The color of love

40 B4 40
27 days to go


Paint fumes make my head fuzzy and my feet heavy.  But still I love painting a room, any room, a new fresh color.  Don't need much of a reason, just a bug and a free afternoon and - voila. 

Sometimes we paint over the old as we're tossing out the old (read: dumped a boyfriend in New Orleans, turned around and painted our bedroom the most horrendous shade of royal blue - all the way up to the 18 foot ceilings).  Sometimes we paint in the new just as we're starting anew (read: every brightly colored apartment kitchen I've had since 1998).  Sometimes you're just so damn excited about your As-Seen-On-TV PaintStick that you simply can't stop yourself from painting every single room, again.  Sometimes it's all HGTV's fault and when combined with a snowstorm and a wild hair - big things happen (read: one manic weekend in NYC painting amazing stripes on my walls).  Sometimes it's because there's a run-down school in Queens that needs some fixin' up and you & your friends are just the right set of do-gooders to make that happen.  Sometimes it's just because those damn paint chips have been taped to the walls since moving in 10 months ago and the wall's just not going to paint itself already.

Spent today painting in Nate's house, the one he's graciously agreed to sell in order to start our lives together in a new house of our own.  This was a whole different thing.  An act, nearly, of service and of love.  I've never painted a room out of love before (well, not out of love for a person, as opposed to a love of bright orange) - and, like a lot of things lately, I wanted to get it just right to show that love.  So I taped and I rolled and I got into the corners like a pro.  I did a second coat and I bent over backwards trying (poorly) to cover that gnarly brown on the ceiling.  And I did that while singing and bopping around to some terrible 90's music and daydreaming of our next steps - in a home that we will share, and paint, together.

What wasn't

40 B4 40
30 days to go

To be fair - I wrote this quite some time ago, and I did so in a full panic (which you'll see below).  Nothing came of the night that this describes, nor of the conversation that seeded my fear, everyone is totally fine and completely still with us.  But it clearly scared the living *%^$ out of me. I just haven't been brave enough to share these words yet.

I share this today to honor Chris Gascoigne, his struggle, and his sister Molly - who I love deeply and with my whole, damaged heart.


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I have no idea where to start and I have no idea where it will all end.

Such a frightening and lopsided place to be.

Is he really making these statements?
Are they better categorized as threats?
Is that over-exaggeration or not enough emphasis?
What does it mean to answer a question of "What do YOU want?" with "I want to die, I want all this to go away and I don't want to have to deal with it anymore."?
What does it mean to give that answer?
What does it mean to hear it?

What the fuck is supposed to happen next?

I can't understand. All I can understand or know is that I can't and don't even come close to understanding or knowing. People think I do, think our shared experience gives me some insight, but I'm completely at a loss. I still see tomorrow, I still believe I have options - thousands of them, I still have more to do.

But I fear that he has a model, a real and viable model. He's seen it, literally seen it, first hand and he knows that, for lack of a better way to put it, that this works. That it's an option. A realistic and easily attainable option. Not that it's easy, but that it is more plausible for him than for someone else who doesn't have the road map, who isn't burdened with the example, who hasn't lived with it in the back of their brain in every moment for the past 2,416 days.

Just one more reason for me to never fully forgive our dad. How could you teach your son that this is an option? How could you leave him with the impression that this is an even remotely legitimate choice? HOW DARE YOU SET THIS EXAMPLE YOU SAD, WEAK, SORRY, SHITBAG EXCUSE OF A MAN.

I have no idea where to start and I have no idea where it will all end.

Someone tell me what to do. Someone tell me where to start. Someone please tell me what to say to make it all better, to stem the tide, to slow this sad, dark march.

What if it's inevitable, what then?

I have no idea where to start and I have no idea where it will all end.
.
.
.

Zilch

40 B4 40
31 days to go

I got nothing today.  I'm sick and whiny and full of complaints. 

This is not in the spirit of writing every day for 40 days straight.  But it's all I can muster.

It's the final countdown (doo doo doo, doo dooooooo)

40 B4 40
32 days to go ('til the big Four-Oh)

But only one week 'til - N'awlins!
And only 11 days 'til I've been with my one true love for one sweet year.
And only 115 days 'til I make some pretty big promises to him in front of all of you.


Counting down.  So many milestones this year.  So many squares on my post-it notes to check off.  So many of life's momentous events that are right here on the horizon.  But you know what I love? 

Life's little moments.  The ones that hardly even get noticed, let alone counted down to.

