Good Day Sunshine

I hate Winter. I like Thanksgiving and Christmas, but that's about where my tolerance ends. If winter only lasted for a month, I'd be OK with it, but instead it drags on for an additional two months. And they are arguably the worst months of the year.

For a long time, I was opposed to Autumn as well, just on principle. I would get irritated when people said things like, "Hooray, Fall is here!" or "Yum, pumpkin spice lattes!" or "I'm so excited about cardigan weather!" I wanted to grab them by the collar and yell, You fools! Fall is bullshit! Winter is on its way! Also, you probably don't even like the taste of pumpkin. It's actually nutmeg, cinnamon, and ginger that you're excited about.

Seriously, though, people need to calm down about pumpkin. It's a nearly inedible gourd, guys.

Anyway, over time I have loosened up about Fall. I can enjoy the changing leaves and crisp air without immediately being filled with despair. I still hate Winter, though. I wouldn't go so far as to say that I have seasonal depression, but there is something about the short days and the awful weather that make me start to think that life will never be good again. What's even worse about my hatred of Winter is that I live in the South, where the Winters are about as mild as you can get and still be able to formally call them "Winter." Imagine what would happen to me if I lived in Canada.

Here, let me illustrate for you the difference between Winter and Spring. The other day, I was out driving. It was 75 degrees, the sun was high and bright, I was barefoot and I had the radio turned up loud. Suddenly, I felt a tightness in my chest. Oh no, I thought, I must be anxious about something. What did I forget? Am I missing an important appointment? And then I realized that the feeling of fullness and expansion in my heart was not anxiety, but rather something that people often refer to as "happiness." Winter made me forget about it, but Spring is here to remind me at last.

Momentary Joys

I have a weird relationship with writing. Actually, I have a weird relationship with most of the things I love to do. Writing, running, playing music. Almost every day, I feel inspired to do these things. I read Black Hockey Jesus, who is an amazing writer (and a runner, come to think of it), or Alice Bradley's blog about writing, and I think to myself, I'll write something! I'll realize my potential! I'll do what I've always loved to do!

I drive down the road and pass what seems like a Macy's-sponsored parade of runners, decked out in spandex and energetic ponytails, their cheeks and noses pink with enthusiasm, and I feel a vicarious elation. I resolve to start running again, right away.

But before I have even opened a Word document or pulled on my shoes, I've talked myself out of it. I've gone so long without blogging, I reason, no one would read it anyway. I've never finished a story that wasn't an assignment for a 6th grade English class. I haven't run regularly since November, so I probably wouldn't even make it 2 miles. What's the point in starting if I won't finish? What's the point in doing it if I can't do it well? Shouldn't I be spending that time doing schoolwork anyway? I've yet to find a scrap of joy that I can't fashion into a straitjacket.

Instead of doing things I love, I beat myself up about not doing them, or not doing them well enough. I tell myself I'm a failure for letting my blog sit stale for 7 months. I'm lazy and gross because I stopped running and gained 7 lbs over Christmas. I have no ambition, no talent, no perseverance.

Of course, the simple answer is, Girl, you crazy.

It's our choice how we spend our time, obviously. There is no authoritative maniac running up to strangers on the street, yelling, "Why aren't you learning to play the clarinet, you worthless piece of shit?!?" We have no responsibility to please anyone but ourselves. I'm not unhappy because I'm not living up to a street maniac's standards, I'm unhappy because I'm not doing the things I know I enjoy, because as soon as I start doing them, I worry about the street maniac's standards. Does that make sense? Of course not. I know. Girl, you crazy.

I think the answer is to live in the moment. At any given moment, you're either doing something that satisfies you, or you're not. Right now I'm writing, and I'm enjoying it. Sometime in the future someone may read it, or they may not. Hopefully, at some moment in the future, I'll be running and enjoying it, and it won't matter how far I go, or whether I ran the day before, or will run the day after. Instead of coming up with reasons that my passions are a waste of time, I would probably be better off asking myself, "Would it make me feel awesome to do this right now?" Because while my writing and running and generally living may not please the judgmental street maniac, I suspect that coming up with new ways to call myself a failure isn't what he had in mind, either.

No Need to Call the Police, I'm Safe

Hi everyone!

I just wanted to let you know that I am neither dead nor in danger, nor have I forgotten you. I returned from Houston on Sunday evening, with every intention of updating you as soon as possible with the story about how the airline screwed up my flight. Unfortunately, I forgotten about the small issue wherein my laptop doesn't actually turn on or do anything right now. No problem, you might be thinking, you can just update at work, where you have access to the internet and you never do anything worthwhile anyway, right? Trust me, I had the same thought, but it turns out we've been working against a pretty tight deadline, and so I was actually productive at an unprecedented level this week. Add to that the fact that I've been spending my evenings preparing to move this weekend, and you have me here in my current situation: sitting in my office at 10:30 on a Thursday night, updating my blog for the first time in what must certainly be a decade.

NaBloPoMo indeed, am I right?

Oh well. At least now you can rest easy and stop bothering Scotland Yard about my whereabouts. Sherlock Holmes has more important things to do anyway, you know.

I Probably Should Have Just Taken a Nap Instead

Well it looks like I owe you all another apology, since I failed to post again yesterday. I waited until late in the evening to try to write something, and the electricity chose that time to start going in and out. Lee was worried about the computer getting hurt by all the excitement, so we shut it down. Good for the computer, bad for my commitment to non-stop blog domination. Oh well. Here we are today, and we all survived my absence, it seems.

Between not writing a post last night and the fact that I accomplished very little "work" today, I'm feeling kind of like a useless bum. It doesn't help that I haven't run since my doomed attempt Sunday night. Last week, I ran several times on the treadmill in the little fitness center here in Lee's apartment complex. I was working on being speedier, and it seemed to be going well, except for the part where I think I pulled my right hamstring. It was sort of bothering me over the weekend, and then when I tried to run on Sunday it was really more of a shambling jog. Granted, a shambling jog isn't that unusual for me during the end of a long run, but this was happening during the first mile, when I usually feel like a cheetah, soooo... probably not a good sign. Just FYI, here are few other things I had working against me on Sunday night:

1) It's July in Houston.
2) Even at 7pm, it was in the mid-90s
3) ... with almost 80% humidity.
4) The sidewalks around here, even in Lee's relatively nice neighborhood, are poorly maintained and pretty wonky. Sometimes you're running at a weird angle, and sometimes you're jumping over deep puddles that see to come out of nowhere, and pretty much all the time you're hopping and skipping and trying not to trip over the places where the concrete squares don't line up.
5) I had maybe only eaten two pop tarts and some nachos that day.
6) ... ok, I can't think of a number 6, but don't you think that's enough reasons?

I was trying to run 7 miles, and I'm pretty sure it would have been the first time I've run that far since I ran the half last year. The reason I was trying to run 7 miles was because I'm training to run the same race again this year. Did I tell you that? No? Well it's true. Anyway, because of all the forces (OF EVIL) working against me, I made it about 2.5 miles before I gave up and walked back home. Lame.

