1. a. The act or an instance of reviving. b. The condition of being revived.
2. A restoration to use, acceptance, activity, or vigor after a period of obscurity or quiescence.
howdy. how ya been? things have been pretty busy here. work is good; i really like my job and my co-workers, which is a totally new and wonderful thing for me, as it’s usually one or the other. well, excluding the music store, but that wasn’t really a job. any place where you’re allowed to sleep off your hangover in the back of the store during your shift isn’t what you’d call a proper work environment. ah, good times.
home is good. after a short-lived, ill-fated day care experiment, the bean is back with his initial care-giver, a wonderful stay-at-home-mom/teacher, and he’s as smart & sweet as ever. dave is finishing up his first semester of math classes, and has entered a new world music phase, which is kind of hilarious. we have friends, too! that’s exciting! we met a couple back in the summer at market square. we’ve been on lots of, like, blind platonic double-dates before, but this is the first time something’s really come out of it. i’m glad dave has a pal. making friends hasn’t been as big an issue for me as for him, but i never seem to keep the friends i make. could be because i tend to make friends with people who are already so entrenched in their own pre-existing scene that they don’t really have room or time for new people. dave tends to be more cautious with people, whereas i’m so desperate for what i have with some of my out-of-town friends, but local, that i’ll throw myself at anyone with a dry wit and cute shoes. anyway. finding a couple with whom we really mesh has been so cool. it’s a nice reminder of how important good friends really are.
and speaking of cute shoes, i am totally on a mission to get some dansko marcelle clogs. one thing i hate about this time of year, though, is that you’re constantly reminded of how much stuff is out there for you to buy. it is way too easy to start thinking that you need all kinds of crap that is completely unessential. unessential, but awesome! i have to throw away the williams-sonoma, pottery barn, and crate & barrel catalogs without even opening them. i’m also not really allowed to go into a target unsupervised. it’s pretty dangerous.
i can’t believe that it’s already almost thanksgiving. wow. i love thanksgiving, maybe even more than christmas, because you have the whole intro to the christmas season thing going on. after christmas, it’s like everything just ends until spring. i mean, i guess you’ve got presidents’ day and mlk day in there, but… not that i live for holidays, mind you, which is how this must sound. anyway, my whole point about thanksgiving was that this will be our first vegan thanksgiving. i have a vague idea of what i’m going to make; now i just need to find an extra eight hours or so between wednesday and thursday. and i really need a dvd with all of the “friends” thanksgiving episodes on it. why don’t they run that show in syndication anymore? who the hell wants to watch “two and a half men”?
so i got a job. i’m pretty excited; this is what i’ve wanted to do since the bean was just a few months old, and the whole thing just kind of fell into my lap. i wasn’t even looking for a job, but FINALLY my connections paid off. not that i have many. and not that i’m the type of person who makes friends with that sort of thing in mind. it’s just always seemed like those people whose jobs i envy have somehow lucked into them. from the start, i planned on going back to work when the bean hit preschool age. and he’s only six months away from that, if we’re talking strict chronology (he turns three in march, but he wouldn’t officially begin a preschool program until next fall). so really, i’m a year ahead of schedule. and what that means is that dave will be able to go back to school sooner than we thought, which is the real benefit (he wants to go back for electrical engineering). all of these things constitute good news, right? RIGHT?!?
here’s what, though: change is scary. i feel like dave and i are finally in a good place with our relationship. it’s taken a lot to get where we are now. things were rough after we had a baby, which was the last major change in our lives, and i am terrified to rock the boat again. i’m sad for the bean, too, because he loves his litle two-day-a-week school. he loves his teacher, and his classmates, and their class goldfish, and their little playground. i am sad that he won’t see these people any more; that these are places he’ll never go again. i’m afraid of being absent for so much of his day. i’m afraid my heart will break. then there’s my moms’ group. those women have made such a huge difference in my life, and i don’t know what life will be like without our regular wednesday and friday gatherings. i don’t want to lose touch with them, but there’s no way i can maintain the same level of closeness. i already feel like i’m going to have to ration the hanging out because i’ll be spending all my free time either with dave & the bean, or cooking and planning meals and doing laundry. and that makes me sad.
