Momma-Daughter

These are a bit old, now... from around a month ago? We were in Elbow Lake. But they make me smile, in spite of the small-townness. Mostly because Paige is just so completely perfectly 3-years-old.

The Accidental Hedonist Makes a Point

So, I regularly follow Accidental Hedonist (because food and I have a lifelong, mutually beneficial and gratifying relationship).

She makes a fantastic point today about Spinach and the FDA. Go on now, click on that link...

I like my job. I am a dork.

"You've achieved success in your field when you don't know whether what you're doing is work or play."
(warren beatty)

it's my favorite day of the month.

it's the day when my eMusic account renews and I get 90 more downloads to feed my addiction.
But it's music, not crack... so no worries, right?
(and if you like music, and download, and want to find good, non-mainstream stuff, and aren't already on eMusic... come on, now. Come on!)

Things I added to the repertoire today that I'm really quite stoked about:

Johnny Cash -- the complete Sun recordings, v.1 and 2. this ate about half my downloads for the month, but totally worth it. I can't even say anything about Johnny Cash that would do him any justice. You either get it, or you don't.

Stephen Malkmus -- Pig Lib. I've been after some Stephen Malkmus for a while now, thank you 89.3 the Current... it was time (I mean, I have a list of about 150 artists going right now. And honestly, it's the shortest it has been in a long time... but still, 150 artists.)

Cat Power -- The Greatest. I'll be honest. I've been alternately waivering and lusting on this for some time... but music that isn't completely frenetic, more about songwriting and less about feeling like I'm on speed, is making its way into my life, just like comfort in downtempo moments are. Amazing how your music reflects where you are on life's journey.

Ben Lee -- Awake is the New Asleep. This came home based solely on the genius encompassed in The Bens EP. It's so good, I had to round out my Ben collection. Mmm.

M. Ward -- Post-War. M. Ward is another one of those artists I've been noodling on. Mostly because, again... it's a bit downtempo. But as I evolve, and yearn for quietness and rest... let's be honest. I need a soundtrack for my life (I always have) and so I just needed something more than Bonny "Prince" Billy to listen to when I get all kinds of reflective. And M. Ward is good. And his music feeds the creative beast in me. Rawk.

forward-thinking?

So, am I the only one out there who sometimes buys/downloads albums based on a recommendation, and then... do not initially dig the music, but come back to it at a random point in time later, and it speaks to you?

I'm having that experience this morning, listening to Bettye LaVette.

I am almost never led astray when I purchase an album recommended by The Onion's AV Club. Generally, these are my peeps, and overall we agree. So I read the review for Bettye LaVette... probably in January, as I'm scanning the "best of" lists I regularly obsess over at the end of the year/beginning of new year. And I think, well... I dig bluesy-type music. I dig excellent female vocals. And eMusic has it. So let's give it a whirl.

And I promptly download and never think about it again.

But as I'm processing through iTunes today finding something low-key Sunday to listen to, I play her disc, I've Got My Own Hell To Raise. (and well, yah. I do.)

It's real delicious, and it was perfect for this morning, as I was super-crabby and probably not the nicest person to be around (apologies to anyone who was on the receiving end of that...). A large skim moosed latte and some diva-esque blues later, I'm all kinds of better... amen and amen.

To sleepy Sundays and the blues.

more yummies.

Oooh.
I'm real excited to take a listen after reading the Rolling Stone's review for the Dears' latest.
Yumm, indie music. It's as a good as a chocolate coke.

yumm.

Orangina makes my day.

'nuff said.

thank you, Scott Adams, for consistently creating cartoons that mirror my pitiful corporate existence.

squee

Squee (skwee.) (noun, verb, adverb, adjective.)
1. A feeling of childlike delight, generally directed at something trivial.
2. The sound made when expressing said feeling.
3. The act of being childishly delighted at something generally regarded as trivial.
4. The brief moments I live life for.

I'm digging on squee right now.
a) my class this semester rules. It's all systemic and ethereal and transcendent and experiential. yummers.
b) tuesday night rock shows. my goodness. I hope a really solid guitar inspires as much out of my when I'm 80 as it does right now. It completely makes my life worth living.
c) the new iTunes interface kicks. Now I really feel the need to trade in old sparky here (the 20Gb) for a newer model.
d) fall clothes. I don't know why I'm always giddy as a schoolgirl when I dig out the sweaters and corduroys... reason # 0958372 I am a complete and utter dork.
e) Diana and I are going to take a spinning class. And not that insane exercise stuff... (though at some point in time I wouldn't be opposed to that either)... we're going to learn how to make fibers. I love Crafty Planet.

this makes me a little excited.

The Literary Guide to the World.

My God. Travel and the written word. Could there be anything sexier?

belated 9/11 reflections

I didn't much think about 9/11 yesterday. Except to remember that I had strep throat that day and watched all the news coverage pretty high on penicillin and nyquil.

But this article in Salon from today made me think. And audibly say, Amen! a few times.

more song lyrics that speak to me

This has, been said, so many times that I'm not sure if it matters
But we never stood a chance
And I'm not sure if it matters
If you are the shores, I am the waves begging for big moons (moons)
I’m mailing letters to addresses in a ghost town, no oh.

Your secret's out...

I know this hurts, it was meant to (it was meant to)
Your secret's out and the best part is it isn't even a good one
And it's mind over you don't don't matter.

This has, been said, so many times that I'm not sure if it matters
But it must, be said, again, that all us boys are just screaming
Into microphones for attention
Because we're just so bored (oh, oh, oh)
We never knew that you would pick it apart, oh
I'm falling apart to songs about hips and hearts

Your secret's out...

I know this hurts, it was meant to (it was meant to)
Your secret's out and the best part is it isn't even a good one
And it's mind over you don't don't matter.

I used to obsess over living,
Now I only obsess over you
You tell me you'd like boys like me better
In the dark lying on top of you

This has been said so many times that I'm not sure if it matters
This has been said so many times that I'm not sure if it matters (x2)

I know this hurts, it was meant to (it was meant to)
Your secret's out and the best part is it isn't even a good one
And it's mind over you don't don't don't don't matter

From day one I talked about getting out
But not forgetting about
How all my worst fears are letting out
He said "Why put a new address on the same old loneliness?"
When breathing just passes the time
Until we all just get old and die
Now talking's just a waste of breath
And living's just a waste of death
And why put a new address on the same old loneliness?
And this is you and me and me and you
Until we've got nothing left!

in honor of the tattoo I'm noodling

What Celtic Goddess Are You?

You are Brighid.
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whoo moments

So I had a couple of whoo moments this weekend, which I would now like to take a second to document and celebrate.
Lesson learned: It's amazing to come out of a cocoon after 7 years to realize how strong and smart and self-directed you really are.

• Bought a new(ish) car. On my own. No one helped me. I just did it. Now, I didn't get the world's best interest rate. But I still did it *on my own*. All by myself. I am proud.
• I fetched me some low, low-priced pants this weekend. I needed them desperately as I had nothing to wear from this winter... it all went away (I think I was a 16 over last winter... maybe transitioning into a 14.) They are all size 10. I haven't been a 10 since junior high. I am certain, since the 8th grade. I have proven to myself that I can do this. I can be healthy, I can take care of my own body. And I'm worth doing it. And I'm not done... I have 30ish pounds to go. Which means that I'm going to be teensy at some point in time.
  