Since I compiled a list of ways in which Houston has sabotaged my running, I feel obligated to make a list of good things about running in Houston. (Because I am a force for justice and fairness in the world.) Here is my list:

1) There is usually a breeze, which is nice.
2) There are very few hills.
3) ... that's pretty much it. Check with me again in December and I'll see if I have more nice things to say.

I guess I'll try for 7 miles again next weekend, since I have to keep training or else I'll never win first place at the big race. Who knows? If I'm really lucky, maybe I'll drop dead of heat stroke!

Fourth on the Floor

Today I had a hectic day riding around Texas with Lee on some work errands. It was actually pretty enjoyable if you don't count the part where we had to get up at 4:30 in the morning. 4:30 in the morning is not generally a time of day I enjoy, as you might imagine, but I'm a trooper so I got through it ok. All that is to say, even though it's late I haven't forgotten about you, and if you're good boys and girls I might even have some pictures of Texas to show you later.

But that's not what we're here to talk about! Instead I want to tell you about my Fourth of July. My main goal for this year's Fourth was to make it as much fun as last year's, which featured a 4 mile race in the morning and a picnic and fireworks in the evening. The first half of that equation was definitely a success. H, the friend I ran with last year, decided not to run it with me this year, so I was a little worried beforehand that I wouldn't have anyone to stand around and talk to before and after the race. Getting up and dressed at 6:45 that morning was kind of lonely, but once I got to the actual race I ran into a girl from work, and some other people I knew from the training program I was doing before I hurt my foot. I really shouldn't have been surprised - it's not like I live in a huge city, so of course I would know at least some of the other runners at a popular local race. But like I always say, if you can't assume the worst, you're not trying hard enough.

The actual running part of the race was fun, although I forgot that the last mile is mostly uphill. The weather was really nice, in the 70s. Since I usually sleep as late as possible and do my running in the evenings, I forget how nice and cool it is in the mornings. Every time I run an early morning race I think I should start running first thing in the morning, but then later I remember how much that sucks, so I don't. I ran a little faster this year, cutting 2 minutes off my total time. My only goal for the race was "run it faster than last time", so I was pleased. That being said, I did the math and I'm pretty sure I still would have had to cut 16 minutes off my time in order to place third in my age group. I totally could have taken the 60-65 age group, though. If I keep running and getting faster and the playing field keeps leveling as I age, I figure I should hit a sweet spot when I'm about 50. So check in 25-ish years from now, when I'll be a real contender. Even though I didn't technically win anything, all the runners got sweet pint glasses with the Four on the Fourth logo on them. (I took a picture of mine, but then my laptop stopped cooperating, and I didn't bring my camera cord with me to Lee's.)

After the race I desperately wanted a nap, but instead I had to run a bunch of errands. Last year's picnic-and-fireworks deal was mostly orchestrated by my friend H, who did all the planning and cooking and driving and et cetera. This year, I was the one who really wanted to go, so I felt like it was my responsibility to make sure we had everything we needed. My friend E and I had figured out ahead of time what we were going to make, and split up the duties. I was to make a pasta salad and buy more juice-box wine, and E was going to get us some delicious North Carolina barbecue and make cookies. So, instead of a nap I went grocery shopping and made up a pasta salad recipe on the fly.

(Here is where I would insert the beautiful pictures I took of the food, if it were possible for me to download them. Sad trombone.)

The pasta salad turned out to be pretty delicious, if I do say so myself, and I should really post the recipe on here sometime. After my success in the kitchen, though, things started to kind of go downhill. First, one of my friends changed her mind and said she wasn't going to be able to come along to the fireworks after all. Oh, and also that she couldn't give me the ride to the airport she had promised me. So I drove, discouraged but not defeated, to pick up my friend E from her place. Unfortunately, when I got there she told me she hadn't put the cookies in the oven yet, so we'd have to wait at least 20 minutes, but probably more because her boyfriend was going to join us and he was driving from a neighboring city. While I sat waiting, worrying about how I was going to get to the airport the next day, and how we were going to find parking at the fireworks, I heard the first thunderclap. Ten minutes later, there was a full-on downpour happening outside.

I was pretty bummed to see my dreams of a lovely explosive-lit outdoor meal slipping away, but I guess at that point I already begun to see the writing on the wall. Besides, trying to recreate the magic of last year's festivities had been a fool's game anyway. E's boyfriend arrived about the time I made my peace with the death of my fantasy Fourth, and at that point we came up with plan B: eat our picnic on the living room floor, drink a lot of wine, and play cards. It wasn't what I'd planned, but of course it turned out to be delightful.

Even though it rained and I didn't get to see anything blow up, the Fourth of July has been pretty good to me for 2 years running now. I've never thought of it as a top-10 event, but depending on how next year goes, it just might become my third-favorite holiday (after Christmas and Halloween, obviously).

Apologetic Placeholder

Guys! Only 6 days into July and I've already failed to post for 2 days in a row! How could this happen?

I'll tell you how it happened: the gods are clearly against me. I know this, because not only did they foil my attempts to post for the past 2 days, but they also stymied my fireworks-watching plan on the 4th of July. But all of that is a story that will be told soon enough.

For now, just know that the only reason I wasn't faithful to my commitment is because my laptop has stopped working. Or rather, I think it works fine, but the screen has elected to no longer show me what is going on in there, save for occasional flashes. It has become an enigma to me, more like a magic eight ball than a personal computing device. I would have gone to work to post on my computer there (because I am just. that. dedicated.), but on the 4th I was incredibly busy having lots of fun, and then yesterday was equally hectic because I was preparing to fly, then flying, then sleeping.

So! Here I am now, safely in Houston, with access to a computer and considerable free time (at least, whenever my boss isn't asking me to do work or whatever). I plan to give you more exciting details on recent events either later today or tomorrow. Huzzah!

Weather Report

I don't have much to say, but I know people check here for updates and I feel like it's been long enough since I posted that at this point something is better than nothing. So here's something which is only barely better than nothing.

The basic gist of things is that there are storm clouds all around my head lately, and wasps swarming inside of it, and concrete on my feet and in my eyelashes. It's been this way for about 2 or 3 weeks now. Things sometimes clear up for a few hours, but once the clouds roll back in it's hard to get anything done. Also I hate writing blog posts when I feel this way, because I always think they sound over-dramatic and ridiculous.

Objectively, my life is pretty decent. This is a fact. But these things start slowly and then take on a life of their own. It seems like sometimes my brain sets the stage, circumstances provide a little push, and that's all it takes to get the ball rolling. Like when you wake up in the morning and some big stupid thing happens, like you drop an iron on your foot, and then you're pissed, and then everything that happens after that is colored by the fact that you dropped an iron on your foot, and then you're just a mud puddle or a missed bus away from throwing a shit fit in your favorite deli because they don't have the bread you like. Except in my case the dropped iron is a family problem I can't really talk about, and the minor annoyances are perceived rejections and insults from various friends and loved ones, and the shit fit I'm throwing is a lot of sleeping and eating and watching Criminal Minds re-runs.

