Category: Words

And on the seventh day, there was cooking

Cooking and company today.

Ashley arrived from Eugene and moved into the spare bedroom for…eh…who knows. Until she finds a place of her own. Or doesn’t and stays. Or whatever. We’ll see.

Before she got here, there was much cooking. I do this periodically on a Sunday. Cook several different meals at once, that is. I made chili, some meat for stew or stroganoff, soup, and a bunch of spicy tomato sauce for Shaksuka or pasta. Hopefully, I will feel like eating it this week. Often, doing the cooking sort of ruins the eating. As it did today. The food is in the fridge and freezer ready to be eaten another day.

Once I got the various food items in a state where they could be unattended, I started reading “the Haunting of Hill House” and am loving it so far. Very atmospheric and psychological.

I also had an unexpected invitation to drinks with one of my favorite people in the world. Which was great until it …just wasn’t anymore. The part where we were both there was fun. A lot of fun. The part where I was the only one there, not so much. I came home feeling a bit…I don’t even quite know. Processing the feeling, I guess. I think I don’t even quite want to admit to myself how I felt. Maybe I’ll figure it out after I sleep on it.

It’s making me uncomfortable to even think about it, so there’s…something. It’s a vaguely Fiona Apple-ish feeling.

Ultimately, I got to spend time with someone I enjoy and don’t get to see as often as I’d like. That’s all that really matters.

I will think about it another day, just like Scarlett O’Hara, because right this second I am sleepy.

It was a very good day.

Crying at movies? I wish…

Nobody sees when you are lying in your bed
And I wanna crawl in with you
But I cry instead
–Love Ridden/Fiona Apple

Two drifters, off to see the world
There’s such a lot of world to see
We’re after the same rainbow’s end, waitin’ round the bend
My Huckleberry Friend, Moon River, and me
–Moon River/J. Mercer

In life, some of us are shouters. Some of us are sulkers. Some of us are cryers. I am one of the cryers.

There are a lot of types of crying, and I am afflicted with most of them. I cry when I am sad, when I am happy. I bawl like a baby at a sad movie, or at a happy one. I laugh until I cry. I cry when I feel powerless, or when I am furious or frustrated. There are certain songs that always make me cry. I cry at weddings and funerals. I cry when people are mean to me, or when people say nice things about me.

There are a few periods in my life in which I have been essentially numb, but for the most part I am an all-purpose cryer, and have always been.

The thing that I hate about crying, aside from the way it makes me ugly, is that people assume that tears equal hysteria or irrationality. Or worse, that the tears somehow indicate that your basic argument, if you have one, is invalid because you are expressing it through tears.

A lot of people are simply not able to listen to someone who is crying.

That isn’t necessarily always a bad thing. It has gotten me out of trouble more than once. More often, though, it has gotten me patronized or dismissed as silly. Which of course leads to feeling even more powerless, frustrated and angry…and straight to more tears.

Vicious cycles are fun, aren’t they?

Crying at movies or books is my favorite sort of tear fest. So cathartic. There are some movies I have a Pavlovian response to at this point. “It’s A Wonderful Life” for instance. It used to only make me cry when George’s brother Harry comes in at the very end and calls George the richest man in town. Gradually, though, I started having anticipatory tears. Now I start to cry as soon as George finds Zuzu’s petals in his pocket and I enjoy every second.

James Taylor’s song “Shower the People” also does it.

Once you tell somebody the way that you feel, you can feel it beginning to heal

And it’s true.
Especially if you have a good cry in the car after you tell them.

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Shhhh, my mind is resting

Since I have been overthinking even more than usual this week, I am giving my brain a little vacation. Reading, mostly. OK, I know some people don’t consider that resting, but I do. For the last several months, I really haven’t been able to concentrate enough to read, so I am on a word drunk.

Nothing too difficult, though. Resting my mind and all. Still, I think I’ve managed to get through 3 or 4 books this week. I’m excited about that-I have missed books! It’s probably a little hard for most people to understand. I don’t remember a time before I was able to read, and I have read constantly for as long as I can remember. Not being able to read was a little like not breathing.

Earlier this week, I read a couple of the Harry Dresden novels. Wizards, fairies, angels and mobsters, oh my. Tonight I tore through “Hell House,” and earlier today I finished David Cronenberg’s new book called “Consumed.” I could tell you what it was about, but that is kind of like thinking so I won’t. Sex, cannibalism, philosophy and a North Korean conspiracy of insects.

Yeah. It does sound weird.

I hope to be back to my regularly scheduled brainy books soon. Maybe after my birthday.

What else have I got in mind this weekend? Not a damn thing. I’ll watch the Ducks beat UCLA, and do some junk around the house. I should probably finish cleaning out the spare bedroom if Ashley will be here on Sunday, right? Maybe make some chili. Buy groceries. Go for a walk or something. I’ve been huddled in all week with words and music. Being a recluse. Having a few small nervous breakdowns. Very minor ones. Mostly enjoying the solitude. Mostly.

So a few more days of enforced brain rest and I will be right as rain.

Why do you suppose people say that? Right as rain? It’s like happy as a clam. What’s happy about getting sand in your shell and living in cold muck?

I don’t get it.

But I don’t care enough to Google it.

Maybe later. I have some more scary reading to do. Mint tea to drink.

Important stuff.

Ciao, y’all.