Brushing your teeth next to someone you love.  High fiving your nephew.  The chickens still being alive after their first snowy weekend outside.  Glee (the show and the feeling of).  Getting out of something at work you didn't want to do anyway.  Balloons stuck in trees.  A clear x-ray.  A full belly.  An empty carton of ice cream.  Random texts, just because.  Country music.  CatDaddy Moonshine.  The Spotted Pig.  Flowers, that grow, out of the ground just because they can & they do.  Hammocks.  Finish lines & starting points.  Set up & strike.  7th Inning Stretches.  Beer.  Mac & Cheese.  Thank you cards.  Magazines (real ones, with paper & ink that smells good).  Photographs.  Airport bars.  Couch sitting.  Tailgating.  The occasional sunrise for a change.  Camping.  Hymns.  Funeral potatoes.  Starting over.  Driving cross country, again.  Remembering something funny your mom once said or did.  Wrapping a gift.

I'll be here all night, you get the idea. 

These, and so many more moments like them, are what we're really made of.  When we hit pause long enough to remember and savor these instead of always counting down to the Next Big Thing... that's when we're living.  That's where life lives.  Why don't we?

Music is...

40 B4 40
(skipped a day, 'cest la vie)  33 days to go


... the window to the soul? 

I went searching for the exact wording of the quote and came up short - which is exactly what I'm doing in the search for the perfect wedding songs (first dance, processional, recessional, other wedding phrases I've never heard before, etc. etc. etc.).  Who knew there were so many momentous wedding moments to capture with just the right chords, lyrics, tempo and timing?

Question: Slow and sweet? Fun and playful? Soft and serious? Traditional? Unique? Instrumental? Loaded lyrics?
Answer:  I have absolutely no idea. 

I do know that music changes everything though. I know that the right song can turn stop and go traffic into a mini-vacation.  It will reverse even the worst of bad days and can bring back powerful distant memories in an instant like just about nothing else in this world.   It can make you dance around in the car like your windows aren't made of clear, clear glass.  Which reminds me of the only other music quote I know (and love) - “Those who dance are considered insane by those who cannot hear the music.”  ~George Carlin (the source of many a great quote, truly). 

So - I'm going to relax about this particular wedding detail.  And I'm going to continue my research by simply listening to more music each day.  And I'm going to hope that it will just come to me.

In the meantime, I'm going to be that wonderfully insane dancer in the car next to you, even if no one else can hear the music...

Snow Day

40 B4 40
35 days to go.

Snow Days.  Snow Days don't mean the same thing to me that they mean to other, normal, people who grew up in snowy, cold places.  It snowed exactly three times that I remember in Arizona growing up.

Time One I was in second grade and living in the middle of nowhere Camp Verde (see http://butweremakinggoodtime.blogspot.com/2009/07/where-blacktop-ends.html).  Our (potentially drunk?) school bus driver dropped those of us from the 'hood off at the end of the blacktop and wished us luck.  She'd decided that it wasn't safe for the bus to take us in the snow on the dirt road home.  Simultaneously she'd also decided that it was completely safe for six elementary school kids who'd never seen snow before to walk home a mile & change in said snow.  Makes sense.  Carry on.   My guess is that most kids would love this - running and playing and catching snowflakes on their tongues a la It's A Wonderful Life or A Christmas Story.  And for all I know, the rest of the neighborhood ran home hooting and hollering and making sand-infused snowballs to hurl around.  All I remember is hating every single step of the interminably long walk home.  It was cold.  It was wet.  It was dark.  And as far as I knew - we'd never get home.  Miserable.

Time Two was at the same house, somewhere around the 4th grade, and we had visitors from Australia in town.  They more or less lost their ever-loving minds playing in the snow and scratching together enough for a snowman.  Again - It was cold.  It was wet.  I was miserable.  

 (Please note the complete lack of any remaining snow on the ground and the abundance of Arizona sunshine in the photo...)

Time Three was in Wickenburg and I got tricked into some sort of "sledding" at school.  Naturally we had only the finest and fanciest of sledding gear.  Two words - cardboard boxes.  I can not fully describe the ridiculousness of the scene.  One truly has to experience sledding with cardboard on a half inch of barely sticking snow.  Dodging the occasional cactus was the truly creative part.

Fast forward to this past weekend.  We have easily a foot of snow on the ground (and on the cars and driveways and sidewalks) with temps in the single digits.  It's cold.  It's wet.  I've just done my homeownerly duty and shoveled the sidewalks.  I'm tempted to be miserable.  What in the hell am I doing living in Colorado? 