So I don't know what my point is. I guess just to say that I'm still here and I think of you often, but you're better off that you don't have to read nonsense like this every day. Eventually the clouds will roll out or whatever they do, and I'll be back to posting photos of my running shoes. I'm thinking of buying a new pair, and you'll be the first to know.

Planning for Success

1. Sign up for an independent study.
2. Halfway through the semester, agree on a reading list (over 40 journal articles, a few books to skim) with the professor. Tell her you'll send her your summary "as you make you progress."
3. Over the next few weeks, read some articles here and there. Maybe 5 or 8 in total. No need to strain yourself.
4. Two to three weeks before the end of the semester, realize that you still have 45 articles to read and summarize, along with all of your other final assignments, and also your 25-hour-a-week job.
5. PANIC.
6. Read furiously.
7. Check clock.
8. You've only read one article in two hours?!?
9. Repeat steps 5 through 8 until you are no longer physically capable of further panic.
10. You need a drink.
11. On Saturday afternoon (your assignment is due Sunday), go hang out with friends from 4 to 9 pm. Drink a glass of wine, or four.
12. Arrive home at 9pm. Did I mention your assignment is due tomorrow? Homework is hard when you're intoxicated, you know.
13. Have a nap til 1am.
14. Wake up, mainline soda, work til the wee hours of the morning.
15. Finish assignment in an exhausted haze.
16. Swear you'll never do this again.

SEVEN MONTHS LATER: Begin again at step 3.

Next Week: Pictures of T-Shirts I'm Giving to Goodwill

Until I'm sure my formerly sprained toe is back to it's old self, I'm having to run in my old running shoes. The ones that don't make me look like Girlfriend of Swamp Thing.

Unlike these, which totally *do* make me look like an Amphibi-lady.

I've mentioned before that every running shoe I've ever tried (except the Nessie Feet) have given me terrible blood blisters, but I have stopped short of ever actually posting photos of my feet in this state because despite what you might think, I actually have a little bit of class and decorum. UNTIL TODAY.

Just kidding, I'm not going to post pictures of my maimed feet. I will, however, post photos of my socks following Monday night's run, and let you draw your own conclusions.


You may not be able to see that well, what the fact that my socks are filthy and also have an adorable pink stripe down the side. How bout we zoom on in?


There you are. Here you can see where I have helpfully added two sloppily drawn dueling suns, in order to call your attention to the areas of interest. Those dark reddish spots there? Oh, that's just where my blood blisters burst open while I was running and made a big painful mess.

I know, right? Pretty punk rock. But here's the best part. Guess how far I had to run over the past 7 days in order to make my feet self-destruct? Go on, guess.

Only six miles. Over the course of a week. To be specific, three separate runs, each totaling less than 2 miles, is all it takes to make my feet literally EXPLODE BLOOD EVERYWHERE.

So I've got a slightly trainwreck-y spine and exploding feet, and yet I soldier on. And to think, I was worried that people would think I wasn't hardcore enough.

(By the way, I promise not to let this turn into the All Running All the Time Blog, but I think we can all agree that you'd be sad if you hadn't gotten to see photos of my dirty socks. Right? Right.)

In Which I Compare My Vertebrae to Irresponsible Teen Drivers

The 10-mile race I was so excited to run was Saturday. And I wasn't in it.

Let's back up. I've been having progressively worse back pain over the past few years, basically ever since I graduated from college and started spending a lot of time sitting in front of a computer. I'm not handicapped or anything like that, but my shoulders and lower back get really tight and sore. Also, I have had some off-and-on pain in my hip after running that someone once told me might have something to do with my hips being out of whack. (I'm pretty sure that's the medical jargon for it.) Although my Mom swears by her chiropractor, I've always been pretty skeptical of them, what with them being uneducated witch doctors and all. (Kidding!) Nevertheless, when I got a coupon for a free exam and x-rays from a chiropractor who was recommended by some people in my running group, I figured I'd give it a shot.

The week after I got the !GREAT NEWS! from the Sports Medicine doctor that I would be OK to jump back on the wagon and finish training for the race, I went to see the chiropractor for the second time. We were going to follow-up on the x-rays and talk about his recommendations. He sat me down and showed me the x-rays of my back alongside someone else's x-rays. The other person's x-rays were meant to serve as an example of a 'good,' well-behaved spine. It curved in all the right places and had spacious, well-defined gaps between each vertebrae. It was a nice spine.

My spine, on the other hand, was slightly less admirable. It was mostly alright, really, until you got to my lower back and then things started to look a little off. Imagine for a moment that my spine is a highway and my vertebrae are cars. The x-ray looked a little like what would happen if the drivers of my bottom two vertebrae got distracted while driving (probably sexting or applying makeup, as young women are wont to do), and then when they looked up, the vertebra in front of them had stopped short and OOPS they bumped into them. Not real hard, just enough that the flow of traffic is all jacked up. So now my vertebrae cars are jammed and the spine highway isn't all curved and pretty like the one in the other exemplary x-ray, and suddenly I'm in a chiropractor's office feeling jealous of another woman whose skin I've never even seen.

The chiropractor's explanation for this was that either I was born with my vertebrae like that OR I injured my back at some point in the past and it healed that way. In either case, he said that there's nothing that can be done to change the fact that they're jammed together, but that he should be able to help get things better aligned and take some of the strain off my nerves and muscles. Doing so would take at least 4 weeks, and oh by the way, I shouldn't run during those 4 weeks because it would make treatment less effective.

So. After receiving all of this news I was... quite upset. Understandably. I was terrified that there might be something permanently wrong with my back, I was confused that he claimed I'd suffered an injury that I didn't remember having, I was pissed that he hadn't been more delicate and compassionate when he explained all this to me, and I was devastated that the possibility of running the race was slipping away again just when I thought everything was going to work out.

What's embarrassing is that of all these concerns, the thing I was most upset about was the possibility of not being able to run the race. Specifically, I was worried about what the people in the running group would think of me. On some level I was OK with the idea of giving up on the race, since I had just taken a month off training and I only had 3 weeks to get ready, but the idea that people would KNOW I had signed up for a race and then dropped out made me feel like a failure. When I signed up for the training group, I felt excited and proud that I was finally declaring myself a 'runner' who was comfortable associating with other runners. When I hurt myself and had to stop running, I consoled myself by thinking that I'd be healed up and back to training in no time. When everyone saw me return to training and then later run across the finish line, they would know that I was serious and not just a quitter.

But if I couldn't run the race after all, they wouldn't know how serious and determined I was. I'd just be some strange girl who had dropped out of training after 2 months and was never seen again. A quitter, and a failure, and a wanna-be. The idea of 'real' runners thinking those things about me was devastating, as embarrassing as that is.

Unfortunately, once I admitted to myself that the reason I was having a nervous breakdown over this whole thing was because I was afraid people would think bad things about me (and not, say, because I have TRAFFIC JAM SPINE), I had no choice but to do the rational thing and let go of the race. I emailed the handful of people from the running group that I had become friends with to let them know that I wouldn't be coming back to training after all, and whaddaya know, they were all really nice about it. Because of course they were. Because most people are mostly kind and good (I think), and this whole thing was really just about the Asshole Voice in my Head messing with me.