i had my last moms’ life group meeting yesterday, and there were only two of us there. sharon said that maybe it would be easier that way; lots of fanfare might make it harder to say goodbye. i think she was right. afterwards, i picked the bean up from his last day at his current, part-time school, and it wasn’t as gut-wrenching as i expected. we went from there to j’s house, which is where he’ll be staying until he’s off the wait-list at another, full-time school. the bean has never met j or any of her kids, but on the way there, he was like, “go j’s house and watch ‘between the lions,’ mama!” when we got there, he just walked right in and became part of the group. j’s great, and her kids are great, and i’m pretty relaxed about leaving the bean there. i can breathe now.
but then we got home, and the bean wanted attention, dave needed help figuring out his largely online math course, and i needed to make dinner and get to a book club meeting. dave shut himself in the office, while the bean was running around, whining because i wasn’t paying attention to him. i was chopping vegetables and trying to maintain my composure in the kitchen. i freaked out. i think i’m still freaked out. i had this vision of my new life, and it wasn’t pretty. how am i going to do this every night? how are we going to relate to each other when we never see each other? is this the right thing? is this a huge mistake? what am i doing?
and just like that, i’m gasping for air again.
so, since chris is supposed to be tackling small group stuff over there, i thought i’d talk a little about matt’s “seeds” sermon from sunday over here. first, it was a lovely sermon. i think matt is a wonderful guy, and i have much love for any fellow showchoir alum. there just aren’t many people who get pas de bourree and jazz hands jokes. but i kind of disagree with part of his interpretation of the parable of the sower. (i’m not going to explain the parable. i’m assuming that, if you’re still with me, you already know what i’m talking about. besides, i inserted a link! that was my gift to you! moving along now…)
there are three main parts to the parable’s central metaphor: the seed, the soil, and – obviously – the sower. i agree that the seed is the gospel and the soil is the heart of man. it’s the sower that gives me trouble. matt said two things, in particular: one, that the only variable in the metaphor is the soil; two, that the sower is “anyone who proclaims the word of the kingdom.” if you see it this way, then we, as christians, are the sowers. we are not responsible for the states of the hearts that receive the message we’re ”sowing.”
the problem i have with this idea is that there are some pretty irresponsible and ill-informed “sowers” out there. and it’s too easy to be dismissive; to say, “oh, well, we’re not talking about them; we know the Truth!” while that may be (i’m just going to leave that one alone, okay?), you still have to account for these people, who are probably just as convinced as you that what they’re propagating is Truth, capital-t. so the sowers are not all the same. all christians do not plant the same seeds. if man is the sower, then the sower becomes another variable in the metaphor.
here’s how i see it: our role in this metaphor is peripheral. jesus is the sower, the gospel is the seed, and our hearts are the soil. the only role we play is that of gardener. it is our job to tend the soil, to make sure that the path never becomes hardened, or rocky, or weed-choked. i think that we need to focus on ourselves; that the condition of the “soil” is EXACTLY what deserves our attention. if we focus on truly living as christians, then the seeds will scatter themselves. i can only speak from my own experience, but after years of being accosted by various “sowers,” i was ultimately drawn to christ because of a light i saw in the people around me. it had nothing to do with anything anyone proclaimed, and everything to do with the way i saw these people live their lives. they were matt’s “productive plants.”
i think i have to stop now because this plant metaphor is getting out of control. i’m thisclose to pulling out my old biology textbooks to keep the metaphor going, and that’s just crazy. anyway, i think i’ve said what i needed to say. for now, at least.
