And Meg is Back! Briefly.
Every time I’ve stepped into the East Lansing Meijer lately, my pervading thought has been “This is not going well”. They’ve moved everything around in a store I’ve been going to since before I could drive. I can’t find anything! Not even kitty litter (and we all know how important that is even if she is a little cat)! Last night I went on a shopping trip about 11:30pm ( I was up north with Cat & Heidi & sometimes Pam for a few days and had had too much sitting on my arse after seeing David over the weekend too go to bed when I got home) and I have decided it really was the best time to go—they’re restocking everything so there are lots and lots of people who also don’t know where anything is to ask where things are but they have a better idea of a general region than I do so ok, I’ll go look over there nice man. Whoops! You meant Australia, not Asia, no worries, I’ll just get on another plane and fly to the other side of the store.
So today I was back in there getting landscaping fabric and cucumbers when I decided I wanted a magazine or two for the road trip to New York this weekend. Not having a better idea of where to look I headed back to the area they used to be in. Alas, there is now hardware there (but I did find the kitty litter on the way). I must have looked distressed (I am very good at looking distressed when needed) because a very cheerful little ball of a man rolled over to me and handed me a…..MAP! Good heavens! There was a map! All this time! He is now most certainly my favorite Meijer worker.
I used said map to meander towards what used to be the candle area and look for a
Newsweek and
The Economist (happily singing “map, map, map. Map, map, map, map” in a ants-go marching manner all the way). I was slightly miffed to find the Newsweek in the “Men’s Interest” section, so you can imagine my irritation when I asked the gangly teen worker where they might be hiding
The Economist and after he informed me that they no longer carry it he proffered a
Bride magazine. You will be happy to know, gentle readers, that I did not beat him senseless with a roll of landscaping fabric. I did, however, in my best McGonagal impression, inform him that was most certainly not the way in which to divert a lady customer’s wrath at discontinuing her reading material.
Past that, things are calm. I think. We had a great time at the lake. So great it makes me sad it’ll probably be Christmas before we do it again. New York kinda worries me because his sister is decidedly cooler than me and I want her to like me. Soon I hope to see grandpa in Las Vegas and my parents are coming in a week. And we may have found a church in Cincinnati ( though we are still taking reccommendations) It's an inner city church about ten minutes from his house. But it may not have any young 30sish people whichwould disqualify it for daily wear and make it an accessory to acting out faith instead of the churhc home. Oh, and David is involved in Moveon.org now as well as the Democrats in Ohio and therefore I seem to be too. They get all weird about me voting in another state, but not about me taking part so that's that. He’s extra sexy when he’s politically active. Anything else? Hmmm….no..wait!.. The Taco Bell guy told me I looked good today. I thought that was odd, since we do not see each other on a social basis and I do not go to Taco Bell that often, but hey, I’ll take it where I can get it.
Disappointed Creative Reverie
Hello Darlings!
I have returned from my 635 mile hidey-hole. The smells of summer are everywhere and I’m almost COMPLETELY done with school crap. It’s funny. Through dating David I’ve noticed more and more of the natural world. I’ve seen the leaves turn color, fall off, snow fall, melt, fall, melt, turn grey, melt, soak in, grass and leaves creep forth again and finally fully leaf out into green glory. I kinda like the smells of driving. On the way home I pass both a Jim Beam factory (smells like popcorn with fake butter), a sugar factory(smells like cake baking), various dead animals leak out the sticky smell of death—one part disgusting yet somewhat familiar in a not entirely unpleasant way—icky smelling cart exhaust, choking truck emissions and, if I’m especially lucky and God smiles at me through sunshine, newly mown grass for miles on end.
I am very sad this week. Whole-heartedly disappointed. I was bumped from my pottery course. I was very very much looking forward to working in clay.
I like building with wood. I like making a skeleton; exact cuts that stay where they’re supposed to, a frame forming and taking shape solidly, removing flex with a wailing hammer and eventually having my imaginings become solid bits of set.
I like working in paper and paint, the stray stroke inspiring brilliance, the colors bleeding together for beauty.
Wire is satisfying but pokey. I don’t really like it.
I like creating with words, either typed with neat precision or written with pleasing curves and angles to express ideas and anger and beauty and joy and faith and hope and frustration and all the things that matter and things that don’t and ME!
I don’t trust fabric. It requires too much foresight and forbearance. It betrays my visions by moving from the size and shape I’ve cut it or refusing to curve when I demand it must. And no matter what, it insists on being essentially what it started as without apology even if I wish it was half a shade lighter at the end.