So I didn't get to run the race, and I was sorely disappointed, but I just keep reminding myself that I have a lifetime of races ahead of me if I want to run them, and this isn't the end of the world. As far as my back goes, I'm still a little skeptical of the chiropractor's explanations for why it's messed up, but there's no denying that those x-rays looked shady, and also no denying that my back pain has improved a lot in the past few weeks. I wouldn't say I'm a convert, exactly, but I'm less... openly dismissive, shall we say? At the end of this week he's supposed to take another round of x-rays, and if I don't like what he has to say then I SHALL SEEK A SECOND OPINION. From a real doctor, this time. Meanwhile, I've been cleared to ease back into running again (again), so I'll be working on that. Hooray! Thanks for checking in.

There's Got to Be Easier Ways to Be Validated, But I'll Take What I Can Get

Say you're a totally amazing runner, known the world over for your excellence and badassitude. Perhaps you have been intensely training for a race, while wearing an outfit that looks exactly like this:

(Or maybe you're more into hot pink. Whatever, I don't mind.)

Now imagine you find your intense training interrupted by an unthinkable injury, the likes of which only a true athlete would ever face. What do you imagine that injury would be?

You are probably imagining yourself wearing a full body cast, which is the only thing keeping your bones organized ever since you ran so fast that you broke the sound barrier and all of your skin melted off. That is truly an awesome injury you've envisioned, reader. But I can do you one better.

Torn ligaments.

Where, you ask? Well, the injury is localized in a small area at the end of my leg, slightly below the ankle.

Well, more like below and in front of my ankle.

I suppose it would more properly be called my foot.

Really, we're talking about the... frontish part.... I guess...

OK FINE I SPRAINED MY DAMN TOE, OK?!? GOD!!

...But it's my big toe, which is very important, you know.

What had happened was this. Back in January I joined that running group I told you about, the one training for a 10 mile race in April. At that time I switched from normal running shoes which had always given me terrible AWFUL blood blisters, to these newfangled Aqua Sock-lookin things.

OH YES I DID. Because aside from being sick of those blisters, I just felt like I looked a little too dignified when I was running, you know? I thought, "How can I bring running, a typically athletic endeavor, down to my usual comfort level of intense dorkiness?" And the heavens opened and took a bunch of my money and then these shoes dropped into my lap.

At any rate, things were going swimmingly and I was blister-free and running faster and making friends and looking just as dorky as I like to. The only issue was that the sidewalks around here are kind of uneven and when I get tired I start to kind of drag my feet (and let's face it, even on a good day I can be a little clumsy), so toe-stubbing was a bit of an issue. The mostly innocuous toe-stubbing reached its climax in an epic week at the end of February that began when I stubbed my toe, fell, skinned my arm and knee, and scratched my ipod.

Even though falling and getting skinned up was painful and made me feel kind of stupid, it was also kind of exhilarating. I stood up all dirty and bloody and it felt like that time when I was 10 and I wrecked my bike and had to walk it all the way home like a warrior. Except this time I wasn't loudly sobbing.

Two days later, proud of my perseverance and confident that my toe-stubbing days were behind me, I joined the group for a 6 mile run. It was tired and having a bad run, and finally around mile 5.8 I stubbed my toe REALLY HARD on an uneven place in the sidewalk. Just whacked it real good against the concrete. This time I didn't fall and when my friend asked if I could keep running I said, "Yeah, I think so." Six steps later it was clear that the stabbing pain in my toe was not going to allow continued running, so I stopped and slowly hobbled on as everyone else sprinted past. It was a dark tenth of a mile back to the car, during which I contemplated the possibility of a broken toe, and the idea that I might not be able to finish training or run the race. Once again I was reminded of that time when I was 10 and I wrecked my bike, except this time it was the despair and the weeping I was thinking of. (But I DIDN'T cry, so there.)

When I finally got back to my car, I worriedly rushed home to take off my shoes and behold my surely monstrously damaged toe. But when I finally got a look at it, it looked mostly normal, except maybe a little more red and swollen than usual. What the hell, toe?!? I was honestly a little pissed at my digit for not looking as awful as it felt. After aggressively icing my foot, I considered going to the doctor, but everyone I talked to told me a doctor would just charge me for an x-ray and tell me to rest, so best to save the money and just not run for awhile.

Thus began an unreasonably stressful 3-week period during which my thoughts consisted mostly of "I should be running I'm getting out of shape what if I miss the race?!? But if I run my toe won't heal and I'll never walk properly again! But if I DON'T run I'll miss the race and be a failure forever... ow my toe, I think I'll eat some cookies." I ran once after I thought I was almost healed, but the pain in my toe came back, so finally I decided that I was willing to pay the price of a doctor's visit just to have someone tell me in an authoritative voice WHAT I OUGHT TO DO.

I made an appointment with the Sports Medicine department of Campus Health. I had intended to check with the receptionist to make sure my special case belonged in Sports Medicine (and not say, the Clumsy Spaz department), but she was all brisk on the phone and I didn't get a chance to explain to her that I wasn't a Real Athlete involved in Real Sports.

During the days leading up to my appointment, I became irrationally convinced that the Sports Medicine doctor was going to turn out to be my middle school gym teacher, and that he would remind me of that time I had to sit out the Presidential Fitness Test because my "ankle was sprained." (It really was, by the way. It's just that I didn't like using crutches, and plus that guy was a jerk.) As I sat in the Sports Medicine waiting room watching football players come and go, I became even more convinced that I'd be seeing Dr. Overweight Gym Teacher, MD only to receive a prescription of heckling and mockery.

But guess what, guys! Turns out, the doctor was a lady! And a very nice one, at that. And she showed me how to "buddy tape" my big toe to my second toe (so it can provide moral support, I assume), and gave me permission to take criminal amounts of ibuprofen. AND she did not laugh in my face when I told her I was training for a race. In fact, she told me that if I tape my toes together and wear normal shoes for the time being (welcome back, blisters!), I should still be able to run the race. Hooray!!

So, the moral of the story is this: Gym teachers seldom have the time or money to attend medical school.

No, wait. The moral is: I'm a real athlete, so suck it, Former Gym Teacher!!

No. Ok, it's probably this: If you think you've seriously injured yourself, just go to the doctor and get it checked out, even if your friend who's broken 8 out of 10 toes tries to tell you it's a waste of time. You shouldn't be taking medical advice from someone who's broken that many bones, anyway.

And The Award For Most Unnecessarily Complicated Craft Project Goes To

It should come as no surprise that I own a lot of books, and that being in grad school has resulted in the purchase of many more. You might be thinking that textbooks can be sold back to the bookstore at the end of the semester, but the problem is that now see each book as an important part of my future as an academic. What if someday I'm writing a journal article, or doing some kind of statistical voodoo, and suddenly I have a question about something I studied in grad school, but I can't look it up because I sold the book back to the bookstore? That is why I can't sell back my books.

