The nice things

Today I cycled to work with my boyfriend and it was lovely. It was a crisp fall morning and the bike trail was not too crowded, and we just relaxed and rode and enjoyed each other's company.

I also had a great day yesterday, not in the fact that I realized that a dream was over, but that I actually came to a strong and forceful conclusion that a dream is, indeed, over. I am looking for a new one.

My son is potty training and he's doing a really good job. Every time he pees in the potty, he pulls up his pants and immediately hugs me because accomplishments deserve hugs and praise. He also wakes up in the morning and yells, "Good morning, Mommy," and then promptly lies back down and cuddles his stuffed dog until he summons the strength to carry around his enormous head all day.

I wrote my first real e-mail in Hebrew today. "I forgot that I am going to Las Vegas on Sunday until Thursday morning. Can we get together on Thursday morning at 11?"

But really the best of this week so far is that I have no desire to figure out what happens next. I'm taking a week off from, "I've finished this, now what? Okay, now that I've finished that, what do I need to do next? Where's my list? Why is my list 2000 items long? Must cross things off!"

It's an amazing feeling.

Sure, I'll get tired of it by the time the end of the week rolls around because it's not in my nature to do nothing for long. But for now...

Ahnee margeeshah shmehnah

Okay, so phonetics aren't my forte. But I learned a useful phrase today that I often employ in English, but apparently is not so useful in Israel.

Ahnee margeeshah shmehnah. I feel fat. But according to the man who taught this to me, people don't say this in Israel. They keep it to themselves if that's the case.

On the other hand, if they think that YOU are fat, heaven help us all. At shmehnah, baby. Additionally, oolai at tipshah ve mechoeret. But ahnee? I don't think so.

So apparently, the self-deprecating bent that is rampant here in the good ole USA isn't universal, to the point that it took this guy many seconds to even conjure up the female version of the words for fat, stupid and ugly.

Very well. Perhaps I'll put an American twist on an Israeli fashion and tell someone, "At margeeshah sh'ahnee shmehnah."

Lit Crit

I read several books over the past couple of weeks, mostly in a sad attempt to be intellectually superior to my fellow airplane travellers who sat in rapt blue day-glo silence in front of their personal television screens, mesmerized by the witty dialog of [fill in name of Hindi Bollywood Star here] or the action-packed adventures produced by Hollywood mega celebs.

And so, although secretly jealous of the easy entertainment that they had, and stewing in a self-induced rage over my academic pursuits, I managed to read a bevy of what I can only call "Ha Smorgasbord Sefer."

That's right, a gastronomic-like, linguistically and grammatically bizarre (read: incorrect) selection of books. And I will critique them below.

The Three of Us: A Family Story
Do not read this book unless you don't have children, are not planning to have children or will forget this book's contents before you have children, and both of your parents are dead (or far far away). However, if you fit those three qualifications then by all means - read away. It is an interesting and well-written true story that will keep you up at night, not because you will stay up late to finish it but because you will be kept awake by the disturbing images floating around in your cerebral cortex.

This Isn't What I Expected
A book about post-partum depression. I'm going to go ahead and recommend against this book unless you want a manual on how to diagnose yourself with PPD. Captain, this might be a good one for you.

Shalimar the Clown
Ohhhhhh, can we say sexy beast? Salman Rushdie is like poetic gold. About 200 pages into the book, I read the end (don't try to stop me; it's a lifelong habit). And even knowing the end, I still wanted to finish the 600 page book. I could live in the dreamy places in this book. Except without the mass murder and rape. And without the disease. But otherwise, yeah.

The Double Bind
What is UP with people writing sexually disturbing books? This book is like taking a cheese grater to the parts of your brain that produce happiness and trust in humanity. I guess in that sense you could call it a great book because it weaves itself so deeply into your psyche but FOR CHRIST'S SAKE! I had to watch a Disney movie immediately after just to get the horrible depression to lift. Maybe that would have been a good time to diagnose myself with PPD...

Noises Off
I had read this play a few weeks ago but had to re-read it, since I'm the costume designer for the community theatre production of this lovely number. Funny, in a British sort of way, which means that it's not. Funny, that is.

It's amazing what 40 hours of flight time can accomplish. However, that also means that I probably won't read an entire single book for several more months. And even then...I think next time I might cave and go for the 16 straight hours of personal programming at my fingertips. From cartoons to carrying on...would that mean they could make a movie called Mulan (Rouge)?