i have always been a highly impressionable person. growing up, i saw almost every autumnal return to school as an opportunity to reinvent myself, usually in accordance with some girl i had either read about or seen in a movie. i remember the summer i saw lucas and decided that i wanted to be exactly like kerri green’s character in that movie. this meant i was going to wear lots of ponytails, cardigans, and bright white keds. i was going to be quiet and ladylike (ha ha). i don’t even remember the movie itself, just the reinvention it inspired. i used to go through phases with the different characters in my babysitters’ club books; i wanted to be every one of the older girls at one point (except kristy). the books described them in such detail that it was even possible for me to mimic their handwriting. i once bought tofu at the grocery store because dawn ate tofu. i can tell you from firsthand experience that an eleven-year-old girl from a meat-eating family in tennessee has no business buying tofu. and don’t even get me started on sweet valley high.
you might think what i’m describing was limited to my awkward pre-adolescent years. you’d be wrong. as i got older, my fascination was usually with some older girl who i thought was the height of cool, whatever that meant. i’d pick up different tidbits; elements of style, language, and taste, all added to my internal cache. i was an emotional pack rat. i didn’t really do anything with this information on the outside. i mean, it’s not like you could look at old photos of me and identify all these different phases. i’ve always pretty much looked the same, in terms of dress and hair and stuff. you have to understand: i didn’t want to look like these other girls, i wanted to be like them. and not because i hated myself, or anything. it was just that i felt they had something that i was missing, some mysterious, elusive x-factor that made me feel constantly incomplete. and, really, at this age, i never got past the daydreaming stage of reinvention. i derived bittersweet pleasure from imagining what my life would be like “if only…” i made elaborate plans in my head, drew floor plans and landscaping schemes for the houses i wished i inhabited, gave names to the pets i wanted to have and to the towns in which i wanted to live. i should stress that i did this at home, alone, when i wasn’t hanging out with my friends. i wasn’t THAT deep inside my own head, y’all.
this ephemeral sense of self-identity stayed with me well into my twenties, and definitely became more pronounced during those periods when i was, shall we say, given to bouts of escapist behavior. it was during a particularly protracted period of responsibility-shirking that my mimicry reached an all-time high (or maybe it was a low). i had done it: i had completely lost myself, and i was perfectly miserable. there was so little about me at that point that was actually me, but in spite of all the junk i was carrying around, i knew a good thing when i saw him. and once i met dave, all the junk started to fall away. i’ll try to use a metaphor he’d appreciate: it was as if i was a magnet that had attracted all this crap, but then someone somehow switched my polarity, and the crap that used to be stuck to me wasn’t anymore. yeah, i’m not really what you’d call a “science person.”
it’s taken me years to get a handle on all this. for a while, when dave and i first got together, i totally retreated. i dropped nearly all my old friends and, er, hobbies, and just stayed home all the time. i went to therapy. i figured some stuff out. and i slowly started to get to know myself again. part of this self-discovery has led me back to god, because i know that i can’t do life on my own. i can’t; it’s a mess when i try. everything is screwed up, and every relationship is disaster. i’ve tried it both ways, and i choose god. i’m aware of how that sounds to some of you. i know that people see religion as a crutch, as “the opium of the people,” as a figment of the imagination. those are all viewpoints i’ve shared, at one time or another. and i really have nothing to offer in response other than some cliched crap, like, “to each his own,” etc. i’m not so sure i need to offer anything more; it just is what it is.
anyway, this is all kind of new to me, in that i didn’t grow up going to church on any kind of regular basis, or reading the bible, or even having discussions about god and what it means to be a christian. i have no foundation, which is something that sets me apart from nearly everyone i know these days. it can be very frustrating, because i feel like there are so many questions i need answered, and it’s hard to find people who are tolerant of this constant questioning. and since my questions have a history of getting me in trouble with various authority figures (usually assholes bosses), it makes me nervous to even ask. so when i started having some issues with the church i’ve been going to, i didn’t really know where to turn. nothing felt safe. i just knew it was going to end badly, with awkward apologies and tense politeness. i was sad, because i hated the thought of leaving behind the friends i’d made, and i wasn’t sure we’d stay friends without the church in common. i love the people; i have some issues with the service and theology.