• I have been relocated for a bit now... and this weekend was the first time I felt like I was coming "home". And when I overslept and missed my Sunday morning walk to Dunn Brothers to get my paper and coffee... I actually missed it. And instead, we went to the Wedge to get groceries in the afternoon... and somewhere down the cereal aisle, it hit me: I bloody *love* city living. I love Minneapolis, I love my place, I love my neighborhoods. I love this city's music and streets and restaraunts and people. I am so, so very home.
• I wrote every single day this weekend. Really good, deep, perfected thoughts that came out slowly and purposefully, and not in fits and starts of frenzied writing inspiration. I love the way my writing self is morphing. I love how disciplining myself to write is creating more meaningful, perfected thoughts.
• I absorbed so much music over the weekend. I went to a show. I spent all day Sunday listening to Ben Folds and Ben Kweller. I could count the times my TV has been on since moving on my fingers. Maybe even on one hand. But my iTunes ranks and play counts are really coming around, getting to be where I want them. Music fuels me, and the more I listen, the more I want. And I'm so thrilled to be getting out to shows, and discovering new (local) music, and rediscovering old loves of music... and wow.
• All this rolls into one whoo: Sarah Green is back. And I really, really like her. She could be one of my favorite people. Ever.
  

aha moment

So that's what it's called.
Stay tuned... I'll be making one of these for me as soon as I can dust off my coding skills.

Preach it, Bill Maher.

I don't like to get terrifically political... really.
But, in light of life these days, I feel a bit compelled to ramble politically for just a moment.

I'll be plain: I'm a pacifist. I don't think fighting, war, killing other people is ever the answer. Go ahead and own a gun, that's fine. If you shoot something, you better be eating it and using its hide for a resourceful purpose. And please don't eat or shoot people. I think that's really pretty wrong.

Our American political climate these past 5ish years has not been one of pacifism (generally, America isn't known globally as the pacifist nation, anyhow...) and so I grow increasingly uncomfortable calling myself an American knowing that this country looks to the rest of the world to be real keen on being "the bomb people". Ew. I don't like being categorized as the bomb people.

So this article in Salon by Bill Maher totally resonated for me. Preach it, Bill.

serendipity

Serendipity is my favorite word. I think it has been since the first grade.
It all started when I read this kids book... it was a Serendipity Book. Serendipity Books are an adorable little children's series that each have a little moral lesson in them.
So the Serendipity Book I fell in love with was Muffin Dragon, and the moral lesson in that one is: when we work together, there's more to share.
The whole point is to teach kids to "deal with the challenges of the world, providing them with positive solutions to difficult problems." (yah!)

At any rate... after getting this book from the library, I asked Mom what Ser-en-dip-i-ty meant. (and frankly, I thought it was real cool that it sounded so much like my name.) So we got it all defined... serendipity is essentially, finding something you didn't know you wanted or needed when you weren't looking for it (or very often, looking for something else.)

I have significant faith in serendipity. The best things I have ever had, I have stumbled upon in the midst of looking for something completely different. This holds true for me when I was 8, and now... looking a very different me at nearly 28 right in the face. I'm feeling real down today, a little discouraged about all life has thrown at me (including how many changes I have chosen to make) and how, while I consider myself a strong in an exceptional way, I am exhausted and feel weak.
But at these times, serendipity seems to work its way into my life, and I find things I'm not looking for... almost like they were looking for me.
I find comfort in odd places.
I find people who mesh with where I am, even if I'm not sure where I am.
I find contentment and peace in strange nooks and crannies of my life, even admidst the chaos.

The serendipity in my life right now is finding a place in my world that's drama-free. And finding a philosophy that living drama-free is IT. I wasn't looking for drama-free... I hadn't even thought about it, because there's a lot of turmoil right now. But what I've found are pockets of my life that now lack drama... that hour I read before I sleep. Mealtimes. Getting ready in the morning. And I can sort of sense that while its all a monkeyjumble right now, drama-free is the light at the end of the tunnel.

I'm delighted by finding the unexpected while I'm looking for something entirely different. And I anxiously anticipate more serendipitousness. It's one of the greatest delights in my life.

reviews of random goodness

etsy.
it's eBay for indie-crafty goodness. sigh. Guess what? If I don't make your christmas gift this year, you better believe it's coming from etsy.

diet lipton green tea.
this stuff is my new crack. Oh, and it's good for you. Find some. Drink some. Be one with the green tea.

meebo.
this is a very cool instant messaging aggregator that is web-based. Which means chat at work is possible. Now, if I can convince my co-workers (especially those who are remote) that we need this... it'd really rock.

Placebo's new song, Infra-red.
This is not at all my normal style of music. But I lovelovelove this song and I sing like a freak when it's on the radio. It's angry, and I'm too busy dealing with life right now to be angry... but some angry listening (and bad radio karoke) is a good enough outlet for me.

Great Harvest Bread Company's cinnamon roll.
oh. my. god.
they are huge, they are sweet, they are made with whole wheat.

brown corduroy pencil skirts.
I am a sexy fall babe. 'nuff said.

whoa.

so I am establishing a(nother) blog, dedicated to getting myself into the discipline of really writing something meaningful every day (it's an internal challenge, and part of this process of reclaiming Essential Sarah).
Anyway, I have always kept my childhood journals with me... they remind me of my roots as a writer; they demonstrate how far I have come; and sometimes, they have wise and valuable lessons inside.

Tonight is one of those nights.

Whoa. moment #1:
I've been reading the rather juvenile ramblings of the 12-14 year old me (it's gone from uncomfortable to merely amusing in recent years)... and as I read, it dawns on me that as long as I have been writing, I have been looking for someone else to fill this void of "love" in me. and look at the nearly 28-year-old me... still looking to fill this stupid void, and all the while I have looked for another human (OK, let's be real here... a boyfriend, a lover, a whatever) to make it go away. And tonight, I realize something life-altering, perhaps: No person is ever going to fill this gaping, fucking void. It's a hole I either have to patch myself, or alternately, live with, in absence of healing.

Whoa. moment #2:
Check out this note to myself (juxtaposed to my, please love me and make me whole, bent on life...) dated 3 January 1993 (13 years ago, I cannot even believe it. forgive the poor syntax and grammar... I was 14. It's the message in there... I make no claims as to this as a solid piece of writing, because frankly... it isn't.)

it isn't in what you think you want.
it isn't in your conscious loves and desires.
happiness is in your unseen thoughts.
you love the most what you outwardly don't go after,
and if it leaves, you see how much it means.
happiness isn't lots of material possessions
it isn't being the best.

happiness is being your own person, no matter what.

postscript: Tocatta and Fugue in D Minor still inspires me to be an artist.

Sarah says, Read THIS: Hold Fast to Friends

There's something to be said for the blogosphere.
This moved me. And I'm so glad to know there are women out there who understand the real value of our friendships. Not to the devaluation of other relationships... but the point here is true and real: as a woman, having a few deep, strong, true female friendships is sometimes the binding that keeps us a complete story.

freedom

I'm admitting to a real guilty pleasure here... but there's a resonating theme for me in this.
(bonus points if you can a) name the artist and b) not ridicule me for knowing the lyrics.)