As a result of my fear of disappointing Future Me, I have amassed quite a stack of textbooks. Up until a few weeks ago this stack was taking up a chunk of the already-limited floor space in my cluttered room. After 3 semesters of accumulating books, I started to fantasize about getting another bookcase so that I could house my books like a civilized member of society, rather than a (particularly well-educated) cave person.

On a related note, my pet gerbils both died last fall. But if there's anything I've learned from devout Christians and fans of mediocre romantic comedies, it's that "when God closes a door, he opens a window." In this case, he closed the door on my gerbils, and he opened the window on a new bookcase. The bookcase in question used to support the gerbils' habitat and house all of their gerbil accessories (food, bedding, tasty treats, back issues of Better Homes & Gardens). But once they died, I was free to fill it with textbooks.

Unfortunately, the bookcase was black, which I felt wouldn't fit with the design scheme of my bedroom. Also, I worried that adding a dark-colored piece of furniture to a room already bursting with furniture would be claustrophobic. So of course, the bookcase would need to be painted. Preferably a nice light, springy green. And because I have been cultivating supportive imaginary friends in my head, that idea was met with a resounding YES!

Everything that happened after I made the decision to paint the bookcase can basically be explained by the fact that the bookcase I was repainting was one of those $40 fiberboard some-assembly-required deals. With a fancy piece of cardboard nailed on the back.

The first step was to buy supplies. I went to Home Depot's paint department and selected a color on a paint swatch that I liked. Then, because I don't like looking confused, I wandered around the store purposefully for a little while. At one point, I accidentally made eye contact with the guy that worked in the paint area.

"Can I help you ma'am?" he said. "Uh, yeah... Can I just take get this paint off the shelf, or do you have to mix it for me?" "When you're ready, we'll mix it for you." "Oh, OK." I wandered off to the plumbing area.

I called my mom and had a quick discussion about types of paint, primer, and sandpaper. Finally, I sucked it up and walked back to the paint area, ready to order my paint in a clear, authoritative way. After finding the paint guy and staring expertly at some sandpaper for awhile, I was finally able to leave with paint, sandpaper, a tarp, and a paint brush. I hadn't even started painting yet, but I was already a home improvement champion.

The first thing I did was lay out my tarp on the living room floor and rip the cardboard backing off the bookcase. I had a vision, you'll recall, and part of the vision was that the bookcase would have no back. Then I removed the adjustable shelves and began painting. After the first coat dried, it became clear that this would require much more paint. Even lightly sanded, the plasticky coating on the bookcase didn't accept paint well, and even if it had, black is a hard color to cover. Sometime between coats 2 and 3, I got a phone call from my roommate (who had been out of town) saying she was on her way back. Not wanting her to come home to a mess, I moved the whole operation into my room, where I had considerably less space to engage in my artism. A few more days passed, during which I applied 3-4 coats of paint to my project, plus touch-ups.

I had noticed during the course of all this that the frame of the bookcase, without its shelves and backing, seemed suspiciously rickety. I mentioned this to my father, who pointed out (as nicely as possible) that it was kind of a cheap piece of junk, and the cardboard backing had provided it with much-needed stabilization. Back to Home Depot I went, this time to procure some wooden triangles with which to reinforce the bookcase. Those ALSO had to be painted, and hammered onto the back of the bookcase.

Finally, my bookcase was uniformly green and beautiful, and it was time to put in the shelves and get my books into their new home. I pressed the metal shelf supports into position, and lifted the first shelf into its space. As I pushed it in, I felt some resistance. Apparently the 4 coats of paint had made the shelf a tight fit. I pushed harder, and the shelf aggressively removed a chunk of paint. OH HELL NO. I did NOT just spend a week huddled in a corner of my room, hunched over a tarp and applying coat after coat after coat of paint just to end up with a shelf-less bookcase. Before I could do anything rash (like SET THE DAMN THING ON FIRE), I put the shelf down and walked away. Once I was calm enough to deal with it, I called my mom for advice. She came up with the ingenious solution of using a razor blade to take off a strip of paint just wide enough to slip the shelves in, and then touching up any black parts that showed once the shelves were in.

So I did that, and at long last I had my masterpiece!


(This is a horrible and offensive photo, I know, but I had to use the flash and then subsequently crop out some of my junk. What was I gonna do, get out my camera and take a better picture? Ha.) (Also, note the strip of black I left at the bottom, which marks the exact moment at which I said, "Ah fuck it, it's done.")

Anyway, if you'd like to do something similar, all you need is a quart of paint, a razor blade, 4 scrap pieces of plywood cut into triangles, 8 days to sporadically apply paint, and about $30. Seriously, though: just go buy a new bookcase.

Why I Abandoned My Quest for Omniscience

I used to be a big believer in the importance of knowing THE TRUTH. It always seemed very important to me to know the truth about things, particularly other people's feelings and opinions about me. Because I am super self-absorbed, apparently. I wanted to know things like, Do my friends secretly think my haircut is stupid? Does my boyfriend really think I'm the prettiest girl in the world? Does my mom think I'm obnoxious? I felt very strongly that I would rather know THE TRUTH and be miserable, than be misled and deluded and happy. (I also felt that most constantly happy people were probably happy because they were too stupid to know better.) Unfortunately, my strongly-held convictions were based on two faulty assumptions:

1) That people have absolute feelings and opinions that are unchanging and completely knowable.
2) That my happiness should in some way be dependent on the feelings and opinions of others.

I don't really believe those things anymore, for a lot of reasons. One big reason for my change in philosophy was the end of a 4-year-long, mostly disastrous relationship. A lot of my happiness at the time depended on what my boyfriend thought of me, and when the relationship imploded for the final time, all I wanted was validation. I was basically OK with the fact that the relationship was over, but it had ended badly enough that I wasn't sure if he had ever actually loved me. I felt that I needed to know whether he had or not; it felt like everything hinged on that fact. If he had never loved me, then the last 4 years of my life had been a waste and I should be appropriately miserable and ashamed. If he had loved me at some point, then that made everything OK. Until I knew THE TRUTH, I couldn't let it go.

Unfortunately, there were some serious obstacles between me and THE TRUTH. For one, I had vowed (in a quite dramatic fashion, as is my way) never to speak to my ex-boyfriend again. For another, even if I broke my promise and asked him directly, there was no guarantee that he would answer the question honestly. During our relationship he had lied to me about a wide variety of things, and would change his mind often and abruptly. He could also be pretty manipulative. So it was possible that even if he never loved me, he would lie and say he did in an attempt to earn my forgiveness. Or if he had loved me, he might lie and say he didn't in an attempt to hurt me. And I'd never know for sure if he was telling me the truth.

This puzzle drove me crazy for quite awhile. Finally, after a lot of obsessing, I was forced to accept a simple fact:

There is no objective way for me to know, without a doubt, the true thoughts, feelings, and opinions of another person. There is no knowable TRUTH when it comes to someone else's inner life.

