'clock in the morning and that is when my best communication happens. also, i slept in the car all day, and therefore am not very tired.

usually car rides are a wonderful time to stop and think about my life and day dream, staring out the window with my music of the day blaring in my ears. i find that i've had a lot of time to think for the past three months, however, and i think i'm tired of thinking. not to say that i'm planning on stopping anytime soon, i just need to think outward, if that makes sense. i need to interact and screw up and then go think on my own. i need my thinking to be an exploration of a response to someone or something, as opposed to an exposition of some dark corner of my soul. not that those two don't go together, in fact, they should go together - the response leads to the dark corner because it is a reflection of it, but i've been so introspective that i've stopped responding to people, sometimes. not to mention that self-examination gets very tiring after a bit, and i've never been good with self-motivation anyway.

i'm just a little stale. it's like writer's block for soul-searching. sometimes you just can't. slash don't want to.

i've spent plenty of quality time with myself and it's time for some outside input. which translates into me being the most ready to go back to school that i've ever been, though i am glad i've had an adjustment period at home before i do - i think that school right after england would have led to a dive into carelessness, to be honest. a daisy-like carelessness, a distraction carelessness. not that i haven't started to fall into that at home anyway, but the level of recklessness would have been greater at school, i think. with recklessness referring to my disregard of conviction. my unwillingness to identify my weaknesses. it's like a blindness to them, really, like i just can't see them - i block them out.

aw. too bad. i guess i'll have to be smug for a little while.

which i hate, honestly honestly i hate it when i get to this part. although being arrogant is quite lovely in its own ego fluffing sort of way. i would be lying if i said i didn't enjoy it just as i hate it.

it's funny, typing about this, because i didn't realize that it was bothering me. apparently it is, depending on one's opinion of the importance of the subconscious. i haven't decided how exactly i feel about it: telling, but fairly easy to overcome, i've found. well, i should say fairly easy to muddle up en route to its expression, which makes it's communication unreliable, and potentially inaccurate.

there's a tangent for you.

i'm tired now.

um, in conclusion, that's what it feels like to be home?

ha. this will be a many-part description. and totally disjointed on first examination. but such is life. and my thought processes on it. it all connects somehow, i promise.

good mornin'.

playing with bookmarks

ok. i've finally discovered my bookmark tool bar. this is exciting for me, but i couldn't get the icons to show beside the names of the sites, and so i was very frustrated. but now, i've figured it out, and my tool bar is as pretty as it should be. i had to arrange them by color and shape. i think i have a very distinctly artistic/visual-type ocd. maybe i'm just eccentric. i think that's how i would define eccentricity, anyway. depending on the understanding of ocd - if we're going with the socially used and accepted one, then yes. if we're talking the scientifically researched one, then no. they are different. one's a quirk, the other is a disorder.

another quirk? i hate real bookmarks. and i hate dog-earing pages. sometimes i use bobby pins. sometimes i just remember the page. i like index cards. they're better than bookmarks-by-name for some reason. maybe because they fit inside the book and don't stick out the top. egh. the tassles are the worst.

anyway. i'm full of adrenaline that was designed to be used on brain power for my exam, but i definitely didn't need it; it was one question. one question on memory as an exam for an entire course worth of lecture. and we were able to choose between two of them! why didn't i come to england for my entire uni career? but i am glad i haven't. think of how easy my masters will be. that is, if i get my masters. plans are becoming more hazy as i get closer to them, i think that may be a little backwards.

the point is that i have jittery things coursing through me, but i want to sleep. i need to sleep, but i'm not sure i can. so here i am : ), typing absolute nonsense and admiring my new (pretty) bookmark tool bar.

i'm going to make sweet potato soup for lunch today.

that's all.

portrait of a town

i wake up to my phone vibrating and the british woman's voice; "it's eleven thuhty. it's time to wake ohp. it's eleven thuhty. it's time to wa-" i stand over my desk holding my phone in wonder. i actually got up without turning my alarm off in my sleep! from now on, i will be putting my phone on my desk instead of beside my bed every morning. and by "from now on," i mean "until friday, when i leave." talk about strong closure. classical films have got nothing on my life right now.

after stretching to pull the pamphlet of bus times off the shelf, i slump onto the bed with my legs pulled up beside me, still half-asleep, and figure out how quickly i need to shower to catch a bus into town. 12:48. eh, no problem. i've even got time to make myself a cup of tea and wake up for a bit before i get clean and dressed.

kate comes into the kitchen as the water in the kettle starts to boil; we chat about how wonderful reading for pleasure is, and how lovely it is to have time to be informed about the world, and she makes herself an omelet. she has a very particular way of cooking; her shoulders hunch and she bends over the cutting board or mixing bowl, she walks quickly and intensely from the fridge to her cupboard and back to the section of counter she's cleaned off. she only breaks her focus to respond to my conversation, often pushing her glasses a little farther up on her nose as she does. she never cooks and talks at the same time, and everything she makes looks like it's come out of healthy living. she's a vegetarian.

after finishing my tea, i walk back to my room, and run into chris. not surprising, since he lives in the room directly across from mine.