I think there's something you should know
I think it's time I told you so
There's something deep inside of me
There's someone else I've got to be
Take back your picture in the frame
Take back your singing in the rain
I just hope you understand
Sometimes the clothes do not make the man

blanket disclosure

here's hoping this covers it.

anticipation

There's so much of me that's all wrapped up in anticipation at the cusp of a season's change. And it seems especially so in the transition from summer to autumn, my two favorite seasons. As Paige and I were rocking on the porch swing tonight, reading out of her big fairy tale book (which is already so loved my next project is to repair it's spine) and generally chilling before bed, I noticed how very early the sun has decided to set.
It's so cool tonight... crisp enough that on the porch, I am thinking I will soon need a quilt for the swing. I feel a project coming on.
Tonight I'm thinking about all the things I'm anticipating. And how much I love anticipating, in ways... and do not, in others. Let's be honest here. I'm not a patient woman. When I want something done, I generally pursue it to the finish line. Right. Now. And perhaps there is a lesson for me in the relentless pursuit of the next accomplishment. I savor the anticipation. For 10 minutes. Then I want what I want, right now.
I just felt tonight like I needed to remind myself that waiting is half the fun. Once you get to the apple orchard, take our your sweaters, shut the windows and bleed the radiators, collect leaves on the parkway, fall clean, wash the thicker quilt and lay it out on the bed, start (with a bit of chagrin) to wear socks again, put away the sandals, start drinking hot coffees in the morning, need a sweatshirt for the morning jog... it's over. Autumn's done, and the pumpkins are frostbitten and saggy like sad little old men, and the snow comes and it's cold and dark and lonesome for the next 4 months.

officially a junkie

Well, it's official. I'm a music junkie.

I've filled th 20GB iPod from 2 Christmases ago.
Ok, big deal... it's 20 gigs.

Someday, when I have some money again, maybe I'll go upgrade myself to a 60GB. (excuse me, I need a moment alone while I think about 60GB...)

In the meantime, I just want to take a brief moment to reflect on music. For so long, music was an integral part of the fabric of me. And I put it on the auction block, thinking I'd trade it for a life I thought I wanted.

Well, something that flows in your veins isn't so simple to get rid of. It's a bit of a small wonder to me, then, that just about 3 years ago, I had a handful (read: less than a dozen) CDs to my name. Thank God for downloadable mp3 files, or I'd need an apartment just for my music... but I digress. What I am really trying to capture here is how thrilled I am to rediscover and fall in love with music all over again. I thank a few fantastic guides along the journey... and just want to say how fantastic it feels to come home to a big part of who I really am ... who I always have been... and who I never want to forget, again.

summing up my life at work this week...

Luscious Detroit

I'm in Detroit for work this week.
I'm exhausted, from everything life has thrown at me -- from everything I have thrown at life.
I miss my little girl.
I am thinking about the day when life returns to normal. Even if it's a new normal.
My hotel room smells like a basement. I am beginning to think I may end up regretting not bringing the Allegra... but who knew the hotel room was going to be moldy and musty? When are hotel rooms musty these days? I mean... it's not the Ritz, but it's not the Motel 6 either. Sheesh.
And I'm working on a bunch of overdue deadlines. Ew. I got myself into it, generally speaking... you know, life sometimes happens and you need to reprioritize. But I'm feeling a bit like I'm being punished for putting my family first... and that, frankly, ticks me off. Grr.
I'm so tired, but it's that tired that is so tired you don't sleep anyway.
And I miss Ireland, still. I want the Europe homesickness to be over... for heaven's sake, how can you be homesick for a place you have spent 10 days of your life in... when the other 20something years of your life, you have spent in *definitely not Europe*?

Blah. Once, in the game Apples to Apples, Luscious Detroit won. Because it seemed such a paradox. And that paradox couldn't be more true tonight, either.

my favorite photos from Ireland

I may not be at the apex of mental health, but I have my moments...

When I don't even think about people who used to really hurt me.
Sometimes they don't even consume my brain.

And that's real nice. It's ugly to let go of something that isn't good for you, but at the same time, is better than nothing.

Funny thing is, I've learned there's a lot more "better than nothing" out there.
And sometimes, even nothing is fine.

are we there yet?

I have this vast sense of impatience at the moment.
Do you remember when you were a child, and you went on a road trip with your parent/parents/grandparents/etc?

You inherently crawled into a steel death-trap-on-wheels, which in all likelihood was unfortunately encased in woodgrain paneling. and, if you were REALLY cool, it was a station wagon; the kind with the seat that folded up in the back. It so didn't have air conditioning. And you were forced to sit in the back seat, on those crappy plastic-posing-as-leather-but-we-all-know-the-dirty-truth seats, which created an immediate, epoxy-like bond between your little tush and itself. And your sibling(s) alternately amused, annoyed, touched, poked, stuck to, and ripped the flesh off, you.

And you never could drive there fast enough.
And your mom/grandma/other benevolent and well-meaning adult said things like:
Let's play a game!
Who wants to sing a round?
Why don't you girls color instead?
Susie, you need to share that can of root beer.
Maybe it's time you kids all closed your eyes and just rested for a minute.

And then, you heard it. That noise dad/grandpa/person of authority (or assumed authority) in the driver's seat makes when they are just about done being hot and tired and have a headache from the road noise and the kid noise and are just about as disturbed about being glued to that plastic seat as you are.

It sounds kind of like a growl, and kind of like something very small and innocent dying.

There'd be that pregnant pause. Then, someone would chime in:
"Daaaaad! Margaret's on my side!"

And you'd get the silence. Or the head-whipping-around-to-the-back-seat, just for a second, glare. Or this:
"If I have to stop this car..." (fill in your favorite threat here.)

More pause. Someone would slap or poke or otherwise annoy someone else in the back seat.
And then you'd hear:

"Are we there yet?"
______________________
That is my whole life right now.

change or die (from Fast Company)

This article from Fast Company was so fascinating to me. On 100 different levels, I'm all about embracing change -- and I sometimes struggle with people who cannot or do not as openly welcome it.

(and let's be honest, there are definitely times when all I want is a routine, and nothing to change for a very long time.)

I just think change is one of the biggest things we need to learn to navigate and make peace with in life... and it's all over.

change

It's the season. My world is upside down, at the moment... and at a time when I'm trying to sort things out, and want to be expressive, I have to reserve myself and do much of my processing on the inside. I live outside of myself... I am one with my emotion and thought and no longer want to hide in the shadows and no longer want to cloak raw emotion. I am not ashamed. But in this chapter of my life, I am also wont to this rather unnatural internal processing, a dialogue that leaves me sleepless and philosophical.

Barbara sums some of this emotion up nicely with a Tracy Chapman song:

Change

If you knew that you would die today
Saw the face of God and love

Would you change?
Would you change?

If you knew that love would break your heart
When you’re down so far
That you could not fall

Would you change?
Would you change?

How bad, how good does it need to get?
How many losses, how much regret?
What chain reaction would
Cause an effect?

Makes you turn around
Makes you try to explain
Makes you forgive and forget

Makes you change
Makes you change

If you knew that you would be alone
Knowing right
Being Wrong

Would you change?
Would you change?

If you knew that you would find a truth
That has a pain that can’t be soothed

Would you change?
Would you change?

How bad, how good does it need to get?
How many losses, how much regret?
What chain reaction would
Cause an effect?

If everything you think you know
Makes your life unbearable

Would you change?
Would you change?

If you’d broken every rule and vow
Hard times come and bring you down

Would you change?
Would you change?

If you knew that you would die today
Saw the face of God and love

Would you change?
Would you change?

still the same, forever changed

All growth is a leap in the dark, a spontaneous unpremeditated act without the benefit of experience.

(Henry Miller)

Ireland

Ireland is the most amazing piece of creation.
I have about, oh a minute before I have to dash out in the raindrops, but let me list just a few of the things that are making vacation 100,000,000,000 times better than I ever imagined.

