August, die she must.

Sometimes I really fight the part of me that wants to be a Redhead, the part that wants to have allergies and autoimmune issues, the part that likes to whine and wipe its nose on its sleeves, the part that longs to have blistering sunburns  and hay fever and grow buck teeth and be home-schooled and perpetually burst into tears.  (Because this is what Redheads do, you know.  Witches have red hair, you know.)  There is another part of me, Mousy Brown, that I want to be in charge.  Mouse is sensible and quiet -- but the thing about Mouse is that mice do not want to be in charge of anything.


Some people characterize Redheads as exciting, fiery.  They aren't.  They're just itchy from the allergies; it makes them moody.  On Wednesday morning I awoke with a mosquito bite on the left side of my forehead and another in the middle of my palm.  Both have become swollen red welts.  Allergies.  At lunch the other day T told me that I looked the same except my hair was less red.  I took this as a high compliment and surreptitiously scratched my forehead.




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It was never so simple as I told myself it was.  Love does not just dissipate, not even when it has every reason to, not even when time has passed graciously and ground down everything sharp, not even when forgiveness is light.  Old love no longer pulls you down and smothers you, but it doesn't just dissolve either.


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Why don't you like me without making me try?

You look the same but everything else is different.  The air between us is changed.  There are things I have let go of, and in letting go of them they have also let go of me.  I cannot inhale what I am looking for.  I consider telling you that calling yourself a narcissist in a self-deprecating tone, small laugh, does not make narcissism any more palatable, but that feels like unnecessary roughness (and maybe I am talking to myself anyway).  I would also like to tell you that I missed you for years and years but I cannot remember what that felt like which renders this irrelevant.  I lean toward you and pretend that I still love you, I lean away and pretend I do not know you, and the transition between the two is seamless.


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The funeral was enormous.  And there were a lot of other non-Muslims so I wasn't the only one in the crowd who did not understand all the readings or know exactly what was going on.  RH's little girl spoke in English.  She said that Daddy had tea parties with her and that he sometimes snuck her candies when Mummy said no.  And that she missed him so much.  She is only four.



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say shut up and quit your crying, give it time and you'll be fine

It is tempting when I am on vacation to drink more or less incessantly.  But I don't, mostly because I want to.  So I wait for the weekends just like I do when I am working.  The other day J told me in utter horror that one of her friend's parents drank beers on a Wednesday.  This is the same child who watched her mother stuff a crack pipe and knew how to make a filter out of steel wool.  How things change.  (I think what I mean is that I am glad that today is Friday.)

During summer vacation it is also tempting for me to sit in the sun incessantly wearing nearly nothing, and I understand how stupid teenage girls became addicted to tanning beds in the 80s.  It isn't that I am interested in developing a tan, but it just feels so good.  How can something so bad for you feel so right?


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I have to go to a funeral this afternoon.  I have never been to a Muslim funeral before.  I know I need to bring something to cover my hair, and I know it's Ramadan so there will be no food.  I like this part because it means it will seem less rude when I ditch at the end and do not hang around eating finger sandwiches and making small talk.


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fixing a hole where the rain gets in

When Shawn said he was going to help me tile the dosseret,  I was a little concerned.  He doesn't have a lot of patience for imperfection -- and tiling, especially when working with marble and slate as opposed to ceramic, is rife with imperfections.  That's part of the art.  You make things look right by making everything slightly wrong in the right way.

But he was helpful, and didn't complain (much).  I drew lines on the tiles so he wouldn't have to measure.  He liked the tile saw.  For some reason, contractor math makes sense to me where the rest of it is meaningless.  I can measure things and predict angles without exactly knowing how.

We did the smaller section yesterday and the larger one today.  Now it all needs 48 hours to dry before I can start grouting.  I'll do that by myself.

I had not planned to do this work this week, especially in light of the fact that I am meant to be doing technical writing for GDJ, but I think I have a compulsion for tiling.  It's like building a puzzle.

I still did the technical writing, not as much as I could have if I'd not spent the first four hours of the day tiling, but enough to look as though I had put in a full day.  And this is the genius of working from home.  I wish I could teach from home.

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T has been asking if I would be willing to see him.  T is an ex-boyfriend whose wife recently ran off with a man from Costa Rica.  I am trying to decide if this is a good idea, not because I doubt my own ability to handle it but because I am unsure why he wants to do this and I find the timing suspect.  Sometimes break ups make people think things that aren't so.

Though I am so often lost in nostalgia, where it comes to T I find myself rather unsentimental.  This is not a reflection on how I felt about him, because I loved him very much.  But somehow I stopped.  I do not always accomplish that so successfully when relationships end.



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