Once I accepted that fact, I was immediately faced with another problem. If my happiness depended upon knowing THE TRUTH about my last relationship, and there was no way for me to know THE TRUTH, then how was I supposed to know how to feel? Briefly, I considered the possibility of floating through the rest of my life in an emotional limbo. If anyone asked me how I was doing, I'd say, "Well, I'm either completely worthless or I'm doing alright - the answer is locked in my ex-boyfriend's head." I ultimately rejected that idea as being potentially off-putting to future acquaintances. Then I considered just assuming the worst (that he'd never loved me), in accordance with Neurotics' Rule #547, and just feeling shitty about myself for the rest of my life. I had to reject that possibility as well, because it seemed like it would require a lot of energy, and was probably unsustainable. Finally, I settled on a solution that had quite possibly never occurred to me before.

I could just say fuck it and be happy anyway.

My self-esteem, self-image, happiness, all that, didn't have to depend on other people! I didn't have to have all the facts, all the time! I could choose to be happy just because! I was on the verge of alerting the news media about my discovery when I realized that this was probably what the constantly happy people had realized ages ago. I'll be honest, for a moment I contemplated punching all those people in the face. "Let's see you choose to be happy after I give you a black eye, sucka!" In the end, though, I decided to put my new knowledge to use and just get over it.

So now instead of constantly searching for the THE TRUTH upon which to base my happiness, I live by these two rules instead:

1) Don't ask questions you don't want to know the answer to.
2) Don't let your happiness depend on anyone else; they're all liars anyway.

Also, rainbows and puppy dogs or whatever.

Consider This the Christmas Newsletter I'll Never Send

The problem with not posting on your blog for months on end is that once you want to post again, it's hard to decide what to do. Should you post excuses for your absence? Updates about what everyone's missed? Or just something unrelated but really interesting, in the hope that no one noticed you were gone in the first place? Well friends, as a consummate overachiever, I've decided to provide you with a combination of all three.

First up, excuses. So of course there was school work, and several trips out of town. Then there were the holidays, and more travel. I've also been a little depressed, which makes it harder for me to write. Plus, the longer I went without writing, the more I debated what to write. As you can see, I have PLENTY of excuses.

Secondly, updates. Since I last posted, I've run two races: a 10k (6 miles) in October and an 8k (5 miles) on Thanksgiving. The Thanksgiving race resulted in the fastest per-mile pace I've ever had in a race, around 11:30. To celebrate, I spent the next 4 weeks not running, so now I'm trying to get back on track, slowly but surely.

I finished the Fall semester without having a nervous breakdown, which was my primary goal. I also accomplished my secondary goal, which was to get decent grades in all of my classes. In addition, I attended two professional conferences, met a bunch of people I admire, and didn't embarrass myself. (I wore a pencil skirt, and if that doesn't automatically make me competent and professional, then I've been lied to by women's magazines for years.)

I visited Lee in TX for a couple weeks, which was AWESOME. I ate at three different Mexican restaurants (one of them twice) in a span of 11 days, so I think it was a pretty successful trip. I'm just sad that I have to wait another 3 months before I can see him again. I spent Christmas with my family, which was nice because they're my family, but stressful because they're my family.

Both of my pet gerbils died, one in his sleep and one due to some kind of gerbil cancer. I cried over both of them, which was unexpected and traumatic. But now, my heart is beginning to heal and I'm considering getting a Betta fish (which is essentially a step down, to Remedial Pet Ownership).

I bought a new car, which means now I have to get rid of my beloved Miata, but ultimately I think it's for the best. Now I have a back seat and a larger trunk, the better to haul illicit cargo. Also, if I ever get my pet-owning shit together and get that dog I've always wanted, I'll have room in my car for him/her to go on adventures with me. It's all about the 10-year plan, people.

Most recently, I spent New Year's Eve with my pal MB. We had Ethiopian food and spent a few hours at a bar, and then came back to my place and played Pandemic, which is a board game she got for Christmas. Basically, all the players work together as employees of the Imaginary CDC to battle infectious diseases all over the globe. We beat the diseases twice in a row, so I imagine we'll both be getting calls from the Actual CDC in the next few days. I can't think of a better way to ring in the New Year.

Currently! I'm gearing up to head back to work at my research assistantship starting tomorrow, and back to classes starting a week from now. I'm also painting a bookcase and ignoring the work that I'm supposed to be doing to prepare for tomorrow. Finally, I'm thinking about how much I love everyone reading this right now.

Now that we're all back up to speed, I want to leave you with a video. This is a TED talk that's been linked on a few blogs I read. It's a woman with a PhD in Social Work talking about embracing vulnerability, so I kind of felt like she was speaking directly to me. I really enjoyed it, and I hope you do too.

Grumbling

Even though I'm not supposed to work on Fridays, I had to go to work today because the people who foolishly hired me to be an integral part of their research team are currently scrambling to get a grant proposal finished.

Then I came home and immediately had to go out and run 6 miles. I wisely chose to run a new route so that I wouldn't be bored by the tedium inherent in running the same old trail for an hour. I didn't really assess the route before I started it, but I guess you could say it was quite pleasant, as long as you don't count the part at the end of the route where it suddenly turned into TWO STRAIGHT MILES OF NONSTOP MISERY HILLS. In other words, I didn't break any records today. Unless there are records for "Most Sweat-Soaked Shirt" or "Slowest Limp Up a Mountain" or "Running Face That Looks Most Like a Stroke In Progress." Or how about "Most Labored Breathing While Walking"?

I could come up with these for days, people.

AND THEN I got home and the whole apartment smelled like the hot wet litter box of Satan's own cat-beast, who is probably named "Buttsplosion," after his digestive problems. The reason the apartment smelled like that because Charlie, who I've recently renamed "Feces Factory" because I want everyone to be put off their meals just as I am every day, actually does have a litter box that sits in our dining room, the smell of which somehow expands to fill every inch of space in our unfortunately quite open floor plan. Since something had to be done to make the smell stop I pulled out the litter box liner and its contents, but then somehow the smell impossibly got EVEN WORSE, for reasons that are too disgusting to explain. And then I valiantly struggled my way out the door and across the parking lot with the Bag of Olfactory Nightmares, because it was WAY too heavy because someone - who is not me - put too much litter in it when they cleaned the box last time. So I, breathing through my mouth the entire time (and still tired from running 6 miles up and down the hills of woe and sadness), had to take a few steps, set the bag down, take a few steps, and set the bag down, all the way to the dumpster which obviously already has it in for me. And then I had to heave the bag in through that terrible small shoulder-level hole and pray with all my heart that it would go IN and not somehow tumble OUT and on to me, forcing me to burn myself alive just to be free of the smell.

Which thankfully did not happen. But the threat was very real.

In conclusion, it's been an exhausting day, so I could not possibly write you a blog post. Please forgive me.

Blurgh

I am exceptionally out of it today, so here's a series of loosely related thoughts...

I overslept by A LOT this morning due to a combination of a misbehaving alarm clock and a bad case of insomnia. As late as I slept, the only reason I woke up when I did was because the maintenance guys were pounding on my door so they could come in and change my air filter. If they hadn't come by, I might still be asleep now.