Peat fires
Windows without screens
Tiny cars that drive on the left
European chocolate
Grand hospitality, the likes of which I have never experienced
Beer that tastes as beer should taste
Fresh fish, whenever I want it
Redheads everywhere
Buildings older than my country
Heather
Sheep
Sleeping til 9AM
Music in the pub. Every. Night.
The view

I have no idea why my ancestors left, but it must have been wild bad, because I cannot say for certain that I won't be sending for my daughter in a few days after I buy an Irish farm and some sheep.

and they're off

well, sorta.
We'll be in the air in, oh... just about 12 hours or so.

This trip (to Ireland, if you haven't heard) is a lifelong dream of mine.
And it's my first overseas travel adventure (lame, being as old as I am... but it will be what it will be.)

So, yay! I cannot promise that I'll be doing a lot of posting... as the laptop's staying here. But send warm thoughts as I embark on what promises to be a long plane ride on our way to Castlewood House.

Photos and thoughts as I can scrounge up internet access. I cannot say that I'm going to miss my country (I'm not being un-American, but again -- things are what they are), but I will miss you, my friends.

Until the next time...

fantastic

From one of my new favorite blogs. This is a fantastic idea. I think I need to get right on this movement for the Minneapolis/St. Paul community.

Any takers?

I have a new favorite word.

Asshat.

random stuff that needs to fall out of my brain

1) my car got broken into wednesday night. I never keep anything in my car. Nothing. Well, I did have my iTrip thing in the glove compartment. These stupid thieves ransacked my car, broke a 200-dollar window, and got a 30-dollar gadget out of it.
So annoying.
And it doesn't help me feel any safer or more comforatable in a neighborhood I have already noticed being speckled with unsavory rental properties.
And now I'm beginning to sound like my father, so I'll stop.
2) I lost a few co-workers this week to a workforce reduction. I was spared (yay -- because I have my dream job and I would have been seriously crushed...) but I still feel sad. I worked with an incredibly talented team, and it's hard to part with people who you respect, enjoy, and would call friends. Sigh.
3) Diana and I are supporting each other in our weight-loss efforts (the person who said the last xx pounds were the hardest were the hardest, has never spoke truer words)... check it out.
4) Finally, some thanks to dole out to friends and the like:
Heather -- for being willing to lend your ear and support to my family, for myriad reasons, and for your willingness to be my personal-trainer-in-absentia while your foot heals (I
cannot WAIT to get back into the gym with you, girl!)
Diana -- for changing your mind, about 100s of things... mostly, I just appreciate seeing you
grow. It's real cool.
Barbara and Nathan -- You guys deserve every happiness on the planet, and I couldn't love either of you more.
Christy -- for just getting where I was at with the violation stuff yesterday. It's so great to
have someone to talk to, who *gets* you when other people might not.
Jenni -- because I'm really glad you decided to e-mail... and because I want you to know how
much happier you look in your new place in the world.
Susan -- because I remain in awe at your ability to hold it together through the worst of
situations. I aspire to be so many bits and pieces of you.

OK. In the midst of all the turmoil, I am somehow reminded how blessed I am with people who truly love me for just who I am -- and do not ask me to be someone I am not. Christy said to me not that long ago that it was a shame that it took a tragedy for her to realize how many people unconditionally loved and cared about her. I'm looking at far more minor tragedies (and near misses), but I'm feeling the same way. Friendships truly do create a beautiful tapestry in your life.

a feminism physical

Taken from Salon.com... I do not know how many times I can urge everyone I know to subscribe... but it's the best.

Jul. 12, 2006 | Katha Pollitt's well-known wit and incisiveness run through all the pieces in "Virginity or Death!" -- a new collection of more than five years' worth of essays from her Subject to Debate column in the Nation. The essays cover a wide range of issues from the war in Iraq to health care, but unsurprisingly, the bulk covers feminist issues: abortion, child care and work, and the seemingly never ending backlash against women's progress. In these meditations, Pollitt defies the stereotype of the finger-wagging, Mommy-knows-best feminist. She credits younger women with being "so much more confident and multicompetent" than she was at her age and lauds their accomplishments.

However, Pollitt definitely has strong opinions about women framing every decision they make as "empowering." She notes in "Sex and the Stepford Wife" that "women have become incredibly clever at explaining these [demeaning] choices in ways that barely mention social pressures or male desires." But, harsh as Pollitt can sometimes be, there's always truth behind her observations.

When I spoke with Pollitt by phone, what struck me most was her optimism -- something a lot of feminists are understandably lacking these days. We're so busy lashing back against the backlash that forward-thinking feminism is hard to muster. Pollitt says that she wishes people would stop talking about feminism's supposed demise and instead talk about its "life." After reading the book, it occurred to me that maybe young women should do the same favor for their predecessors.

Some of your essays deal with the anti-feminist backlash that's been brewing lately. So many of those arguments -- like Sylvia Ann Hewlett's book about older women not being able to have children because they focused too long on their careers, or the New York Times articles about the "opt-out revolution" -- seem like spruced-up versions of old myths. Why do we keep falling for them over and over again?

It's a very interesting question -- why do they keep doing this? It's part of the half-fulfilled nature of feminist hopes. I think that there's a fear out there that "Oh my god, if women aren't holding to marriage and child raising and sacrificing themselves for the family, then nobody is going to do it." People will just be living in their studio apartments for their whole lives. [Laughs.] For example, Sylvia Ann Hewlett had five children, and she produced some of them when she was over 50 years old! And she's saying, even if you have one child you're going to be crying in the gym because you don't have two children. And you just want to say, "Look -- you wanted to have five children." But obviously this is a minority taste. I think there are probably more people in our society who have no children than have five children. She just seems unable to accept that people are doing more or less what they want to do, or some version of what they want to do.

I remember when I was younger and just getting into feminism, I read Susan Faludi's "Backlash." And now, it's really the same exact thing all over again. It's so odd to me that women are still letting bogus statistics -- like if you're over 35 you're more likely to be killed by a terrorist than get married -- affect them.

Yes, it's very odd. My mother used to subscribe to Ladies' Home Journal and Good Housekeeping and all those women's magazines, even though she always worked. She would get these magazines and I would read them when I was little and there would be articles: "Can This Marriage Be Saved?" and "How to Have a Better Marriage." I was always thinking -- what's it to you? Why do the editors of this magazine care if somebody else is married or not?

You include essays in the book about the loss of Betty Friedan and Andrea Dworkin. In the Dworkin piece, you say that you "miss the movement that had room for her." Can you just explain that a bit? Do you think feminism has become watered down?

I was thinking about how timid and deferential and also Beltway-oriented so much of organized feminism is now. It seems to revolve around electoral politics and abortion rights -- those are the two big deals. Think about all the feminist bookstores that have closed and feminist magazines that have folded. I get much less sense of a vibrant culture of feminism with its own institutions and its own internal debates.

What does an effective feminism for the future look like to you?

I think that feminism needs to be more grass-roots, and this is true at the electoral level also -- look at South Dakota. I think that there has been a real retreat from the day-to-day presentation of feminist issues. Think of all the women who won't identify themselves as feminists. Why is that? One reason for that is the word "feminist," but it's also a lot of the concepts around feminism. The basic idea of women being self-directed creatures as opposed to being there to help some man through life and stay with the children and do the cooking -- that idea has been delegitimized; you just don't hear it that often if you live in much of the country.