"hey, do you have a non-yellow highlighter i can borrow?"
"yes? it's pink, and running out of ink, i think, but you're welcome to it"
"thanks"
"yep"

i close my door, glad for the peace offering, and get ready for my shower.

after getting dressed and collecting my books and laptop on my desk, i transfer the pile into my book-bag and grab two pounds to stick in my jacket pocket for the bus ride.

i get to the castle gift shop, realize that there is no one else there except the employees, shake it off and go ask the man in a uniform for a ticket to the tour.

"four pounds, please"
"yeah, here you go"
"alright then, you're the only one on the tour right now, but we'll start off in about two minutes"
"ok, thanks."

i leaf through the coat-of-arms magnets in the middle of the shop, wishing that my family had such a history. i do see a "baker" magnet, but apparently my ancestors changed their name to baker after coming to the states, so i can't even claim it. it does look like my mom's family, though; a little stark, very classy, good, basic colors.

"right, we'll start now, as soon as this group comes through"
"thanks so much"
"now, you ask any questions you have, since there's only one of you - i can't really just talk to one person!"
"alright, i will"
"whereabouts are you from?"
"north carolina . . ."
"yeah?"
"mmhm"

so my personal tour of lancaster castle was spattered with comments like "do you have civil courts like that in the states?" and "you know about king george the third, don't you," with a knowing grin. it wasn't malicious, he was a wonderful tour guide, and we ended up having a lovely conversation about appalachain culture and bluegrass music in the barrister's library half-way through the tour.

then, i walked around town for a bit, exploring what's become my third home-place and realizing that i've learned my way around fairly well. i bought my secret santa present in woolworth's and the conditioner i needed in somerfield's, and then i set my sights on finding a place to study. all of the coffeeshops in town are closed on sundays, so i ended up in bella italia. the host tried to put me in the middle of the restaurant, but i asked for a seat by the window. i always hated it when customers did that at the boathouse, but i figured i was justified. it was 3 pm, the place was not crowded, and there were two other window tables open yet. anyway, for the next hour, the host, who was also my waiter, played like i was invisible. i didn't mind much while i was eating my pastry and looking over my psych notes, but once i was ready to go it started to ruffle my feathers just a bit. i finally had to flag down one of his fellow waitresses and get her to tell him to give me my check.

after that, which prompted a study on whether being a single woman makes a difference in situations like that, i searched for another place to settle in. i got a hot mint chocolate at costa, only to find out they were closing in ten minutes. what kind of coffeeshop closes at 5 in the evening? well, nevermind. i journaled there until they started locking the doors and then went to my only other option - mcdonalds.

now, the mcdonalds in lancaster is actually relatively nice, as far as furniture goes, so i bought an orange juice and sat down in one of the mod wingbacks in the window by the door, under the staircase. quiet, out of the way, nestled in a corner enough to satisfy my ocd-ness about sitting in the middle of a room. i like to have my back up against something when i'm working or in a restaurant, i don't know.

just then, a young girl and boy come exploding into my space - the girl runs smack into the high chair stacked under the stairs and proceeds to climb into it, after it's stopped bobbling from the impact. she's too old to be in a high chair though her hair, most of which is pulled back into a ponytail, still pokes out in ringlets around her face. it's the pale straw color that mine was when i was younger. the boy makes a verbal jab at her, and she fires back without hesitation. she's a pistol, my goodness.

finally, a skinny older man with straight, thick, scraggly gray hair comes around the corner with the first young boy and another. the three kids - two boys and the girl, must be his grandchildren, although he does look like a younger grandpa. maybe 60s.

"do yeh mind?"
"no, no, go for it"

he pulls one of the wingbacks at my table around to face the two boys, who've pulled up to a table a few feet away from the girl, who's still in the highchair. they all chatter away as i type on my laptop and then grandpa instructs the boys, "you stay hehre now, i'm gonna go feh a smoke" and heads outside, where he stakes out a bench facing the window, so he can keep tabs on them.

the girl is now scooting the highchair around the floor in her attempt to get out of it. i smile at her, amused. i don't help her - i wouldn't want her to go running off for her grandpa to go find. he comes back in, helps her out and comments "yeh too big feh these things, love."

the siblings tear around a bit more, catching my eye every once and awhile. i smile when they do - it's nice to be around kids again. i find a new sentence in my book that i can use and as i'm typing it out, i notice that the girl has saddled up to the side of the table and is peering around at my screen.

"it's an essay, for school"

she looks at me calmly, her eyes simply observing me.

"what's your name?"
"couhtney"
"i'm jessie, it's nice to meet you"
"hiya"
"how old are you?"
"fouhty fouh"
"oh yeah?"

her grandpa holds up five fingers: "what's this, couhtney?"
"six."
"when's that been six?"
"eh," she looks back at me, "don't listen teh him, he's an old geezeh."
"well, i believe you. you look forty four."

she stares at me for a moment, puzzled. i think she's not sure what to do with an adult who agrees with her ridiculous-ness.

her brother, the oldest of the three, i figure out later, comes around and comments on my laptop: "my teacheh's got a laptop like thot'n"
"it's really nice for working on."
"you've got pinball on't, y'know - go teh program, 'gehmes' and then 'pinball'"
"you want to play?"
"yea, alright"

meanwhile, sam (their grandfather) and i start up a conversation.