But wait - all the rules have changed.  I don't have to go to school.  No one's dragging me out to build snowmen.  Shoveling aside, I don't have to go outside at all.  It's the weekend and all I have to do is, well, nothing.   Nothing.  Can sit indoors, baking & cooking & drinking & planning a honeymoon with my honey.  Now that, my dears, is more like it.  I know some of you were out snowshoeing and skiing and whatever other torture you chose.  But me?  Nothing.

I say bring on more Snow Days - I've got some relaxing to do.

Make your move

40 B4 40
36 days to go.


As a way to torture myself tonight I counted up all the moves I've made in my first (nearly) 40 years and the numbers astounds even me... thirty four. 

Thirty four moves.  Who does that?

It came up at dinner with the BF, we were talking about selling and renting and buying our existing houses as we head into this next phase of "us".  He finds himself daunted by the moving - he's moved twice.  Ever.  Which prompted me to count and, voila...

• Alice Springs
• Anchorage
• Camp Verde (2)
• Townsville, Qld
• Wickenburg (2)
• Maryborough, Qld -- here's where I stop counting my parents' moves as my own, but there would be 5 more moves for them - 3 of them from one continent to the next, extra points for both distance and insanity.
• Tucson (Round I) - Coronado Dorm, home for a summer, ManziMo Dorm, Speedway house, AgFarm apartment, Senior year apartment (5)
• La Place, LA
• New Orleans
• Tucson (Round II) - Mountain Street duplex, Broadway house (2)
• Cleveland (oops)
• Perris, CA (ooooooooops)
• San Francisco - Berkeley, Oakland, Ocean Beach, Cathedral Hill (4)
• Barcelona/San Sebastian - it counts
• New York - East Village, Carroll Gardens, Hells Kitchen (3)
• Los Angeles - Santa Monica, Redondo Beach, La Brea/Wilshire - all in <8 months (3)
• Insert a crazy year+ of being more or less homeless and livin' la vida gypsy (can't even count these in the tally) - http://butweremakinggoodtime.blogspot.com/2009/08/not-on-road-again.html
• Denver - Jenny's basement, rented basement, Downing Street apartment, Pearl Street house

Thirty four.  And I've likely missed one or two in there.  Holy Hell.  All this counting & moving and packing & unpacking makes me think of an earlier post re: Running From vs. Running To.  The jury is still out, you decide.  http://butweremakinggoodtime.blogspot.com/2009/07/all-road-running.html 

And if that post wasn't telling enough - try this one on for size
http://butweremakinggoodtime.blogspot.com/2009/06/home-where-my-thoughts-escaping.html

For now - I really can't wait for my 35th move, the one where my heart can finally sit still and marvel at the man I love and at the life we're building together, regardless of which house we're living in.  

The best laid plans

40 B4 40
37 days to go.

Planning.  Making plans.  Planning ahead.  Plan B (and C, and sometimes, albeit rarely, D).

These are things I do, and do well, and do again, and do once more just to be sure.  And wedding planning - oooooohhhhhh wheeeeeeeee - ain't that the mac-daddy of all the planning fun to be had?   Perhaps Libby put it best when, upon being asked to be a bridesmaid, responded immediately with "What will my job be and is it already on the spreadsheet?".   Only a hint of sarcasm.  You see, I'm trained to detect it.

The spreadsheet, my darlings, is the only way to go.  
The spreadsheet, my dears, has saved any good planner's ass more than once.
The spreadsheet, in a word, Rules.

And so I've been planning.  It's more accurate to say that we've been planning - as it seems that the BF is far more interested in colors and candles and who says what when than one would have guessed.  And I love it, I love him, and I love that he gives a hoot.  But he's slowing down my planning, he's gumming up my spreadsheets, and he's teaching me to compromise...  I'm learning to not care as much if he cares more and to stand my ground if and when it matters.

And here's what I've learned most of all, thus far, there is still time...

What I've learned most of all is that when I do stand my ground, on the things that do matter, they are not the types of things that are on the spreadsheets.  There is no (expected) line in the sand over the color of dresses or shoes or nails.  I'm not, so to speak, married to a towering cake or teetering heels.  We mostly agree and we mostly came to the table with the exact same picture in our heads of what this day would look like and so there are very few compromises to be made. 

The place where I will dig my (non-existent) heels into the ground (if need be) will not make the spreadsheet.  It will not show up in photos.  It may not even be noticed or remembered by anyone but me.  But it's important.  It's central.  And it's more specifically about love than just about anything else that will happen that day.  It's a few, powerful, words that matter because they're true and that matter because many of our most loved guests can not stand in front of the people they love most and get married the way we will this summer.  The least I can do is speak that truth and make it a part of our collective day together. 