You have to ask, Why do people make the choices they make? Let's take women being more likely to take their husband's name. Think to yourself, What are the costs of not taking your husband's name? Look what happened to Hillary Clinton in Arkansas! And so I just think that women -- feminists -- need to have the conversation with people who don't agree with us, people who live in places that aren't so cosmopolitan. You need to make the connection between your own personal life and the larger story of what's happening in the country and what we can do to help ourselves. I'm sure someone like Wonkette feels quite feminist and liberated in her own life -- she just doesn't see how what happens to abortion rights in South Dakota has anything to do with her.

Ana Marie Cox's review of your new collection in the New York Times Book Review riled a lot of people by using the words "strident" and "tacky" to describe feminism. What was your reaction to the piece?

You know, to tell you the truth, I didn't study the review closely -- because I'd like to maintain my cheerful disposition! But I think a review that begins "strident feminism" is pretty much declaring that we are in the land of backlash cliché. If you read my book you'll see that I support sexual freedom, I support freedom of speech, I'm not a family-values person at all, and I am not the sort of the Dworkinite fuddy-duddy of Cox's imagination. I think the resentment that some younger women feel -- and I don't know how old Wonkette is, or how old she presents herself -- toward older feminists is very interesting. I don't quite understand it except as kind of a kill-the-mother thing. What is this "girls just want to have fun" feminism? It's a very shallow approach to life. And I can't think of another social movement where "strident" is a bad word.

Exactly. Since when is feminism supposed to be all sweetness and light and politeness?

Well, do black people, do Latinos, do workers go around saying, "Oh no! Our leaders are so strident! Someone just wrote a strident book defending my rights!" Even if they themselves are more moderate, they're happy! So I think it's sort of an odd combination.

I was upset by the review because -- as you know -- I spend a lot of time talking about how people don't give young women enough credit on feminism and women's issues. And then some seemingly smart young woman runs out and calls feminism tacky. It makes us all look like idiots.

We discussed this on Feministing when I referred to "young featherheads" who think their abortion rights are secure and aren't planning to vote. And [the thread] was all about how wrong I was to think that young women weren't all that political -- and I hope I was wrong! But then someone said, no that's right -- they are featherheads. And she talked about the women at her school. There are a lot of women who are feminist and who call themselves feminist, but then there are a lot who really don't want that identity. My daughter just finished her freshman year at Wesleyan -- quite a liberal school -- and told me that in her sociology class, the professor said, "Raise your hand if you're a feminist," and my daughter was one of two kids that raised their hands!

When I was in college, a professor asked the same question and the reaction was the same. I remember being so depressed about it. Do you think that feminism has something to offer all young women?

I think that feminism is a social justice movement; that's the way I see it. And potentially every woman and every man should be interested in women being able to take equal part in every aspect of our society. [Right now] there's a funny combination of women advancing in certain areas, and their progress being blocked in others. For example, women are advancing educationally; women are expecting to work. Marriage is happening later. So you have a longer time of living on your own and sexual experimentation. There's this general sense of sexual freedom and sexual expressiveness that permeates so much of the media and the society, and yet you still find that women are quite stymied in other areas.

Most of the young women we're talking about grew up under Reagan, in very conservative times. Whereas second-wave feminism really came out of the left. It came out of a moment in the '60s when there were a lot of radical politics around. And that's a very different social and political moment than now. There's this huge backlash going on involving women's bodies and appearance, and the immense pressure to be beautiful and thin and complaisant and alluring. That's what Linda Hirshman and others call "choice feminism" comes out of. Which is just saying, "I'm a free agent. I'm making my own choices, so we don't have to talk about them. In fact, it's insulting if you want to talk about them. Don't judge me."

You say in one of your essays that "women have learned to describe everything they do, no matter how apparently conformist, submissive, self-destructive or humiliating, as a personal choice that cannot be criticized because personal choice is what feminism is all about." But in writing about abortion rights, you say that we need to acknowledge "women as moral agents" and trust them to decide what's best for themselves. How do we negotiate those two things?

I think it's like freedom of speech in that the government is not going to make decisions about what you can say publicly, but that doesn't mean that everything that somebody says publicly is a hot idea. That doesn't mean that they're not going to say something and be really sorry later. The idea I find so strange is that because a woman might have an abortion and come later to think, "I wish I hadn't done that" -- that that's a reason to make abortion a crime. That makes no sense at all. What that really says is that women are incapable of making a good decision, so we have to make the decision for them! Because there's only one good decision, and that's to have the baby.

The interesting thing is that you're never going to get women who choose to have a baby to say, "Well, looking back, that was a terrible idea -- that's when my life really went off the rails." And yet I'm sure we can all think of people where having a child with the wrong person, at the wrong time, under very discouraging circumstances really is a decision that maybe they might secretly wish they hadn't made. So to me abortion rights is a very personal and intimate area of life that involves a lot of risk -- having a baby involves a lot of risk: physical, emotional, social, psychological. And so each woman has to decide for herself because she's responsible for herself.

Do you think it's important that women call themselves a feminist or is it enough that women are doing feminist work -- without necessarily labeling it as such?

I think that conservatives have really done an amazing job of taking away from us all the good words like "liberty" and "freedom" and demonizing the words that are left. Like "feminism" and "choice." And "liberal." I think we can't let them do this forever. If you lose a way to describe yourself, you've lost a lot. If you lose the word "feminism," you are losing the idea that there is anything particular to the way women's situation is structured in this society. I would fight for that word. But it's a losing game in the end. I think we've seen that with "liberal." "Liberal" was a very good word! "Liberal" was a word that put together the idea of our constitutional liberties -- like freedom of speech and the rights of the individual against the government -- with the idea of fighting poverty. Fighting racial discrimination. Once you lose the word, you lose a very good way of keeping those concepts together. And I think the same is true about "feminism." But if people want to start calling themselves women's liberationists, that's OK with me.

It does seem like we spend a lot of time -- and I do this myself -- debunking myths about the death of feminism. So how do we change the conversation so that we're not just constantly defending ourselves?

Well I think that's related to the way that feminist victories become incorporated into society -- they lose the character of being considered feminist. For example, half of all medical students are women, but how many of those women in medical school think, "My presence in this seat is a victory for the women's movement"? How often when people write about this fact, do they see that in terms of a social victory for women? People will maintain that this was part of the natural evolution of society, you didn't need a women's movement, that it would have happened anyway. None of which is true.

I think we need to reclaim the conversation in a number of areas. For example, when we talk about abortion, how often do we talk about it in terms of women's lives? As opposed to it about a fetus being a person. The anti-choicers have so thoroughly switched the conversation over to the question of the personhood of the fertilized egg or fetus that now it's even a person before it's implanted in your uterus! So on the one hand you have that our victories aren't being acknowledged as real victories and that the problem areas are areas of enormous retreat. So I just think we need to start talking more about our own lives as being important. I think that we need to be much bolder.

But all these things aside, you say that you're still optimistic. Are you optimistic about feminism too?

I guess I feel that the rollback of our rights is only temporary -- and I say that in my introduction. That a big modern industrial country like America is not going to become a right-wing Christian nation in which you have to show your marriage certificate to get birth control. If you can measure the strength of an impulse by the ferocity of the opposition to it, I would say that feminism is very much alive. People don't spend a lot of time anymore bashing unions, for example. They don't spend a lot of time bashing the black power movement, but feminism really gets to people. So I think the fact that it really gets to people shows both its relevance and its power.