"zac's the brawn," and also the pinball champ, at this point, "but tj hehre is the brains. and couhtney's the muscle"

he smiles at her as she runs around to put something in the bin, and asks me if i'm going to lancaster uni. he got expelled at 15, and wanted to be a jockey, but got married instead.

"to three women, actually. lived with seven othehs, and now i've got thuhteen grandchilren! so much for being a jockey, yeah?"
"no kidding"
"they all thuhteen tuhned out alright, too - except feh one. he'll be a jailbihd yet! already institutionalized, i think he's developed a taste feh it."
"well, i guess if you get used to it . . ."

we both chuckle. courtney jumps into the chair next to me; "thot bin oveh theh smells!"
"that usually what happens when you put a lot of trash in one place," i reply.

tj smiles at me, and i get sucked into watching zac play pinball as tj tells me about how he's waiting to get his results; he might be going to grammar school. he's so proud of it, but trying desperately to be nonchalant; "eh, we'll see."

sam announces, "alright, you lot - i'm going feh anotheh smoke, and when i come back it's time teh go. you've pestehed the miss enough"

he comes back in, shakes my hand and wishes me good luck with my results as zac finishes his last game. the kids bounce out in front of their grandpa's guiding hands, and i wave to all of them as they pass by the window. i go back to my highlighting but hear a determined fist on the window right beside me; i look out to see courtney, staring at me intently with her hand over her mouth. she blows me a kiss, i blow her one back. she grins, satisfied, and skips off to join the boys.

regarding kanaph

kelly spoke on a passage in samuel at fusion tonight; she was talking about childlike faith, and resting in our father, and she brought up the word kanaph, which is the hebrew word for "wing." you know, "i rest beneath the shadow of your wing . . ."

great. that's wonderful.

here's the thing - it is also the hebrew word for "cloak."

think about it for a second.

we are to rest in the folds of god's cloak. we are to cozy up to the creator of the universe and talk into his chest of our dreams and hurts and desires and beliefs, about our days and our moods and our concerns and our friends.

it was just such a striking picture in my mind, being that i have a great need for physical affection, and am hurting for it at the moment. god actually has that space between a man's shoulder and his neck, right below his collarbone; the one that a woman's head fits perfectly into, do you know? god has a nook. and i was made so that i can wiggle up to him, bury my head in his nook with my arms tucked around my sides, and his arm around me, and then just look up at my god, soaking him in.

". . . definitely has a romantic plot line."

anyway.

he always seems to know right where to hit me, doesn't he.

cheers : )

boyfriend sweaters

me: "i think my boyfriend's a fruitcake."
lauren: "no, no, his grandmother knitted it for him. he never wears it."
me: "so he gave it to me!"
lauren: "exactly."
me: "oh, good. that makes sense."


this weekend was really wonderful. i finished wuthering heights, caught up with a kindred spirit, drank red wine and remembered why i'm in love with john cusack. not necessarily in that order.

also, i made a new list, seeing as how i haven't made one since i was 16 and i've been hatching too many plans that don't have a slot in the old one.

things to do before i die.

1) rediscover my identity as a bookworm
2) live in the uk for a year, at least
3) work as a live-in nanny for a family, preferably in the scottish/english countryside
4) take a cooking class
(and when i say "take" i mean "audit" so i don't have to do any work and can just learn)
5) take an art class
6) rent rooms in my house out to people who need a place to stay
7) have a library in one room of my house
8) own brown leather couches. old ones. sherlock holmesian ones.
9) find home
10) make my home
11) figure out what i'm to do with my connection to the ideas of people and relationships

good luck, right? well. i'm fairly determined, so we'll see what happens.

mmph.

because i don't want to be motivated. but also because i wish that i did want to be. because then i would be, wouldn't i.

i was so motivated this morning. and i will be in a bit, i just need a little time. i'm not really sure why, or what i'm hoping to accomplish in that time that will make it so much easier to be motivated, but there it is.

i'm in a mood where i want to be passionate, but i can't justify the risk involved. even with academic passion - the risk is that i won't be able to communicate my knowledge fully, or that i won't be able to write down what i think in the amount of time that i have. and if i can't do it completely, then why even start, right? which then means that i have less time and am more likely to sell myself short. i've never quite managed to be logical about passion.

i suppose that's the problem i have with schoolwork - it's channeling my passion into grade-able form. which takes forever. my excitement doesn't appreciate being channeled, although it's good for it, i think.

i don't like school. i love learning and i love sitting in a classroom and being taught, but i hate being graded and having guidelines for my reaction to the material. i'm not too sure about this career-woman-get-my-masters-and-ph.d. thing. it may be my mood, but part of it isn't, i know.

this is not helpful. it doesn't matter whether i like school or not, i'm in it for the next year and a half. i might as well embrace it and be productive, yeah?

yeah.

heh. right then . . .