I like working in people, even though they are annoying and tend to stray from where I’ve put them or learn their lines, or sit quietly while waiting for use or not wander off. Like wood, I occasionally want to hit them with hammers. But I don’t. It wouldn’t be Christ-like.
But I like clay.
I like everything about clay. I like the way it’s hard when I take hold of it and then it gets formable with a bit of pounding and elbow grease. I like the way it gets dry but revives with a touch of slip or water. I like that it forms in my hands with no other tool or responds to any number of tools. I like that it hardens and bakes and can be made colorful simply for form or for function. I like clay.
I think it is no mistake that the metaphor is that He is the potter and I am the clay. It’s a gentle but firm forming. There’s not the violence of cutting and pounding as in wood. Not the pokiness of wire. Not the reforming without changing the pattern. Not the explicit complexity of words. Not the irreparable errors of paint. It’s silent work with voluminous results. It’s set to a tune that soothes and awakens me.
I like clay.
I am very sad that this is not my time.
Look! Pictures!
David & Grayson in my living room.
Grayson, aka "The Blur". Oh my, dog parks are good things.
Six Pound Cat vs. 72 Pound Dog...and it's a stand off. Her claws, his wussiness, I'm not suprised.
The lovely bride and groom.
The me and David.
The Yi and Alan
The Mike and Debbie
The Aaron and Michelle
The Bride and her Papa
Yeah, I have that effect on people.
So I was giving an exam today and some students were having it read to them in the hallway. One kid (for whom passing was a mathmatical impossibility), walked into the room, slipped something on his desk, went back into the hall, peeked back into the room and ducked out again.
A split second later, I heard a retreating WHUMP! WHUMP! WHUMP! WHUMP! WHUMP! noise in the hallway. I looked out and realized he'd taken off running.
Fashuoom! By the time I got out there he was rounding the corner.
Moved pretty fast for a big guy. Try explaining that one to security.
Gee golly and thanks y'all for playing:) I suppose the stealthy 2000th one was just too sneaky-sneaky for me (Mild alliteration Meg? Yes, but bear with me, I'm an English teacher in the middle of exams).
Info I keep meaning to post but haven't gotten to:
The memorial dinner for the memorial fund for the students who died & whatever else it's going to provide for the community is tonight at the high school from 6-9pm, $5 per plate. I guess there's also something about a silent auction and baked goods, but I'm not really sure what that's about.
Ironically, I will not be in attendance--the retirement dinner is also tonight and i paid my $25 a while ago.
Last funny thing of the day, with the purpose of creating a good-humored smirk:
I asked one of my tenth graders for a simile, she wrote:
"Way up in the sky are stars; balls of gas burning like the sun."
Somebody's not paying attention in science class.
PLEASE CHECK
THE BOTTOM OF THE PAGE TO SEE IF YOU ARE MY 2000th VISTOR!
If you are, please leave a comment letting me know who you are, if not, leave a comment anyway!
Unbelieveable!
It's the last day of school...how the heck did that happen? Yippeeeeeee!
Uh oh...
I ate the last of Katie & Steve's wedding chocolates today. I'd like to say it was because I have awesome self-control but in reality, I put them on top of the TV with the peanut butter one still in it and forgot about it for a week.
I think this is a symptom of THE CRASH. I have several through the year--after a play, at Christmas, at Spring Break, but the biggest on happens at the end of the school year. All the stress melts away and I have a few hours when I'm nearly manic with energy. I clean, sort, empty, paint, whatever has been on my list. Then comes THE CRASH.
All I can do is sit. Not read. Not talk. Not pet the cat. Just sit. Perhaps with the TV on, perhaps playing a mindless online game of Cubis 2 or Collapse (the key here is no mental exertion and no movement past the wrist). It's usually not an issue. I just sit and sleep off and on for a day or so. Catch up so to speak. Then I perk up and go back to the usual Meg you all know and love.
But it's hit early. This weekend I graded like a some sort of green-inked tornado, did laundry, cooked, emptied my car (had not been throughly done since October), painted my shower curtain rod, changed out the liner, painted a mirror frame, atarted Reading Ann Lamott's Plan B, went to open houses and graduation, took long walks, pulled weeds, washed the throws in the living room, rotated my mattress, talked to a bunch of people, church, etc. I didn't quite get to vaccumming the car and now I'm afraid it'll never get done.
I did my 4am get-up-and-do-things thing today. And I did things. And then I came home and sat down on the couch to read the mail. At 7pm I woke up. Now I'm trying to get movitivated to go to the store or at least vaccum the car, or warm up dinner. But I think it's here. Before exams. I'm going to enjoy the view from my picture window. And then go to bed. And try to forget I had wonderful amusing ideas to blog about when I started this....