-- By Jessica Valenti

never has there been a story of more woe

... than that of the girl who couldn't catch the early flight home.
eta on my flight: 2 hours til I board.
though I am desperately trying to get on standby for the 5:40...

a world devoid of proximity and (thus far) 10-gallon hats

I'm sitting in the rental car center, in the heart of the DFW airport complex. (yes, it's a complex. A 10 minute bus ride just to get to the rental joint. Proof that yes, everything in Texas is big?...)

My traveling compatriot is due in an hour or so's time, and so, as I'm wont to do, I'm multi-tasking. Sans preschooler and spouse, I have to dream up novel ways of feeling accomplished... so I'm ravenously devouring what is, in all likelihood, the worst sandwich I have ever purchased, and a comparatively fresh (and hence, delicious) bag of salty, greasy Lay's. And checking email. And tracking Susan's flight (bless it, it looks as if it will be late. Delta...). And blogging (well, that last one was sort of a duh...)

I haven't set foot in Texas as an adult... as a tried-and-true city girl (and, let's face it, Easterner at heart, if not in residential history), The south/west (depending on to whom to talk) has no appeal to me. No. Appeal.

But, alas, I'm here (and, admittedly, excited about it) to meet some clients, who I feel like, in a way, are like old friends. And I'm here to observe the fruits of our labors on the first project I completed in this role (I typed "new job", but that just seems out of character...), and so its a short trip, but worthwhile nonetheless.

Additionally (and I'd say coincidentally, but I'm having a hard time believing the world is random), this trip gives me my "air legs"... we set off for Ireland in, what... 10 days now (wow!) and, honestly... once I do a bit of traveling, I ache to do it more often. This is perfect timing... and a couple of weeks after our return from Ireland, I'll head out to Detroit for our quarterly team meeting.

A couple of observations about Texas:
1) I knew this, but you know how you don't know something, really... til you experience it? Anyway, it's bloody hot here. Not like, ooh, it's going to thunderstorm tonight, hot... but the "oh my god it's been this hot for 3 months now" hot, the hot that hangs in the air like a lead curtain. Now, I'm a big fan of summer... really, I (mostly) rue the fact that I live in a state where the average winter temperature is 19 degrees in January. But I like summer because I can have my windows open all day and enjoy what my silly midwestern meteorologists affectionately call, "good sleeping weather". I've only been here for about an hour... but honestly, A/C (or living underwater) is the only way to go in the summer here.
2) Maybe this just wasn't an observation I was able to make as a pre-teen, but the space! I know, I know... everything's big in Texas. And I'm just slightly disturbed by that... I'm sure space is just fine, but dark nights and quiet kinda creep me out. Seriously, I had to sleep with a light on and a fan blowing in the middle of February when I lived in a small town through high school. I need proximity to life. Sirens, or people, or music, and streetlights, please! Bustle. I like bustle. I cannot imagine living in a large city (like Dallas) just to think how spread out everything is... I have just started growing on the idea that a whole 44x80 foot yard is a waste of space (when you think about what is done on such lots in Chicago and New York and the like).

Long story short -- it takes all kinds of urban terrain to fit all the faces on the planet. I was beginning to think I was just going to fall in love with any city that I wasn't born in. The jury's still out on Texas, but I'm glad to know, for my own sanity, anyway, that I'm beginning to define the urban that fits me.

Allex Les Bleus

Vive La France!

oh, pickles

Ten Top Trivia Tips about Pickles!

1. Peanuts and pickles are beans!
2. Cats use their pickles to test whether a space is large enough for them to fit through!
3. Pickles have a memory span of three seconds.
4. The deepest part of pickles is over 35,000 feet deep.
5. Pickles are 1500 years older than the pyramids.
6. A sixteenth century mathematician lost his nose in a duel over his love for pickles, and wore a silver replacement for the rest of his life.
7. Pickleocracy is government by pickles!
8. Pickles are picked, sorted and packed entirely in the field.
9. Pickles can smell some things up to six miles away!
10. The average human spends about 30 days during their life in pickles!

I am interested in - do tell me aboutherhimitthem

thinking in QWERTY

I've been so heads-down writing at work these days, I started making a to-do list last night.
I typed it in my brain. Using my very own personal, imaginary QWERTY keyboard.


Yikes. Thank GOD I'll be downing pints on the Dingle Peninsula in less than 3 weeks.

from the ashes

it's been a couple of weeks since we said goodbye to Chyna and Neville. Part of me is already acclimated to a one-animal family... and then there's the part of me that still guards the back door while I let Fred out because I think the cat's going to get out.

So it's all a process, a journey, like anything else in life. And like anything else in life, great good comes from great sadness.

For instance: Paige has a wheat allergy. Total bummer. Except the wheat allergy prompted us to join a grocery co-op, which I have always wanted to do but never really had an impetus to do it. But now, I'm wondering why I ever delayed (except for maybe those unemployment/underemployment where money was a persuasive barrier...). Co-op grocery stores make me happy.

nifty

hope for future generations

True confession:

one of the things that sort of made me grimace about bringing a new, tiny person into my life was the fear that I would have to turn off decent music for at least 18 years -- that I would be forced to listen to cassettes of Barney and Disney on every long car ride, until I realy *d0* want to stick my head in an oven.

Literally... because when I was a kid (and let's be honest -- I'm not yet 30, so "kiddom" wasn't that long ago), kid's music sucked. Really, really sucked. And my parents checked out of the music scene when they had to be the "responsible" adult who raised me right and proper (and come on, I like Van Halen now... Dad could have listened to it in the car when I was 5 with no negative side affects... sheesh.) Point being, when it came time for me to find my musical identity... I went through a really ugly, almost unmentionable metamorphasis (it started with Mariah Carey, Michael Bolton and Boyz 2 Men... and it completely pains me to write that.)

Anyway... I have, as of late, found myself with significantly more hope for the generation I am doing my part to rear.
1) I have decided that it's real dumb to stop listening to my music when it's something I love... I'm just not going to hide part of the Essential Sarah from my kid. That's silly.

So, Paige listens to, and (miracle of miracles!) likes rock and roll.

2) Not all kid's music completely sucks these days. We regularly jam to They Might Be Giants together... and let's be real, I jammed to They Might Be Giants way... way back in the day ( I still have my original copy of Flood). And there seems to be an upswing of not-too-shabby kiddie rock .... Kindie Rock, as Salon calls it.

Cool. I'll continue to maintain that we'll be sending Paige to rock and roll camp sooner than later...

Score One for the Yanks

From today's Salon

From where I was sitting in the epicenter of the Ghana-fan section, three seats away from drums that never ceased beating, American defender Oguchi Onyewu's foul didn't look like much of one. Indeed, my neighbor to the left seemed as puzzled as I was. But referee Markus Merk (now the most famous retired dentist in the world) was certain Onyewu had fouled Ghana forward Razak Pimpong from behind, and awarded a penalty kick to Ghana. Ecstasy broke out around me as midfielder Stephen Appiah fired home the shot that would send the West Africans into the next round and send the United States packing.

There was no ill will in either direction, though, not from Americans who felt they had been robbed, nor from triumphant Ghanaians gloating over their toppling of a superpower. A political superpower, that is. Despite its corniness, the motto for the 2006 World Cup -- "a time to make friends" -- was alive and well in Section 1b of the Nuremburg Frankenstadion on Thursday. I felt it throughout Germany in all the bars, trains and super-populated public viewing spaces I visited during the first two weeks of the world's most popular sporting event.