i have a friend who values even the annoyances that naturally accompany friendship because they serve as a reminder that the relationship IS. no relationship is prefect; there are always ups and downs – that’s the nature of things. and it was in talking to this friend that i realized my relationship with the church isn’t necessarily any different. i think it’s impossible for me to be in total agreement with everything i hear at church, all the time. i don’t have friends with whom i never disagree, do i? does that mean we’re not friends? why can’t i apply the same principle to my relationship with my church? then it dawned on me: i totally can.
the older i get, the more firmly i believe in the importance of surrounding myself with people who don’t just embody admirable qualities, but who actually live and practice and speak and interact admirably. of course, it helps that my definition of “admirable” has matured with me. i am glad to have friends who care about me and my family. i am thankful for all the people who don’t run from my questions, and who chime in with questions of their own. i am blessed to know people who understand that we are all in this together. i am relieved to have found a community that feels like home. and i am so lucky to have in my life people who let me be myself.
i love buffy the vampire slayer. it’s one of the best television shows of all time, period. yeah, yeah, the basic plot is a little cheesy, with the whole “one girl in all the world” thing (you can either suspend disbelief in the name of entertainment, or you can’t), but what makes the show is joss whedon. the characters he created and the writing on the show are awesome, pretty much throughout all seven seasons. one of my favorite episodes is “once more, with feeling,” in which a musical demon (this is the cheesiness i was talking about) makes everyone sing and dance as though they’re on a broadway stage. the best part about it, aside from the surprising (with the exception of anthony stewart head*, who played dr. frank-n-furter in a london rocky horror picture show revival) musical talents of the cast, is the music whedon wrote for this episode. the songs are shockingly well-written, both musically and lyrically. i actually own the soundtrack on cd. it may or may not make me cry in spots. ahem.
anyway, since i first saw this episode, it has occurred to me more than once that a full-length, whedon-penned musical would be a thing of brilliance. and, as i just discovered on my friend’s media blog, such a thing does, in fact, exist!
“dr. horrible’s sing-along blog” stars neil patrick harris, nathan fillion, and felicia day, and it’s totally awesome and funny and bittersweet and everything you’d want it to be. i never watched firefly, so nathan fillion will always be caleb from buffy and the cop (sheriff?) from slither. come to think of it, i need to watch firefly. why haven’t i? hmmm. anyway. neil patrick harris, of course, was doogie howser back in the day. (dude, what ever happened to wanda?) i know he’s been in other stuff since then, but i don’t think i’ve actually seen any of it. no matter; he’s hilarious. so that’s my endorsement. you should go watch it before it’s gone.
*giles’s brother, murray head, was judas iscariot in the original jesus christ superstar! he also sang that song, “one night in bangkok,” which is from the tim rice musical, chess. i knew all that stuff about murray head, but i never realized he & giles were brothers.
in which there are many parenthetical notes
Published February 29, 2008 Uncategorized Leave a Commentwe went to see henry rollins’ spoken word performance last sunday night. dave has seen him lots, both with the rollins band and without, but it was my first time (though i have listened to many of his spoken word albums). and i have to say, i think the years have been kind to dear henry. first of all, he wasn’t nearly as short as i thought he’d be; he’s basically average height. the way people talk, you’d think he was, like, 5′2″, or something. second, he was way funnier than i expected. not that he’s not a funny guy – i knew that much from listening to his old stuff. but if you know anything about him, you know that henry rollins is a self-proclaimed angry guy. and he tends to rant. which can be entertaining when it’s coming from an intelligent place, as his rants tend to do, but it can also be exhausting. i think, though, that henry has mellowed with age. he was hilarious. he talked for 3.5 hours, with no intermission, and 3 hours of that was straight up funny. i came away with a new found respect for mr. black flag, and, for better or worse, now i think of him as this angry little teddy bear. because, for all his anger and righteous indignation, i think he’s a total softie at his core. and he’s quite attractive. dave was all, “he’s definitely not as bulky as he used to be,” and i was like, “yeah, but he looks good. the bulk is gross; now he’s perfect. he’s definitely still pretty ripped under that shirt, you can tell… i mean, i guess he is. i don’t know. he’s okay.” all of this just kind of gushed out of my maw before i knew what i was saying. i haven’t had a celebrity crush in years, people. but between henry rollins and rami kashou from “project runway,” i’m feeling like quite the teeny-bopper. you know, now that i think about it, i’ve always been into guys who look like dave, with that same coloring & build. hell, i was into dave himself for years before we even met. he was this guy with amazing brown eyes who i’d see around town every couple of months. he always looked so tough to me, but also like he needed someone to be nice to him. (he does not remember me at all from this time period, which tarnishes the romantic aspect of this story a wee bit.) anyway, this went on for years before he finally started coming into the record store where i worked, and eventually asked me out. and so on and so.