Made with Dead Sea Minerals

Today we visited the Dead Sea. It was pretty cool apart from the fact that I repeatedly got salt in one of my orifices. I think every 10 minutes I had to blindly stumble from the water as my helpful Boyfriend got a bottle of water with which to rinse my burning eyes and a towel to wipe off the crusty pain. Either that, or I was spitting out mouthfuls of foaming saliva and wrinkling my face in disgust and a fruitless attempt to rid myself of the yucky yucky taste of extreme brine.

But apart from that, it was enjoyable. The water doesn't move around you like it does in the non-dead seas. It truly feels dead. As dead as water can be, of course. Is water really ever dead? I guess that would require a state of aliveness at some point...after all, water does have need oxygen to exist, and it respires by evaporating...

Silent Night

I'm in the Holy Land. I don't feel Holy. In fact, I don't feel much of anything. Perhaps this has something to do with the confusion of my internal clock, or the fact that I could just as easily be in Texas, or Boston, or Amsterdam and the city would look and feel very similar to Jerusalem. I suppose that I'm confirming here what I've long suspected...I'm not sentimental.

I don't cry at life insurance commercials. I don't remember "the good old days" with fond caressing love. I don't seek out old friends or old boyfriends or old memories or anything of that ilk to relive some past that no longer moves me. So perhaps this is why, when I think of Christ moving through these streets, or when I think of the many years of tearing down and building up and conflicts and haggling and peace, it feels just like any other day of my life.

But the things that do move me - being able to put my boyfriend in context. Knowing that, given his background (seeing it, living it) that he is being a really great guy in his way, trying to understand me better and making a super A-1 effort to fit this idea of love. I think back to the years of refined gentility that I lived with another guy and realize that much of it was all taught to him from an early age just by his surroundings, and also by his family. It meant that he knew early on how to be delicate with women, how to make life poetic, what to say and what to do. He made love and appreciation very obvious. But it never forced me to look beyond what I saw, and perhaps I can make that connection now.

This city is full of hidden places and multiple meanings. Perhaps my boyfriend is rough around the edges but there's a lot more too him than just the stony exterior. And that helps a lot, the perspective.

So we'll see. Right now, I miss my bed and my son.

Southern European Goodness

Oh. And might I just say...I LOVE Italian men. There is a group of them staying in the same hotel this past week. They know how to make a woman feel damn sexy just by looking her up and down. All in all, that might mean that they're chauvinist pigs, but god damn it - I haven't felt this smashingly attractive in a long time.

Uncoiling

This past week in India, I have slowly (ever so slowly) been uncoiling from the tightly wound mess of self that I had been these past weeks before leaving. Moving house. Moving house and in with my boyfriend. Finishing a wedding dress. The wedding dress, finished, was not finished because it was not perfect. Wedding dress was praised by client. Still a failure in my mind. Trying to transfer recorded interviews onto computer. Failing. Wanting to be beautiful, smart, funny, thin, special. Failing. Failing, failing, failing. And with every failure I got another tight coil in my spring.

But now I'm here in the land of heat and spice and feeling quite relaxed. So much of those twisting turns that have pierced their way into my body are eeking out of me now. In part this is because my work is under control and I feel like I'm making progress on something worthwhile. Plus, it pays. I mean, literally - it pays me money. Overall postive.

But the other big part of this equation is that I finally asked myself, "For whom?" For whom do I need to make this wedding dress perfect? If my client likes it and accepts it, then why am I making myself crazy? For whom do I need to be the smartest? Do I want to not only join, but also run, MENSA? Or perhaps memorize Pi to the billionth digit? Not really. No. There isn't anyone or anything that I actually care about that NEEDS me to be the smartest.

So I ask myself that now, for everything. For whom do I need to deliver this roadmap? Our customers, my boss, my livelihood. Well, all right then. Go ahead with the stress.

For whom do I need to be the prettiest? No one. The funniest? No one. I am enough of each of these things for myself that they come together to make me better than I would be if I didn't take care of myself, didn't get out, didn't try to love and be loved.

For whom do I need to be a good and loving mommy? Sir Nedlypants. No question whether I'm holding on to that one.

For whom do I need to be in shape? Myself. I need to feel good and healthy and eat well.

The Bhagavad Gita - I think this book sums it up. If you have a choice between doing something that you might not be great at, and doing nothing, go with the first option. Better to work hard and suck than not work at all.

So now I am just left with a mission to re-evaluate that which is important to me. What are the qualities in myself that I love? What are the qualities I used to have and don't anymore, but that I want back? What are the qualities that I dislike and want to get rid of? What is my spiritual goal in life? What is my material goal?

I don't have answers to any of those questions right now, except that for the next short term interval, I am going to try to be a better mom, a better girlfriend, and try to accept those I love for who they are with the knowledge that they do the same for me.