Despite the disappointment, all was not lost for the Americans in Germany. Large contingents of fans from Virginia, California, Pennsylvania and Texas -- no doubt inspired by midfielder, neophyte rapper and Texan Clint Dempsey (aka "Deuce") -- traveled to Nuremburg in support of their team. (No slight to residents of other states; these were the only contingents I could identify.) Allow me to pause for a minute to underline the importance of the words "their team." Perhaps for the first time at a World Cup not played in the States, Americans were out in full, spirited and gregarious force. Even four Brits -- two from Leicester City and two from Nottingham, diehard soccer fans because only the brave admit supporting those sides -- told me they were impressed by the Yanks. America, the world's football fans are proud of you!

Save the self-congratulatory pats on the back, though. There are four long years to consider this quick (and unnecessary) exit from the World Cup. Obviously there is still a long way to go in both footballing prowess and fan support, but that's taking nothing away from the great turnout by Americans, who seemed to just about outnumber the Ghana supporters in the Frankenstadion. Sitting in the Ghana section, however, it was hard not to switch allegiances. Chants of "U-S-A!" are little match for rhythmic drumming, ultra-charismatic fan support and what I'm pretty sure was some low-grade marijuana, brought out just as the final five minutes of injury time was announced to the crowd.

Despondency looks the same whether it's caked in red, white and blue makeup or worn as a frown by a tiny blond 10-year-old American girl who sits across from you on the train ride back from the stadium. The news that Italy had beaten the Czech Republic was more salt rubbed into the fresh wound. Had the U.S. managed to win, it would have been its flags waving on the long walk past the old Zeppelinfeld -- the massive meadow surrounded by rows of columns facing a large tribune constructed from plans drawn by Nazi architect Albert Speer. It didn't help that on this day, the Ghana side seemed eminently beatable. But baby steps, America, baby steps.

While culture critics feasted on the fascinating contradictions in Germany, there was some great football played in the first round of games, and highlights of public spectatorship were many. I spent the tournament's first, absurdly sunny Saturday afternoon at an outdoor bar/club/lounge/pool/wonderland called, rather inexplicably, Platoon, replete with a massive screen and two-tiered stands to boot in (east) Berlin's young and artsy Mitte district. The very fact that such a venue exists, and in total dedication to extracting maximum pleasure from a few football matches, is a testament to how saturated the country is in all things Weltmeisterschaft.

While not surprising, it is impressive to note that nary an advertisement on TV, in a magazine or newspaper, on a bus or on the metro does not have something to do with football. Halftime at matches is torturously rote: 15 minutes of what I'm convinced are the same commercials broadcast in exactly the same order. Even late-night television ads for phone sex lines feature pouting frauleins clad, momentarily, in full team kits, cavorting between studiobound goalposts, all the while daring you to, ahem, "score." But, football fanatic that I am, and lascivious or not, such excess feels like paradise.

And paradise apparently serves grilled chicken Caesar salads and Alsterwasser (a mixture of lager and lemonade that, despite how that may sound, is perfectly refreshing on a hot afternoon) with a view of Hamburg's famous harbor. Accuse me of Monday-morning quarterbacking (or centerbacking, as the case may be), but I wasn't expecting the U.S. to upset the Czechs as easily as they did the Portuguese in their first match at the 2002 World Cup. The Czechs were the strongest team at the 2004 European Tournament until their captain, Pavel Nedved (whom many have rightly noted is a dead ringer for a "Roadhouse"-era Patrick Swayze), fell to injury. To shield myself from possible shame, I wanted to watch the match in as comfortable a public setting as possible -- to ensconce myself in comfort to make the inevitable jibes and catcalls directed at yours truly less hurtful. Enter the phenomenon of the German beach club.

Often miles away from an open body of water, consisting of a boatload of sand dropped in the middle of open space in the middle of a city, beach clubs have become quite the rage in Germany. Uniting the beach and football is nothing new -- just ask the Brazilians -- but for the neutral spectator, the idea is tinged with genius. No doubt we have some Bauhaus-influenced brilliant mind to thank for this blessing. And though it pained me to see the U.S. so thoroughly beaten by the irresistible Czech attack, I cannot deny that the blow wasn't cushioned by a comfortable deck chair and a cold Beck's.

The other side of paradise can be found at Hamburg's Fan Fest, held in a massive open field called Heilingengeistfeld, capable of hosting upward of 50,000 people, all in the shadow of an equally massive flak bunker, which, after the Second World War, was scheduled for demolition; it survived all attempts at its destruction. How's that for German engineering? Four public seater stands (and one private one) face a gigantic LED flat screen, while smaller concourses snake around behind the stands, featuring tents dedicated to the cuisines of each of the 32 nations represented in the tournament. This is the province of both the diehard fan and the dilettante, equally welcoming to families and fanatics alike.

One of the things you notice very quickly about the World Cup's propensity to bring people together from various countries who might never cross paths is that the smallest measures of shared cultural understanding can make for fast friends. In the wake of Iran's 3-1 loss to Mexico, it's entirely fine for the German Fan Fest emcee to sing "La Cucaracha" in Spanish and both Mexican and Iranian fans alike will dance around in a huge conga line, loving every second. Perhaps I'm discounting alcohol as a contributing factor, but I do think that soccer has a lot to do with it.

"Vaya Con Dios" sang the Argentine to a clutch of Serbian (or Montenegrin) fans as they walked down the pedestrian-only concourse leading from the Gelsenkirchen Hauptbanhof (train station). It was a fitting, and perhaps necessary, blessing given what was to transpire between the footballing representatives of these two (recently three) countries later in the day.

I took a 5:40 a.m. train from Hamburg to Gelsenkirchen, a ride besmirched not merely by drunken German fans who boarded in Bremen (how they were drunk by 6:40 a.m. I've no idea) but also by the weather. A smattering of rain dampened the journey, but let up by the time I heard that sweet Argentine serenade. Skies remained gray, but the mood in the streets and subways was spirited. It looked to be a grim day for football, yet in the minutes before the gates to the Arena auf Schalke were unlocked -- and the cynical will not believe this -- a chasm of bright blue and sunshine broke through the clouds directly over the stadium. It appeared that God had, once again, a hand in matters concerning Argentine football.

Wearing large, dark sunglasses, I felt free to gawk at the spectacle before me. You could lose yourself in color: Serbian navy blue, the albiceleste of the Argentines. Four inexplicable Poles wore their country's red as if merely to complete the spectrum.

Beyond my comprehension, the doors opened three hours before game time. And despite plenty of evidence to the contrary -- namely, the throngs of people entering on all sides of me -- I couldn't help feeling special, as if World Cup president Sepp Blatter had an eye out for me. To be seated alone in the giant stadium could be described as peaceful if not for the German pop blasting over the loudspeaker.

The game, alas, was over before it began. Maxi Rodriguez scored in the fifth minute as the Argentines pinged the ball about with single touches, between and behind the vaunted Serbian defense. But even so fluid an attack could not prepare the crowd for what will be regarded as "the Goal." I'm almost certain countless babies were conceived in the moments after Esteban Cambiasso expertly finished Hernan Crespo's cheeky back-heeled pass into the top left half of the net. It's the kind of goal that creates football fans for life.

There were four more Argentina goals, one scored by budding genius Lionel Messi. Messi, who could be the best player at this tournament, is a stoop-shouldered kid with tousled hair who shuffles his weight gently, but perceptibly, from foot to foot, as if the tag of "the new Maradona" didn't weigh a thing. Of course, he takes off like a shot when he wants to, and was too much for the Serbs, assisting a goal and scoring one in just 15 minutes of play.