a couple of days ago, dave, out of nowhere, says to me, “i want to start eating more healthfully.” this was a huge deal for two reasons: 1) i really believed that dave was going to be one of those men who had to be forced by his wife sometime in his sixties to give up butter and bacon and all manner of bad foodstuffs due to a looming medical predicament; and 2) i have been trying to eat better for the past 3 years, and dave has been completely unwilling to change anything about his diet the whole time, which makes it damn near impossible for me to get anything accomplished in that arena. i am the kind of person who cannot have any junk whatsoever in the house because if it’s there, i’ll eat it. it doesn’t matter that those pringles and little debbies aren’t technically “for me;” if they’re there, i know about it because i’m the sole grocery shopper. it doesn’t matter that they’re for your lunch. i didn’t buy myself any crap at the store, so i will just have to eat your crap. and then we’ll have to replace your crap because i’ve eaten it all. but now! now there will be no more crap! this is exciting. and you know how it came about? through music, because that’s how dave makes all major decisions. i’m only sort of kidding. he’s been listening to this band lately, and they sing about all these social issues, including animal cruelty and slaughterhouses and the like. since dave can’t just listen to a band without knowing their entire history, he knows that this band was a huge influence on the likes of ian mackaye and the d.c. scenesters, many of whom are co-op shopping, no-meat eating, green living progressives. in other words, these are the kind of people whose ranks i’ve wanted to join for years. dave doesn’t drink or smoke or do drugs (well, not that he would these days, anyway, but i mean he never did, even when the rest of us were dabbling) because he subscribes to the “straight edge” philosophy, and this band he’s been listening to, beefeater (ha! it’s gin and carnivores at once!), extends the straight edge thing to the food they put into their bodies, and how they spend their money (in terms of buying local, organic, and fair trade products when possible). which makes sense. in fact, i can’t believe i never thought of using that argument on him myself.
so that’s pretty much what’s been going on with us this week. i’m so glad march starts tomorrow. february, with your flu and your rain and your chills and your dreariness, you can totally kiss my ass. i don’t think i’ve had spring fever this bad since, like, maybe high school. bring on the daffodils and dogwoods!
hi! how’ve you been? it’s been a while. it seems like i’ve had an endless list of meaningless household tasks to accomplish over these last couple of weeks, which has been eating into the time i spend here. well, household tasks and online gossip sites. yes, i know how terrible that is. yes, i know i’m shallow. see you in hell!
so i was reading over some of what i’ve written here, and i noticed that i’ve left out some important steps in documenting my religious soul-searching. since i first talked to my aunt and uncle about orthodoxy, i’ve been doing a bit of reading up on the subject, and i’ve been asking them a ton of questions (they are incredibly well-read on the subject of religion). then, around the end of january, i went to vespers with my aunt. vespers is a saturday evening prayer service, and it’s short, compared to sunday liturgy (about 45 minutes instead of 90 or 120). after the service, we went out to dinner with the priest and another couple from the church. my aunt kinda set this up so i could ask her priest any questions i had from the reading i’d been doing. without going into a lot of detail, and without inadvertently misrepresenting the views of the orthodox church, let me just say that i came away from this meeting feeling disappointed and a bit confused. basically, i think my personal beliefs conflict too greatly with the views of the orthodox church for me to sensibly pursue an interest with potential conversion in mind.