We had pizza at work today in honor of my upcoming birthday, and that was lovely. It also nicely counterbalanced the jokes that my officemate kept making about how I was going to be fired due to tardiness.

I bought a new alarm clock that will also play my ipod, so that's cool.

I enjoyed the song "I Kissed a Girl" when it was first released, and that was fun while it lasted, but I think it's about time that Katy Perry be stopped.

Did I mention that the first thing I did when I woke up was send my officemate an email, subject line: "ACK!" ?

According to my former boss / co-author, the response we got back on that paper yesterday is no big deal and should be easy to respond to. Somewhere, in an alternate universe, there is a version of me that accepts criticism with grace and aplomb.

Does anybody have any tips on what kind of face you're supposed to make when people are singing happy birthday to you? Also, what do you do with your hands? Is there a way to prevent people from singing to you altogether? It's too late to avoid it this year, but I'd like to start preparing for next time.

It's So Hard To Be Good

Lately I've been trying really hard not to waste food, not to eat so much junk food, and not to eat out so often. So far, I've been pretty pleased with myself. I've been going to the grocery store often enough that I don't have to subsist off crackers and cereal, and I've been saving money by not eating out as often and also by coming up with creative ways to make sure I use all of the groceries I buy.

For instance: Awhile back I had to buy eggs for something, and I ended up with 4 eggs just sitting in my refrigerator for weeks on end. Now that I'm trying to be more conscientious about food and groceries, I was determined to put them to good use before they went bad. I had already resigned myself to an unorthodox meal of scrambled eggs some disappointing Tuesday evening, so I felt like a genius when I came up with the idea of hard-boiling them and putting them on a salad instead.

So it was that today, I hard-boiled eggs for the first time. Since I don't work on Fridays this summer, the extent of my plans for the day were to sleep in, boil some eggs, and run 3 miles. I was a little apprehensive about the eggs because technically they're a week past their official expiration date, but I was emboldened by the results of a recent experiment with slightly expired yogurt. At any rate, I googled "how to boil eggs" and followed the instructions faithfully. While they cooked, I prepared the rest of my salad (which was sexy as hell, I wish I'd taken pictures), and then I very carefully selected a test egg to peel.

I have to pause here for a tangent. When I was a kid, one of my favorite books was Charlotte's Web. There's a scene in Charlotte's Web where Templeton, the sketchy rat, takes one of the unhatched goose eggs down into his lair, because he's weird, and also possibly wanted to do sexual things with it. Anyway, all the farm animals forget about Templeton and the egg for a really long time until one day some kind of barnyard mayhem goes down and the egg - now WAY past its expiration date - gets broken and stinks up the place. As a child, I knew it must smell truly awful if even barnyard animals were offended by it, thus for as long as I can remember I've been extremely wary of potentially rotten eggs.

With all of this in mind, I delicately peeled and cut up my egg, fully prepared at any moment for it to explode like a foul grenade and totally ruin my day. Luckily it looked (and smelled) just like any other hard-boiled egg, so I went ahead and put it on my salad and ate it, and it was delicious, and all was right with the world.

A few hours later, it was time to head out and run. I was a little hungry, salad notwithstanding, but I decided to just wait until I got back to eat anything. After schlepping for 3 miles in the 80-degree weather, I came back and drank 8 gallons of water and had an apple to hold me over until I cooked dinner. As I sat on the couch cooling off, however, something not good started to happen. I had a confusing feeling that I might pass out or vomit or die, or all three at once. And then suddenly, with only just enough warning to get myself to the appropriate location, I violently ejected my salad (along with my carefully-prepared egg) back out the way it came.

I tell you all this not to disgust you (hope you weren't eating anything, by the way), but to ask you this question... Does this mean that I should throw out the rest of those eggs, just in case?

Photographic Evidence

I had planned to tell you all about my new house guest, but time got away from me so that will have to wait until tomorrow. Instead, here are some photos I found that illustrate just how fully-loaded Lee's car was for the trip to Texas.

Note the rear tire, which just barely has enough room to turn without scraping against the wheel well.

Bonus reflection of me taking pictures of a car in a hotel parking lot, like a crazy person.

So there you are. That's what a medium-sized sedan stuffed to the brim with all of one's earthly belongings looks like, these days. I also meant to take photos of the cockpit so that everyone could see how cramped it was in there, but I forgot to. Suffice it to say, every hour or so I would look around for a place to put something (an empty soda bottle, my feet, a gum wrapper), and then be like, "Oh, right." and just swallow it instead.

Finally, as a palate cleanser, here's a photo of the sunset in Mississippi as we sped through trying to make it Louisiana before stopping to sleep:

Why I'm The Best Girlfriend Ever (Part 2)

Hello, and thanks for returning for the thrilling conclusion of our tale of romance and heroism!

When we left off, it was Tuesday evening, Lee and I were assembling a car-top carrier, and I was slowly becoming convinced that we were never actually going to leave North Carolina. I even began to entertain the idea that, perhaps, I was trapped in some sort of Groundhog Day scenario.

Once we finished constructing the luggage carrier and had it mounted to the top of Lee's car, we were finally able to start packing boxes into the backseat and trunk. As we carried the first few boxes to the car at 10pm on Tuesday night, I reflected on the heady days of my youth, when with pink cheeks and sparkling eyes I had believed with all my heart that we would be leaving early Tuesday morning. At this point I was merely a shadow of my former self, and I knew that this never-ending bullshittery had irrevocably aged me.

At some point Lee noticed that my spirit had dimmed. Maybe it was because I went nearly an hour without speaking, trudging wordlessly up and down the hall, in and out of the elevator, watching silently while Lee unloaded cart after cart of boxes. Around 2:30 in the morning he suggested that I go home and get some sleep while he finished up the packing, so that at least one of us would be well-rested when we hit the road early that morning. I grudgingly agreed to let him work on into the night while I slept peacefully in my pillowy soft queen-sized bed. I vaguely remember being awakened at about 4:30 in the morning to let Lee into my apartment so he could sleep, too. But after that, I happily snuggled back down into the covers, whisked away by blissful dreams of hitting the open road at last.

Wednesday morning.

If I remember correctly, the first thing Lee said to me was, "You're gonna be so mad when you see the apartment." Apparently, he had packed all he could into the car and there were still boxes left. Like, 10 of them. That morning we stood in his apartment and gaped with despair at the remaining boxes. I was pretty sure Lee was going to cry. I, on the other hand, had long ago transcended human emotions and calmly accepted the fact that I had obviously done something terrible for which I was being severely punished. We made some half-hearted stabs at problem-solving as we felt our planned departure time slipping painfully out of our grasp. There was nothing else to do, nowhere else to put the rest of the boxes.

Defeated, Lee called his mom and brother and asked them to drive out and take the last of the boxes to be stored at their house. Earlier that morning, before I had realized how truly screwed we were, I had demanded that we forgo breakfast until we were on the road. Now, with nothing do but wait for backup, we decided to go to Bob Evans and eat our pain.