A game like this makes everyone smile, even those humbled in defeat, as I witnessed after the match, watching the Netherlands-Ivory Coast match with five smiling Serbs in a crowded bar. But really, what else can you do but smile when you lose by a touchdown in American football? A Scotsman and an Englishman squeezed between us and we were able to share predictions for next year's English premiership. They then told me about trying to buy scalped tickets from a "tout," going to the ATM to withdraw the money for the tickets and returning only to find the tout in handcuffs, pressed chest-first onto a German police van.

Looking back on my first two weeks at the World Cup, I continually smile at how easy it has been to start conversations with strangers from not-so-strange lands. Granted, it helps to be able to say the name Bastian Schweinsteiger (a young, talented German midfielder) with the verve and excitement of a 12-year-old. But you have to credit soccer -- like no other sport in the world -- for the goodwill. Sure, there's an aw-shucks quality to it, but then again, Americans are supposed to be good at this sort of thing. Now all we need is a domineering defensive center-mid and we're back in business.

Brazil!

So what if USA's out of the cup...
This was too much fun to pass up.

tired

Is anyone interested in hearing how tired I am?
I'm really, really tired.

I'm exhausted from the double-talk and backpedaling.
I'm done with the tiptoeing, the jockeying for position, with politicking and taking sides.
I'm so totally over misrepresentation, not saying what you mean, self-interest and two-faced interactions.

I'm spent when it comes to smiling, to playing nice, to grinning and bearing, to pretending like everything is OK.

Here's what I really want:
I want to hear people's honest opinion. Even if it's offensive. Or mean. Or selfish. Or stupid. Take a stand, be who you are. That means some people may not like you. Or that you are in the wrong relationship. Or the wrong community. Or the wrong educational system. Or the wrong job. Get over it -- that's life.
I want to see leaders, lead. And I want to see respect -- equality -- realism -- relationships -- take priority.
And I want to hear about the common good -- the end in mind -- our ultimate goal. And not about you, or me, or any one individual's petty snips and snats about another individuals' petty snips and snats.

I want to to be a part of something exhilarating -- something bigger than two people battling -- something that makes an impact, that changes our fabric, that shifts our world, even slightly.

But I cannot do that ensnared in a web of self-interest. It's sticky. It's ugly. It's a poisonous trap, and I desperately want out.

chronically imperfect

"The greatest of faults, I should say, is to be conscious of none."
(thomas carlyle)

this quote validates me, in a way. At work recently, I have been working on a project that is not entirely within my realm of expertise (read: I have to push myself out of my comfort zone on a regular basis on this one) -- as well as working on my thesis, which requires some extra energy and definitely an acceptance of being outside my comfort zone at fairly regular intervals.

Additionally, (and I think most of my friends can attest to it,) I am constantly calling my competency -- my characteristics -- my strengths and weaknesses into question. Not work related, necessarily -- just, am I being the Sarah I want to be (the Sarah who follows the Guiding Competencies, that is...) And I think the consensus is that, those of us who truly have a stake in the self-actualized, healthy, competent world, are the ones who are actually questioning our competencies -- our level of self-actualization.

So, I have come to realize a dichotomy of sorts this weekend (mostly, as I stressed out wondering how I could balance laundry and preschooler and father's day and careerwoman... which, turns out, the laundry is still sitting there....)
1) I am chronically imperfect. And that's probably OK -- it at least gives me an ongoing project.
2) I am better off for accepting my chronic imperfection, because it seems that acknowledging my imperfection is the first step in acheiving what I can through the chronic imperfection.

turn, turn, turn

I've always loved that stupid song,
To everything,
(turn, turn, turn)
There is a season...

you get it.
And while I generally speaking, prefer to not torture my blog following with personal angst (though, I have been known to do it), I have to say that I'm in the middle of the turn, turn, turn part of my life right. this. second.

turn 1: Paige was diagnosed with allergies this week. To cats, dust, wheat, and to a lesser degree, dogs. Which means I need to find new homes for Neville and Chyna. (Fred stays -- he's too old and too speecial needs for us to try and find him a new home...) It's damn hard to part with animals when you consider them members of your family. Plus I now have carpet to get rid of, wheat products to give away...like our entire existance changed with one doctor's appointment.

turn 2: I'm at the apex of school... meaning, I feel like there's 100,000 things I still need to do and yet there's so little time to get it all done. Like everything else in my life, I know that it will all come together like it's supposed to -- it always does -- but anticipating the road ahead is overwhelming.

turn 3: friends are in a state of flux... I've rekindled some old friendships, I have friends who are looking to move, I have friends who are having babies, I have friends who are getting married, I have friends who I have lost. I feel joy and loss in all of this, and those are hard emotions to reconcile, both equally valid and yet somehow diametrically opposed. I languish in the joy of setting myself free from unconstructive relationships, though I feel like I take my joy in someone else's pain; I struggle with the pain of another pregnancy that isn't mine -- even though I'm at peace with having one child.

so that's the long and short of it. Turn, turn, turn, my world ... but not so fast I cannot keep up, if you please.

Insult, injury

Girls and boys, this week marks the beginning of the 2006 World Cup in Germany -- for those of you not in the know, it's a 4-year event that roughly equates to the soccer-specific Olympics.

Allow me to jump on the soapbox for 10 seconds here: Soccer is cool (see previous posts), in large part because it is a global game. It's a language you can speak with anyone else on the globe (virtually, excepting the good ol' USA, where the game is followed in pockets, but certainly doesn't enjoy the rampant popularity of American Football...) With the exception of this fine nation, the world basically stops for a month every 4 years and unites under the banner of football. What else in the world does that?

This is what makes my heart beat when I think of the game. This is what gives me goosebumps. This global camaraderie is what makes the game, the beautiful game.

So when John sends me this (pardon me) completly ignorant and bigoted article our very own St. Paul Pioneer Press chose to publish, I nearly fainted. Then threw up. Then considered starting a lynch mob.

Here are some things I really just cannot get my brain around here:
1) How completely ignorant is this writer? He starts his article by essentially professing his hatred of immigrants, legal or otherwise. And I'm wondering: He's probably not 100% native amercan (though that IS an assumption on my part), so I wonder how HE got here... did some crazy alien space ship drop him off in a pod at birth? Or is it more likely that his ancestors were also immigrants who brought their own traditions and passions and culture that was eventually woven into the fabric of this nation? Dumbass.
2) So you don't like soccer. OK, well, it's America, land of free choice (and I know, free speech). But that doesn't mean that ESPN is going to stop televising the biggest sporting event ON THE GLOBE (he can't argue with me there, the most people on the planet watch this one) because this red-neck idiot would rather watch golf. This is also America, land of capitalism -- and ESPN is probably not airing World Cup for charity -- duh, you moron, they are doing it because people watch, and when people watch, advertising sells, and sold advertising means $$$. Figure it out, buddy. You're the minority here.
3) When did free speech in this country begin to equate with the right to insult anyone you do not agree with? I'm all for voicing your opinion (believe me, this blog wouldn't exist otherwise), but you don't need to slander others to do that ... do you?

I have never been so insulted that it physically took me time and effort to read an entire article. I can only hope that other soccer supporters, soccer bloggers, and maybe even the casual observers will stand up, take note, and make their voices heard on this.
I thought I lived in a society that embraced the fact that our planet was growing smaller. Maybe Tom Powers will get the hint (or at least exit using that pod he was dropped here in.)