look, here’s the thing: i’m a total social liberal. no matter what any priest may say, i just don’t feel right going along with the idea that homosexuality is a sin; that it’s something that you have to confess and pray god to help you with; that it’s something that should prevent you from taking communion; that it is a moral cross you must bear. i can’t explain why i feel this way, either – i’m not gay, and i don’t even have gay friends to stick up for. i certainly wasn’t raised in a liberal family, or in a liberal part of the country; i actually grew up in the bible belt. i feel that for me to be part of a church that teaches that homosexuality is sinful would be akin to me joining a church that says racism is okay. obviously, that was kind of a deal-breaker for me.
with my interest in orthodoxy somewhat squashed, i decided to check out the church where we have our m-ville moms gatherings. that started out okay. the thing about that church is that the demographics are perfect. the majority of the parishoners are late twenties/early thirties with young children. they wear jeans to church. they drink lots of coffee, and they’re really laid-back. they’re open and welcoming. but… they’re evangelical. the more i learn, the more i’m starting to think that they believe the bible is meant to be taken literally, which is something i disagree with. they talk an awful lot about how much they love jesus, and i’m just uncomfortable with that. they sing contemporary christian songs during the services, and people raise their arms up while they sing. i tried to tell myself that it didn’t bother me, but it does. i’m not sure why: maybe because i just can’t relate to what they’re feeling; maybe because i’m generally uncomfortable with such public displays of affection; maybe because i was raised in a nice, quiet methodist church. last sunday’s sermon was about the importance of “church planting,” and that’s when things relly started going downhill for me. because i’m not about to go spreading the good news to my atheist friends, much less strangers. i’ve got to figure out where i stand before i’m anywhere near qualified to put my money where my mouth is, so to speak. call me selfish, but this is about MY relationship with god. at least for now.
and that’s really what all this searching has been about: i feel that, since i’ve been out-of-touch with my spirituality, things haven’t been so great. i don’t like myself this way. i’m unbalanced, and it spills over into all the various roles i play: mother, wife, friend, daughter, niece, etc. that’s as in-depth as i’m going to get with that explanation. anyway, it sort of dawned on me one day several weeks ago that i needed to renew my relationship with god. at first, i was pretty concerned with the technicalities: what do i have to believe to be classified a member of religion x? i loaded up on books and set out on a quest for answers and information. all that reading was interesting, but it was really just creating more confusion than anything. so i put down the heavy religious tomes and picked up eat, pray, love, by elizabeth gilbert.
yes, i know it’s an oprah book. look, oprah picks some good books, okay? i know her show may be cheesy, but she’s a smart lady, you have to admit. and is encouraging people to read ever a bad thing? anyway, the book is great. here’s what i’ll be taking from liz gilbert’s experience: i don’t have to have all the answers, i don’t have to join anything, and i don’t have to subscribe to anyone else’s set of beliefs. i can go ahead and move forward. it’s funny; i always thought you had to do all that stuff to really believe in god. yeah, i don’t think so anymore, and that’s so refreshing.
i don’t know what i was thinking when i went off about the beauty of kids’ music in that last post. i’m not going to spend a lot of time feeling stupid about it, but i do want to clarify: the kids’ music phenomenon i don’t get isn’t when original music is written specifically for children; it’s when people make albums of kids singing, say, beatles songs, or pop songs, or something. why do kids need to hear other kids singing those songs? can’t they just listen to the originals? so i feel dumb about my blog rant, but less dumb about past conversations with other parents, because i guess i made more sense than i thought i did. i think i was, um, a little overpowered by my own hormones last week. hey, it happens.