     "Marriage is a vital social institution. The exclusive commitment of two individuals to each other nurtures love and mutual support; it brings stability to our society. For those who choose to marry, and for their children, marriage provides an abundance of legal, financial, and social benefits. In return it imposes weighty legal, financial, and social obligations....Without question, civil marriage enhances the "welfare of the community." It is a "social institution of the highest importance.  Marriage also bestows enormous private and social advantages on those who choose to marry. Civil marriage is at once a deeply personal commitment to another human being and a highly public celebration of the ideals of mutuality, companionship, intimacy, fidelity, and family.

Because it fulfills yearnings for security, safe haven, and connection that express our common humanity, civil marriage is an esteemed institution, and the decision whether and whom to marry is among life’s momentous acts of self-definition.”

~ from Goodridge v. MA Department of Public Health

Support Systems

40 B4 40
38 days to go.


As recently mentioned, I've got a long list of crap I need to/should do.  I'd like to amend the list to add that I'm also trying to change my way of thinking and speaking to re-adjust those to be a long list of things that I want to do.  Things I'm looking forward to doing.  Things that if I do do them - will mean that a better, longer, more enjoyable, wackier, fun-filled life is in the works.

To that end - I should (damnit, see what I mean?), I would like to get off my butt more often and move this body of mine around.  I would love to someday be one of those people who honestly enjoys exercise, the ones who have a better day with a good run in it rather than being one of those people who dread the effort needed to sweat & breathe hard.  But - since I'm solidly in the latter camp - I need some help to pull this off.


I'd like to thank one darling Amy Blackburn for her willingness to keep me honest and to be kept honest herself in the process.  She's checking in with me daily to see what our plan is for getting off the couch and out of the house.  We're making promises to each other and making sure that we don't find new and inventive ways to break said promises.  And she manages to do that all in a way that doesn't make me feel shitty about myself, not even one little bit.  This is no small feat.  She's some sort of motivational genius and I'd like the world to know so. 

Like so many other things in this life - I don't think I could do this without Amy's push, her praise, and her prodding.   Thank you sweet friend.

That's it - a bit rambling today, but an important bit of getting to 40, getting married, and finally getting it together.  

To dos

40 B4 40
39 days left

• Get married
• Don't list all the to dos under "get married" or risk being here all night and well into next week
• Sell a house, rent another, buy yet another
• Write every day
• Show I love you more often and most sincerely
• Exercise every (other?) day
• Volunteer, for the love of God, volunteer!
• Be gracious for a change
• Look for a different job
• Learn to love the current job
• Call your brother - he's a good egg, remember to tell him that soon
• Seek laughter
• Remember the chickens now that they're outside, poor things
• Get a dog
• Teach the dog that the chickens were here first and are important too
• Call that guy about the thing
• Pick the damn guitar back up
• And play it already
• Cook
• Decide on table layout, colors, flowers, hair, shoes, gifts, lighting, music, desert, ceremony, booze, honeymoon, guests, postage...  Wait, damnit, those snuck in here.  It was bound to happen.
• Ride your old friend Mathilda to work, she's lonely
• Get back into a habit of travel, you love travel
• Call your friends, you miss them
• Plant the rest of the bulbs
• Move on
• Make some concrete plans for New Orleans - it's 2 weeks away
• Recruit extra team members for The Overnight "Team Wheat"
• Paint the 2nd coat
• Take down all the pictures you hung over the first coat, pull the nails; rinse, repeat
• Choose health over sloth
• Reflect
• Buy wedding gifts for Stephanie, Rachel, Wendy & Jac
• And on and on and on...

40 B4 40

I'm stealing liberally (the idea, not the content) from my sweet, smart, involved, complicated, committed, and wickedly brave friend Jenny P.  Imitation is the most sincere form of flattery, yes?

For 30 days before her 30th birthday, Jenny faithfully put pen to paper (OK, she put fingertips to keyboard, but that doesn't sound the same) with a daily post to http://30daystil30.tumblr.com/   When you get a moment - take a peek, directly into her soul in a lot of cases. 

Inspired by that exercise and by her writing - I bring to you 40 B4 40.  For the next 40 days before the Big Four-Ohhhhhhhhhh(shit), I'll do my best to get back to a good habit of writing, every, single, day.

So here goes - and I'm already a day behind - absolutely no surprise there.

Please enjoy.