There we sat, haggard and unwashed and out of place amongst the other diners, who all lived happy, carefree lives where all their things were unboxed and they weren't endlessly preparing for cross-country moves that never actually happened. It was at that point that I think Lee and I both realized that the experience had reached a critical level of awful which transcended time and space. Neither of us could remember a time when we hadn't been side by side, cleaning and packing and carrying boxes. The fact that we hadn't yet died or killed each other meant that we were bonded for life, like every pair of romantic interests in every disaster movie ever. The only appropriate response to surviving a trauma like that together is to make sweet, grimy love. But we were tired, and in a restaurant, so instead we ate pancakes and eggs.

When the cavalry finally arrived, Lee took his mom upstairs "to look around" and she didn't come back down for three hours. It was my job to guard the van while Lee and his brother carried down boxes. Every once in awhile I received a report that the apartment was almost empty, or that Lee's mom was dusting the baseboards. After half an hour, I got wise and called my mom to entertain me while I waited.

Around 4pm, the apartment was empty, the cars were full, and the keys were turned in. Three days before I might have felt a little sentimental about the end of an era, but at this point it took all the self-restraint I could muster not to set the whole building on fire and ride away on a motorcycle. Lee was determined to start heading toward Texas that night, but since I had moved onto the acceptance phase of the grieving process I was able to convince him that maybe staying at his parents' house and then getting up and driving in the morning (after showers!) would be a more pleasant option. So we drove to Charlotte, ate the last North Carolina barbecue Lee will have for awhile, and passed the hell out.

Thursday morning.

The sun bloomed majestically in the east and pointed its golden fronds toward our destination. After some coffee (and a few photo ops for Lee's mom), we set out like the Joads, Clampetts, and Bundrens before us, on a journey to far-distant lands that no one ever wanted to go to in the first place. We drove for 14 hours on Thursday, slept in Baton Rouge, and drove another 6 hours on Friday. I was in Texas long enough to enjoy an impressive rain storm and a few delicious meals cooked by Lee's talented aunt before I flew out early Sunday morning.

So, to summarize...

My plan: Pack Monday. Leave early Tuesday, drive all day Tuesday and Wednesday, spend three days together in Texas, fly home Sunday.
Vs.
Reality: Pack Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. Leave Wednesday evening and drive 2 hours to Charlotte. Leave early Thursday, drive all day Thursday and Friday. Spend a day and a half together in Texas, fly home Sunday.

If I ever agree to help anyone move ever again, I better be getting a technicolor triceratops with wings at the end of it.

Seriously, though? The whole process was about as painless and enjoyable as it could have been, given the circumstances, and I wouldn't have wanted to go through it for anyone else's sake. And even though I miss him terribly, I'm so proud of and excited for that kid.

I Eagerly Await My Award for Best Girlfriend Ever (Part 1)

Thanks to Lee, I have reached a point in my life where I can safely say that if you ever move across the country, I'm the kind of girl you want helping you out. Throughout the whole week-long process of packing up Lee's things and driving 1,000 miles to Texas, I exhibited a level of patience I was unaware I even possessed. (As long as you don't count the one time I lost it and threatened his life.) (Technically, I threaten his life pretty often, but I only meant it that time.)

Arguably, that level of patience wouldn't have been necessary in the first place if the Counselor had planned ahead a little better. But I can only assume that he loves me so much that he intentionally engineered things to go the way they did in order to prove to me that I'm capable of accomplishing far more than I ever dreamed possible. He's so generous that way.

Lee finished school with about a week to kill before he graduated. We were supposed to head to Texas after he graduated that Sunday. My thinking was that we'd everything ready ahead of time, pack it all in the car on Monday and then hit the road on Tuesday, giving us a few days to hang out in Texas before I had to fly back to North Carolina the following Sunday. Suspiciously, every time I suggested this timeline to Lee, he would say things like, "We'll see how things go."

When Moving Week (hereafter known as My Time In Purgatory) arrived, Lee had already sold most of his furniture, and his parents hung around on Monday to help us get rid of what was left. They took a lot of stuff to donate, and then we moved his old bed to my apartment so I could get rid of my over-10-year-old mattresses. That part was actually pretty fun, and involved me wrapped like a burrito inside the old mattress in the back of the van, holding the back hatch shut with one hand while hanging on for dear life with the other.

After his parents left, we packed and cleaned. And cleaned and packed. Around 10pm, we had the bathroom and kitchen emptied and clean, but there was still a huge pile of boxes and miscellany sitting in his living room, an aquarium to break down, a closet full of clothes, and a small bookcase with the books still in it. And we had laundry to do. Soooo... we headed back to my place where we did three loads of laundry while we both dozed a little on the couch. At the end of Day 1 of My Time In Purgatory, we went to bed at 2am.

On Tuesday we slept a little later than we intended, but I woke up with high hopes(!) that we could finish up the packing that day and then leave that evening, maybe stopping over near Charlotte to stay with his parents that night. "There is no way," I boldly declared, "that I am going to sleep tonight without putting at least a few miles behind us." Unfortunately, it took awhile before we could get started, because Lee had a few errands he had to run. Errands that couldn't have been taken care of prior to that day. Certainly not during the week before, when were both just sitting around doing nothing. Regardless of who we blame for the sitting around on Tuesday morning (although just to be clear, we blame Lee), I was in pretty good spirits, baking muffins for breakfast and downloading comedy albums* to listen to on the way to Texas.

It was already about 2pm by the time we got back to his apartment to finish up the packing. Lee started breaking down the aquarium while I worked on putting together his newly purchased car-top luggage carrier. I opened the instructions, which told me to first look at the instructions for the strap kit meant to hold the carrier on the top of the car. So I opened those instructions and read them intently, as only a doctoral student can. The more I read, though, the more the sinking feeling in my stomach grew. The strap instructions kept saying things like "Thread gray strap (a) through hole (b) and into mounting bracket." Why, I found myself wondering, wasn't there a helpful parts letter after 'mounting bracket'?? More importantly, why weren't there any mounting brackets? There sure as hell weren't any on Lee's car.

Lee came around the corner as I sat frowning angrily at the instructions. "What's wrong?" he asked. "I think we have a problem," I said, with extra frowning. Long story short, we spent the next hour and a half driving to Sears and back to get the mounting brackets. At this point it was about 5pm.

After all of that work to track down the parts necessary to hold it to the car roof, I assumed that assembly of the carrier itself would be simple. Something like:
1) Put your junk in the bottom half
2) Attach the top half to the bottom half (probably with duct tape)
3) Strap the thing to your car

In reality, there were fucking hinges and locking mechanisms to attach with screwdrivers and wrenches and shit, and at one point I had to close myself inside it and assemble by the light of Lee's old cell phone. It took almost 2 more hours to put the damn thing together, while the pile of Lee's possessions gathered dust.

This is getting kind of long, so I'm going to stop here and finish up later. Go have a snack, maybe work a few shifts at your job - we'll meet back here in a day or two.

*By the way, I highly recommend Patton Oswalt's Werewolves and Lollipops and Feelin' Kinda Patton. Lee and I laughed until we cried... although that might just have been road-trip-related delirium. I can't guarantee how they'll perform when you're well-rested and sitting still.