today i went to service at the church where all the moms’ group stuff happens. it was interesting. they have a band, which wasn’t nearly as terrible as i was expecting. the band was actually pretty good, but the songs were those contemporary worship songs about how awesome the j-man is, and i really just can’t get into it. lyrics like, “i want to spend eternity in your arms” will forever be secular (um, and totally cheesy) in my mind. it was a good thing i was there alone, because the right company would’ve reduced me to out-of-control giggling (you know who you are). but basically, the songs were all right until the singer got to the end and did this strange (to me – but i’m sure it was very sincere and heartfelt), whispery, “thank you, jesus. thank you, god. lord, we love you” thing into the microphone. anyway, i sang because it was catchy, but i couldn’t really hear myself over the band, and i kept thinking about doing that thing where you kinda close off your ear with your finger so you can hear yourself in your head, but i was hyper-aware that i’d look like a total asshole, so i didn’t do it. i just sang more quietly and remained amused by the thought. and, if that last bit wasn’t nerdy enough, i took notes during the sermon. i wanted to remember what was said so i could process it better later, and so i could tell both dave and my aunt about it without forgetting important details. and because i will find any excuse to buy a new notebook (although i never thought i’d need a church notebook). i swear, i think at least 70% of my desire to be a teacher was based solely on my love of office supplies.
i had therapy on friday, and it was one of those sessions that sneaks up on you and punches you in the face, do you know what i mean? like, i went in expecting to talk about the regular old bullshit, but i ended up telling my therapist stuff that i don’t think i’d ever told anyone about. and not on purpose; like, they’re not really deep, dark secrets – it’s just that it never comes up. but when i was finished, i couldn’t believe that it had taken me three years to tell my therapist, because it all seemed so important, in terms of explaining certain of my behaviors. after therapy, for the first time in a loooong time, all i wanted to do was to go get stupid drunk. i didn’t; that’s not even the point. i guess i tapped into something i really need to deal with, eh? i think that must be a good sign.
and now i’d like to take a moment to endorse the best freaking chapped lip cure ever, in the entire world. this is no small feat, people. i’ve been putting everything from lipsyl to carmex to vaseline to philosophy kiss balm to burt’s beeswax balm to neutrogena to blistex on my lips for the past two or three months, and all for nought. the only thing that has managed to restore my lips to their lovely, natural, super-smooth, un-chapped state is aquaphor, and it only took, like, three applications. i’m throwing all that other crap out, and i’m never buying anything else. so ye of chap-ed lip, take heed!
peace out, home skillets.
i don’t know why certain hip children’s music turns me to mush, but it does. i totally have a playground crush on justin roberts for writing all the wonderful songs on meltdown, and i don’t even know what he looks like. if you know someone with kids, or if you’re a parent yourself, buy this album. it’s kids’ music in content only, which is to say that it’s more than tolerable – it’s actually good. i never used to understand why people bought kids’ music. why couldn’t kids just listen to regular music? now i get it: it’s the lyrics. i don’t know why this never occurred to me before, because it sure as hell seems pretty obvious now (and i cringe to think how many times i’ve launched into this stupid argument in front of other actual people before), but kids are gonna be more into songs when they’re about, like, blaming things on your little brother, or having to get glasses, or chalk drawing, or having a tantrum. kids can relate to kids’ music, duh. anyway, i start listening to these songs, and start thinking about how their little self-esteems are so fragile, and how it’s so important to teach them to be happy and self-confident, and how the world is such a cruel place sometimes, and how you have to make them strong enough to deal with all the bullshit they’re inevitably going to encounter so they can come through it all with their spirits intact, and i just lose my shit completely. it’s embarrassing. fortunately, it’s usually just me & the bean in the car when i have these little holden caulfield episodes. and he’s behind me, so it’s not like he knows what’s going on. because i’m sure crazy emotional mom can’t be great for his burgeoning sense of security and well-being, eh?
